Will The Real Heretics Please

Stand Up

AUTHOR:

PUBLISHER:

David W. Bercot

Scroll Publishing Co., Tyler, Texas

A POLEMIC:

By Rev. Earl Cripe

PREFACE
In 1965 I was ordained to the Christian Ministry by the Elders of the Table
Mountain Chapel. In that year I began a television series on Channel 19 in
Modesto, California, titled God's Point of View. The purpose of that title was
not to call attention to myself or to be irreverent, but rather to call men back
to the Bible, from which they were rapidly departing in the existential,
situation-ethics religion of Neo-Evangelicalism, Evangelism Explosion,
Positive Thinking and Charismatic Humanism, all of which are experiential in
nature. In the last fifty years, we have seen the end result of Enlightenment
Theology. Men of the modern Church, even that which is called fundamental,
are determining doctrine and practical expression by situations and trends
of the times instead of the inerrant Word of God, which is unchanging and
unchangeable. It was my purpose (as well as the purpose of the Elders who
guided me) to do my part to bring men back to the Bible as the common
denominator in the Christian Church.
Also in 1965 I began a radio ministry called the Table Mountain Chapel
Hour. Both of these endeavors are expository teaching series where the
whole Bible, in sequence, is taught by way of the public media. In 1972 I
dropped the television sessions, but I have continued with the radio work in
both of these forums. In addition to that, I have been invited on a dozen
occasions to be a guest speaker on the well known radio program
Conference Echoes which reaches into virtually every country in the world.
Both of my own radio series have been broadcast (intermittently at times) in
Africa, the British Isles, the Islands of the Pacific and on occasions in
Australia, New Zealand and Central and Northern Europe.
These things not only qualify me, but constrain me to offer insights into
new, controversial or troubling doctrines that surface from time to time,
particularly if their first appearance is good and attracts many faithful
people to them. That alone is not to say that they are bad. But the prophets
of the Church are to try the doctrines to see if they are of God.
I had originally thought to do a rather simple book review on Bercot, but it
soon become evident that such an abbreviated opinion was not advisable
perhaps not even possible in this instance. Bercot, while not writing in depth
or with the involved insights of a scholar, has nonetheless raised most of the
issues confronting orthodox Christianity. To give an adequate response

requires an adequate discussion of those issues. This, of course, need not be

exhaustive, but it does need to be thorough.
I have had inquiries concerning the book in question and the doctrine of
its author. I have been specifically asked or encouraged to make a book
review for several parties who are confused and/or concerned about the
book or interested in what I think. This is not new to me. In the past I have
made book reviews on some of the dogmatic works of Karl Barth, Life in the
Son by Shank, Law and Gospel, Contrast or Continuum by Fuller, the later
books of Francis Schaeffer, and T.V. series The Power of Myth by Joseph
Campbell as forwarded and endorsed by Bill Moyers (which is not complete
as yet). I have recently completed a book-length paper on the Westcott and
Hort Greek Text, in specific, and lower criticism, in general. I am in the
process of doing reviews on Birthright by Needham and Classic Christianity
by George. In some of these cases, as with Barth, Berkeour, Schaeffer and
Lewis, these are little more than thumbnail sketches. An exhaustive review
would be formidable and maybe in some cases beyond the scope of my
abilities. The task at hand is neither formidable nor beyond my
understanding, but it does take a bit of time and space.

INTRODUCTION
My purpose in writing this polemic is to perform a service to God's people
and nothing more than that. Perhaps you do not know what a polemic is; it is
a critical response to an idea or a system of ideas that is contrary to those of
the one offering the polemic. It is designed to defend one system of beliefs
by means of discrediting a person or a theology which has those beliefs
under attack. I do not personally know David Bercot. There is no personality
consideration here. My efforts relate solely to his book and the things that
he has alleged in it.
If Bercot's efforts are out of an honest heart, he will not object to this
enthusiastic and penetrating criticism of his views which really amount to a
polemic of his own against historic Christian Orthodoxy (which Bercot claims
to be a part of but is not). What is fair for him, is fair for others. If he objects,
he is characterizing himself. One of the things that all of those who practice
maledicent have in common is the readiness to raise a bitter complaint
when elders and Church leaders are critical of their views. This is supposed
to be unloving, uncharitable, factious, divisive and self-righteous. But this is
only a ploy to try to insulate themselves from exposure and to prejudice the
minds of readers against those exposures. Every one of them is himself
engaged fully in condemning and criticizing those who do not agree with
him. For the most part they take on the legendary leaders of the Church
because these are invariably the ones who are standing in the way of those
who spread false doctrines. But the Bible is as clear on this subject as on any

other. The leaders of the Church must try the spirits and the doctrines to see
if they are of God and to stop the mouths of those who go from house to
house subverting the minds of the simple, the unlearned, the unskillful, the
defenseless and the unsuspecting. We are to mark those who cause
divisions and offenses contrary to the doctrine and avoid them. We are to
rebuke, sharply, those who are not sound in doctrine. Christ, who is the head
of the Church, gave some to be apostles, prophets, preachers, teachers,
evangelists, and so on, so that we might grow up in the faith, sound in
doctrine, not tossed and driven by every theological whim and not giving
heed to seducing spirits that would drag men away from the path of truth
and light. There are certain men who have crept into the Church, unawares,
ordained of old to the very condemnation of discrediting the grace of God,
bringing back the circumcision (the law covenant condition of salvation by
the dead works of fallen man rather than by the finished work of Christ), and
who would trouble the brotherhood. These are those who would deceive, if it
were possible, the very elect. They have transformed themselves into angels
of light and, like Satan, their master, they quote the Word of God. But it is an
edited version that is rearranged to suit themselves and their false
teachings. For this cause, the flock of God is commanded to listen to their
leaders, who have the rule over them, who have their good at heart, and
who must give an account to God. These men have that gift of the Holy
Ghost which is the discernment of false spirits (or the good spirits, as the
case may be) and who can expose the claws and the fangs. If the Elders of
the Church undertake such an evaluation, there is always a danger of being
wrong, and that is a serious thing. But not to do so is to guarantee oneself
that he will be wrong, and that is worse.
Admittedly I have no role of leadership among the Anabaptist people.
Because of this, one might question why I have an interest in their wellbeing. It is a fair question and I will try to explain that.
Eight generations ago, Jacob Greib my ever-so-great grandfather on my
dad's side, came over from Ammonberg, Germany, in the 18th century. It is
commonly believed that he was a preacher in the Brethren movement,
though the details are a bit vague. His son, John Gripe, (his name was
changed from Greib to Gripe by the British and was still later changed to
Cripe) was a German Baptist minister of two churches in Pennsylvania. His
son, John Edward, was a deacon, but Joseph Cripe, his grandson, (18121892) was an active preacher and evangelist in Indiana and Illinois and is
still listed in histories as one of several principal founders of the Church in
the region. He was a circuit-riding preacher, who pastored two churches. One
was in Indiana and the other was in Oceola, Missouri. His son, Daniel, was
also a preacher-on-horseback who served two churches. His son, Joseph
Cripe, evangelized the whole state of Indiana, much of it Indian territory. He
worked among Indians, settlers and traders. They were so far out in the

frontier that when his wife died (after his own death), she was not given a
Christian burial for two years because it was that long before another
Christian minister come to the area. Joseph's daughter, Elizabeth Cripe
married Jacob Cripe. Their son, John Edward Cripe, married Charlotte
Umbaugh, whose father, Emannuel Umbaugh, was a German Baptist
preacher. My step-grandfather, Owen C. Cripe, was a preacher and an elder
in both the German Baptist and the Old Brethren churches. For many years
he edited an inner-church publication called The Testimony of Truth, which I
am sure many of you remember.
My mother's side of the family descended from the Moravian Brethren
and the Hutterites. My ancestor of six generations ago, Peter Brillhardt, was
a preacher with the Brethren. My grandfather's great grandfather, Peter
Wolf, was a Brethren preacher, as was his grandson, John Wolf. My mother's
grandfather on her mother's side, John Fitz of Virginia, was a German Baptist
minister. My grandfather, John F. Wolf, was an elder and a preacher in both
the German Baptist and the Old Brethren churches. I am not implying that
my heritage is as notable in that regard as some of the great family names
like the Millers, Rumbles, Yosts, Gishes, Floras, Garbors, Laymans,
Overholtzers, Grovers, Wagners, Blickenstaffs, Kinzies, Covers, Heinrichs,
Skiles, Boyds and the like, which we usually associate with spiritual
leadership (no attempt is made to be exhaustive but no one is intentionally
left out). But I am saying that I have a genealogical as well as traditional
interest in the Brethren movement and a jealousy concerning their
reputation and well-being. That interest may not be welcomed or
appreciated, but I have it all the same.
A review does not necessarily mean a condemnation, although it may, of
course. And then it is possible to chide in certain areas and commend in
others. As always, we must approach these efforts with some fear and
trepidation but with courage and determination. The well-being of the family
of God depends upon the ability of its leaders to be able to tell the wolvesin-masquerade from the sheep and to have the courage to fend them off.
People wishing to benefit from such reviews should employ the biblically
recommended practice of the Bereans. They should read these words with
openness and interest. Then, after having done so, they should compare the
things that Bercot has said in his book and the things which we have said in
this review, with the teachings of the Bible and the historical facts. (A study
of historical facts and writings will show the way in which Bercot has handled
or mishandled, as the case may be early Church history and the
teachings of the Ante-Nicene Fathers. It will not, however, tell us anything
about divine truth. That must come from the Bible, and only from the Bible.
In spite of Bercots lengthy and cunning effort to mislead the modern Church
on this point, the position of Historic Orthodox Christianity is, and has
always been Sola Scriptura. The Bible is the guide and the only guide to

the faith and practice of the Church. The practice of the Eastern mystics and
the Roman Catholic Church to place traditional practice, Church teaching
and the teachings of non-biblical writings in the mix as to the Churchs
beliefs and practices is a long acknowledged, well defined and wholly
condemned heresy by Orthodox Christianity. On this point there can be
absolutely no question, doubt or accommodation. More about this later.)
The burden of proof and of truth always rests, in the final analysis, with the
individual. The mind that is closed to such a debate, when it has come into
your cote, is in much more danger of being misled than the one that is open
to it with caution but resolve.
I do not mean by this that Christians should be open to every idea that
comes along. This is certainly not the case. But within the framework of
those things which propose to identify orthodox and historic doctrines of the
Church to make quotations from the ancients, and particularly in a
situation where those quotations and conclusions differ widely as to what
they say and mean and what the foundations of our faith really are there
is not only a permission but a mandate to look carefully, with as few
preconceptions as possible, at both sides of the dialogue for the purpose of
making an accurate and informed decision.
If this review is of help to you, I am glad. If not, you will at least have
gotten a point of view to consider. This kind of divergence is biblically
acknowledged. For there must be also heresies among you, said St. Paul to
the philosopher-plagued Christians in the Greek Church of Corinth, that
they which are approved may be made manifest among you (I Cor. 11:19).
********************

WILL THE REAL HERETICS PLEASE STAND UP

hapter

ne

A Review
This title was apparently taken from the punch line of a television quiz
program from the 50s called To Tell The Truth. The moderator (or whatever
his proper title) was Bud Collier. It has been long ago and I do not remember
the names of the panelists. Each week there were three mystery guests who
would all pretend to be a certain person, engaged in a certain vocation
about which he or she was questioned by the panel, but only one of them
was genuine. The other two were pretenders. At the conclusion of the
questioning, each of the panelists would guess which of the three persons
was the real one that they were each claiming to be. After the guesses were
made, the moderator would say, Will the real (John Doe) please stand up,
and he would rise to his feet. As I read this book, I thought that this was
maybe a strange source from which to draw a title for a book that proposes
to examine the sincerity and genuineness of the ancient Church, in contrast
to the theatrical church of today. But on the other hand it is about on a par
with the kinds of catchy, trendy, borrowed-from-the-world tactics of the
modern religious scene. This could be a petty and insignificant thing, or it
could set the intellectual, moral and spiritual tone for this book as you, the
panelist, tries to decide who the real culprit is in this production.
I know very little about David Bercot other than that he is a title attorney
and professes to have been raised as a Jehovah's Witness. At some point he

left that group, he says, and by his own declaration, joined forces with a
fundamental, evangelical organization. It is disappointing to me that he does
not identify that denomination, town, church or pastor. I have heard stories
of those who went to Tyler, Texas, in the hope of meeting Mr. Bercot, and his
congregation where he fellowships and getting more acquainted with his
pastor and his doctrine. The people involved felt that they were treated very
coldly; they never got to meet Bercot and they left having found out
nothing. If true, this is obviously a concern (we must allow that it may not be
true, though the report that I had seemed genuine enough).
After having read his book rather carefully for the fourth time, I would like
(according to the scriptures, I believe) to talk to that pastor about this man
and his past association with evangelicalism. This is not because of a
personal interest in Bercot, but because of the things that he says. He tells
of having studied evangelical doctrines and having become involved in
teaching them to others. In spite of a description that appears to identify a
rather active spiritual involvement, he says that he was waiting for
something to happen in his life that never happened. He says that he talked
to others and they were waiting for something to happen that never
happened either. Righteousness in their lives was supposed to come to them
automatically, magically and with no effort on their own part. Still he talks of
agonizing and earnest prayer. It is unfortunate in my view that Bercot
considers studying the Bible, witnessing, teaching, agonizing, earnest prayer
and being genuinely concerned about the lives and spiritual well-being of
others to be absolutely nothing. It would seem that this was not the
persuasion of the Apostles when they told the people to choose out deacons
to administer to the needs of the widows and the other needy. It was not a
good thing that they should take the time to wait on tables, but they should
rather spend their time in prayer and the study of the Word of God. They did
not consider prayer, study of the Word of God, and exhorting and
communing among themselves to be a situation where nothing was
happening in terms of the works of righteousness. Everyone has his own
view of what good works are, I guess, but is he permitted to denounce as
nothing that which the Bible holds to be of the highest virtue and utmost
value prayer and the study of the Word of God? Maybe Bercot was on the
right track and he didn't know it. Maybe someone who did not have his wellbeing at heart got his ear and convinced him otherwise. Well, we do not
know the exact situation so we cannot be more definitive. But what we do
know is that there is no way in which we can understand why zeal, joy,
enthusiasm, prayer, study of the Word of God and witnessing to others can
be looked at as nothing happening. Maybe a more pertinent question is,
What was Bercot expecting to happen? Or perhaps an even more
penetrating question is, Did this whole situation ever take place, or is
Bercot constructing the first of an army of straw men?

Apart from that issue, there is something that troubles me about Bercot's
claimed experience with mainline, fundamental evangelicalism. I was raised,
until I was twenty-eight years old, in the Brethren Church and doctrine. Until
I was thirteen, it was the doctrine of the Old Brethren at Salida, California,
where both my mother's father, John Wolf, and my father's step-father, O. C.
Cripe, were preachers. From fourteen until twenty-eight, I was brought up in
the Grace Brethren environment. This group divided from the Ashland
Brethren, which in turn had divided from the Church of the Brethren. The
Grace Brethren are Semi-Calvinistic Brethren. They believe in salvation by
grace, in election, in sovereignty, in predestination and in security, but they
also believe in the free will of man (whosoever will may come), that Christ
died for everyone, true repentance must be followed by at least some act of
obedience and that baptism is the first act of obedience. They are
evangelical, oriented toward missions and dispensational. Since that time I
have pastored in a community Bible Church; I have been a guest speaker
and lecturer in numerous churches, conferences and forums; have been in
Christian Churches of all kinds; and have sat and talked by the hours with
everyone from Roman, Greek, Eastern and Russian Catholics, Lutherans and
Presbyterians to Church of Christ members, Pentecostals and Evangelical
Frees. I am now fifty-seven years old. I have an excellent memory for past
things and discussions and can remember well, sometimes in detail, things I
heard as a child. I remember conversations going back half a century. In all
that time and in all those places I never one time heard anyone say that all
you had to do was just sit and wait and pray and God would magically put
obedience in your life. Everyone that I have ever known or talked to has
always believed, in one doctrinal form or another, that there will only be
good works in the life of the person who makes the effort and does those
good works. Many people that I know believe that you cannot do those good
works until you are born again and have the new nature, a thing that comes
about as a result of repentance and conversion (which you must choose as
an act of your will). But everyone that I know believes that the individual
himself must do those works or they will not get done.
I am not aware of a Christian group that teaches that you just sit and wait
and hope and pray until God magically does these good works in you, apart
from your decision, commitment and effort. I am not a supporter of Luther
or Calvin, neither one of which was in the main stream of orthodox
Christianity doctrinally. But both of them believed it was imperative on the
Christian to do good works and live a holy life. Few leaders in the history of
the Church have believed as fully in the need for good works in the life of
the Christian or were as demanding about it as Calvin. Their teachings on
the subject had to do with the source of those good works and their nature
and quality in the overall biblical theology of good works. Were they of the
first or second Adam? Were they of the Spirit or the flesh? Were they an
effort to earn favor with God or the result of having been given favor with

God as a gift of grace? But they never questioned the imperative of good
works or man's participation in them in terms of decision and action.
Certainly St. Augustine believed in the free will and the need for good works.
Contrary to the uninformed beliefs of many, St. Augustine believed that you
could loose your salvation if you did not do good works. In this I do not
agree with St. Augustine, but I cite it to show that even the man who was
accused of leading the movement (that good works had no place in the
doctrine of salvation), did not in fact believe that. (This we shall show in
another chapter from Augustine's own words, books and teachings.) Even
the Antinomians, who believed that every reference to law and
commandments was a contaminant to grace (these were considered to be
heretic by St. Paul, St. Augustine and the Orthodox Church) believed that
God's children had the responsibility to do good works and to initiate them
through human responsibility. How these good works were defined,
identified and carried out, was where they went wrong, but they believed in
the need for them just the same.
It is entirely possible for someone to piecemeal the teachings and writings
of any man to make them say just about anything. This is done all the time.
Satan misrepresented the words of God Himself to make it appear that God
wanted His Son to throw Himself off the temple. But this treachery,
motivated by a hidden agenda, was not true. Neither God nor the Scriptures
had said what Satan quoted them as having said. I have never heard the
things alleged or taught that Bercot accuses evangelicals of in his book. I do
not believe that any evangelical group does believe or teach like that. I defy
any man to bring me any teaching or writing of any Christian leader (not
someone unknown who claims to be a Christian, but someone whose
position in the Church can be documented) who has legitimately and in
context said: God does not expect his children to do anything in their
Christian lives in terms of making an effort. All He wants them to do is just
sit and pray and hope and wait expectantly. God will miraculously establish
obedience in their lives through vicarious obedience. Even Luther, in his
misguided and unorthodox doctrine of vicarious obedience, did not exactly
believe and teach that. I have never, in all of my years, heard or seen such
a thing. Of course, it is possible that someone, somewhere believes that, but
the point is that this is not, nor has it ever been, the teaching of the
conservative, fundamental, evangelical orthodox Christian Church. By
orthodox, we do not mean what Bercot means by orthodox (we will get to
that in a little while, too) but what we and the rest of fundamental
Christianity mean by orthodox. And by evangelical we do not mean
Evangelical Conservative Theology founded by Arminius at the time of the
Enlightenment. That is a wholly different subject and theological issue. We
will take that up, too.
But there is something that I have heard many times. In fact, I just
heard it again this week. I do not doubt that I have heard it hundreds of

10

times in my life, though I have not kept count. I have heard Mormons,
Jehovah's Witnesses and members of other non-Christian religious groups
telling me that evangelical Christianity does not believe in free will or human
responsibility or doing the works of God. Of course that is not true. What is
true is that we Christians do not at all agree on what the will of God is, or
how it is done.
There is an interesting thing in that regard that occurs in talking to
Jehovah's Witnesses, in particular, and religious humanists, in general. They
claim to believe in Jesus Christ and salvation by grace and faith. But in their
discussions of their doctrines and in their writings while they will throw in
quotations from others and casual references now and then to give a false
impression to keep your ear they never mention Christ the incarnate God,
the new birth, the indwelling Holy Ghost or the new creation of the Second
Adam. This is because they do not believe that in Adam all die and in Christ
all are made alive (I Cor. 15:21,22). They do not believe that all sinned in
Adam, and so death passed upon all men because all have sinned the
aeorist tense: all did sin, at some time in the past in Adam (Rom. 5:1214). They do not believe that there is . . .none that doeth good, no not
one. . . (Rom. 3:10-12). They do not believe that . . . by the deeds of the
law shall not flesh be justified. . . (Rom. 3:20). They do not believe that . .
. to him that worketh, the reward is not reckoned of grace but of debt, but to
him that worketh not but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly, his
faith is counted to him for righteousness (Rom. 4:4,5). They do not believe
that . . . He saved us and called us with an holy calling, not according to our
works, but according to his own purpose and grace which was given in Christ
Jesus before the world began (II Tim. 1:9,10). They do not believe that Jesus
Christ, . . .by Himself, purged our sins. . . (Heb. 1:3) They do not believe
the Father when He said to the Son, thou art the God (Ho Theos), thy
throne is forever (Heb. 1:8). They do not believe in the Holy Trinity, the
Father, Son and Holy Ghost, and that each of these is fully God and fully
equal to the other. Sometimes when they speak of doing the will of God,
they speak of grace and of faith, but they do not mean what you and I mean
by that. They have an Old Testament, religiously humanistic doctrine of
salvation by the good works of basically good man with enough help thrown
in by God to push us over the hill. They omit the Cross (except as an
example of suffering for the will of God), the person and the work of Christ
and the Holy Ghost from their explanations. Go back and read carefully the
book or listen carefully to the tape, and see if you can recognize this very
thing.
How does this relate to Bercot and his book, or does it? That is what we
are going to attempt to discover.

11

****

***************************

hapter

wo

WHAT BERCOT BELIEVES

Jesus was once talking to a noble, honorable, moral, devotedly religious
leader in Jerusalem. The man wanted to engage Jesus in a religious
discussion. In fact, he was very avid and forward about it. But Jesus stopped
him at the end of his opening statement. He told him that there was no
point in such a discussion between them. While Jesus would be talking about
the works of faith, grace and the Kingdom of God, this religious man would
think that Jesus was verifying his own errant and misguided notions that he
had it within himself to obey God and do His will by merit of his own moral
and religious character. Jesus told Nicodemus that until he was born again,
by the Holy Ghost, into that new realm and with a new nature, he could not
grasp anything about the Kingdom of God. There can be no meaningful
discussion about good works unless you are talking to a man who has
repented and been born again.

12

In discussing Bercot's book, the same principal applies. Bercot has raised
many questions about righteous living and the commandments of God.
There are legitimate discussions that could take place between Christian
people about these issues, but they are not the issue here. Until we
determine where we are with respect to truth, salvation, redemption, the
new nature, the Holy Ghost, the Bible and the legitimate doctrines of the
orthodox Church, there is no more point in discussing these issues with
Bercot than there was with Jesus discussing them with Nicodemus. And so in
the review of this book, I will focus on several things which to me are the
only real issues raised here. Bercot's concept of what early Christianity was
and who its leaders were; his doctrine of salvation; his understanding of
good works; his understanding of tri-partite man (Body, Soul and Spirit) and
the threefold salvation that Christ has provided (Justification, Sanctification
and Glorification); his doctrine concerning the Bible; his view of what the
early Church taught; his doctrine of the oral traditions of the early Church
and their place of importance in orthodox doctrine verses the written
instructions of the Bible; Bercot's appeal to the witness of the Alexandrian
theologians; his defense of the doctrines of Pelagius; his condemnation of
the doctrines of Augustine and the consistency of Bercot's views both with
respect to his theology and his willingness and/or ability to take his own
counsel. In these last two, Bercot himself has said that if a man talks a lot
but does not do according to his claims, he does not deserve to be taken
seriously. We shall consider that criterion in making our evaluation and
arriving at a conclusion.
While we will feel the need and the liberty of making commentary remarks
from time to time, the purpose of this chapter shall be to identify the views
of Bercot. In the next chapter, we will evaluate and offer a polemic, at least
in part.
Who Were The Early Christians?
Bercot starts out at least by stating that the Early Christians are those
. . .Christians who lived between 90 and 199 A.D. This is a bit confusing, for
he immediately proceeds to list men, included among whom are . . .
Irenaeus who lived past 200 A.D..., Clement of Alexandria who lived to
about 220 A.D., Origen who lived to 254 A.D., Tertullian who lived to 240
A.D. by most accounts (some say 220 A.D.), Cyprian who live until 258 A.D.
and Lactantius who lived well into the 4th century.
By the term early Christians, I am primarily referring to the
Christians who lived between 90 and 199 A.D. The Apostle John was
still living at the beginning of this period. The first generation of early
Christians were men like Polycarp who had been personally taught by
one or more of the apostles. The period ended with a man who was
only one human link removed from JohnIrenaeus, a pupil of Polycarp.

13

By the term early Christianity, I am referring to beliefs and practices

of the world-wide community of early Christians who maintained
bonds of fellowship and communion with each other. I'm not referring
to the beliefs or practices of anyone labeled as a heretic by that
church. So I'm not describing the entire field of wheat and weeds
mixed together, but only the wheat. (Matt. 13:24-30) Although this
book primarily focuses on the Christians who lived between 90 and
199, the common beliefs and practices of these early Christians were
generally maintained by Christians living in the next century. Most of
the major changes in Christian beliefs did not occur until after 313,
when Constantine legalized Christianity. For that reason, the
discussion that follows will also include quotations from writers who
lived between 200 and 313, as long as their teachings agree with
those who lived in the period immediately after the apostles. 1
Were These The Church Fathers?
Bercot denies passionately that these were the early fathers, Apostolic
Fathers, Ante-Nicene Fathers, or fathers in any sense.
When I start talking about the early Christian writers, people usually
respond by saying, Oh, you mean the early church fathers. But these
men were not church fathers! Most of them were fairly ordinary, hardworking Christian elders with above-average education. They would
have been highly indignant at being called church fathers. The only
church fathers they recognized were the apostles. Actually, the very
fact that these writers were not church fathers is what makes their
writings so valuable. 2
Their Works Were More Valuable Because They Were Not Fathers.
An essential part of Bercot's argument hangs on the validity of his
statement that these were not fathers. If they were fathers, then his
argument is fallacious, their writings are not as valuable as he had thought
and the bases for his remarks are misguided.
Actually, the very fact that these writers were not church fathers is
what makes their writings so valuable. 3
The Leaders of the Early Church Were Not Theologians. 4
1

1 David C. Berecot, Will The Real Heretics Please Stand Up, (Tyler, Texas,
Scroll Publishing Co.,1989) p. 13
2 Ibid.
3 Ibid., p. 14.
4 Ibid.

14

It is quite important to Bercot that he convince his readers that the early
Christians were not theologians. Part of his strategy is to mark the plain,
informally educated worker-preachers in contrast to intellectuals and highly
trained churchmen.
Apologetics, Defenses Against Heresy and Letters of Instructions to
Churches Are Not Theological Writings. 5
Bercot sees that there are many skilled writings by many men on many
issues that were faced, were debated and even sometimes solved by the
early Church. Bercot, in opposition to the tradition of scholarship, chooses to
state flatly that these are not theological writings.
The Early Christian Leaders Were Fairly Ordinary, Hard Working
Elders With Above Average Education.6
Bercot established his position firmly that men like Justin, Irenaeus,
Clement of Alexandria, Origen and Ignatius were ordinary in their education
and intellect and that they were hard-working. Based on his position
concerning education and theology we take it that hard-working means
that they were farmer-preachers who did not hang around seminaries and
cathedrals all day long, as opposed to hard-working in the sense of study,
oratory and writing.
The Early Christians All Believed And Taught The Same Thing. 7
To Bercot, there simply wasn't any variations in the beliefs and the
teachings of the early Christians as to basic matters. They all had one
voice on issues of faith and practice.
No Men Cited Who Were Considered Heretics By The Early Church. 8
Bercot is quite certain that the men whose views he has used were
considered to be sound in doctrine by the early Church. There were a few
heretics around, he says, but he has avoided using any of their views in his
assessment of early Church history.
Eight Christian Writers.9
Bercot has eight men on whom he says he relies: Polycarp, Justin,
Irenaeus, Clement of Alexandria, Origen, Tertullian, Cyprian and Lactantius.
This is a bit confusing, since Bercot never mentions the doctrine of Tertullian
after this initial citation, and he does quote from Clement of Rome, though
he is not mentioned here. He does not mention Ignatius here, who was
5
6
7
8
9

Ibid.
Ibid.
Ibid.,I p. 15.
Ibid.

Ibid.

15

perhaps the best of the Alexandrians in the Ante-Nicene era, but does a bit
later. It is also strange that he would use Lactantius in the 4th century, along
with Cyprian and Tertullian, a Western Churchman, while ignoring John
Chrysostom altogether and Athanasius for the most part, the two greatest
churchmen in the history of Alexandria. We will want to look into this.
These Were People Of The Cross.10
While Bercot does not deal with the achievements of the cross of Christ in
any orthodox sense, still the cross as a symbol and example is very
important to his doctrine and theology.
Are Humans Capable of Obeying God?11
Bercot believes that all men did not fall in Adam and that natural born
man, apart from any help from God, is capable of obeying God. While he
confuses the issue with talk about needing God's help, Bercot does not
mean that man is a fallen sinner and cannot do anything good without God's
help. He means rather that there are some things that may be too hard for
us, and there may be more required than we may be able to do on our own.
His answer to the question is: yes, mankind, natural born and without God's
help, is capable of obeying God.
What Bercot Believes about Salvation.
We are not saved by faith alone. By this Bercot does not enter the classic
argument between the Arminians and the Calvinists. Faith to him means
something entirely different. There the argument is, is a man truly
repentant and has he really been converted if he does not do the works of
the Spirit? But Bercot does not mean that. In fact, it comes out early on
that he probably does not even believe in The Holy Ghost, the person and
the third Member of the Godhead in any sense that is acceptable to
Orthodox Christianity. Bercot is very clear about what he means. Faith is a
combination of man's works and God's help. It is all a matter of the original
creation finding its way back to God. Even the matter of man finding his way
back to God is not an orthodox thought with Bercot.
The early Christians universally believed that works or obedience
play an essential role in our salvation. This is probably quite a
shocking revelation to most evangelicals. But that there's no room for
doubt concerning, this matter. . .12 (emphases mine)

10

Ibid., p. 55 .
11 Ibid., p. 59.
12 Ibid., p. 64.

16

Are Faith and Works Mutually Exclusive?13

Here Bercot argues that salvation is a matter of faith and works, uniting to
accomplish man's salvation. Again this is not the orthodox argument or the
place of works in the salvation that Christ has provided. Bercot never
mentions the salvation that Christ has provided. In fact, Bercot does not
believe that Christ provided man with salvation. He is the savior only in the
sense of his example. Bercot is talking about a situation where man must
have confidence in God in order to make it along the road to working out his
own salvation.
Yes, But The Bible Says. . .14
Here Bercot wishes to say that the early Christian Oral Tradition is how the
real words and meanings of the Bible was preserved. If Origen said a certain
thing, or if Clement of Alexandria said a certain thing, then that is what the
Bible says, and not what Jerome, Athanasius and Augustine put together in
the canon. In other words, Bercot will not allow the Bible to condemn what
he says the early Christians believed. The point of this chiding title is: don't
tell me what the Bible says, listen to what I am telling you that the early
Christians said. They know, better than the King James, what the Bible really
said.
Can A Person Be Saved And Lost?15
Bercot believes that a person can be saved and lost. This is almost a
superfluous point since no one, in Bercot's formula, is saved until the end of
time. Again this is not the argument of Arminius who believed that once you
were born again and God had given you salvation, it was probationary and
must be maintained by good works. Bercot is talking about getting
sidetracked and never really getting here. But where we are going and how
we are getting there is aesopian language with Bercot, as we shall see.
Groups That Preached Salvation By Grace Alone. 16
Bercot claims not to believe that it was Christians at all who came up with
the doctrine of salvation by grace alone. It was, in fact, the Gnostics who
invented this doctrine. I say claims to believe, because it is hard to accept
that anyone could seriously believe that, or that Bercot is consistent or
convincing in his argument.
Predestination.17
13 Ibid., p. 68.
14 Ibid., p. 69.
15 Ibid.,p. 72.
16 Ibid.,p. 73.
17 Ibid., p. 75.

17

Bercot believes that God predestines no one, that neither the Bible, the
Apostles nor the early Church believed it and that it was a doctrine that,
while Augustine toyed with it in the 4th century, really came from Luther
and Calvin. Just how the Church, from the 3rd to the 15th centuries, was
corrupted by something that Luther came up with in the 16th century,
Bercot does not tell us.
The Free Will.18
The free will, to Bercot, means that man has not been totally corrupted by
the fall, that he is completely free in his natural state to do righteousness if
he wishes and is willing, that he needs no redeeming because he never fell
into sin and that this life is really a situation of maintaining that good and
acceptable state until life is over.
The Problem of Biblical Passages That Seem To Contradict His
Doctrine.
Bercot is not worried about biblical passages that contradict him. They can
all be easily explained away, not by exegesis but by simple little illustrations
that restate, reorient and reapply the message and which focus on one small
point while ignoring the rest of the import of the passage. To make the point,
Bercot quotes Origen:
One of the doctrines included in the teaching of the Church is that
there is a just judgment of God. This fact incites those who believe it
to live virtuously and to shun sin. They acknowledge that the things
worthy of praise and blame are within our own power. It is our
responsibility to live righteously. God asks this of us, not as though it
were dependent on Him, nor on any other, or upon fate (as some
think), but as being dependent on us. The prophet Micah
demonstrated this when he said, 'It has been announced to you, O
man, what is good. And what does the Lord require of you? To do
justice and to love mercy.' [Mic. 6:8]. Moses also said, 'I have set
before you the way of life, and the way of death. Choose what is good
and walk in it.' [Deut. 30:15] Notice how Paul also speaks to us with
the understanding that we have freedom of the will and that we
ourselves are the cause of our own ruin or our salvation. He says, 'Do
you show contempt for the riches of His goodness, patience, and longsuffering, not realizing that God's goodness leads you towards
repentance? But because of your stubbornness and your unrepentant
heart, you are treasuring up wrath against yourself for the day of
wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God. God will render
to each one according to his works. To those who by persistence in
18 Ibid., p. 76.

18

doing good seek glory and immortality, he will give eternal life. But for
those who are contentious and who reject the truth and follow evil,
there will be anger, wrath and tribulation.' [Rom. 2:4-8]. But certain
statements in the Old and New Testaments might lead to the opposite
conclusion: That it does not depend on us to keep the commandments
and be saved. Or to transgress them and to be lost. So let's examine
them one by one. The statements concerning Pharaoh have troubled
many. God declared several times, 'I will harden Pharaoh's heart.'
[Exod. 4:21] Of course, if Pharaoh was hardened by God and sinned as
a result of being hardened, he was not the cause of his own sin. So he
did not possess free will. Along with this passage, let's also look at the
passage in Paul: 'But who are you, O man, to talk back to God? Shall
the thing formed say to Him who formed it, 'Why have you made me
like this?' Does the potter not have power over the clayfrom the
same lump to make one vessel unto honor, and another unto
dishonor?' [Rom. 9:20,21]
Since we consider God to be both good and just, let's see how the
good and just God could harden the heart of Pharaoh. Perhaps by an
illustration used by the apostle in the Epistle to the Hebrews, we can
show that, by the same operation, God can show mercy to one man
while he hardens another, although not intending to harden. 'The
ground,' he says, 'drinks in the rain that falls upon it and produces
crops for the farmer, being blessed by God. But the ground that
produces thorns and briers is worthless, and is in danger of being
cursed. Its end is to be burned.' [Heb. 6:7,8]
It may seem strange for Him who produces rain to say, 'I produced
both the fruit and the thorns from the earth.' Yet, although strange, it
is true. If the rain had not fallen, there would have been neither fruit
nor thorns. The blessing of the rain, therefore, fell even on the
unproductive land. But since it was neglected and uncultivated, it
produced thorns and thistles. In the same way, the wonderful acts of
God are like the rain. The differing results are like the cultivated and
the neglected land. The acts of God are also like the sun, which could
soften wax and harden clay at the same time. 19
While we will look at this matter carefully in the next chapter, at which
time we will certainly not defend, justify or exonerate Origen, I want you to
read this quotation over again carefully and take note that Origen never
mentions the word, predestination. Thus Bercot hangs his argument of the
beliefs of the early Christians concerning predestination on a quotation to
which he gives his spin at the end, but which nevertheless studiously avoids
the word and only peripherally engages the subject. It appears that Origen
19 Ibid., pp. 80-2.

19

was concerned with the judgment, man's sense of duty and his
acknowledgment of God's goodness. Every sincere Christian who has ever
believed and taught predestination, at least the ones that we have heard or
read after, has always been concerned with the same issues.
Can God Foresee The Future?20
Bercot's complaint is not with God's foreknowledge. It is with
predestination and election. Yet in his effort not to offend Jehovah or to
appear to be criticizing Him, Bercot inadvertently robs Him of His
sovereignty also.
Although not believing in predestination, the early Christians
strongly believed in God's sovereignty and His ability to foresee the
future. For example, they understood God's prophecies about Jacob
and Esau to be a result of His foreseeing the future, not a result of His
arbitrarily predestining those men to a particular fate. But they saw a
significant distinction between foreseeing something and causing it.21
It thus appears that Bercot's God is a helpless observer, knowing what
man is going to do but having no power or authority to influence it or bring
it to pass. What kind of sovereignty would that be, we wonder?
Baptism.22
Bercot believes that sins are actually washed away by the water of
baptism. It is not an outward expression of an inner truth. It is the act itself
which regenerates and results in the New Birth.
Remission of sins. They believed that water baptism canceled all
past sins. For example, Justin Martyr wrote, There is no other [way to
obtain God's promises] than thisto become acquainted with Christ,
to be washed in the fountain spoken of by Isaiah for the remission of
sins, and for the remainder, to live sinless lives. They based their
views on baptism and remission of sin on the following Bible passages,
among others:
And now what are you waiting for? Get-up, be baptized and wash
your sins away, calling on his name.(Acts 22:16) 23 . . .
Nevertheless, not all of the Anabaptist doctrines were identical to
the early Christian beliefs. For example, their understanding of
baptism differed somewhat. I think this was once again an example of
20 Ibid., p. 82.
21 Ibid., pp. 82-3.
22 Ibid.,p. 85.
23 Ibid., p. 86.

20

Newton's First Law of Theology. The Catholic, Lutheran, and Reformed

churches all held to the early church belief that we are reborn through
baptism and that baptism is both an instrument and a sign of God's
grace. However, baptism in those churches had, for the most part,
degenerated into a meaningless ceremonial ritual administered to
every newborn infant. No personal faith and repentance was expected
on the part of the one who was baptized. So they had lost the early
Christian understanding that being born again through baptism was a
life-changing step. Overreacting to this abuse of baptism, the
Anabaptists went to the opposite extreme, at least verbally. They
taught that water baptism wasn't a sign and instrument of God's
grace, but rather a symbol of obedience to God. They said water
baptism merely symbolized that the believer was dying to his old life
and rising again to a new life in Christ. Although they verbally differed
from the early Christians, the Anabaptists actually did much to restore
baptism to the role it had played in early Christianity. 24
But though Bercot chides the Anabaptists for not believing that actual
saving grace is administered in the sacrament and though he claims to
believe that only the waters of the baptistery or the river washed away sins,
Bercot is still using the language in an aesopian manner, He has something
other than the conventional concepts of salvation in mind.
One thing that particularly impresses me about the early Christians
is that they never put God in a box. For example, they always believed
that God would do what was loving and just toward pagans who had
never had the opportunity to hear about Christ. Likewise, they
believed that although baptism was the normal channel of grace and
the means of rebirth, God was not necessarily bound by it. 25
In a rather startling reversal, Bercot argues that those who say that all
men must be saved are putting God in a box. God, in his goodness and
mercy, will take care of the heathen who never heard.
This is a position that has always been easy for the Brethren. Man is not
saved by the water, but by the Holy Ghost baptizing us into Christ. Therefore
if someone cannot be baptized, such as the thief on the cross, no
disobedience is involved. Of course, they never included the heathen in that,
as Bercot does, but then bear in mind that Bercot does not believe that man
is a sinner by nature or that he is lost, in the orthodox sense.
It would seem quite an impossible doctrine, for someone who believes
that sins are actually washed away in the water and that there is no other
24 Ibid., p. 163.
25 Ibid., pp. 88-9.

21

way of salvation than to undergo that washing. But Bercot gives a different
definition of salvation, than the one which we are used to.
The New Birth.
Here Bercot seems to state a reasonably orthodox belief in the New Birth.
Based on Jesus' words to Nicodemus, the early Christians also
believed water baptism was the channel through which a person was
born again. Irenaeus mentioned this in a discussion about baptism, As
we are lepers in sin, we are made clean from our old transgressions by
means of the sacred water and the invocation of the Lord. We are thus
spiritually regenerated as newborn infants, even as the Lord has
declared: 'Except a man be born again through water and the Spirit,
he shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven. (John 3:5) 26
But while this statement seems conventional, it is not, as we shall see.
Bercot has his own conception of New Birth. This comes out in his
discussion of Spiritual Illumination:
The early Christians believed that the newly baptized person, after
receiving the Holy Spirit [take particular note that Bercot does not use
the term The Holy Ghost on his own behalf, but attributes the term to
the early Christians], had a clearer vision of spiritual matters,
receiving illumination as a child of God and a citizen of His kingdom.
Clement of Alexandria discussed all three of these spiritual events
associated with baptism: This work is variously called grace, and
illumination, and perfection, and washing. Washing, by which we
cleanse away our sins. Grace, by which the penalties of our sins are
canceled. And illumination, by which that holy light of salvation is
beheld, that is, by which we see God clearly.27
The new birth, to Bercot, is a matter of receiving illumination that you are
a child of the kingdom. Baptism is a work. In the ordinance we are
administered saving grace, we are illuminated, we are perfected and we
are washed from our past sins. What Clement said about it might be
acceptable in the right context. We shall look at the context given by both
Clement of Alexandria and Bercot in the next chapter.
Altar Calls.28
26 Ibid., p. 87.
27 Ibid.
28 Ibid., p. 89.

22

Bercot believes that many evangelical Churches use altar calls as an easy
alternative to baptism. He does not say why he thinks they do that. The
implication is that it is easier, not as humiliating, and matters little since
they believe that the person involved has already been elected to salvation
by free grace without works and nothing is required of him in any case.
Again we skip over subjective discussions of particular matters such as
war, divorce, etc. If we can agree with Bercot on essential doctrine we can
discuss these matters with him, and it wouldn't be much of a discussion,
since most of the things he says need not be contested. But first we want to
be sure that we are talking about the works of the Spirit in the New Man in
Christ and not the deadness of the letter in the old man in Adam. There is
one issue that we will dwell on, however, not because of the issue but
because of a misstatement that he makes, and, at least in our view, it
becomes important in the end analysis of this book and its mission.
Capital Punishment.
Bercot states that the early Christians did not believe in capital
punishment. Of course, the Church has never believed in putting criminals to
death as an act of the Church's responsibility, but the early Church had
nothing to do with or to say about what the state did. To refuse to defend
oneself is not the same as taking an active stand against capital
punishment. But that is a bit beside the point. Bercot then states that this is
the position taken by the Anabaptists:
Like the early Christians, the Anabaptists also preached a message
of the cross. If the Head had to suffer such torture, anguish, misery,
and pain, how shall His servants, children, and members expect peace
and freedom as to their flesh? they asked. At the same time,
although they were cruelly hunted down, tortured and executed, they
refused to fight back or retaliate against their persecutors. One of the
most touching examples of their unselfish love for others is that of
Dirck Willems. Fleeing from the Catholic authorities who had come to
arrest him, Willems dashed across a frozen lake and made it safely to
the other side. Glancing back as he ran up the banks of the shore,
Willems noticed that the deputy pursuing him had fallen through the
ice and was about to drown. Although he could have now escaped with
ease, Willems turned back and pulled the drowning deputy to safety.
Unmoved by this unselfish act of love, the officer in charge ordered
the deputy to arrest Willems. As a result, Willems was arrested,
imprisoned, and eventually burned alive.
Again, like the early Christians, the Anabaptists refused to use the
sword on behalf of their country, either for protection or for executing
criminals. In obedience to Jesus' words, they refused to take oaths.

23

Rather than preaching a gospel of health and wealth, they stressed

simplicity of living. In fact, because of persecution, most of them lived
in dire poverty.29
Just as in the above quotation, the tendency of Bercot and others is to
confuse the issue of non-resistance with that of capital punishment. The
Brethren have always understood that God put the sword in society for the
good of the race. The Church is a peculiar people. They are pilgrims and
strangers in the earth. They are not called upon to bear the temporal sword
and to direct the affairs of the land as were the Israelites under the old
dispensation. But unlike the Quakers and other more politically involved
groups, the Brethren have never felt it their duty, their right or their desire
to try to interfere with the use of the temporal sword in society. Capital
punishment in our secular society is a wholly different issue than nonresistance in the Christian community. Roman 13 makes it very clear that
the sword is put there by God and that anyone who resists it is resisting God
and His ordinance and messengers. It is not, and never will be the work of
the Church, but it is the work of God in His role as King over all the earth.
While there have always been differences of opinion (certainly in the early
Baptist movement) and always will be, this has been the general position of
the Brethren from the start.
Who Better Understands The Apostles. 30
Bercot believes that the early Christians understood the Apostles better
than we do.
The Advantage of Time.31
We both read the same Bible; but the fact that they were closer to the
Apostles than we are gives them the edge.
The Cumulative Effect of Small Changes. 32
Like Fenton J. Hort, Bercot attributes the preservation of the Bible to man
and not to God. Since many small changes have been made from the early
times, we do not have the pure word that they did. It is Bercot's argument
therefore, that the historical record of the beliefs of the early Christians is
more reliable than the Bible to tell us what the Apostles believed.
The Advantages of Language and Culture. 33
29 Ibid., p. 162.
30 Ibid., p. 109.
31 Ibid., pp. 109-10.
32 Ibid., pp. 110-11.
33 Ibid., p. 111.

24

Bercot believes that knowing the Greek language and the culture in which
the Apostles lived gave the early Christians a better understanding than we
can ever have of what the Apostles believed. Therefore we must get our
pure beliefs from them, not from the Word of God.
Have you ever talked to an Apostle?34
Bercot believes that those who talked to the Apostles face to face have to
have a better understanding of their beliefs and of the truth of God than we
do. Bercot does not tell us, though we know it, that among the men that
Bercot cites, only Clement of Rome, Polycarp and Barnabas talked to the
Apostles. It should be noted that he cites those three very little, yet Justin,
Irenaeus, Ignatius, Clement of Alexandria and Origen never talked to them.
Oral Tradition.
Bercot believes that the oral tradition, carrying the teachings of the
Apostles by word of mouth, is more reliable than the Bible in assuring the
original beliefs. Therefore we should trust his version of the beliefs of the
early Christians more than the Bible itself when it comes to the original
truth.
The Primary Teaching Of The Apostles Was Oral
All of Jesus' teaching was oral. He didn't leave even a single word of
written instruction for the church. When the church was founded on
the day of Pentecost, the only Christian teaching it had was oral. In
fact, our New Testament wasn't completed until nearly the end of the
first century. So the first century church relied largely on the teachings
of the apostles because the apostles primarily taught orally. After all,
do you really think that Paul, the tireless evangelist and teacher, had
nothing more to share with the early church than the 13 or 14 brief
letters in our New Testament? Of course not! Paul exhorted the
Thessalonians, So then, brothers, stand firm and hold to the
teachings we passed on to you, whether by word of mouth or by
letter. (2 Thess. 2:15) Paul wanted the Thessalonians to adhere to his
oral teachings just as much as to his written teachings. What about
the other apostles? Do you think that the sum total of Peter's teaching
was merely seven pages of writing? Do you really think that the
apostles Andrew, James, Philip, Bartholomew, Thomas, James (son of
Alphaeus), Simon the Zealot, and Judas (son of James) had nothing
whatsoever to share with the church? Preposterous! These were handpicked men who had spent three years of personal training in the close
company of Jesus himself. The testimony of the early church is that all
of the apostles were actively preaching and teaching the gospel. Paul
34 Ibid., p. 112.

25

told the Corinthians Now, I praise you because you remember me in

everything, and hold firmly to the traditions, just as I delivered them
to you. (1 Cor. 11:2 NAS) Paul goes on, however, to rebuke some of
the Corinthian women who were not wearing head coverings. Yet,
there had been no prior written command from the apostles for a
Christian woman to cover her head while praying or prophesying. But
there was definitely an apostolic custom or tradition, as Paul testifies:
If anyone wants to be contentious about this, we have no other
practice nor do the churches of God. (1 Cor. 11:16) But please don't
jump ahead of me. I'm not saying that there were any additional
doctrines, moral commandments, or revelations that were handed
down orally to the early Christians. In fact, the writings of the early
Christians are the strongest evidence we have that there were none.
Our New Testament contains all of the doctrines and moral
commandments that are essential for Christians. Instead, apostolic
tradition (the oral teaching of the apostles), consisted primarily of two
things. The first was the establishment or approval of practices
involving worship and fellowship. In fact, most of the practices of the
first century church in these areas were matters of apostolic tradition
or customnot written direction. For example, nowhere in the New
Testament are Christians told when they should meet together or how
often they should observe the Lord's Supper. But the testimony of the
early Christians shows that there were some very definite customs
that had been handed down by the apostles or their associates on
these matters. Church government itself was established by custom or
by the oral teachings of the apostles. When Paul gave Timothy and
Titus instructions about selecting elders and deacons, he was not
instituting a new form of church government. (1 Tim. 3:1-13; Titus 1:59) He was simply describing the type of men who should fill the
positions of oversight that had already been implemented. The second
function of apostolic tradition was the clarification and enlargement of
matters that were discussed (or that would later be discussed) in the
New Testament writings. The apostles never intended that the church
try to interpret their writings in a vacuum, apart from their extensive
oral teachings. Because the early Christians clung to the wealth of
apostolic oral instruction, they had an enormous advantage over us in
interpreting the Scriptures. But please don't confuse apostolic tradition
with the later human traditions that the Roman Catholic and Greek
Orthodox churches adopted. The vast majority of the Catholic and
Orthodox traditions were unknown to the early Christians. Instead,
they originated after the time of Constantine. 35
35 Ibid., pp. 113-15.

26

We shall pass over for the time being the almost scandalous suggestions
that the Gospels are not the written words of Jesus Himself but nothing more
than oral tradition; that all of the Word of God is not contained in the Bible;
that non-biblical writers were given the same authoritative credence in the
early Church as the ones who wrote the Bible; that trying to interpret the
Bible without someone who was there and heard the Apostles teach is an
intellectual and spiritual vacuum from which nothing can be learned; and
that the early Church had an enormous advantage over us in interpreting
the Bible. We will take up later the fact that Bercot does not believe that the
Bible is the only guide to the faith and practice of the Church, that he
promotes the Roman Catholic and Eastern Mystic doctrine that traditions
and Church dogmas take precedence over the Word of God (which Bercot
does not consider to be flawless, infallible and inerrant, though he seems to
say that he does). Nor will we dwell for the moment on why Bercot has
esoteric knowledge when you and I can't possibly have it and why we are
limited to accepting what he assures us that the early church believed. All of
these things we will look into a bit later.
But what does strike me now is the abrupt and clean way in which the oral
tradition turned from the pure Word of God to the corrupt cesspool of
traditional heresy almost overnight with the coming of Augustine and the
Council of Nicaea. Why would these men of the highest integrity and the
willingness to suffer death for the cause allow this to happen before their
very eyes and do nothing about it? On the face of it, it seems an
incongruous fantasy that is born more of desire and imagination than fact.
Were the Teachings of the Apostles Deliberately Altered? 36
Bercot believes that we should take the oral traditions of the early Church
as being superior to the written word on the assumptions that he makes.
They would not have added to the truth because they believed that the
revelation was complete. Thus we should take their word for it that they did
not add to it. This is in spite of the fact that all of the Apostles warned of
false apostles and we have notable examples in the Bible. In II
Thessalonians 1, someone had even been writing false teachings and
signing the apostles names to them. Still Bercot believes that these good
men would not have done such a thing.
These men can be trusted as to their integrity in bringing forth a pure and
inerrant Word of God in oral tradition because they were willing to be
martyred. To Bercot, if anyone is willing to die for his beliefs, his beliefs must
be infallible truth. If this is to hold up, do you realize how much divine truth
has been lost, never to be recovered on the battlefields of this world, where
decent young men gave their lives in the belief that they were doing
36 Ibid., p. 117.

27

something for God and country? You may say that they died for a false
cause, but you cannot say that, if Bercot is right. The fact that they were
willing to die proves that they were right, according to Bercot.
The Early Christians Were Ultraconservative. 37
By this revelation, Bercot advances the belief that these men could not
have changed the words of truth through their oral tradition because, being
conservative, they were not in favor of change. It does not seem like much
of a case, I will grant you, but that is what Bercot believes, or at least, says
that he does.
Most of the early Christians never talked to the Apostles, but they
consulted with the disciples of the apostles, therefore their oral tradition was
better than the as-yet-uncanonized Scriptures.
They All Taught the Same Thing. 38
The voluminous writings of highly regarded historians to the contrary
notwithstanding, Bercot claims to believe that the early Christians or at least
the ones that he is willing to allow as testimonies, all taught the same thing
and believed the same thing.
They Walked in the Footsteps of Jesus. 39
Bercot believes that we can trust their inerrancy because they were all
faithful men who traced Jesus steps.
As a lawyer, Bercot must feel that he is loosing his case, for he is resorting
to the kinds of arguments that weaken, rather than strengthen a case. He
uses an emotionally rather than a factually based argument to prove that
the early religious men did not add to or take from the canon of truth.
What did Jesus Say About Their Doctrine? 40
Bercot believes that the things written to the Churches in the Book of
Revelation by St. John (earlier he said that Jesus never left a word of written
testimony; now apparently he has changed his mind) before the end of the
1st century in which Jesus had mostly criticism to make of those who were
drifting from the faith and allowing false teachers to come in, and at the end
of which He eternally denied anyone the right to use anything other than
The Book for the faith and practice of the Church justify the oral tradition
of the 2nd and 3rd century Church.

37 Ibid., p. 123.
38 Ibid., p. 125.
39 Ibid., p. 126.
40 Ibid., p. 127.

28

Constantine.41
Bercot believes that the decline of the Church can be blamed on
Constantine.
The Council of Nicaea.42
Bercot believes that some dark, dreadful evil took place at Nicaea that
damned the fortunes of the Church to the present age.
This had to do with the condemning of Arius as a heretic and the
establishing of the Holy Trinity as dogma. There were some other things that
went on at Nicaea but this was the main agenda. A great deal can be
learned about Bercot's doctrine by pondering why this is so upsetting to
him. Arius was a non-Christian heretic, who developed his doctrine from the
teachings of Origen that Christ was a phantom, a created being and inferior
to God, and that there is no Holy Ghost. The thing that Nicaea was about
was the conflict between Arius and Athanasius, Bishop of Alexandria and one
of the few good ones that Eastern philosophical, school of mysticChristianity ever had. Much can be made of peripheral issues if one wants to
avoid the center, but the Arian issue was what it was about.
Creeds.43
Bercot believes that creeds, which kept out such heresies as Arianism and
Pelagianism, were a great evil that seriously hurt the Church.
St. Augustine.44
Bercot believes that St. Augustine was at once the most influential and
the most disastrous theologian to come along in the long history of the
Church. He blames St. Augustine for the Reformation and the views of
Luther and Calvin. He does not give him credit for Arminius' views, if indeed
he knows who he is, but in all truth Arminius was much closer to Augustine
than Luther and Calvin combined.
Pelagius45
Bercot believes that Pelagius was a good old boy, who had some
unorthodox views, but really had some good ones too and was treated very
unfairly by the cunning, eloquent and powerful St. Augustine who talked him
into the ground and never let him get his views across.
The truth is that St. Augustine and Pelagius never met face to face and
never debated each other in a public or private forum. Bercot appears to say
41 Ibid., p. 132.
42 Ibid., pp. 141-44.
43 Ibid., pp. 145-6.
44 Ibid., p. 147.
45 Ibid., p. 150.

29

that they did, in the last paragraph on page 152, though there could be
ambiguity in his statement. It would not be a serious error in any case,
either in its own merit or in light of more glaring historical errors engaged in
by Bercot in his assassination of Church history. There was one time when
Pelagius came to Hippo to see Augustine, after a one-sided council in
Jerusalem in which John of the Cross, an avowed enemy of Augustine and
Bishop of Jerusalem, received all of Pelagius' accusations against Augustine
without even notifying Augustine of the Palestine conference or giving him
the opportunity or courtesy of a reply. According to history, Pelagius went to
see Augustine to apologize and to make peace, but he never told Augustine
he was coming. When he got there, Augustine was away on visitations for
some months. Pelagius left, never getting to see him.
Pelagius was notified of the African synods, where Pelagianism was
denounced as heresy, and invited to attend and speak in his own behalf, but
Pelagius never came, although he sent representatives.
Anabaptists.46
Bercot believes that the only hope for early Christianity and the last
outpost of orthodoxy, is the Anabaptists. This book, as well as the one to
follow (Common Sense) has evidently been written for the express purpose
of gaining an entrance by flattery and deceit and confusing and misleading
by way of what Bercot mistakenly believes to be their ignorance of Orthodox
Christian doctrines and Church history.

46 Ibid., pp. 159-65.

30

Chapter Three
An Evaluation And Polemic
Who Were The Early Christians?
Bercot starts out at least by stating that the Early Christians are those
. . .Christians who lived between 90 and 199 A.D. This is a bit confusing
for he immediately proceeds to list men, included among whom are . . .
Irenaeus who lived past 200 A.D..., Clement of Alexandria who lived to about
220 A.D., Origen who lived to 254 A.D., Tertullian who lived to 240 A.D. by
most accounts (some say 220 A.D.), Cyprian who live until 258 A.D. and
Lactantius who lived well into the 4th century.
By the term early Christians, I am primarily referring to the
Christians who lived between 90 and 199 A.D. The Apostle John was
still living at the beginning of this period. The first generation of early
Christians were men like Polycarp who had been personally taught by
one or more of the apostles. The period ended with a man who was
only one human link removed from JohnIrenaeus, a pupil of Polycarp.
By the term early Christianity, I am referring to beliefs and practices
of the world-wide community of early Christians who maintained

31

bonds of fellowship and communion with each other. I'm not referring
to the beliefs or practices of anyone labeled as a heretic by that
church. So I'm not describing the entire field of wheat and weeds
mixed together, but only the wheat. (Matt. 13:24-30) Although this
book primarily focuses on the Christians who lived between 90 and
199, the common beliefs and practices of these early Christians were
generally maintained by Christians living in the next century. Most of
the major changes in Christian beliefs did not occur until after 313,
when Constantine legalized Christianity. For that reason, the
discussion that follows will also include quotations from writers who
lived between 200 and 313, as long as their teachings agree with
those who lived in the period immediately after the apostles. 1
Were These The Church Fathers?
Bercot denies passionately that these were the early fathers, Apostolic
Fathers, Ante-Nicene Fathers, or fathers in any sense.
When I start talking about the early Christian writers, people usually
respond by saying, Oh, you mean the early church fathers. But these
men were not church fathers! Most of them were fairly ordinary, hardworking Christian elders with above-average education. They would
have been highly indignant at being called church fathers. The only
church fathers they recognized were the apostles. Actually, the very
fact that these writers were not church fathers is what makes their
writings so valuable. 2
Here Bercot offers not the tiniest shred of evidence for his claim. He does
not tell us who informed him of this. He does not cite his references. He does
not say how he knows that they would have been highly indignant. He
simply says, with italics for emphasis, that these were not church fathers.
This notion is out of harmony with established Church history. Philip
Schaff, often regarded as the best of the historians of the Church as to his
facts if not his commentary, gives the accepted view, in Volume II of his
monumental eight-volume work.
The Ante-Nicene fathers may be divided into five or six
classes:
(1.) The apostolic fathers, or personal disciples of the apostles. Of
these, Polycarp, Clement of Rome, and Ignatius are the most eminent.
(2.) The apologists for Christianity against Judaism and heathenism:
Justin Martyr and his successors to the end of the second century.
1
1

Bercot, Will The Real Heritics, Please Stand Up, pp. 13--4.
2 Ibid., p. 14.

32

(3.) The controversialists against heresies within the church: Irenaeus,

and Hippolytus, at the close of the second century and beginning of
the third.
(4.) The Alexandrian school of philosophical theology: Clement and
Origen, in the first half of the third century.
(5.) The contemporary but more practical North African school of
Tertullian and Cyprian.
(6.) Then there were also the germs of the Antiochian school, and
some less prominent writers, who can be assigned to no particular
class.3
While this outline can be and no doubt has been disputed, there can be no
argument against the role of 1, 2 and 5 as Fathers of the Church.
Here Bercot establishes the first of his necessary arguments. He must
separate what he is going to say from accepted Church history. He must also
argue that the truth can have no fellowship with the formal, organized,
accepted views. The Fathers were formal, official theologians and doctors
of the Church and Her theology. The early Christians on whom Bercot wishes
to rely were not fathers even though Church history shows plainly that
they were and have been so known by orthodoxy for centuries.
Two things may be noted here: 1) Warning is served that Bercot is going
to be arbitrary and capricious in his construction and analysis of Church
history. 2) Bercot's first building block of his anomalous doctrines is disputed
by the facts.
Their Works Were More Valuable Because They Were Not Fathers.
An essential part of Bercot's argument hangs on the validity of his
statement that these were not fathers. If they were fathers, then his
argument is fallacious, their writings are not as valuable as he had thought
and the bases for his remarks are misguided.
Actually, the very fact that these writers were not church fathers is
what makes their writings so valuable. 4
Again Bercot resorts to arbitrariness and gives us no insight into his
wisdom and authority. Why would their writings not have been valuable if
they had been father? Why should we believe this arbitrary statement?
What written witness is there to bear this out?
The Leaders of the Early Church Were Not Theologians.
3 Phillip Schaff, History of the Christian Church (Grand Rapids, Michigan, WM. B. Eerdmans Publishing
Company, 1910, rptd 1989), vol II, pp. 129-30.
4 Bercot, p. 14.

33

David Bercot, Jehovah's Witness, or Ex-Jehovah's Witness, educated in no

school of theology, young and admittedly in doubt concerning his own depth
and maturity of understanding, assures us that the early fathers (who were
not fathers) were not theologians. He gives us no documentation for this
view. He simply lays this startling information on us and asks us to believe it
for no other reason, now or at any time in the book, than that he assures us
that it is true. But Bercot is not content; he goes even further. There was no
systematic theology in the pre-Constantine Church:
If these men had been great founders of theology, their writings
would be of limited value to us. They would simply tell us what
doctrines these particular founding theologians had developed. But
these men did not write theological treatises. In fact, no one in the
second century church can even be called a theologian in the modern
sense. And there is no real systematic theology in the entire preConstantine church.5
Note two things in passing: 1) We have now left the 90-199 A.D. period
and gone into the second century and down to 319 A.D., and the time of
Constantine. Yet Bercot has said 90 to 199 A.D. There is method to this, as
we shall see. 2) Bercot has used the ambiguous term the modern sense.
What is this supposed to mean? It is a catch-all term that leaves an escape
route if he is cornered on this. When the theology of Clement of Alexandria
and Origen are shown to be heretical or non-supportive of his views, he can
go back to 90-199 A.D.
In the modern sense and in every other legitimate sense these men were
indeed theologians and they did indeed write theological treatises and
establish some form of systematic theology. Bercot can argue that this is not
so in the modern sense and no one can prove him wrong because no one
can say for sure what he means by the modern sense. But this will only
serve to confuse the already confused and fool the unenlightened and
defenseless. We shall have to again take a look at legitimate history on this
matter. The fathers were indeed theologians.
The most eminent among the Greek Apologists of the second
century is FLAVIUS JUSTINIUS surnamed Philosopher and Martyr.''
He is the typical apologist, who devoted his whole life to the defense
of Christianity at a time when it was most assailed, and he sealed his
testimony with his blood. He is also the first Christian philosopher or
the first philosophic theologian.6 Justin is the first among the fathers
who may be called a learned theologian and Christian thinker. He
5 Ibid.
6 Scahff, II, p. 712.

34

had acquired considerable classical and philosophical culture before

his conversion, and then made it subservient to the defense of faith. 7
IRENAEUS: Almost simultaneously with the apology against false
religions without, arose the polemic literature against the heresies, or
various forms of pseudo-Christianity, especially the Gnostic; and upon
this was formed the dogmatic theology of the church.8
HIPPOLYTUS: This famous person. . . was undoubtedly one of the
most learned and eminent scholars and theologians of his time. . .9
CLEMENT OF ALEXANDRIA:
Clement was the father of the
Alexandrian Christian philosophy. He united thorough biblical and
Hellenic learning with genius and speculative thought. He rose, in
many points, far above the prejudices of his age, to more free and
spiritual views. His theology, however, is not a unit, but a confused
eclectic mixture of true Christian elements with many Stoic, Platonic,
and Philonic ingredients.10
ORIGEN: HIS THEOLOGY. Origen was the greatest scholar of his age
. . . .His knowledge embraced all departments of the philology,
philosophy, and theology of his day.11
TERTULLIAN: QUINTUS SEPTIXIUS FLORENS TERTULLIANUS is the
father of the Latin theology and church language, and one of the
greatest men of Christian antiquity. 12
And so Bercot's pronouncement that none of the early Christians, except
Origen, were theologians, is far from being accurate.

Apologetics, Defenses Against Heresy and Letters of Instructions to

Churches Are Not Theological Writings.
One thing I can say for Bercot is that he is indeed a man full of surprises.
Do you realize how many Bible students, scholars, seminary professors,
prophets, preachers and teachers will be startled to no end to learn that
Christian Apologetics is not theology? And what one of us would ever
have suspected that the Letters of St. Paul, St. Peter, St. John and St. James
to the Churches, with doctrinal formulas and practical exhortations for every
situation the Church would encounter in the history of its life in this world,

7 Ibid., p. 715.
8 Ibid., pp. 747-8.
9 Ibid., pp. 758-9.
10 Ibid., pp. 782-3.
11 Ibid., p. 790.
12 Ibid., p. 819.

35

did not involve theology? We had thought that the very essence of the
defense of Christianity in the early centuries was theological treatise!
On a serious note, theology is a word that comes from Theos (God) and
ology which is the termination for nouns having to do with studies of various
sorts. It means, quite simply, the study of God, His Word and things
pertaining to God. Everyone who sits down in the morning (or the evening or
the afternoon), reads his Bible and ponders on the things of God, is a
theologian. Obviously there are more definitive theologians, such as those
who go deeper into the things of God, or who make a vocation of studying
the things of God. But there is nothing esoteric, popish or scholastically elite
about the word theology. If anyone wishes to believe that the biblical books
of Romans, Galatians, Ephesians, Hebrews or the subject of Apologetics are
not theology, I suppose that there is little we can do to stop him. But to give
any credence whatsoever to such a claim as Bercot has made is below the
minimum requirement for common sense. This is neologism in its most
visible form. But in order for Bercot to get over with his ideas put forth in
this book, he has to separate the reader from legitimate theology. He will do
this by claiming that we (Bercot, the early Christians and you the reader) are
not in the slightest way interested in theology. In this way he can make any
capricious claim that he wants to and Orthodox Christian theology cannot
expose or censure him.
The Early Christian Leaders Were Fairly Ordinary, Hard Working
Elders With Above Average Education.
Bercot deals in generalities. He does not explain what he means by fairly
ordinary, hard working, or above average in education. Does this mean
that they were farmers who did not spend all of their time and make their
living from their religious involvements? Does it mean that they did not
teach in theological schools (which would have been hard to do if there were
no theology in those days)? Does it mean that they had little more than a
high school education? Could they read Classical Greek? Could they read
Hebrew? Or perhaps Bercot does not intend for us to know what he means.
Maybe he is busy giving general impressions that will create a historical and
theological picture in our minds without ever making firm and simple
statements to which he can be held to accounts by those who wish to take
issue with his interpretation of church history and doctrine. In any case we
shall look again at legitimate Church History.
CLEMENT OF ROME, the name of a great celebrity in antiquity, was
a disciple of Paul and Peter, to whom he refers as the chief examples
for imitation. He may have been the same person who is mentioned
by Paul as one of his faithful fellow-workers in Phililppi (Phil. 4: 3); or
probably a Roman who was in some way connected with the

36

distinguished Flavian family, and through it with the imperial

household, where Christianity found an early lodgment. His Epistle
betrays a man of classical culture, executive wisdom, and a thorough
familiarity with the Septuagint Bible. The last seems to indicate that
he was of Jewish parentage. . . . Later legends. . . picture him as a
highly educated Roman. . . .13
IGNATIUS stands out in history as the ideal of a catholic martyr,
and as the earliest advocate of the hierarchical principle in both its
good and its evil points. As a writer, he is remarkable for originality,
freshness and force of ideas, and for terse, sparkling and sententious
style; but in apostolic simplicity and soundness, he is inferior to
Clement and Polycarp, and presents a stronger contrast to the epistles
of the New Testament. . . . Ignatius glows with the fire and impetuosity
of the Greek and Syrian temper which carries him beyond the bounds
of sobriety. He was a very uncommon man, and made a powerful
impression upon his age. He is the incarnation, as it were, of the three
closely connected ideas: the glory of martyrdom, the omnipotence of
episcopacy, and the hatred of heresy and schism. Hierarchical pride
and humility, Christian charity and churchly exclusiveness are typically
represented in Ignatius.14
JUSTIN . . . had acquired considerable classical and philosophical
culture before his conversion, and then made it subservient to the
defense of faith. . . . To judge from his employment of several
teachers and his many journeys, he must have had some means,
though he no doubt lived in great simplicity and may have been aided
by his brethren.16
IRENAEUS is the leading representative of catholic Christianity in
the last quarter of the second century, the champion of orthodoxy
against Gnostic heresy, and the mediator between the Eastern and
Western churches. . . . His position gives him additional weight, for he
is linked by two long lives, that of his teacher and grand-teacher, to
the fountain head of Christianity. We plainly trace in him the influence
of the spirit of Polycarp and John. 17
HIPPOLYTUS: This famous person. . . was undoubtedly one of the
most learned and eminent scholars and theologians of his time. . .
certain it is that he received a thorough Grecian education. . . 18
[CLEMENT OF ALEXANDRIA] He rose, in many points, far above
the prejudices of his age, to more free and spiritual views.
13 Ibid., pp. 687-88.
14 Ibid.,,p. 657.
16 Ibid., p. 712.
17 Ibid., pp. 750-51.
18 Ibid., pp. 758-59.

37

ORIGEN: surnamed Adamantius on account of his industry and

purity of character, is one of the most remarkable men in history for
genius and learning, for the influence he exerted on his age, and for
the controversies and discussions to which his opinions gave rise. He
was born of Christian parents at Alexandria, in the year 185, and
probably baptized in childhood, according to Egyptian custom which
he traced to apostolic origin. Under the direction of his father,
Leonides, who was probably a rhetorician, and of the celebrated
Clement at the catechetical school, he received a pious and learned
education. While yet a boy, he knew whole sections of the Bible by
memory, and not rarely perplexed his father with questions on the
deeper sense of Scripture. The father reproved his curiosity, but
thanked God for such a son, and often, as he slept, reverentially kissed
his breast as a temple of the Holy Spirit. 20
TERTULLIAN: QUINTUS SEPTIXIUS FLORENS TERTULLIANUS is the
father of the Latin theology and church language, and one of the
greatest men of Christian antiquity. 22 In short, we see in this
remarkable man, both intellectually and morally, the fermenting of a
new creation . . . 23
LACTANTIUS [was] a professor of eloquence in Nicomedia, and a
man of elegant culture. . . Lactantius as the tutor of his [Constantine's]
eldest son, Hosius as his trusted counselor who probably suggested to
him the convening of the first ecumenical synod; he was we may say
for few years his ecclesiastical prime minister. 24
If one wished to ignore the burning passion and vigor and the morbid and
open fascination with martyrdom that caused him the criticism of his peers
and of historians, one might be able to call Ignatius ordinary in education
and intelligence. Bercot concedes that Origen was an educated theologian,
but beyond that he chooses to call these men ordinary, hard working and
only reasonably educated, a necessary thing in order to drive a wedge
between the theology that he is going to ascribe to them and that of
educated, professional theologians. In order to make that case, he has
restated history to fit his needs.
But the evident truth is that none of them was an ordinary, every day
person, it is unlikely that any of these professional politicians, scholars,
theologians and churchmen ever did a day's work by the fields in his life,
and they had educations that, even by today's standards, were
extraordinary. Judge for yourself whether the description, Fairly ordinary,
20 Ibid., pp. 786-87.
22 Ibid., pp. 822-23.
23 Ibid., p. 825.
24 Ibid., pp. 865-66.

38

hard working Elders with above average educations fits this group of men.
Most of them were elite men from aristocratic or privileged families and they
proudly maintained their distance from the ordinary man, both in the Church
and in society (this may not have been true of Clement of Rome and
Polycarp). Again Bercot is caught with his cunning left hand in the literary
and historical cookie jar.
The Early Christians All Believed and Taught the Same Thing
Bercot claims that the early Christians, at least the ones that he uses for
testimonials to his version of the early doctrine, all believed and taught the
exact same thing.
One of the noticeable features of early Christianity is the
relative lack of rigid theological dogma. In fact, the further
one goes back in Christian history, the less theology he
finds. However, even though early Christianity was marked
by a divergence of beliefs in many areas, there were still
many common themes and beliefs that run throughout all
of the early Christian writings. This book will focus on
these common or universally-held beliefs and practices. 25
Bercot has told us that he has used only early Christians who all agree. He
has given no insight into why he has chosen not to cite the views of those
who do not agree. After all a scholarly work would do exactly that. And
that is what Bercot claims to have given us:
Will the Real Heretics Please Stand Up combines sound
scholarship with a free-flowing, readable style designed for
contemporary evangelical laypersons.26
But our concern is not with adventurism or acts of self-congratulation. Nor
is it with the fact that there are many men not cited who did disagree on
many points. It is with the validity (or the lack thereof) of the claim that
these all agreed on the basic doctrines, when in reality there was a wild
casting about and an unbridgeable gap of doctrinal contradictions.
After telling us that all of the men whom he has cited agree on all points,
he now tells us that they do not all agree. In fact they disagree on many
things. This is a
contradicting of himself. It is hard to understand.
Apparently Bercot is hopelessly bogged down in his program and is simply
trying to confuse the issue. He appears to be saying that they all agree so
he can use their testimony to drive home his point, but that they do not all
25 Bercot, p. 15.
26 Ibid., back Cover.

39

agree in order to hedge against inevitable criticism. Bercot is not going to

tell us what those things are over which they disagree. Nor is he going to tell
us who those writers are, who disagree with what he considers the basics.
Nor are we given their views on these subjects. He has simply chosen to
discard them as dissenters to his views, which are the right ones, and
therefore they are heretics.
So in other words, Bercot has found men (five, he seems sure would be
sufficient) who agree or at least he says they agree on certain subjects.
He cannot and does not assure us that there is basic agreement among
them on a broad range of foundational issues. He tells us only that they
agree, or at least for the most part, on the few doctrines which Bercot
wishes to promote in this book. In fact, though he mentions more, there are
only three basic things for which he is searching to find agreement, and we
shall discuss them in due course.
Bercot is frank to admit his editing of bits and pieces of the doctrine.
To that end, I have not represented any beliefs or
practices as being those of the early church in general
unless they met the following criteria:
1. All early Christian writers who mentioned the subject
express the same view; and
2. At least five early Christian writers, separated by time
and geographical distance, discussed the subject. Actually
most of the matters discussed in this book are supported
by testimony from more than five writers. 27
Thus it appears that Bercot has limited his authority to those few
instances when those whom he cites agree with him on a limited few issues,
no matter what else they might believe. Even so, Bercot has misstated the
facts. Clement of Rome and Polycarp were not separated by time and
distance, Clement of Alexandria, Origen and Irenaeus were not separated by
time and distance and Tertullian and Hippolytus were not separated by time.
Not all of the early Christian writers agree with what he says on any of the
subjects that he raises, and Bercot has to know it. One who has read enough
to put together even the meager and incomplete thoughts that Bercot has,
cannot be ignorant of the views of the most important of the Apostolic
Fathers (even though Bercot refuses to call them that) such as Clement of
Rome and Polycarp on the vital subject of Justification by faith, to say
nothing of the other fundamental issues that he raises, directly or indirectly,
as we shall see. What does real Church History reveal about unanimity on
basic doctrines, such as salvation?
27 Ibid., p. 15.

40

The term church-father originated in the primitive custom of

transferring the idea of father to spiritual relationships, especially to
those of teacher, priest, and bishop. In the case before us the idea
necessarily includes that of antiquity, involving a certain degree of
general authority for all subsequent periods and single branches of
the church. Hence this title of honor is justly limited to the more
distinguished teachers of the first five or six centuries, excepting, of
course, the apostles, who stand far above them all as the inspired
organs of Christ. It applies, therefore, to the period of the ecumenical
formation of doctrines, before the separation of Eastern and Western
Christendom. The line of the Latin fathers is generally closed with
Pope Gregory I. (d. 604), the line of the Greek with John of Damascus
(d. about 754).
Besides antiquity, or direct connection with the formative age of the
whole church, learning, holiness, orthodoxy, and the approbation of
the church, or general recognition, are the qualifications for a church
father. These qualifications, however, are only relative. At least we
cannot apply the scale of fully developed orthodoxy, whether Greek,
Roman, or Evangelical, to the Ante-Nicene fathers. Their dogmatic
conceptions were often very indefinite and uncertain. In fact the
Roman church excludes a Tertullian for his Montanism, an Origen for
his Platonic and idealistic views, an Eusebius for his semi-Arianism,
also Clement of Alexandria, Lactantius, Theodoret, and other
distinguished divines, from the list of fathers (Patres), and
designates them merely ecclesiastical writers . . . The unanimous
consent of the fathers is a mere illusion, except on the most
fundamental articles of general Christianity. We must resort here to a
liberal conception of orthodoxy, and duly consider the necessary
states of progress in the development of Christian doctrine in the
church.
On the other hand the theology of the fathers still less accords with
the Protestant standard of orthodoxy. We seek in vain among them for
the evangelical doctrines of the exclusive authority of the Scriptures . .
. The reformers were as great and good men as the fathers, but both
must bow before the apostles. There is a steady progress of
Christianity, an ever-deepening understanding and an ever widening
application of its principles and powers, and there are yet many
hidden treasures in the Bible which will be brought to light in future
ages. . . Each had also his weakness. Not one compares for a moment
in depth and spiritual fullness with a St. Paul or St. John; and the whole
patristic literature, with all its incalculable value, must ever remain
very far below the New Testament. The single epistle to the Romans or
the Gospel of John is worth more than all commentaries, doctrinal,

41

polemic, and ascetic treatises of the Greek and Latin fathers,

schoolmen, and reformers. 28
But his [Origen's] best disciples proved unfaithful to many of his
most peculiar views, and adhered far more to the reigning faith of the
church. Forand in this too he is like Schleiermacherhe can by no
means be called orthodox, either in the Catholic or in the Protestant
sense. 29
HIPPOLYTUS was the most learned divine and the most voluminous
writer of the Roman church in the third century; in fact the first great
scholar of that church, though like his teacher, Irenaeus, he used the
Greek language exclusively. . . . His style is vigorous, but careless and
turgid. Caspari calls Hippolytus the Roman Origen. This is true as
regards learning and independence, but Origen had more genius and
moderation. . . In the fifth book the author comes to his proper theme,
the refutation of all the heresies from the times of the apostles to his
own. . . . The ninth book, in refuting the doctrine of the Noetians and
Callistians, makes remarkable disclosures of events in the Roman
church. He represents Pope Zephyrinus as a weak and ignorant man
who gave aid and comfort to the Patripassian heresy, and his
successor Callistus, as a shrewd and cunning manager who was once a
slave, then a dishonest banker, and became a bankrupt and convict,
but worked himself into the good graces of Zephyrinus and after his
death obtained the object of his ambition, the papal chair, taught
heresy and ruined the discipline by extreme leniency to offenders.
Here the author shows himself a violent partisan, and must be used
with caution.30
He [Tertullian] is just the opposite of the genial, less vigorous, but
more learned and comprehensive Origen. . . . For his opponents, be
they heathens, Jews, heretics, or catholics, he has as little indulgence
and regard as Luther. With the adroitness of a special pleader he
entangles them in self-contradictions, pursues them into every nook
and corner, overwhelms them with arguments, sophisms,
apophthegms, and sarcasms, drives them before him with unmerciful
lashings, and almost always makes them ridiculous and contemptible.
His polemics everywhere leave marks of blood. 31
So much, apparently, for the notion that these men all agreed and that
they were gentle, non-dogmatic and simple. We understand Bercot's need to
present a united front for these early Christians in the doctrines that he
28 Schaff, 627-29.
29 Ibid., pp. 790-91.
30 Ibid., pp. 763-65.
31 Ibid., pp. 824-25.

42

attributes to them in the hope of making his case. But his task is simply
impossible. Even a lawyer can only stretch the truth so far without tearing it
completely in two.
Bercot Has Only Cited Men Who Were Not Considered Heretics By
Their Peers
I'm not referring to the beliefs or practices of anyone labeled as a
heretic by that church.32
Bercot has relied on the ignorance and the laziness of those who read this
book. It is an easy thing to discover that Clement of Alexandria, Origen,
Eusebius were all denounced by their church groups to one degree or
another, for heretical views. Origen's case was the most graphic, where he
was removed form the school at Alexandria by Demetrius' charge against
him (the man responsible for getting him the position) and the actions of his
own bishop in Constantinople. The following quote is brief in an effort to not
wear you out with repetition. We will take up the heresies of these men later.
In fact the Roman church excludes a Tertullian for his
Montanism, an Origen for his Platonic and idealistic views,
an Eusebius for his semi-Arianism, also Clement of
Alexandria. . . 33
While it is true that this particular quote limits their censorship to the
Roman Church and some of them were Greek, we will see the whole of the
matter shortly.
Eight Early Christian Writers.
Bercot now introduces us to his hand picked group of eight writers, which
are Polycarp, Irenaeus, Justin Martyr, Clement of Alexandria, Origen,
Tertullian, Cyprian and Lactantius. Since Bercot has given his views of these
men in his book and since we do not want to completely rephrase him here,
we will not repeat them. What we will do is give you a short version of the
true history of these men, undistorted by sectarian biases or hidden
agendas. Though we have subjectively quoted from these men already, we
hope to give you a somewhat more comprehensive over view of their
theology now.

32 Bercot, p. 13.
33 Schaff, II, p. 627.

43

POLYCARP: A relatively simple and decent man, a personal friend of

apostles and a leader in the early Church, about which not a great deal is
known. Philip Schaff says of him:
An echo of Paul's teaching is found in Polycarp, Ad Phil. c. 1,
where he refers to the firm root of their faith, preached to them from
olden times, which remains to this day, and bears fruit in our Lord
Jesus Christ. But it should be remembered that Polycarp, in the very
first chapter of his letter, represents faith and the whole salvation as
the gift of free grace.34
There is a paucity of information about the beliefs and teachings of
Polycarp. This gives opportunists the opening to quote his few writings out
of context and to imply things about this which are hard to disprove, though
they, of course, are not proven either. We will decline to sit in that game. We
are not going to try to construct anything. His doctrines are for the most
part non-sensational and sometimes vague. In the absence of more of his
writings we do not know how many times he may have spoken of
Sanctification, only to have it misunderstood. But these two quotations
about him are unmistakable in what they say. They will serve to expose the
mischief of Bercot in trying to enlist him for his cause.
The most eminent among the Greek Apologists of the second
century is FLAVIUS JUSTINIUS, surnamed Philosopher and
Martyr. He is the typical apologist, who devoted his whole life to the
defense of Christianity at a time when it was most assailed, and he
sealed his testimony with his blood. He is also the first Christian
philosopher or the first philosophic theologian. . . . His education was
Hellenic. . . . Justin is the first among the fathers who may be called a
learned theologian and Christian thinker. . . .But, like all the AnteNicene writers, he had no clear insight into the distinction between the
Old Testament and the New, between the law and the gospel, nor any
proper conception of the depth of sin and redeeming grace, and the
justifying power of faith. His theology is legalistic and ascetic rather
than evangelical and free. He retained some heathen notions from his
former studies though he honestly believed them to be in full harmony
with revelation. Christianity was to Justin, theoretically, the true
philosophy, and, practically, a new law of holy living and dying. The
former is chiefly the position of the Apologies, the latter that of the
Dialogue. He was not an original philosopher, but a philosophizing
eclectic, with a prevailing love for Plato, whom he quotes more
frequently than any other classical author. He may be called, in a loose
34 Ibid., p. 667.

44

sense, a Christian Platonist. He was also influenced by Stoicism. He

thought that the philosophers of Greece had borrowed their light from
Moses and the prophets. But his relation to Plato after all is merely
external, and based upon fancied resemblances. He illuminated and
transformed his Platonic reminiscences by the prophetic Scriptures,
and especially by the Johannean doctrine of the Logos and the
incarnation. This is the central idea of his philosophical theology.
Christianity is the highest reason. The Logos is the preexistent,
absolute, personal Reason, and Christ is the embodiment of it, the
Logos incarnate. Whatever is rational is Christian, and whatever is
Christian is rational. The Logos endowed all men with reason and
freedom, which are not lost by the fall. He scattered seeds of truth
before his incarnation, not only among the Jews, but also among the
Greeks and barbarians, especially among philosophers and poets, who
are the prophets of the heathen. Those who lived reasonably and
virtuously in obedience to this preparatory light were Christians in
fact, though not in name; while those who lived unreasonably were
Christless and enemies of Christ. Socrates was a Christian as well as
Abraham, though he did not know it. None of the fathers or schoolmen
has so widely thrown open the gates of salvation. He was the broadest
of broad churchmen.35
CLEMENT OF ALEXANDRIA was the father of the Alexandrian
Christian philosophy. He united thorough biblical and Hellenic learning
with genius and speculative thought. He rose, in many points, far
above the prejudices of his age, to more free and spiritual views. His
theology, however, is not a unit, but a confused eclectic mixture of
true Christian elements with many Stoic, Platonic, and Philonic
ingredients. His writings are full of repetition, and quite lacking in
clear, fixed method. He throws out his suggestive and often profound
thoughts in fragments, or purposely veils them, especially in the
Stromata, in a mysterious darkness, to conceal them from the esoteric
multitude, and to stimulate the study of the initiated or philosophical
Christians. He shows here an affinity with the heathen mystery cultus,
and the Gnostic arena. His extended knowledge of Grecian literature
and rich quotations from the lost works of poets, philosophers, and
historians give him importance also in investigations regarding
classical antiquity. He lived in an age of transition when Christian
thought was beginning to master and to assimilate the whole domain
of human knowledge. And when it is frankly admitted (says Dr.
Westcott) that his style is generally deficient in terseness and
elegance; that his method is desultory; that his learning is undigested:
we can still thankfully admire his richness of information, his breadth
35 Ibid., pp. 719-23.

45

of reading, his largeness of sympathy, his lofty aspirations, his noble

conception of the office and capacities of the Faith.
The three leading works which he composed during his residence as
teacher in Alexandria, between the years 190 and 195, represent the
three stages in the discipline of the human race by the divine Logos,
corresponding to the three degrees of knowledge required by the
ancient mystagogues, and are related to one another very much as
apologetics, ethics, and dogmatics, or as faith, love, and mystic vision,
or as the stages of the Christian cultus up to the celebration of the
sacramental mysteries. The Exhortation to the Greeks, in three
books, with almost a waste of learning, points out the
unreasonableness and immorality, but also the nobler prophetic
element, of heathenism, and seeks to lead the sinner to repentance
and faith. The Tutor or Educator unfolds the Christian morality
with constant reference to heathen practices, and exhorts to a holy
walk, the end of which is likeness to God. The Educator is Christ, and
the children whom he trains, are simple, sincere believers. The
Stromata or Miscellanies, in seven books (the eighth, containing
an imperfect treatise on logic, is spurious), furnishes a guide to the
deeper knowledge of Christianity, but is without any methodical
arrangement, a heterogeneous mixture of curiosities of history,
beauties of poetry, reveries of philosophy, Christian truths and
heretical errors (hence the name). He compares it to at hick-grown,
shady mountain or garden, where fruitful and barren trees of all kinds,
the cypress, the laurel, the ivy, the apple, the olive, the fig, stand
confusedly grouped together, that many may remain hidden from the
eye of the plunderer without escaping the notice of the laborer, who
might transplant and arrange them in pleasing order. It was, probably,
only a prelude to a more comprehensive theology. At the close the
author portrays the ideal of the true Gnostic, that is, the perfect
Christian, assigning to him, among other traits, a Stoical elevation
above all sensuous affections. The inspiring thought of Clement is that
Christianity satisfies all the intellectual and moral aspirations and
wants of man.36
ORIGEN: In the year 203, though then only eighteen years of age,
he was nominated by the bishop Demetrius, afterwards his opponent,
president of the catechetical school of Alexandria, left vacant by the
flight of Clement. To fill this important office, he made himself
acquainted with the various heresies, especially the Gnostic, and with
the Grecian philosophy; he was not even ashamed to study under the
heathen Ammonius Saccas, the celebrated founder of Neo-Platonism.
36 Ibid., pp. 782-84.

46

He learned also the Hebrew language, and made journeys to Rome

(211), Arabia, Palestine (215), and Greece. In Rome he became slightly
acquainted with Hippolytus, the author of the Philosophumena, who
was next to himself the most learned man of his age. Dollinger thinks
it all but certain that he sided with Hippolytus in his controversy with
Zephyrinus and Callistus, for he shared (at least in his earlier period)
his rigoristic principles of discipline, had a dislike for the proud and
overbearing bishops in large cities, and held a subordination view of
the Trinity, but he was far superior to his older contemporary in
genius, depth, and penetrating insight. . . .Origen was the greatest
scholar of his age, and the most gifted, most industrious, and most
cultivated of all the Ante-Nicene fathers. Even heathens and heretics
admired or feared his brilliant talent and vast learning. His knowledge
embraced all departments of the philology, philosophy, and theology
of his day. With this he united profound and fertile thought, keen
penetration, and glowing imagination. As a true divine, he consecrated
all his studies by prayer, and turned them, according to his best
convictions, to the service of truth and piety. He may be called in
many respects the Schleiermacher of the Greek church. He was a
guide from the heathen philosophy and the heretical Gnosis to the
Christian faith. He exerted an immeasurable influence in stimulating
the development of the catholic theology and forming the great
Nicene fathers, Athanasius, Basil, the two Gregories, Hilary, and
Ambrose, who consequently, in spite of all his deviations, set great
value on his service. But his best disciples proved unfaithful to many
of his most peculiar views, and adhered far more to the reigning faith
of the church. Forand in this too he is like Schleiermacherhe can
by no means be called orthodox, either in the Catholic or in the
Protestant sense. His leaning to idealism, his predilection for Plato,
and his noble effort to reconcile Christianity with reason, and to
commend it even to educated heathens and Gnostics, led him into
many grand and fascinating errors. Among these are his extremely
ascetic and almost docetistic conception of corporeity, his denial of a
material resurrection, his doctrine of the preexistence and the pretemporal fall of souls (including the pre-existence of the human soul
of Christ) of eternal creation, of the extension of the work of
redemption to the inhabitants of the stars and to all rational
creatures, and of the final restoration of all men and fallen angels.
Also in regard to the dogma of the divinity of Christ, though he
powerfully supported it, and was the first to teach expressly the
eternal generation of the Son, yet he may be almost as justly
considered a forerunner of the Arian heteroousion,, or at least of the
Semi-Arian homoiousion, as of the Athanasian homoousion.

47

These and similar views provoked more or less contradiction during

his lifetime, and were afterwards, at a local council in Constantinople
in 543, even solemnly condemned as heretical. But such a man might
in such an age hold erroneous opinion without being a heretic. For
Origen propounded his views always with modesty and from sincere
conviction of their agreement with Scripture, and that in a time when
the church doctrine was as yet very indefinite in many points. For this
reason even learned Roman divines, such as Tillemont and Mohler,
have shown Origen the greatest respect and leniency; a fact the more
to be commended, since the Roman church has refused him, as well as
Clement of Alexandria and Tertullian, a place among the saints and the
fathers in the stricter sense. Origen's greatest service was in exegesis.
He is father of the critical investigation of Scripture, and his
commentaries are still useful to schools for their suggestiveness.
Gregory Thaumaturgus says, he had received from God the greatest
gift, to be an interpreter of the word of God to men. For that age this
judgment is perfectly just. Origen remained the exegetical oracle until
Chrysostom far surpassed him, not indeed in originality and vigor of
mind and extent of learning, but in sound, sober tact, in simple,
natural analysis, and in practical application of the text. His great
defect is the neglect of the grammatical and historical sense and his
constant desire to find a hidden mystic meaning. He even goes further
in this direction than the Gnostics, who everywhere saw
transcendental, unfathomable mysteries. His hermeneutical principle
assumes a threefold sensesomatic, psychic and pneumatic; or
literal, moral and spiritual. His allegorical interpretation is ingenious,
but often runs far away from the text and degenerates into the
merest caprice; while at times it gives way to the opposite extreme of
a carnal literalism, by which he justifies his ascetic extravagance.
Origen is one of the most important witnesses of the Ante-Nicene text
of the Greek Testament, which is older than the received text. He
compared different MSS. and noted textual variations, but did not
attempt a recension or lay down any principles of textual criticism. The
value of his testimony is due to his rare opportunities and life-long
study of the Bible before the time when the traditional Syrian and
Byzantine text was formed. 37 [An internal note before moving on.
Since Schaff's day, Hort's Alexandrian and Neutral Texts have been
exposed as frauds by textual scholars and the Syrian and the
Byzantine are the same: the Traditional text.]
CYPRIAN: As Origen was the ablest scholar, and Tertullian the
strongest writer, so Cyprian was the greatest bishop, of the third
37 Ibid., pp. 790-92.

48

century. He was born to be a prince in the church. In executive talent,

he even surpassed all the Roman bishops of his time; and he bore
himself towards them, also, as frater and collega, in the spirit of
full equality. Augustin calls him by eminence, the catholic bishop and
catholic martyr; and Vincentius of Lirinum, the light of all saints, all
martyrs, and all bishops. His stamp of character was more that of
Peter than either of Paul or John. His peculiar importance falls not so
much in the field of theology, where he lacks originality and depth, as
in church organization and discipline. While Tertullian dealt mainly with
heretics, Cyprian directed his polemics against schismatics, among
whom he had to condemn, though he never does in fact, his venerated
teacher, who died a Montanist.38
TERTULLIAN: QUINTUS SEPTIXIUS FLORENS TERTULLIANUS is the
father of the Latin theology and church language, and one of the
greatest men of Christian antiquity. We know little of his life but what
is derived from his book and from the brief notice of Jerome in his
catalogue of illustrious men. But few writers have impressed their
individuality so strongly in their books as this African father. In this
respect, as well as in others, he resembles St. Paul, and Martin Luther.
He was born about the year 150, at Carthage, the ancient rival of
Rome, where his father was serving as captain of a Roman legion
under the proconsul of Africa. He received a liberal Greco-Roman
education; his writings manifest an extensive acquaintance with
historical, philosophical, poetic, and antiquarian literature, and with
juridical terminology and all the arts of an advocate. He seems to have
devoted himself to politics and forensic eloquence, either in Carthage
or in Rome. Eusebius calls him a man accurately acquainted with the
Roman laws,'' and many regard him as identical with the Tertyllus, or
Tertullianus, who is the author of several fragments in the Pandects. . .
Some years after, between 199 and 203, he joined the puritanic,
though orthodox, sect of the Montanists. Jerome attributes this change
to personal motives, charging it to the envy and insults of the Roman
clergy, from whom he himself experienced many an indignity. But
Tertullian was inclined to extremes from the first, especially to moral
austerity. He was no doubt attracted by the radical contempt for the
world, the strict asceticism, the severe discipline, the martyr
enthusiasm, and the chiliasm of the Montanists, and was repelled by
the growing conformity to the world in the Roman church, which just at
that period, under Zephyrinus and Callistus, openly took under its
protection a very lax penitential discipline, and at the same time,
though only temporarily, favored the Patripassian error of Praxeas, an
38 Ibid., pp. 825-26.

49

opponent of the Montanists. Of this man Tertullian therefore says, in

his sarcastic way: He has executed in Rome two works of the devil; has
driven out prophecy (the Montanistic) and brought in heresy (the
Patripassian); has turned off the Holy Ghost and crucified the Father.
Tertullian now fought the catholics, or the psychicals, he frequently
calls them, with the same inexorable sternness with which he had
combated the heretics. The departures of the Montanists, however,
related more to points of morality and discipline than of doctrine; and
with all his hostility to Rome, Tertullian remained a zealous advocate of
the catholic faith, and wrote even from his schismatic position, several
of his most effective works against the heretics, especially the
Gnostics. Indeed, as a divine, he stood far above this fanatical sect,
and gave it by his writings an importance and an influence in the
church itself which it certainly would never otherwise have attained.
He labored in Carthage as a Montanist presbyter and an author, and
died, as Jerome says, in decrepit old age, according to some about the
year 220, according to others not till 240; for the exact time, as well as
the manner of his death, are unknown. His followers in Africa
propagated themselves, under the name of Tertullianists, down to
the time of Augustin in the fifth century, and took perhaps a middle
place between the proper Montanists and the catholic church. That he
ever returned into the bosom of Catholicism is an entirely groundless
opinion. Strange that this most powerful defender of old catholic
orthodoxy and the teacher of the high-churchly Cyprian, should have
been schismatic and an antagonist of Rome. But he had in his
constitution the tropical fervor and acerbity of the Punic character,
and that bold spirit of independence in which his native city of
Carthage once resisted, through more than a hundred years war, the
rising power of the seven-hilled city on the Tiber. He truly represents
the African church, in which a singular antagonism continued to reveal
itself, not only among the Donatists, but even among the leading
advocates of Catholicism. . . Tertullian was a rare genius, perfectly
original and fresh, but angular, boisterous and eccentric; full of
glowing fantasy, pointed wit, keen discernment, polemic dexterity,
and moral earnestness, but wanting in clearness, moderation and
symmetrical development. He resembled a foaming mountain torrent
rather than a calm, transparent river in the valley. His vehement
temper was never fully subdued, although he struggled sincerely
against it. He was a man of strong convictions, and never hesitated to
express them without fear or favor. Like almost all great men, he
combined strange contrarieties of character. . . . 39 He is just the
opposite of the genial, less vigorous, but more learned and
39 Ibid., pp. 822-23.

50

comprehensive Origen. He adopts the strictest supernatural principles;

and yet he is a most decided realist, and attributes body, that is, as it
were, a corporeal, tangible substantiality, even to God and to the soul;
while the idealistic Alexandrian cannot speak spiritually enough of
God, and can conceive the human soul without and before the
existence of the body. Tertullian's theology revolves about the great
Pauline antithesis of sin and grace, and breaks the road to the Latin
anthropology and soteriology afterwards developed by his likeminded, but clearer, calmer, and more considerate countryman,
Augustin. For his opponents, be they heathens, Jews, heretics, or
catholics, he has as little indulgence and regard as Luther. With the
adroitness of a special pleader he entangles them in selfcontradictions, pursues them into every nook and corner, overwhelms
them with arguments, sophisms, apophthegms, and sarcasms, drives
them before him with unmerciful lashings, and almost always makes
them ridiculous and contemptible. His polemics everywhere leave
marks of blood. It is a wonder that he was not killed by the heathens,
or excommunicated by the Catholics. His style is exceedingly
characteristic, and corresponds with his thought. It is terse, abrupt,
laconic, sententious, nervous, figurative, full of hyperbole, sudden
turns, legal technicalities, African provincialisms, or rather antiquated
or vulgar latinisms. In short, we see in this remarkable man, both
intellectually and morally, the fermenting of a new creation, but not
yet quite set free from the bonds of chaotic darkness and brought into
clear and beautiful order. 40
LACTANTIUS is another about whom not much is known. From what can
be determined, historians have never considered him to be of much
importance and for good reason. Eerdmans Handbook to the History of
Christianity has a brief comment:
Lactantius served as a tutor in Diocletian's court at Nicomedia, and
again later, after becoming a Christian, in Constantine's. His elegant
Latin earned him the title 'The Christian Cicero'. His book The Deaths
of the Persecutors luridly demonstrates that persecutors come to bad
ends, and three other apologetic works, including The Divine
Institutes, commend Christianity to educated readers. His theology
was defective, being often rationalistic and moralistic in tone.41
Philip Schaff adds:
40 Ibid., p. 825.
41 Eerdmans Handbook to The Historyuof Christianity, (Grand Rapids, Michigan, WM. B. Eerdmans
Publishing Company), p. 197.

51

Lactantius [was] a professor of eloquence in Nicomedia, and a man

of elegant culture. . . Lactantius was the tutor of his [Constantine's]
eldest son, Hosius was his trusted counselor who probably suggested
to him the convening of the first ecumenical synod; he was, we may
say, for a few years his ecclesiastical prime minister. They [Lactantius
and Hosius] were, each in his way, the emperor's chief advisors and
helpers in the great change that gave the religion of the cross the
moral control over the vast empire of Rome. 42
Why Bercot wishes to use a man who was at the disposal of a pagan
emperor by choice, who was a politician and an eloquent orator, who was
advisor to the dreaded Constantine and instrumental in his decisions, who
was known by Christians and non-Christians alike as the Christian's Cicero,
and whose theology was defective, rationalistic and moralistic is something
of a mystery. Two possibilities present themselves for pondering: 1) As a
humanist and rationalist, who was unsound in doctrine, Lactantius was
reasonably in line with the Gnostic Christianity of Clement of Alexandria and
Origen and the Platonic and Stoic Christianity of Justin the philosopher. 2)
Since little is known, Bercot can infer arcane knowledge about Lactantius
that would support his views if only he had written them down. In fact he
does essentially that:
Lactantius (lack TAN she us) is less familiar to most Christians today.
This is our loss, because he wrote with unusual clarity and eloquence. .
. .The writings of Lactantius are important because they were written
at the very end of the pre-Constantine period of the church. They
demonstrate that most Christian beliefs had changed very little during
the 223 years from the end of the Apostle John's life to the beginning
of Constantine's reign.43
We have just seen, from Philip Schaff and W.B. Eerdman, two
unimpeachable Church historians, that this is simply nonsense. Lactantius,
the orator and politician, who was a rationalist and a humanist and cared
little for sound doctrine, represented the views of no orthodox Christian of
the early period. We do, however, see his views showing up in the
humanistic views of the Roman Hierarchy; views that were opposed by
Augustine, Jerome, Athanasius, Chrysostom, and Tertullian.
Before moving on from Bercot's eight writers, there is an interesting
occurrence here to which I wish to call your attention. Bercot will later make
use of small quotations from both Clement of Rome, the first notable
42 Ibid., pp. 865-66.
43 Bercot, p. 21.

52

churchman of the Post-Apostolic era, and Hippolytus, whose public life and
ministry fell between A.D. 198 and A.D. 236, yet he fails to include them,
along with any sketch of their views and character. Why is that, do you
suppose? There is no way of knowing for sure, but certain factors do seem
to bear on this book.
Even a cursory examination of the Epistle of Clement and what other
writings exists, will soon show that Clement was indeed a supporter of
salvation by faith and grace, and that alone. Bercot can take a small citation
from him that was intended to focus on Sanctification and holy living, and
make it appear to be in support of Bercot's doctrine, but he does not want to
direct your attention to the man or his doctrine, neither can Bercot possibly
make any sketch that will ignore that fact without resorting to things for
which he would almost surely be caught. Additionally, a study of Clement of
Rome will put the lie to the claim that all of the early Christians said exactly
the same thing about salvation and were in perfect agreement on all
fundamental doctrines. And then too, it is an easy thing for the uninitiated in
Church history to become confused between Clement of Rome and Clement
of Alexandria, if the two are not put in juxtaposition.
An equally brief study of Hippolytus will show several things to be so
which Bercot has denied. 1) The early men of the 2nd and 3rd century were
not placid men who agreed and disagreed amiably with no harsh words and
dogmatic positions. 2) The very kinds of heresies and departures from
orthodoxy existed in both Alexandria and
Rome at the turn of the 2nd century which Bercot says did not come along
until Constantine and Augustine. 3) There was at least one outspoken
churchman who was very angry about the Ebionism, Platonism, NeoPlatonism, Philonism, Stoicism and Gnosticism of Justin, Clement of
Alexandria and Origen, and who was taking them on very tenaciously,
branding their Greek Philosophy as opening the door to all of the heresies of
the Church. Philip Schaff correctly observes that these were really only two
heresies: Ebionism, which included all Jewish heresies including Chiliasm or
Zionism, and Gnosticism which comprehended all of the other philosophical,
religious, pseudo-Christian heresies. Bercot will quote selectively from him,
but he will not encourage you to study him in a comprehensive way.
Now you have Bercot's opinion of these men, as contrasted to the opinion
of legitimate Church history. This will form the basis for you to make an
objective decision about where they stood and what they believed. It will not
equip you to know those answers in depth, but it will make it possible to see
if Bercot has used or misused their testimonies.
Subject Matters Which We Will Not Cover
Since I do not, as I stated at the outset, plan a word by word commentary
on Bercot, I will skip over the subjects: Citizens of Another Kingdom, A
People Not Of This World, A Love Without Condition, A Childlike Trust In God,

53

Is Right And Wrong Simply A Matter of Culture?, DivorceA Roman Plague,

AbortionNot A 20th Century Phenomenon, High Fashion and Low Modesty,
Roman R-Rated Entertainment, Evolution Before Darwin, To The Roman, All
Men Were Not Created Equal, The Role Of Women In Roman Religion, Is
Conservative The Same As Godly?, Why They Succeeded Where We Often
Fail, and How The Church Helped Individuals Grow Spiritually.
We are not suggesting that these are not important subjects, but we are
saying that they, in and of themselves, do not tell us what Bercot believes
about Christian dogma. These fall into the category that we discussed
earlier when we talked about Jesus and Nicodemus. There are things in them
with which we would take issue in any event. But we cannot agree with any
of them until we know the doctrine of Bercot. If he were talking about the
works and the fruits of the Spirit in the life of a born-again Christian, we
might profitably engage in such a discussion. But if the foundation rests on
the dead works of fallen, mortal, religious man, then we are on different
wave lengths and there is no common denominator. And so, instead of
discussing these issues point by point, we shall focus on Bercot's doctrine
and where he is coming from.
Let me take time to illustrate. Suppose you are walking down a street and
you pass a tavern. Just as you do, the door flies open and the policemen are
dragging out a thoroughly drunk and disorderly man. He sees you and calls
out in belligerent and slurred tones, Hey brother, tell these policemen that
Jesus said we are supposed to love one another and to turn the other
cheek. Now suppose one of the Brethren who is a known and respected
preacher gets up the next Sunday morning and says, You know, brethren,
Jesus said we are supposed to love one another and to turn the other
cheek. These two statements may be semantically the same, but they are
not at all expressing the same axiom. One is true, the other, if it is not an
out-and-out lie, is at the very least a non-truth. Of course when you use an
illustration that vivid, the issue is easily seen, but let us see how subtle it
can get. Suppose I come to your church next Sunday and sit near the front.
While the brethren are discussing among themselves who is going to hold
forth, I stand up and say, You know, brethren, we are supposed to love one
another and turn the other cheek if any feels wronged by another. That is all
I wanted to say, I will sit down now. (Don't worry, I am not going to do that.
It is only an illustration) Your reaction is, Yes, but wait a minute. Is this
really something with which we can agree? Do we really know this man, his
doctrine and exactly where he is coming from and why? We know who he is,
and he is reported to be a Christian in the faith, but if we could sit down and
talk to him and ask him any questions we wanted to, what would we be left
with? How can we be sure we are talking about the same thing? While you
are pondering this, another man gets up, uninvited perhaps, but not shouted
down, and he says, Yes, I agree entirely with everything that man has said.
He is a neat appearing, conservatively dressed man with a colored, hard-

54

cover NIV Bible under his arm. Is he expressing truth with which we can
agree? If you can agree with me, can't you agree with him? If you agree
with me, do you have any right not to agree with him? But the fact is, as we
later discover, this man is a New Age religionist who does not believe in
Christ, an inerrant or inspired Bible, a literal creation, the resurrection or
eternity. He is sent out on a missionary endeavor to try to imply common
ground, generate some interest in his carefully worded views and see if he
can drag some people away from your group. Now can you agree with him
on the subject of love and turning the other cheek? Don't his words then
take on an entirely different meaning with which we cannot and do not want
to identify? Is there actually any discussion we can have with him on these
issues? Isn't our only legitimate discussion with him, as it applies to spiritual
matters, about repentance and conversion? Let us examine where Bercot is
coming from. The search begins to narrow and intensify with the next
subject.
People Of The Cross.
This section requires careful discernment because its message is illusive.
It could be the one that ties Bercot solidly to the outer fringes of orthodoxy;
or it could be the most crucial in ascertaining the distinctly unorthodox
theology of humanism. Here Bercot makes a number of significant
admissions and a few very significant omissions.
Admissions With Which We Can All Agree:
Bercot makes some points that, as stated at least, are not objectionable.
1. The modern Christian does not have enough willingness to suffer. He is
too soft. He has grown too accustomed to the easy life.
2. Any one who does not take up the cross of Christ is not worthy of Him.
3. Whosoever seeks to save his life will loose it, but he that is willing to
loose his life for Christ's sake will find it.
Bercot's Interpretations Of What This Means:
But what are the theological and doctrinal contents of these words? He
will tell us, if we listen carefully.
1. He who chooses to live well for eternity will live in discomfort for the
present. He will be subjected to all types of troubles and burdens as long as
he is on earth, so that in the end he will have divine and heavenly
consolation. (Lactantius) 44
2. Ignatius (Who was denounced by the other Orthodox Fathers as having
deliberately and fanatically brought suffering down on himself and other
Christians by his morbid fascination with martyrdom) was an example to
follow:
44 Ibid., pp. 55-6.

55

Ignatius, overseer of Antioch and a companion of the apostle John,

was arrested for his Christian testimony. While he was enroute to
Rome for trial and execution, he wrote letters of admonition and
encouragement to several Christian congregations. He told one
congregation, It is necessary, therefore, to not only be called by the
name Christian but to actually be a Christian.... If we are not ready to
die in the same manner of His suffering, His life is not in us. (St. John
12:25) To another he wrote, Bring on the fire and the cross. Bring on
the packs of wild beasts. Let there be the breaking and dislocating of
my bones and the severings of my limbs. Bring on the mutilation of
my whole body. In fact, bring on all the diabolical tortures of Satan.
Only let me attain to Jesus Christ! . . . I would rather die for Jesus
Christ than to reign over the ends of the entire earth. Shortly after
penning those words, Ignatius was brought before a screaming mob in
the Coliseum of Rome, where he was torn to pieces by wild animals. 45
In other words, to actually be a Christian, to Ignatius, meant to dare the
Romans to bring on the wild animals, to break his bones and to torture him.
This is Bercot's example of what Jesus meant.
Tertullian encouraged a group of local Christians who were
languishing in a Roman dungeon with these words, Blessed ones,
count whatever is hard in this lot of yours as a discipline of your
powers of mind and body. You are about to pass through a noble
struggle, in which the living God is your manager and the Holy Spirit is
your trainer. The prize is an eternal crown of angelic essence
citizenship in the heavens, glory everlasting. He also told them, The
prison does the same service for the Christian that the desert did for
the prophet. Our Lord himself spent much time in seclusion so he
would have greater freedom to pray and so he would be away from
the world.... The leg does not feel the chains when the mind is in
heaven..''46
If Tertullian was encouraging those who, through no fault of their own,
were about to be martyred, then we can share in his words. But Bercot gives
this a mandatory context. Unless you feel the lash of the whip, the weight of
the leg chain and the cold, slimy dankness of the prison floor, you are not
obeying Christ's commandment to take up your cross and follow Him. The
cross, then, is only a burden to be born on one's back, a suffering of physical
pain and imprisonment.
45 Ibid., p. 56.
46 Ibid.

56

This principle can be a profitable study in the pursuit of the Christian life
and discipleship. But it has no meaning in a discussion of Justification. By
this teaching of the letter instead of the spirit, every Christian in America,
including Bercot, is doomed to fail in his quest for eternal life. Bercot is not
really talking about suffering, but about works for salvation and how the
natural man can earn his salvation by them. He appears to say that unless
we go through with that which plagued the early Christians, we are not
Christians. Bercot realizes this so he cites the instance of a man who went
through the physical pain of suffering in an operation. With this story he
hopes to relate it to the present age. The correlation that is supposed to be
here is the physical of torturous suffering. Bercot dramatizes to be sure that
we get the point:
As I drove home from church, I marveled at how well the deacon
had illustrated the very point the pastor was trying to makewe don't
know what it means to suffer for being a Christian. We think when we
endure the same tribulations in life common to everyone, we are
suffering for Christ.47
This involuntary suffering has nothing at all to do with willing martyrdom
for Christ's sake, but Bercot uses it as a stepping stone. Not only are there
physical sufferings in operations, but there are emotional and mental
sufferings. Now Bercot has gotten into the area we discussed earlier. There
are two objectionable aspects to his case. 1) Granted there are emotional as
well as physical sufferings for the operated upon, but what has that got to
do with voluntary suffering for Christ's sake? It is misapplied to the people of
the cross. 2) And then, there is nothing wrong with what he says, unless he
is describing it as part of the innate goodness in man and part of the
meanings of earning salvation.
Omissions Which Are Revealing.
Though Bercot speaks of the cross, he does so only in the context of
obedience. He has no concept of the true meaning of the work of the cross:
atonement, vicarious suffering, expiation, judgment, redemption and
Justification. By people of the cross, Bercot does not mean those who have
abandoned all hope of righteousness by the law and in themselves and have
trusted in the achievements of the finished work of Christ on the cross,
the propitiation and the mercy seat (or the blood of atonement) and the
forgiveness of sins, as their only hope. He may or may not have grasped
some of what Jesus meant when He talked of taking up our crosses and
following, but none of what St. Paul meant when he said, God forbid that I
should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is
47 Ibid., pp. 57-8.

57

crucified unto me and I unto it. He has omitted the message of the Apostle
in Colossians 2: 12-17: Buried with him in baptism, wherein also ye are
risen with him through the faith of the operation of God, who hath raised
him from the dead. And you, being dead in your sins and the uncircumcision
of your flesh, hath he quickened together with him, having forgiven you all
trespasses; blotting out the handwriting of ordinances that was against us,
which was contrary to us, and took it out of the way, nailing it to his cross;
and having spoiled principalities and powers, he made a shew of them
openly, triumphing over them in it. Let no man therefore judge you in meat,
or in drink or in respect of an holy day, or of the new moon, or of the
sabbath, which are a shadow of things do come; but the body is of Christ.
Bercot has in mind a suffering and martyrdom that takes men from the
materialistic and easy life and brings them into fellowship with God through
the example of His son. Though Bercot talks about suffering for Christ's sake
and though he tells us that we will only find our lives if we loose them, he
does not explain what this means. Is Christ Jehovah our Savior who saved us
by taking our place in judgment and suffering for our sins, or does He save
by example?
Are Humans Capable Of Obeying God?
Under this topical heading Bercot alleges a number of things:
1. The early Christians believed that they were capable of obeying God by
nature.
2. Early Christians didn't rely on their own strength. They realized their
need for divine assistance:
The early Christians didn't attempt to live such uncompromising
lives simply on their own strength. They realized their need for Divine
power. Of course, that's nothing new. Throughout the centuries,
Christians of all denominations have realized that we need God's help
in order to walk by His commandments. And I don't think any of us
have ever deliberately set out to serve God without his help. 48
Bercot makes no mention of Christ in us, the new nature, or the indwelling
Holy Ghost.
What frequently happens, however, is something like this: Initially,
we do walk closely with God, depending on His power. But we later
begin to backslide spiritually and slowly pull away from God. Normally,
this process begins internally; outwardly, we still act the same.
Although we still go through the motions of one who is depending on
God, our prayers begin to become cold and formalized. We may still
48 Ibid., p. 59.

58

read the Scriptures, but our minds and hearts are on other interests. In
the end, we find ourselves depending entirely on our own strength. 49
To Bercot, the issue is one of whether mentally we rely on God or on our
own strength. You may say that this could mean relying on the old nature or,
by faith, relying on the new nature through the power of the Holy Ghost. It
could of course, but does it? We shall see in due course. Bercot's departure
from orthodox Christianity begins to take shape:
The problem isn't that the church doesn't preach about the need for
relying on God's strength. In fact, evangelical Christians generally
teach that we are incapable of doing anything good on our own
strength. But if we humans are simply unable to obey God, there is
nothing we can do about our disobedience except to pray for God to
change us into obedient persons. Yet, does this really work? 50
At this point Bercot challenges the orthodox Christian precept that man
cannot obey God in the powers of the flesh. He does not issue this challenge
on scriptural grounds, but on experiential grounds, chiding those Christians
who look silly in his example.
I remember my excitement when I first heard someone preach that
we can't do anything good by our own poweronly God can do good
things through us. We only have to ask God to change our faults and
to overcome our sins for us. So this is the secret, I thought to myself.
I couldn't wait to put the idea into practice, simply letting God change
my faults and eradicate my sins. I prayed eagerly for God to do this
very thing. I gave it all to God. Then I waitedbut nothing happened.
So I prayed more. Still nothing changed. At first, I thought the problem
was just me. Were my prayers not sincere? I finally talked to other
Christians in private about the matter and found that I wasn't the only
one with this problem. Others had obtained no better results than I
had. So why do you go around saying that God magically takes away
our faults and turns us into obedient persons? I asked them.
Because that's the way it's supposed to work, was the reply. I
realized that most Christians were afraid to express themselves
honestly about the matterfor fear that they were the only ones who
hadn't been successful. So here we were all re-enacting the story of
the emperor's new clothes because we were afraid others would
consider us unspiritual. 51
49 Ibid.
50 Ibid.
51 Ibid., pp. 59-60.

59

Bercot relates his personal experiences, by which he hopes to prove that

natural man can do good in his own strength and that anyone who believes
otherwise is a silly goose, sitting around idly and pathetically and looking at
the sky. Bercot cites unnamed people in unnamed places, taught by
unnamed preachers and unnamed denomin- ations. Why not name these
places and people. After all Bercot, later on, has no problem naming Nicaea
and St. Augustine and calling him a sadist, a fool and a liar. So why not tell
us who these people are. I am intrigued. I have never run into such
preaching or such hapless fools as these.
Bercot here uses the phrase, we were all re-enacting the story of the
emperor's new clothes. 52 I assume that by this Bercot intends to call
attention to the adage, The emperor has no clothes. If so, why not say so.
If Bercot is worried that such an adage would wound the sensibilities of
Anabaptist people, then why use it at all. Or maybe Bercot simply has not
heard or read correctly and is engaging in another of the many instances of
neologism found in his book.
In a strange statement, the reason for which I am unsure, Bercot takes a
large step toward undermining not only what he has just said, but the whole
argument of his book:
I'm not saying that the sit-back-and-pray approach hasn't ever
worked for anyone. I am saying that it hasn't worked for me, and
historically it hasn't worked for the church. 53
I am not sure where he gets his information and permission to speak for
individuals throughout the history of the Church, but if Bercot is not sure
that his principle is all-pervasive, true or necessary, then what is the point?
Does he really mean to say that a biblical principle that will work for some,
will not work for others? Is he trying to tell us that some men can do the will
of God in their natural state (with God's help) while others cannot?
Apparently realizing the weakness of his argument, Bercot makes a dramatic
gesture, hoping to regain the control of his argument by the use of a buzz
word:
Our evangelical doctrine on this matter comes from Martin Luther,
who taught that we are totally incapable of doing any good by
ourselves and that both the desire and power to obey God come from
Him alone. Although these were cornerstone teachings of the German
Reformation, they didn't produce a German nation of obedient, godly
Christians, but rather just the opposite. Lutheran Germany was a
52 Ibid., p. 60.
53 Ibid.

60

cesspool of drunkenness, immorality, and violence. Sitting back and

letting God do all the work produced neither a godly church nor a
godly nation.54
We are startled that Martin Luther is abruptly and in an illogical fashion
inserted into this 2nd and 3rd century discussion. Apparently the whole
thing is Martin Luther's fault. Bercot gives no biblical or historical
documentation nor doctrinal argument for his claim. He simply announces,
emphatically, that the idea that man is evil by nature comes from Luther. Yet
Bercot will later argue that St. Augustine invented this doctrine in the 4th
and 5th centuries. Now, if Bercot believes in Origen's reincarnation doctrine,
maybe Martin Luther was Augustine, or maybe he was around before him?
Certainly according to Bercot and Origen, Martin Luther would need to come
around at least one more time before getting it right. In the apparent hope
of giving further weight to a sagging argument, Bercot makes another of his
arbitrary and inaccurate statements:
In contrast, the early Christians never taught that humans are
incapable of doing good or overcoming sin in their lives. They believed
that we have the ability to serve and obey God.55
As Bercot continues, he reveals the true nature of his humanistic religious
beliefs:
However, first we must have a deep love for God and a profound
respect for His commandments. As he phrased it, the Lord has to be
in the Christian's heart, not simply on his lips. At the same time, the
early Christians didn't believe that they could overcome all of their
weaknesses and remain obedient to God day after day simply on their
own strength. They needed additional power from God. But it wasn't a
matter of sitting back and asking God to do all the work. They
believed that our walk with God is a joint project. The Christian himself
must be willing to sacrifice, to pour his energy and very soul into the
project. But he also must recognize his need for God's help. As Origen
explained, He makes Himself known to those who, after doing all that
their powers will allow, confess that they need help from Him.
The early church believed that a Christian must earnestly desire and
seek God's help. It wasn't a matter of a one-time request, either, but a
continual process. Clement taught his students, A man by himself
working and toiling at freedom from sinful desires achieves nothing.
54 Ibid.
55 Ibid.

61

But if he plainly shows himself to be very eager and earnest about

this, he attains it by the addition of the power of God. God works
together with willing souls. But if the person abandons his eagerness,
the spirit from God is also restrained. To save the unwilling is the act of
one using compulsion; but to save the willing, that of one showing
grace. So they viewed personal righteousness as a joint project
between God and man. There was an infinite supply of power from
God; the key was to be able to tap into this power. The earnest desire
had to come from the Christian himself. As Origen remarked, we aren't
blocks of wood that God manipulates at his fancy. We are human
beings capable of desiring God and of responding to Him. In referring
to the necessary eagerness on our part, Clement wasn't referring
simply to a bare desire. Rather, he said we had to be willing to suffer
painful internal persecution. Putting to death our fleshly ways was
going to hurt, and if we weren't willing to suffer internally, wrestling
with our sins, then God wasn't going to supply the power. 56
Here Bercot has declared, using the quotations the ancients to shore up
his claim, that natural born man has the ability to serve God. Man must
initiate the action. God will not respond with additional help until man has
done all that he can do. God helps those who help themselves is a
Justification, not a Sanctification message with Bercot. Not only that but
man, according to the quote from Origen as applied by Bercot, may not even
admit to God that he needs help until he has done all that his power will
allow. That which man can do involves total love for God and a deep
respect for His commandments. This apparently means something more
than just believing that the Ten Commandments (or other commandments of
God) are true and holy. There must be some kind of inner, philosophical
entering in and bonding together with them. Righteousness is a joint project.
Part of the power is supplied by God and part by man, or, in Bercot's
formula, part is supplied by man first, and then by God. But it is not only
power that man contributes part of. It is goodness and righteousness itself.
The early Christians, according to Bercot, taught that were men capable by
nature of serving and obeying God. Righteousness was a joint project
between man and God.
Before moving on, there are two things to which I wish to call your
attention. From the beginning of this section, Are Humans Capable of
Obeying God?, until the end of it in a few paragraphs, Bercot never once
mentions the New Birth, the indwelling Holy Spirit, Grace, the New Covenant
or the New Nature. Clement speaks of the spirit of God, on page 61, with a
small s! This is almost certainly in keeping with Bercots own theology, as
we shall see. Bercot speaks exclusively of man's innate ability to serve God
56 Ibid., pp. 60-1.

62

and God's willingness to help us out in that venture. He does use the name
of Christ in the next to the last sentence of the section, but the way he uses
it is most significant: They could easily avoid this punishment if they wished
to [by denying Christ]. But they endure it willingly because they put their
trust in God.''
In other words, denying Christ was the test of their loyalty to God. But the
power does not come from Christ; it comes from God. It is trust in God, not
in Christ, that makes the difference. The spirit of God, to Bercot, is not a
person, but a oneness with God in thinking and in purpose that comes to our
spirits, which are good and capable of knowing God by natural birth, when
we give it our all. And in this thing of giving it our all, we are not talking
about sincerity, goodness, or duty. Don't think that if you are a good farmer,
housewife, son, daughter, preacher or elder, you have done enough to win
favor with God and earn salvation. Perish the thought, my half-hearted
brother or sister:
In referring to the necessary eagerness on our part, Clement wasn't
referring simply to a bare desire. Rather, he said we had to be willing
to suffer painful internal persecution. Putting to death our fleshly
ways was going to hurt, and if we weren't willing to suffer internally,
wrestling with our sins, then God wasn't going to supply the power. 57
Pay no attention to what Clement may or may not have meant. It is what
Bercot means that is at issue here. If you are living in comfort and joy, if you
are not in a constant turmoil and struggle within, if you are not living with
guilt and anxiety, if you are not a masochist and a self-inflictionist for the
cause of God, then you are kidding yourself if you think you are on a course
to earn your salvation, according to the doctrines of David C. Bercot.
Now Bercot begins his apology for this chapter:
Some people may be disturbed by this early Christian teaching. But
as Jesus said, ''Though you do not believe me, believe the works.
(John 10:38 NAS) Before we disparage the theology of the early
Christians, we had better have a good explanation for their power. We
can't deny the fact that they had incredible power. Even the pagan
Romans didn't dispute this. As Lactantius declared, When people see
that men are lacerated by various kinds of tortures yet remain
unsubdued even when their very torturers are worn out, they come to
believe that the agreement of so many and the unyielding faith of the
dying is not without meaning. 58
57 Ibid., p. 61.
58 Ibid., pp. 60-1.

63

Bercot has made two claims here. One is that his doctrine has the force of
the teaching and practice of the post-apostolic orthodox Church. We will
address that a bit later. The second thing he says is that people will know of
the genuineness of our faith when they see us willing to suffer and die for it.
While the Bible speaks much of the willingness to suffer, nowhere in the
Bible that we are aware of is that made the sign of disciples to the world at
large. By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, that ye have love
one for the other, is what the Bible says. The willingness to suffer if
necessary is mandatory for effective Christian service, but it is not the sign
of discipleship. Lactantius' statement is about par, in my thinking for a
politician and an orator. He has said no more than Lincoln at Gettysburg. Of
course, those who suffer willingly do not do so unless that suffering has
meaning to them. But that tells us nothing about that meaning. Does Bercot
want to argue that soldiers who die for love of country are doing the will of
God? If so, he is in trouble later on in his book. Even Bercot acknowledges
that many people threw themselves unwisely and unnecessarily into the
sword and the fire. What shall we say of them? What of the Buddhist who
sets himself on fire or the Marxist activist of today who is willing to die for
his beliefs, as off the mark as they may be? Are we forced to accept the
legitimacy of any belief that is documented by the martyrdom of its
adherents? If not, how then can we test the voracity of the belief of an early
Christian (or professing Christian) simply because he was martyred? Thus it
appears that this is not necessarily testimony or power. What then of
Bercot's question: how do we explain the power of the early Christians?
Maybe it was neither testimony nor power, and, as we shall see, maybe
many of them were not Christians in the orthodox sense? Yet Bercot offers
fanaticism, suffering and martyrdom as the proof of natural man's ability to
do good and serve God.
There Is More To The Story.
Bercot wishes that we might learn lessons from the early Church as he
sees it. Those lessons are that the early Christians were able to live as
citizens of another kingdom and as people of a different culture because
of:
1. The supporting role of the Church.
2. The message of the cross.
3. The belief that man and God must work together for man's holiness. 59
You may think it strange that Bercot, who started out by making an
emphatic point that the message was not cultural, would now make
reference to their very different culture. But there is definite method to
this. A very distinct part of Bercot's argument is that the oral tradition of the
59 Ibid., p. 62.

64

early Christians carries more weight than the written Scriptures and that
they, not we, were living in that culture. Only they could know what
Christianity, as taught by the apostles, meant. When Bercot made the point
that Christianity in the early days was not cultural, he wanted to seal off
anyone from trying to evade the things that he was saying by arguing that it
was a different time and a different culture. Now that he has or at least
thinks that he has got us to accept his views on the teachings of the early
Church and how they take precedence over any other including our own,
another concern comes into play. He wants to convince us that only they
could have known what the Apostles really meant. This means that we are
duty bound to accept what Bercot has said in this book, because he has
proven to us what the early Church taught. He has exclusive knowledge and
it is totally different from anything that anyone has taught us before. But
this is only a dropped hint at this point. That argument comes later. Still, he
is conditioning us for the cultural aspect which is crucial to his argument.
Again Bercot speaks of the message of the cross. To Bercot, it is an
example of the extreme dedication and suffering that we must undergo to,
with some help from God, save ourselves. Bercot continues to beat the drum
of man's innate goodness and the duty to lend our zeal and good works to
God's provision in order for salvation to occur. The belief that man and God
must work together for man's holiness, was an enabling factor that made it
possible for the early Church to live faithful lives.
What They Believed About Salvation.
As Bercot continues to build his case, his training as a lawyer and the
absence of any training as a minister or a theologian, becomes more and
more obvious. A minister is honor-bound and accountable to God to tell you
the whole story (whether he understands and likes it or not) and let you
make up your mind. A lawyer's training is to manipulate your minds to force
you to come to his conclusion, whether you want to or not, whether it is true
or not. He will down-play or ignore those things which are troubling to his
argument before the court, while over-emphasizing and mischaracter- izing
those things upon which he wishes his case to hang. While Bercot decries
those who give lip service only, he continues to major in the letter, rather
than the spirit, and to edit and rearrange facts to suit himself. No wonder
Jesus said, Woe unto you lawyers!
To this point, there are a number of crucial elements to Bercot's argument
that have been put into view:
1. His edited version of who the early Christians (not fathers!) were.
2. Whether or not humans can do the will of God.

65

3. The message of the cross, which, to Bercot , is a message of the

willingness to suffer and an example left to us by Christ.
4. His doctrine of God and of the Holy Trinity.
Bercot has not brought this last doctrine out into the open and declared it
in so many words. He is far too shrewd to defame the Holy Trinity to a group
of people he considers to be traditional Anabaptists . He has done it by
omission, by referring only to God when talking about power, obedience
and salvation, by referring to Christ only when talking about the cross and
obedience to suffering (a bit later on, when his doctrine of salvation is past,
he will refer to Christ more in order to put down criticism. But he will not and
cannot do it now) and by using a small s when making his few references
to the spirit of God. He has made several quotations from the ancients
which refer to the Holy Spirit (some in a very elusive and hidden way so as
to give the impression that it is he who is talking when it is not), but Bercot
has initiated no reference to a belief of his own in the Holy Spirit. In this
we can see, as he, of course, wants us to see eventually without alarming or
scaring anyone off, the Gnostic-Origen, Arian, doctrine of God. It is, simply
put: God the Father alone is JEHOVAH, The God. Christ the Son, a created
being who was born to God and the hosts of heaven who are his mother,
is a god. He is the savior of the world, but only by example. Christ shows
us the way to God which is for man to suffer as the ultimate and exhaustive
expression of his abilities, for the Kingdom. While Christ is somewhat higher
than us, he is essentially no better than us, for he is our brother. We too are
creations of God, so we, like Christ, can the heretical doctrines of
evangelical Christianity notwithstanding do the will of God, please God
and thereby earn eternal life. That, to Bercot, is the message of the cross
and what it means to be people of the cross.
The Holy Ghost, to Bercot, is a figment of the heretical imagination. There
is no person of the Holy Ghost. What the Bible is talking about is the spirit of
God. It is just like the spirit of man that is in us. Is it any different than we
are? Can it be separated from us? Is it another person? No more is the
spirit of God a person. Though you may have missed it, Bercot has been
saying this rather clearly from the second chapter on.
Having pretty well set this stage, and having warned us against listening
to theologians, doctrinarians and Orthodox Fathers, Bercot now wants to
get into theology and doctrine.
When I first began studying the early Christian writings, I was
surprised by what I read. In fact, after a few days of reading, I put their
writings back on the shelf and decided to scrap my research
altogether. After analyzing the situation, I realized the problem was
that their writings contradicted many of my own theological views.
This is not to say that I found no support for any of my beliefs in the
early Christian writings. Their understandings corroborated many of

66

my views. On the other hand, they frequently taught the opposite of

what I believed, and they even labeled some of my beliefs as
heretical. The same would probably hold true of many of your
beliefs.60
This patronizing statement is a common ploy for anyone who is going to
tell you that you are wrong. It is supposed to mean: I know, I know, don't
tell me. I used to believe all of that until I got my eyes opened. There is also
supposed to be a sympathy factor that will disarm you: Hey, listen, I was
fooled too, it isn't just you. They had me taken in for a long time. Not only is
this a standard psychological gimmick but it is part of the indoctrination and
teaching for Jehovah's Witness and Mormon missionaries who are sent out to
make raids on what are determined to be vulnerable churches. Maybe
Bercot is one of them, maybe he isnt, but he is certainly drawing on that
tradition. But they aren't the only ones who use it. In recent months I have
been told by three different people that their father was either a Baptist or a
Methodist minister and that they used to believe that stuff until they got
smart. Over the last twenty years, I would say that at least one hundred
people, maybe more, have told me, in this county alone, that their father
was either a Baptist or a Methodist minister. If everyone whose father was
supposed to be a minister, had really had a minister for a father, we would
be clear up to our ears in Baptist and Methodist ministers. Maybe that would
be alright, but the point is, it simply isn't true. It is common barnyard
psychology and strategy for anyone who wishes to put down your beliefs.
Bercot gives five examples to illustrate that which shocked him so bad
that he put up his books and did not want to face up to it for a long time.
Still he prefaces them by saying:
These five examples are not the hardest of their beliefs for us to
accept, but neither are they the easiest. You may find that you agree
with their views on some of these matters, but it's unlikely that you'll
agree on all of them.61
It seems inconsistent that Bercot, raised as a Jehovahs Witness by his
own admission, would have been shocked into intellectual seclusion by
beliefs that you and I might not find hard to accept and with which you will
probably agree in part and may agree in total, though he doubts it. It seems
eminently more likely that these are the hardest cases that Bercot can
make, even by selective editing of the writings of the ancients, with any
appearance of integrity. And then too, Bercot may not want to tell you that
you don't agree with these views. Perhaps he fears prejudicing your minds to
60 Ibid., p. 63.
61 Ibid.

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think that you don't believe something when perhaps you don't know
whether you do or not.
Are We Saved By Faith Alone?
Here Bercot, in trying to chide the doctrine of Faith Alone, tacitly
acknowledges what the apostle's doctrine was in the matter.
If there's any single doctrine that we would expect to find the
faithful associates of the apostles teaching, it's the doctrine of
salvation by faith alone. After all, this is the cornerstone doctrine of
the Reformation. In fact, we frequently say that persons who don't
hold to this doctrine aren't really Christians. 62
Bercot does not explain why anyone who does not agree with this doctrine
would expect to find the faithful associates of the apostles teaching it. Nor
does he tell us what the fact that we would expect to find the apostles and
their associates teaching it has to do with the Reformation which was fifteen
hundred years later. Bercot has taken in too much territory and tried to tie
too many things to one hitch.
1) If he wishes to say that no knowledgeable person would expect to find
the followers of the apostles teaching this doctrine, since the apostles did
not teach it, he should say so.
2) If he wants to say that the apostles taught it but the early Church did
not, (which is really what he is saying and the only thing he can say since
the Bible is clear on what the apostles taught), he should say that.
3) If he wishes to accuse the Reformation of distorting the doctrine of the
Scriptures, the Apostles and the early Church, then that should be his
theme.
But to say that since the Reformers in the 16th century believed in the
doctrine of salvation by faith alone, there is an assumption that the apostles
taught it and therefore we would expect the early followers of the apostles
to teach it is nearly in coherent. The vast majority of Christian people in this
world, who faithfully read the Bible (particularly Arminians) have never read
anything written by Luther or Calvin and know little or nothing about what
they taught or believed. I am confronted by outraged and dumbfounded
people rather commonly when I explain over a radio program what Luther
taught about vicarious obedience. They have never heard of such a thing
before. You would probably be hard pressed to go into the average
evangelical, fundamental Church and find anyone who could tell you, with
any degree of accuracy of comprehensiveness, what Luther's doctrine of
vicarious obedience was or any specific thing that Calvin taught in his
famous Institutes of the Christian Faith. I know what he taught, because I
62 Ibid., p. 64.

68

have read it. While I agree with many things that Calvin said, I do not come
down where he does, and I know why I don't, but most Christian people do
not. After having listened to Bercot, I do not believe that he does either.
Then Bercot says, In fact, we frequently say that persons who don't hold to
this doctrine aren't really Christians. I wonder who the we are that Bercot
is referring to? Is he identifying with evangelical Christianity?
Bercot them moves on to build his case against salvation by faith alone.
The story we usually hear about church history is that the early
Christians taught our doctrine of salvation by faith alone. But after
Constantine corrupted the church, it gradually began to teach that
works play a role in our salvation.
Fairly typical of the scenario painted is the following passage from
Francis Schaeffer's How Should We Then Live? After describing the fall
of the Roman Empire and the decline of learning in the West, Schaeffer
wrote: Thanks to the monks, the Bible was preservedalong with
sections of Greek and Latin classics.... Nevertheless, the pristine
Christianity set forth in the New Testament gradually became
distorted. A humanistic element was added: Increasingly, the authority
of the church took precedence over the teaching of the Bible. And
there was an ever-growing emphasis on salvation as resting on man's
meriting the merit of Christ, instead of on Christ's work alone. 63
I wonder if Bercot really wishes to argue with the statement that the
Christianity set forth in the New Testament was pristinely pure? If he wishes
to argue with the statement that a Hellenistic element was added in the
Ante-Nicene period, we shall soon answer that. If he wishes to argue that
the Roman Catholic Church of the Medieval times did not corrupt the
doctrines of Grace and add human works, penance and payments of all sorts
into the Church's official doctrine of salvation, then Bercot is not only a
rephraser of history, but a poor student of it.
It is not my purpose to defend Schaeffer. I personally knew Francis
Schaeffer in an informal way and I liked him as a person, but I did not agree
with many of his doctrines. But I am not sure that he meant to say that the
notion of salvation by works, not grace, crept into the church after Nicaea. If
so he was wrong. There is no arguing that this doctrine was held by some in
the Church all along.
But Bercot's following statement is another exercise in wishful thinking
and imagination.

63 Ibid.

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The early Christians universally believed that works obedience play

an essential role in our salvation. This is probably quite a shocking
revelation to most evangelicals. But that there's no room for doubt
concerning, this matter, I have quoted below (in approximate
chronological order) from early Christian writers of virtually every
generation from the time of the Apostle John to the inauguration of
Constantine: Clement of Rome, who was a companion of the apostle
Paul and overseer of the church in Rome, wrote, It is necessary,
therefore, that we be prompt in the practice of good works. For He
forewarns us, Behold, the Lord comes and His reward is before His
face. . . to render to every man according to his work. . . . Let us
therefore earnestly strive to be found in the number of those who wait
for Him, in order that we may share in His promised reward. But how,
beloved ones, shall we do this? By fixing our thoughts on God by faith.
By earnestly seeking the things that are pleasing and acceptable to
Him. By doing the things that are in harmony with His blameless will.
And by following the way of truth, casting away from us all
unrighteousness and sin. 64
Earlier Bercot has omitted Clement of Rome from his list of early
Christians. He knew very well what he was doing when he did it. Clement is
most often considered to be the fellow worker spoken of by St. Paul. The first
and most honorable of the Apostolic Fathers believed fully in the doctrine of
salvation by faith and grace alone and not by works. Bercot did not wish to
direct attention to him. Indeed Clement, along with Polycarp, were the two
original Apostolic Fathers (Barnabas was the other). But now he cites
Clement of Rome as being in harmony with his Arian doctrines of salvation
by works. The truth is that Clement was on very clear record in the matter.
Clement bears clear testimony to the doctrines of the Trinity (God,
the Lord Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit, who are the faith and the
hope of the elect), of the Divine dignity and glory of Christ, salvation
only by his blood, the necessity of repentance and living faith,
Justification by grace, Sanctification by the Holy Spirit, the unity of the
church, and the Christian graces of humility, charity, forbearance,
patience, and perseverance. 65
Later on Bercot himself quotes Clement of Rome:
We are not justified by ourselves. Nor by our own wisdom,
understanding, godliness, or works done in holiness of heart. But by
64 Ibid., pp. 64-5.
65 Schaff, II, p. 643.

70

that faith through which Almighty God has justified all men since the
beginning.66
There is no fundamental, evangelical Christian anywhere who does not
believe in good works, rewards for the faithful, perseverance, watchfulness
and the participation of man's will and works in Sanctification. The citation
that Bercot has given from Clement of Rome mentions faith and says
nothing about a doctrine of Justification by works. Calvin taught the
perseverance of the saints, demanded a rigorous level of obedience and
good works and flatly proclaimed that those who did not do good works are
not elected to salvation. But to use Clement of Rome's belief in obedience in
the life of a Christian, faithfulness, watchfulness and the hope of eternal
rewards as an affirmation of Bercot's Neo-Platonic doctrines is worse than
dishonesty, it is charlatanism. No one knows better than Bercot that
Clement of Rome thoroughly denounced the doctrine that Bercot is
upholding. The above quotation makes it clear that Clement of Rome was at
poles opposite from the Arian humanism of the inherent goodness of man
and salvation by works and grace.
Bercot also misapplies his citation from Polycarp. Schaff has cited
Polycarp's belief in the Pauline doctrines of Justification by faith. Speaking of
Clement of Rome's statement concerning the faith of the Old Testament
Saints in the citation above, Schaff quotes Polycarp:
An echo of Paul's teaching is found in Polycarp, Ad Phil.. c. 1, where
he refers to the firm root of their faith, preached to them from olden
times, which remains to this day, and bears fruit in our Lord Jesus
Christ. 67
Again, Bercot later quotes Polycarp:
Polycarp wrote, Many desire to enter into this joy, knowing that by
grace you are saved, not of works, but by the will of God through Jesus
Christ. (Eph. 2:8) 68
Bercot then cites Barnabas in support of his views:
Barnabas states: He who keeps these [commandments], will be
glorified in the kingdom of God; but he who chooses other things will
be destroyed with his works. 69
66 Bercot, pp. 67-8.
67 Schaff, II, p. 667.
68 Bercot, p. 68.
69 Ibid., p. 65.

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Barnabas is another of the fathers that Bercot did not list in his eight.
Barnabas was so outspokenly Pauline in his doctrine that legalists in
Alexandria accused him of not believing that man had free moral agency or
responsibility. Barnabas did not believe that, but was talking about the
source and the means of Justification. We suspect that Bercot knows this, or
he would have listed him with the Eight since he was the first and most
prominent of the Apostolic Fathers. Certainly he knew enough of Barnabas'
views to make the following quote later on:
Barnabas wrote, To this end the Lord delivered up His
flesh to corruption, that we might be sanctified through
the remission of sins, which is effected by His blood.'' 70
Bercot makes no attempt to distinguish between the doctrine of
Justification and Sanctification. This is apparently true for two reasons. 1)
Bercot does not understand, as unfortunately most Christians do not, the
great salvation and particularly that part of it which relates to Sanctification.
2) It would matter little in any case, for Bercot does not believe in the great
salvation provided for us on the cross. Bercot knows only the salvation that
we secure for ourselves in the end by our good works, without the new birth
and the new nature, with a little help from God (or a lot of help from God as
the case may be). Barnabas traveled a great deal with St. Paul. It seems
evident that Barnabas is here referring to Sanctification. From the scarcity of
language it is hard to be certain.
What Bercot is up to in this chapter is a sort of a back-door way of
documenting his doctrine of salvation by works. He is saying in effect that
since these men were on record as saying they believed in works for
salvation, then their later statements (later in his book) that seem to speak
of salvation by grace have to be understood in this already established light.
In other words, whatever they meant by grace and faith, they could only
have meant that the primary responsibility and burden was on man, who
could do good works and must do as many as possible before the help from
God, that was needed as an added boost, would kick in. But this is nothing
more than doctrine by accommodation, acclamation, reconciliation and the
process of elimination. This is not the way to establish the doctrine of
salvation, but if it were, Bercot would be out of luck because Romans was
written before and appears in the Bible before James. Thus the onus would
be on Bercot to reconcile St. James to St. Paul in Romans 3 and 4.
I think it is timely to establish clearly the Orthodox doctrine of Salvation
and of the Sanctification aspect of it, before going further, so that you can
70 Ibid., p. 68.

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see how it is not at all clear that some of these citations mean what Bercot
interprets them to mean.
The Historic Orthodox Christian Doctrine of Sanctification.
Sanctification is one of the three components of the doctrine of the Great
Salvation . The Orthodox formula is:
1. Man is body, soul and spirit.
2. Justification has to do with the salvation of the spirit. Sanctification has
to do with the salvation of the soul, and Glorification has to do with the
salvation of the body.
3. Justification is a past salvation for the Christian. We have been saved.
Sanctification is a present salvation. We are being saved. Glorification is a
future salvation. We shall be saved.
4. Justification is salvation from the penalty of sin and has to do with the
judicial aspects of man's sins and God's judgment. Sanctification is salvation
from the power of sin to rule over us in our lives and has to do with the
inheritance of the saints and rewards in the day of judgment. Glorification is
salvation from the presence of sin and has to do with our future, physical,
immortal state.
5. A man will be Glorified because he has been Justified. Sanctification,
while it is real, consequential and commanded, does not determine whether
or not a man will be in the resurrection of the just on that last day. But it
does have consequences for that day. If any man's works shall be burned, he
shall suffer loss. If any man's works shall abide, he shall receive a reward.
We must all stand before the judgment seat of Christ so that every man can
receive for the works that he has done, whether they be good or bad. Be not
deceived, God is not going to be made a fool. Whatsoever a man sows, that
shall he also reap. They that have done good shall receive for the good that
they have done, and they that have done evil shall receive for the evil, and
there is no respect of persons with God.
To Orthodoxy, Sanctification, the salvation of the life or the soul (the two
words being identical in the Greek in this instance) is the great middle
ground of Christian teaching that makes it all relevant to you and me today.
There is an inheritance to be gained or lost. This is what it means, in
Orthodox doctrine, to live and reign with Christ in His Kingdom. Through
obedient Christian living, an abundant entrance into that Kingdom shall be
ministered to us, said St. Peter in the first chapter of his second letter. Yet no
violent man, immoral man, idolatrous man, liar or troublemaker has any
inheritance in the Kingdom, according to St. Paul in Ephesians 5:5,6. To
Orthodoxy this is a comment upon the Kingdom here and now and the
present spiritual condition and duty. It describes the state of a derelict child,
not of an unregenerate man.
To someone like Bercot, any mention of rewards, God's displeasure or
future consequences for our deeds makes reference to salvation which is a

73

single unit concept. You are either saved or you are not. But this is not the
orthodox biblical doctrine. And so it is possible that some of these men may
have been talking about the salvation of the life from the power of sin and
the rewards for faithful service. But this will certainly go far over the head of
a humanistic religionist whose mind has not been enlightened by a Holy
Ghost which he does not believe in any case.
Bercot cites one of the early fathers.
Hermas, who was probably a contemporary of the apostle John,
wrote, Only those who fear the Lord and keep His commandments
have life with God. But as to those who do not keep His
commandments, there is no life in them.... All, therefore, who despise
Him and do not follow His commandments deliver themselves to
death, and each will be guilty of his own blood. But I implore you to
obey His commands, and you will have a cure for your former sins. 71
With the application of this quote we have no quarrel. Hermas, we
concede, was a non-Christian, religiously legalistic heretic who believed in
salvation by good works and that alone. Schaff speaks of Hermas:
He views Christianity as a new law and lays chief stress on practice.
Herein he resembles James, but he ignores the liberty by which
James distinguishes the perfect Christian law from the imperfect old
law of bondage. He teaches not only the merit, but supererogatory
merit of good works and sin-atoning virtues or martyrdom. He knows
little or nothing of the gospel, never mentions the word, and has no
idea of justifying faith, although he makes faith the chief virtue and
the mother of virtues. He dwells on man's duty and performance more
than on God's gracious promise and saving deeds. In a word, his
Christianity is thoroughly legalistic and ascetic, and further off from
the evangelical spirit than any other book of the apostolic fathers.
Christ is nowhere named, nor his example held up for imitation (which
is the true conception of the Christian life); yet he appears as the Son
of God, and is represented as pre-existent and strictly divine. The
word Christian never occurs in his writings. 72
Hermas is probably in theological union with Bercot. But true Christianity
is hardly concerned with the opinions of such a fellow as this. We will have
none of a man who does not mention the name of our Christ, nor call
himself by the name of Christian.
Now Bercot brings in the testimony of Justin Martyr:
71 Ibid., p. 65.
72 Schaff, II, p. 684.

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In his first apology, written sometime before 150 A.D., Justin Martyr
told the Romans, We have been taught... that he accepts only those
who imitate the virtues that reside in Himself-restraint, justice, and
love of mankind. . . . And so we have received [this teaching] that if
men by their works show themselves worthy of His design, they are
deemed worthy of reigning in company with him, being delivered from
corruption and suffering. 73
After our experience with Hermas, it would seem prudent to inquire of
Bercots witnesses. What sort of person was Justin in terms of his beliefs and
teachings? Again we quote from Philip Schaff who has deduced the following
from Justin's writings and the opinions of other leaders of his day:
His [FLAVIUS JUSTINIUS, surnamed Philosopher and Martyr.'']
education was Hellenic [here comes in the Hellenic note that Bercot
denies]. . .Justin is the first among the fathers who may be called a
learned theologian and Christian thinker. . . .But, like all the AnteNicene writers, he had no clear insight into the distinction between the
Old Testament and the New, between the law and the gospel, nor any
proper conception of the depth of sin and redeeming grace, and the
justifying power of faith. His theology is legalistic and ascetic rather
than evangelical and free. He retained some heathen notions from his
former studies though he honestly believed them to be in full
harmony with revelation. Christianity was to Justin, theoretically, the
true philosophy. . . . He was not an original philosopher, but a
philosophizing eclectic, with a prevailing love for Plato, whom he
quotes more frequently than any other classical author. He may be
called, in a loose sense, a Christian Platonist. He was also influenced
by Stoicism. He thought that the philosophers of Greece had borrowed
their light from Moses and the prophets. But his relation to Plato after
all is merely external, and based upon fancied resemblances. . . . .
Whatever is rational is Christian, and whatever is Christian is rational.
The Logos endowed all men with reason and freedom, which are not
lost by the fall. He scattered seeds of truth before his incarnation, not
only among the Jews, but also among the Greeks and barbarians,
especially among philosophers and poets, who are the prophets of the
heathen. Those who lived reasonably and virtuously in obedience to
this preparatory light were Christians in fact, though not in name;
while those who lived unreasonably were Christless and enemies of
Christ. Socrates was a Christian as well as Abraham, though he did not
73 Bercot, pp. 65-6.

75

know it. None of the fathers or schoolmen has so widely thrown open
the gates of salvation. He was the broadest of broad churchmen.74
So much, we would suppose for any serious consideration given to the
opinions of Justin on the subject of salvation. The views of a man who
believed that Socrates was a Christian, though he did not know it, and who
was willing to throw
open the doors to the church
to any good heathen, can hardly be taken seriously, much less received as
an authority.
Bercot further appeals to the witness of Clement of Alexandria to establish
the orthodox doctrine of salvation:
Clement of Alexandria, writing in about 190, said, The Word, having
unveiled the truth, showed to men the summit of salvation, so that
either repenting they might be saved, or refusing to obey, they might
be condemned. This is the proclamation of righteousness: to those
who obey, rejoicing; to those who disobey, condemnation. And again,
Whoever obtains [the truth] and distinguishes himself in good works
shall gain the prize of everlasting life.... Some people correctly and
adequately understand how [God provides necessary power], but
attaching slight importance to the works that lead to salvation, they
fail to make the necessary preparation for attaining the objects of
their hope.75
What about the testimony of Clement? Was he the sort of leader whose
views should have sway with us?
Clement was the father of the Alexandrian Christian philosophy. He
united thorough biblical and Hellenic learning [again the Hellenic
influence] with genius and speculative thought. . . . His theology,
however, is not a unit, but a confused eclectic mixture of true
Christian elements with many Stoic, Platonic, and Philonic ingredients.
His writings are full of repetition, and quite lacking in clear, fixed
method. He throws out his suggestive and often profound thoughts in
fragments, or purposely veils them, especially in the Stromata, in a
mysterious darkness, to conceal them from the esoteric multitude, and
to stimulate the study of the initiated or philosophical Christians [this
is the various-levels-of-gnosis system of Gnosticism]. He shows here
an affinity with the heathen mystery cultus, and the Gnostic arena. . . .
The three leading works which he composed during his residence as
teacher in Alexandria, between the years 190 and 195, represent the
74 Schaff, II, pp. 719-23.
75 Bercot, p. 66.

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three stages in the discipline of the human race by the divine Logos,
corresponding to the three degrees of knowledge required by the
ancient mystagogues, and are related to one another very much as
apologetics, ethics, and dogmatics, or as faith, love, and mystic vision,
or as the stages of the Christian cultus up to the celebration of the
sacramental mysteries. . . . At the close the author portrays the ideal
of the true Gnostic, that is, the perfect Christian, assigning to him,
among other traits, a Stoical elevation above all sensuous affections.
The inspiring thought of Clement is that Christianity satisfies all the
intellectual and moral aspirations and wants of man. 76
You may wish to form your views of orthodoxy and salvation based upon
the confused almost incoherent theorizing and philosophizing of a
mystical mind that was part Gnostic, part Stoic, part Platonic and part
religious (I refuse to say part Christian because I don't know any such
phrase), who believed that the ideal Christian was a Gnostic; if so there is
little I can do to stop you. But go ahead on your own; dont wait for me.
Bercot is treating the integrity of understanding Christians in a cavalier
manner by this sort of patronization. But the low point has not been
reached; the worst (by far) is yet to come.
Bercot now resorts to the words of Origen to give credence to his
Goodness-Of-Man, Works-For-Salvation doctrine. It is the ultimate irony that
he should do this. Bercot is later to argue that sovereignty, election,
predestination and foreknowledge are the results of Gnostic impurities in the
Church. But the truth lies in just the opposite, as we shall soon see. There
was nothing at all in Gnosticism that needed or defended these fundamental
and orthodox doctrines of the Church. It was in fact the humanistic doctrines
of the inherent goodness of man, the semi-equality between Christ and,
man and immortality that comes through superior knowledge and mortal
goodness that relied upon Gnosticism and came from Gnosticism. We will
not go further with that argument for the moment because it comes up a bit
later; but we mention it here because, in support of his views, he takes
testimony of the two most notorious religious Gnostics of history, Origen and
Clement of Alexandria. These are the men who attempted to establish a
rational and scholastic correlation between Gnosticism and Christianity. It
would be desirable to attribute this attempt at twisting the truth 180% to
tyronism. Has not Bercot shown tendencies in that direction? But it is simply
too much to believe that this man, who contrives an argument to tar
Augustine and Athanasius with a Gnostic brush, knew nothing of the Gnostic
background, leanings and heretical teachings of Origen. Of course, Bercot
does not mention this in his brief and selective citation from Origen:
76 Schaff, II, pp. 783-4.

77

Origen, who lived in the early 200s, wrote, The soul. . . [will] be
rewarded according to what it deserves, being destined to obtain
either an inheritance of eternal life and blessedness, if its actions shall
have produced this for it, or to be delivered up to eternal fire and
punishments, if the guilt of its crimes shall have brought it down to
this.77
Here Bercot has engaged in less than candor. In citing these words from
Origen's First Things, Bercot does not tell us that Origen is not speaking
about his own beliefs but characterizing the beliefs of others with whom he
does not agree. Origen did not believe in eternal torment nor in annihilation.
He believed in final restoration of everyone, including the devil. That is one
of the problems with this kind of highly selective, out-of-context of
documentation. Still, Bercot knows that he is in some trouble on this, for he
puts condescending words in Origen's mouth, by quotations that he never
made, but Bercot makes for him:
In an unusual move, the elders of Alexandria appointed Origen, only
18 at the time, to take Clement's place as head of the training school.
They chose wisely, and Origen poured his very soul into the task. He
quit his short-lived profession as an instructor of grammar and
literature, and he sold all of his Greek literary books on credit to
another man. He subsisted in poverty off of the small monthly
installment payments he received from the sale of his Greek literary
books. He refused to accept any payment for his services as a
Christian teacher. After teaching new Christian believers all day, he
would study the Scriptures far into the night. Before long, Origen
became one of the most respected Christian teachers of his age.
Eventually, some of his students asked him to give a series of lectures
on the Bible, discussing each book of the Bible, passage by passage.
The students paid scribes to take down his words, and these became
the first set of Bible commentaries ever written by a Christian. Origen
didn't intend for these commentaries to be taken too seriously, since
he frequently went off on tangents and personal surmises. Throughout
the commentaries, he displayed an amiable, non-dogmatic disposition,
frequently ending a discussion by saying, Well, that's the best I can
do with that passage. Maybe someone with more insight has a better
explanation. 78
Bercot does not paraphrase Origen, but quotes him. He does not say
where or when Origen said this. To my knowledge he never said it. If Bercot
77 Bercot, p. 66.
78 Ibid., p. 18-19.

78

knows where, he should have given the citation. Perhaps Bercot will say that
this is a convenient quote by him on Origen's behalf and never intended to
be taken as anything more. The problem is that it is simply against the rules
of sound scholarship to give a quotation that a man never made. Beyond
that Bercot says that he said it. Origen was . . . frequently ending a
discussion by saying. . .[quote] There is no indication here that these are
words that Bercot made up for him.
Why would Bercot do this? Why would he risk the credibility of his
documentation by putting words in Origen's mouth? The reason is simple
enough. Bercot must claim Origen for his cause to keep his enemies from
using Origen against him. Bercot is only too painfully aware of what Origen
believed and taught. He must find a way to neutralizeat the very least
minimizethe fatal blow that can be struck to his whole tenuous argument
by Origen's teaching. So after profusely praising the judgment of the
Alexandrian leaders for their wisdom in trusting the theological chair of the
east to this 18 year-old Gnostic, Neo-Platonic, Eastern Mystic, and after
thoroughly and deliberately misrepresenting Origen's beliefs about
salvation, Bercot attempts to laugh off Origen's major, heretical doctrines by
saying that he playfully and good-naturedly went off onto tangents and
surmises which he did not intend to be taken seriously. Herein is a
marvelous thing. Can you imagine a theologian who would study the
scriptures far into the night and then write a set of commentaries on
Christian theology that he did not intend students or church men to take
seriously? Is there no end to Bercot's deceit in the pursuit of an imaginary
doctrine that he is trying to invent for early Christianity and that is rapidly
vanishing into thin air from whence it came?
The truth of the matter becomes clear as we listen to a brief but thorough
airing of Origen's beliefs by a real historian and scholar whose integrity and
accuracy is unquestioned for over 100 years..
In the year 203, though then only eighteen years of age, he was
nominated by the bishop Demetrius, afterwards his opponent,
president of the catechetical school of Alexandria, left vacant by the
flight of Clement. To fill this important office, he made himself
acquainted with the various heresies, especially the Gnostic, and with
the Grecian philosophy; he was not even ashamed to study under the
heathen Ammonius Saccas, the celebrated founder of Neo-Platonism. .
. .Origen was the greatest scholar of his age, and the most gifted,
most industrious, and most cultivated of all the Ante-Nicene fathers.
Even heathens and heretics admired or feared his brilliant talent and
vast learning. His knowledge embraced all departments of the
philology, philosophy, and theology of his day. With this he united
profound and fertile thought, keen penetration, and glowing
imagination. . . . He may be called in many respects the

79

Schleiermacher of the Greek church. . . . But his best disciples proved

unfaithful to many of his most peculiar views, and adhered far more to
the reigning faith of the church. Forand in this too he is like
Schleiermacherhe can by no means be called orthodox, either in the
Catholic or in the Protestant sense. His leaning to idealism, his
predilection for Plato, and his noble effort to reconcile Christianity with
reason, and to commend it even to educated heathens and Gnostics,
led him into many grand and fascinating errors. Among these are his
extremely ascetic and almost docetistic conception of corporeity, his
denial of a material resurrection, his doctrine of the preexistence and
the pre-temporal fall of souls (including the pre-existence of the
human soul of Christ) of eternal creation, of the extension of the work
of redemption to the inhabitants of the stars and to all rational
creatures, and of the final restoration of all men and fallen angels.
Also in regard to the dogma of the divinity of Christ, though he
powerfully supported it, and was the first to teach expressly the
eternal generation of the Son, yet he may be almost as justly
considered a forerunner of the Arian heteroousion,, or at least of the
Semi-Arian homoiousion, as of the Athanasian homoousion.
These and similar views provoked more or less contradiction during
his lifetime, and were afterwards, at a local council in Constantinople
in 543, even solemnly condemned as heretical. . . . His great defect is
the neglect of the grammatical and historical sense and his constant
desire to find a hidden mystic meaning. He even goes further in this
direction than the Gnostics, who everywhere saw transcendental,
unfathomable mysteries. His hermeneutical principle assumes
a
threefold sensesomatic, psychic and pneumatic; or literal, moral and
spiritual. His allegorical interpretation is ingenious, but often runs far
away from the text and degenerates into the merest caprice; while at
times it gives way to the opposite extreme of a carnal literalism, by
which he justifies his ascetic extravagance. 79
Since this is such an incredible expose of Origen heresies in such a short
space, I will outline what Schaff (who tried to defend Origen as best he
could, which wasn't very well, given what he had to work with), has said.
1. Origen was an 18 year old, undisciplined, philosophically mystic boy,
genius when he was appointed the chair of theology at the Alexandrian
school (Alexandria was the theological school for the Eastern Church; in
North Africa was the theological seat for the Western Church).
2. Origen came to the position with a background in Gnosticism, NeoPlatonism and Greek Philosophy.
79 Schaff, II, pp. 787-92.

80

3. Origen immediately set out to fully familiarize himself with the full
extent of these heresies so he could . . . fill this important office.
(Remember, he was only 18!)
4. As the leader of the Eastern Church, he studied, without shame or
embarrassment, under the heathen philosopher Ammonius Saccas, the
infamous founder of Neo-Platonism.
5. He went to Rome and became friends with the Roman philosopher
Hippolytus. Some Church historians feel sure that Origen sided with the
Roman pagans against the Church in Rome. This is deduced from the fact
that Origen came back from Rome with a pagan subordination view of the
Trinity. This means that Christ was not fully God and the Holy Ghost was not
a person at all, though the name could be used if one insisted on it, to form
a theoretical, not an actual Trinity. (This, incidentally, is very close to the
Jehovah's Witness' view.) Still, Schaff says, he was smarter and had better
intellectual insight than the Roman bishops. In light of St. Paul's teachings in
I Corinthians 1 and 2, we must admit to being unimpressed.
6. He was so intellectually and scholastically gifted at that even the
heathens and heretics admired him. I must confess that this does not give
much comfort or reassurance to me, either.
7. With a glowing imagination, keen penetration and fertile thought, he
was a true divine. I am not sure what all of this means exactly, but I don't
think the Church should take pride in it.
8. He was the Schleiermacher of his age. Anyone who is aware of the
German Intellectualism and theological liberalism of Fredrich Daniel Ernst
Schleiermacher (1768-1834), known as the father of Protestant liberal
theology, will be told a great deal by this.
9. Most all of his students left him because of his peculiar views, choosing
rather to remain true to the orthodox faith of the Church.
10. Gregory and Ambrose liked Origen and set store by him, in spite of his
many deviations from orthodoxy.
11. He was idealistic in the philosophical sense, had an addiction to Plato
and his pagan philosophies, and he never ceased trying to make a marriage
between reason and Christianity (which orthodox Christianity from St. Paul
to Augustine to the present age has always seen as impossible from a
biblical point of view). He was lead into many grand and fascinating errors.
In other words he was not only a heretic, but like the sociologists and
biological science professors of todays university, he was so attractive that
he led many inquisitive young minds and foolish theology students over the
edge with him. Say, that is grand and fascinating stuff isn't it?
12. He was so fanatically ascetic that he was almost docetistic in his view
on corporeity (only the lucid Philip Schaff could string together such
euphemisms). In case you don't know what that means (if you are a normal
human being who is mentally and emotionally healthy, you probably don't),
an ascetic is one who lives in a world of contemplation and rigorous self

81

denial, usually including anything sexual (even if he is married, in the case

of the Alexander Mack commune in the early Brethren movement), for
religious purposes. A Docetist was a member of the Docetae, an early group
of Religious Heretics who believed that Christ's body was not real, but a
phantom. In this case, what Schaff is referring to is those who lived in such a
mystic and unreal world that they doubted their own physical state, thinking
that they were perhaps phantoms themselves when it comes to the issue of
corporeity. This comes from corporeal, which means materially real, or
having a real physical body. Origen was such a basket case mentally and
emotionally that he not only had doubts about Christ's material, physical
reality, but his own as well. To paraphrase Philip Schaff's lucid description:
Origen was so mystic, abstract and spaced out, that he had virtually lost
physical contact with and awareness of reality. This my Brethren, not
sovereignty, predestination, election and foreknowledge is Gnosticism.
13. This docetic view led Origen to a doctrinal denial of the physical
resurrection.
14. Origen believed in the preexistence of human souls. In other words,
like the Mormons who took much of their theology from Origen, he believed
that we all pre-existed somewhere and that when male and female
procreate a body, God sends us down to inhabit it. But there was more to
Origen's view of preexistence. With him it was reincarnation. These
preexistent souls are those who have lived before and have not been good
enough, so they are sent back to try it again. Like Shirley MacLaine, we just
keep coming around until we get it right.
15. This preexistent, reincarnation theology led naturally to Origen's belief
in final restoration, not only of men, but of angels, good and bad even the
devil himself. We just keep coming back and improving our lot until finally
we are good enough for eternity.
16. Creation is eternal. This earth is never destroyed, nor is any man or
creature.
17. Like a good Jehovah's Witness, Origen said he believed in the deity of
Christ, but he did not, at least in any orthodox Christian sense. He believed
that Christ was created by God and was inferior to God.
18. Because of this belief, Origen was the father of the Arian Heresy. When
Bercot, and/or any Jehovah's Witness, defends Pelagius, it is really Arius that
he wants to defend and is defending by proxy. But Arius is more readily
identified as a heretic by most orthodox Christians, so it is better to teach
Arianism through the guise of Pelagianism. This is a bit unfair to Pelagius
who was heretic on the subject of the fall, but who apparently had no
problems with Christ's deity. He did, however, have many problems with the
Holy Ghost, in which he almost certainly did not believe. So it is hard to feel
sorry for him. But Arius is the Jehovah's Witnesses apostle. It was he who
challenged the deity of Christ and the Trinity. It was at the Council of Nicaea
that Arius was defeated and the Arian heresy was stamped out officially in

82

the Church. Still Arius was able to get concessions in the Creed. For this
reason the Nicene Creed was written. It removed all of Arius. That is the
terrible sin committed by the counsel of Nicaea, which has Bercot making
dark and foreboding statements and sharpening his knife. The Nicene Creed
was still not satisfactory on the person of the Holy Ghost, and so the
Athanasian Creed was brought forth, which corrected those oversights. At
this point the Alexandrian School that had always been tainted with
Arianism, Gnosticism, Platonism, Stoicism and Greek mysticism, which made
it very weak on the Trinity rebelled. Most of the intellectual, philosophical,
mystical heresies have come from Alexandria and the Eastern Church.
Though we do not support popery nor the Roman Catholicism of the 16th
century, it is none-the-less the fact that the Enlightenment was the result of
a major faction of the Church breaking away from the orthodox doctrines of
Western Christianity on a primarily philosophical, governmental and
scholastic ground, that brought on the religious humanism of the
Enlightenment.
(There is another thing that I will briefly explain to you. Heteroousion or
Anomoiosion are Latin terms describing the beliefs of Arius that Christ
was a created being, in substance unlike the Father. Homoiousion is a
Semi-Arian term meaning that Christ was of like substance with the Father
but couched in a doctrine that did not define the extent, if any, that Christ
differed from other created beings, or they from Him. This doctrine called
Christ divine but denied the He is truly God, or that he is equal to the
Father as touching his Godhead. Homoousios is an Orthodox Christian
term meaning that Christ, the Eternal Word [Logos] was of one substance
with the eternal Father. This is the view that was argued successfully against
Arius by Athanasius at the Council of Nicaea.)
It is small wonder that Demetrius and the Bishop of Constantinople put
Origen out of his seat and that Constantinople, the head of the Eastern
Church, denounced Origen as a heretic in 543. What else were they to do if
they were to continue to claim to be Christian in any legitimate sense?
Schaff does not like this and claims that Origen was not to be blamed
because the doctrine of the times was hopelessly confused until Augustine,
Jerome and Athanasius straightened it out 100 years later. But with all
deference to the great historian (and he is the greatest of the historians in
volume, detail and factuality), we simply cannot accept this kind of a
premise. Origen was supposed to have had many of the MSS. of the New
Testament. He was supposed to have been a great Bible student. He claimed
that all of his views squared with the Bible. Origen's supporters cannot have
it both ways. Origen was either ignorant of the Scriptures, in which case he
was a liar; he was of small mind and perceptiveness, in which case his
supporters are all in error about him; or he was deliberately heretic for
cunning, knowledgeable, humanistic reasons. Without serious argument, the
latter is true. You can tar him with any brush you wish, but you can't hide

83

the fangs. Origen was one of the great heretics of the early Christian
movement.
Bercot quotes from Hippolytus:
Hippolytus, a Christian overseer who lived at the same time as
Origen, wrote, The Gentiles, by faith in Christ, prepare for themselves
eternal life through good works. He again wrote, [Jesus], in
administering the righteous judgment of the Father to all, assigns to
each what is righteous according to his works.... Justification will be
seen in the awarding to each that which is just; to those who have
done well, there will be justly assigned eternal happiness. The lovers
of wickedness will be assigned eternal punishment. . . . But the
righteous will remember only the righteous deeds by which they
reached the heavenly kingdom. 80
Notice that Hippolytus says that it is by faith in Christ that the Gentiles
do good works. This is in opposition to Bercot's claim that man does not
need faith or the new nature. He has the ability within himself. I do not see
that Hippolytus is saying that.
Hippolytus says that the righteous will only remember the good deeds
that they did, by which they reached the heavenly kingdom. This is a
statement that the Bible makes, and I have made many times about
Sanctification and the Kingdom of God. As we pointed out earlier,
Sanctification is part of the great salvation. In Sanctification, the grace is in
the provision, but it is only by faith that this provision is appropriated. If this
is not the message of the 11th chapter of Hebrews, what is it? Again, this is
a discussion that goes on continually in evangelicals circles and groups. In
proves nothing so far as I am concerned with respect to Bercot's nonChristian, legalistic view of salvation. These statements of Hippolytus are
fairly ordinary and in no way rule out the biblical doctrine of salvation by
faith and grace, nor do they distinguish between Justification and
Sanctification.
And there is another thing about Hippolytus that is worthy of mention in
passing. Bercot makes a passionate plea that these men were not fathers,
nor were they scholars or theologians. They all agreed and they all got
along. Only Origen, he says, was a bonafide theologian. But this is in plain
contravention of the facts. Hippolytus was in violent disagreement with the
Gnostic-Christian, Platonic-Christian, Neo-Platonic-Christian, Stoic-Christian,
Philonic-Christian, Greek-Philosophy-Christian, corrupted doctrines of
Clement, Origen and the Alexandrian school in general. In that regard, I
quote from Schaff:
80 Bercot, p. 66.

84

[Hippolytus] was undoubtedly one of the most learned and

eminent scholars and theologians of his time. . . Certain it is , that he
received a thorough Grecian education . . . .At all events he wrote all
of his books in Greek. . . .[He] was the most learned divine and the
most voluminous writer of the Roman church in the third century; in
fact the first great scholar of that church, though like his teacher,
Irenaeus, he used the Greek language exclusively. . . . He repudiates
philosophy, almost with Tertullian's vehemence, as the source of all
heresies; yet he employs it to establish his own views. On the subject
of the Trinity he assails Monarchianism, and advocates the hypostasian
theory with a zeal which brought down upon him the charge of
ditheism. His disciplinary principles are rigoristic and ascetic. In this
respect also he is akin to Tertullian, though he places the Montanists,
like the Quartodecimanians, but with only a brief notice, among the
heretics. . . . In the fifth book the author comes to his proper theme,
the refutation of all the heresies from the times of the apostles to his
own. He takes up thirty-two in all, most of which, however, are merely
different branches of Gnosticism and Ebionism. . . . He represents Pope
Zephyrinus as a weak and ignorant man who gave aid and comfort to
the Patripassian heresy, and his successor Callistus, as a shrewd and
cunning manager who was once a slave, then a dishonest banker, and
became a bankrupt and convict, but worked himself into the good
graces of Zephyrinus and after his death obtained the object of his
ambition, the papal chair, taught heresy and ruined the discipline by
extreme leniency to offenders. Here the author shows himself a
violent partisan, and must be used with caution.. 81
This Ante-Nicene Father (Philip Schaff, Bruce Shelley and W.B. Eerdman list
him as one) does not sound to me like a fairly simple, hard-working old boy
with a better than average education who was neither scholar, theologian
nor doctrinarian, and was gentle, non-dogmatic and in perfect harmony with
the Alexandrian school of his day.
Cyprian is another case similar to the above. True, he was not a
theologian or a scholar but he was one of the most formal, pontifical and
rigid Roman bishops. So much so that even St. Augustine refers to him as
eminence. He was also a Western Churchman, as was Tertullian and
Lactantius. In the citation by Bercot, the very same kind of scriptural
statement, that does not address the subject of Justification nor shed any
light on its doctrine, is cited.

81 Schaff, II, pp. 763-765.

85

To prophesy, to cast out demons, and to do great acts upon the

earth are certainly a sublime and admirable thing. However, a person
does not attain the Kingdom of Heaven even though he is found in all
these things unless he walks in the observance of the right and just
way. The Lord says, 'Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have
we not prophesied in your name and cast out demons in your name
and performed other powerful works in your name? And then I will
confess to them, I never knew you. Depart from me you workers of
evil.[Matt. 7:22,23] There is need of righteousness so one may
deserve well of God the Judge. We must obey His precepts and
warnings that our merits may receive their reward.82
Bercot gives an interpretation to these remarks that will make them
support his description of what the early Church believed about salvation.
But this simply will not work. All of my life I have heard preachers talk about
the righteous behavior that is required to enter the Kingdom of Heaven. No
one that I know believes that a child of God is going to be rewarded for
something that he did not do. This quotation simply does not make the
argument between salvation by works as opposed to salvation by grace. I
believe what Cyprian said and I believe in salvation by faith and grace,
through the new birth. I have taught verse by verse through the New
Testament letters where these citations are given in almost direct form. I see
no conflict at all between the doctrine of salvation by free grace, as a gift,
and the salvation of our lives from the power of sin by the works of
righteousness that God has before ordained that we should walk in them.
But then I understand the difference between Justification and Sanctification.
Bercot does not only not understand that distinction, but, so far as I am
concerned, he does not understand the doctrine of salvation at all. It is
inevitable that he would read his hapless and hopeless doctrines of salvation
by the dead works of fallen man into all of these statements, just like the
Judaizers in Galatia did, but that does not make it so. And then too, Cyprian
was not strong in the Scriptures:
His peculiar importance falls not so much in the field of theology,
where he lacks originality and depth, as in church organization and
discipline.83
One would not expect to learn much about the theology and doctrine of
the early Church from this very liturgical and formal Roman bishop.
Now Bercot appeals to Lactantius:
82 Bercot, pp. 66-67.
83 Schaff, II, p. 846.

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Finally, Lactantius, writing in the early 300s, explained to the

Romans, Why, then, did He make [man] frail and mortal? ... [So] He
might set before man virtue, that is, endurance of evils and labors, by
which he might be able to gain the reward of immortality. For since
man consists of two parts, body and soul, of which the one is earthly,
the other heavenly, two lives have been assigned to man. The first,
which is appointed for the body, is transitory. The other, which belongs
to the soul, everlasting. We received the first at our birth. We attain to
the latter by striving, that immortality might not be available to man
without some difficulties.... For this reason He has given us this
present life. That we may either lose the true and eternal life by our
sins, or win it by our virtue. 84
It would appear that Lactantius is a legalist who does not understand
salvation by grace. That is not surprising in light of what history tells us
about the man and his views.
LACTANTIUS served as a tutor in Diocletian's court at Nicomedia,
and again later, after becoming a Christian, in Constantine's. His
elegant Latin earned him the title 'The Christian Cicero'. His book The
Deaths of the Persecutors luridly demonstrates that persecutors come
to bad ends, and three other apologetic works, including The Divine
Institutes, commend Christianity to educated readers. His theology
was defective, being often rationalistic and moralistic in tone.85
Philip Schaff, in the History of the Christian Church, adds:
Lactantius [was] a professor of eloquence in Nicomedia, and a man
of elegant culture. . . Lactantius was the tutor of his [Constantine's]
eldest son, Hosius was his trusted counselor who probably suggested
to him the convening of the first ecumenical synod; he was we may
say for few years his ecclesiastical prime minister. They [Lactantius
and Hosius] were, each in his way, the emperor's chief advisors and
helpers in the great change that gave the religion of the cross the
moral control over the vast empire of Rome. 86
Certainly he is not orthodox in his views. His amateurish notions on
dichotomy fall far short of acceptable orthodox doctrine. If we are to take
this statement as determinative, which Bercot wishes us to do, it would
84 Bercot, p. 67.
85 Eerdmans, p. 196.
86 Scahff, II, pp. 865-66.

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appear that Lactantius, like the other Gnostics of his day, does not believe in
a physical resurrection. For since man consists of two parts, body and soul,
of which the one is earthly, the other heavenly, two lives have been
assigned to man. The first, which belongs to the body, is transitory. It thus
appears that to Lactantius there is no life for the body beyond this transitory
state. Only the soul will live on.
In orthodoxy, man is tri-partite: body, soul and spirit. Salvation applies
to each part of the man. Justification to the spirit, Sanctification to the soul
or the life, and Glorification to the body. There is a spiritual body and we
shall have it, the Apostle said in the 15th chapter of 1st Corinthians.
An interesting thing, however, is the inconstancy with Bercot's statements
about the early Christians and the heretics who came along and corrupted
them. Bercot was not going to use any Westerner or early Christian past 199
A.D. when he started out. Now he brings in a Westerner from the 4th century
whose life and doctrine was lived and learned in the very household of the
dreaded Constantine, who is the father of all evils as far as Bercot is
concerned, and concerning whom we ourselves stand in doubt and
disapproval. Why should it then be thought that this man is a just, accurate
and pure witness to the doctrines of the apostolic Christian Church? Bercot
has cast about for anyone who will say a few sentences, or even a few words
that he can extract out and paste into his mocked up doctrine of salvation.
Lactantius, the brilliant orator and politician, is wholly inconsistent with the
model of the early Christian that Bercot so carefully crafted in the opening
pages. But he is apparently not concerned with consistency. He
demonstrates either a contempt for the intelligence and spiritual
discernment of the Anabaptists, (for whom this book has been designed),
or such an over-estimation of his own persuasive powers that he is only
concerned with piecing together each section as he goes along. Internal
inconsistency is the hallmark of his effort from start to finish. If Bercot knows
he is being inconsistent, he seemingly does not care. If he knows and does
care, he apparently lacks the skill, the concreteness of belief and the facts to
do anything about it at this point.
In the same presumptuous and arrogant spirit, Bercot feels that he has
sufficiently made his point to dispense with the argument. The matter is now
settled. He says emphatically, in fact, every early Christian writer who
discussed the subject of salvation presented the same view. 87 In light of
what we have shown in the examination of this section it is not only clear
that Bercot is wrong, but that he has attempted to deliberately mislead the
reader. Philip Schaff defined the views of Clement of Rome: Clement bears
clear testimony to the doctrines of the Trinity (God, the Lord Jesus Christ
and the Holy Spirit, who are the faith and the hope of the elect), of the
87 Bercot, p. 67.

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Divine dignity and glory of Christ, salvation only by his blood, the necessity
of repentance and living faith, Justification by grace, Sanctification by the
Holy Spirit, the unity of the church, and the Christian graces of humility,
charity, forbearance, patience, and perseverance. 88 This one position by
Clement of Rome is enough to put the lie to Bercot's claim that every one of
them said the same thing. The views of Clement of Rome bear not the
slightest resemblance to those described for him by Bercot. We have noted
how the citation by Bercot of Clement's words do not contradict these nor do
they support Bercot, though he tries to give them that interpretation.
An echo of Paul's teaching is found in Polycarp, Ad Phil.. c. 1, where
he refers to the firm root of their faith, preached to them from olden
times, which remains to this day, and bears fruit in our Lord Jesus
Christ. But it should be remembered that Polycarp, in the very first
chapter of his letter, represents faith and the whole salvation as the
gift of free grace.89
Two of the first three and the most honorable of the Apostolic Fathers
refute Bercot's hopeful and imaginary claim. Barnabas, the other of the
three, certainly does not support it. On these bases alone, Bercot's claim is
dishonored and disallowed. But in my view these are not the most significant
or damning. What is much more revealing is that Bercot has appealed for
the early orthodox doctrine
to Irenaeus; Justin Martyr, a Christian
Platonist, who was influenced by Stoicism, who considered Christianity to be
true Gnosticism and who said that Socrates, because he was a good
heathen was a Christian even though he didn't know it; Clement of
Alexandria, another so-called Christian Gnostic who taught a confused
mixture of Christian ideas strongly mixed with Stoic, Gnostic, Platonic and
Philonic elements; and Origen, the Gnostic heretic who was run out of the
Church by his own Bishop in Constantinople, and Demetrius, the man who
promoted him to the office. He finishes off his testimonials with vague
quotes from men who may or may not have meant what he says they did,
most of whom were highly educated men of scholasticism and theological
training and position, which Bercot condemns in his opening statement and
says did not exist, except for Origen. He would not have appealed to them if
they were highly educated theologians for their testimony would have
meant little to us. He also resorts to Western Churchmen who were formal
bishops and close personal associates of Constantine whom Bercot
denounces. In short, Bercot, simply doesn't know what he is doing or saying.
The subject of the beliefs of the ancients has gotten completely away from
88 Schaff, II, p. 643.
89 Ibid., p. 667.

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him. With his half-truths, partial truths and outright deceit, he has failed to
carry his point.
Does This Mean That The Early Christians Taught That We Earn
Our Salvation By Works?
Bercot has already explained his theology of salvation. He now engages in
a syncretic effort to stave off the inevitable criticism based on Biblical
passages and to round up any and all biblical statements and doctrines
under his banner. He expediently asks and answers the critical questions.
Everything that he says now must be viewed through the glass of the
doctrine already carefully laid down.
In this section Bercot appears to be in open contradiction of his earlier
claims. He cites statements that he has just told us that the early Christians
never made! But that is alright. He has method to his madness. He is going
to completely strip faith and grace of their meaning and rephrase them to
make them conform to his doctrine. He just needs a bit of time and
operating room. This is a shop-worn tactic. Grab the subject before someone
else does, and you can give it your own twist. As obvious as it is, it continues
to be successful.
No, the early Christians did not teach that we earn salvation by an
accumulation of good works. They recognized and emphasized the fact
that faith is absolutely essential for salvation, and that without God's
grace nobody can be saved. All of the writers quoted above stressed
this fact. Here are just a few examples: Clement of Rome wrote, We
are not justified by ourselves. Nor by our own wisdom, understanding,
godliness, or works done in holiness of heart. But by that faith through
which Almighty God has justified all men since the beginning.
Polycarp wrote, Many desire to enter into this joy, knowing that by
grace you are saved, not of works, but by the will of God through Jesus
Christ. (Eph. 2:8) Barnabas wrote, To this end the Lord delivered up
His flesh to corruption, that we might be sanctified through the
remission of sins, which is effected by His blood. Justin Martyr wrote,
Our suffering and crucified Christ was not cursed by the law. Rather,
he made it manifest that he alone would save those who do not depart
from His faith.... As the blood of the Passover saved those who were in
Egypt, so also the blood of Christ will deliver from death those who
have believed. Clement of Alexandria wrote, It follows that there is
one unchangeable gift of salvation given by one God, through one
Lord, benefiting in many ways. And again, Abraham was not justified
by works, but by faith. [Rom. 4:3] Therefore, even if they do good

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works now, it is of no advantage to them after death, if they do not

have faith. 90
These disarming words do not tell us anything concrete. We already knew
the soundness of the doctrine of Clement of Rome and of Polycarp. Barnabas
seems to be Pauline in his position. There is a drastic shift in kind, quality,
clarity and meaning between the three Apostolic Fathers and the
Alexandrian theologians. Bercot would like to make the words of Clement of
Alexandria and Origen sound the same as those of Clement of Rome and
Polycarp, but even a novice in the faith can see and hear the difference.
Being wary of the overall doctrine of Clement of Alexandria and of Justin, we
are not impressed with these isolated quotes. It is the reenactment of an old
game. Even a heretic can appear to be established in sound biblical doctrine
if his words are edited and taken out of context by those who are clever and
who have an agenda. But anyone who believes that the heathen are saved
without the gospel by good works and that Socrates, the heathen
philosopher, was a Christian and did not know it, cannot mean what
orthodoxy means when he talks of faith and grace. No amount of wistful and
utilitarian contexting can actually turn a truth into a lie or a lie into truth.
But Bercot is up to something still more elusive. He is not trying to tell us
that Justin and Clement are orthodox. He is trying to tell us that all such
statements mean, and always meant, what he has earlier identified
salvation to be. In other words, the Arian anti-orthodoxy is the real
orthodoxy. It is the orthodoxy of the fundamental, evangelical, conservative
Christian Church throughout the centuries that is unorthodox. By citing
these seemingly clear statements on faith and grace and claiming them for
his camp, Bercot wishes to get to the subjects before the reader does and to
disarm his critics. This kind of deception makes a serious discussion of faith
and grace with Bercot all but impossible.
Are Faith And Works Mutually Exclusive?
It is quickly seen what strategy Bercot is pursuing. He comes out strong,
as if he is going to make all apparent contradictions vanish, but then
immediately veers off. He does not intend to discuss his own potential
inconsistency after all. What he wants to do is shift the argument to others
whose views he will contemptuously characterize so that he can knock them
over. But first he wants to reassure his abashed listeners.
You may be saying to yourself, I'm confused. Out of one side of
their mouths they say we are saved because of our works, and out of
90 Bercot, pp. 667-8.

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the other side they say we are saved by faith or grace. They don't
seem to know what they believed! Oh, but they did. 91
We have just noted the confused doctrines of most of the men Bercot uses
for documentation; particularly Justin, Clement of Alexandria and Origen. If
anything is evident it is that, while they knew that they did not agree with
orthodox Christianity, they did not know what they believed in many
perhaps most areas of theological thought. Yet Bercot, if he knows, will
not concede that for a moment. He blithely assures us that they certainly
did know what they believed. Our confusion comes from the fact that evil
religious men (in normal Church history these would be the true historic
fathers who rescued the reeling doctrine of the early Church from the hands
of the Gnostic Neo-Platonists at Alexandria) are the ones who are
responsible for our confusion. They have tried to tell us that they did not
know what they were talking about.
But Bercot does not want to dwell on this for two reasons. 1) Too much
focus of attention would tell even the most casual reader that they were not
orthodox. 2) He does not want the discussion to convince any that maybe,
because of these quotations, the early Christians did not believe what he
said that they did.
Bercot has a different plan. He has to make some more straw men that he
wishes to knock over. Abruptly, as if in a hurry to get to it before the crowd
begins to leave, he blurts out:
Our problem is that Augustine, Luther, and other Western
theologians have convinced us that there's an irreconcilable conflict
between salvation based on grace and salvation based on works or
obedience. They have used a fallacious form of argumentation known
as the false dilemma by asserting that there are only two
possibilities regarding salvation: it's either a gift from God or it's
something we earn by our works.92
The false dilemma, legitimately understood, means that there is no true
conflict between the doctrines of Justification and Sanctification. The
apparent contradiction between St. Paul and St. James is due to a lack of
biblical understanding of the Great Salvation. But Bercot will again twist
historic phraseology to give it a meaning that suits his sectarian biases. To
him it means that salvation is part works and part faith. This is a logical joint
venture that is very comfortable for the religious humanist. To the Arian
theology, salvation by grace and faith is a false doctrine. Since the phrase is
91 Ibid., p. 68.
92 Ibid., pp. 68-9.

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used in the Bible, Arians will use it, but only after they have robbed it of any
real meaning, as Bercot is going to attempt to do.
He needs the early, non-theological, non-scholarly, non-professional
religionist who does not teach doctrine, to give his views credence for that
segment of the Christian Church into which he is trying to make inroads. So
he continues to give poor, mixed up, humanistic, mystic souls like Justin,
Clement of Alexandria and Origen an all-knowing, superior, sophisticated
theological image. He puts words in their mouths:
The early Christians would have replied that a gift is no less a gift
simply because it's conditioned on obedience. 93
Bercot does not tell us which of these eight witnesses would have said
this. Was it Irenaeus, the man who believed that Mary was the new Eve?
Was it Justin the Platonist who believed that nearly everyone was saved
including the Greek philosopher Socrates? Was it the Gnostic-Christian
Clement of Alexander who was totally confused
and thought maybe
Stoicism, Gnosticism, Neo-Platonism, Greek philosophy and Christianity were
all different ways of saying the same thing? Was it Origen, the Gnostic
mystic who didn't believe that Christ or even he, for that matter had a
real body or that there would be a physical resurrection and who believed in
reincarnation and universalism so that everyone including the devil would
be saved in the end? Or is it in fact Bercot, rearranging the testimony of
history to make it fit his preconceived scheme?
In order to drive home his point, Bercot uses an illustration.
Suppose a king asked his son to go to the royal orchard and bring
back a basket full of the king's favorite apples. After the son had
complied, suppose the king gave his son half of his kingdom. Was the
reward a gift, or was it something the son had earned? The answer is
that it was a gift. The son obviously didn't earn half of his father's
kingdom by performing such a small task. The fact that the gift was
conditioned on the son's obedience doesn't change the fact that it was
still a gift. 94
Here Bercot establishes for us his concept of grace and works. Bercot says
that if the father asked the son to do something small in order to earn a big
reward, the reward is a gift because the work was small and the gift is large.
But several things are evident here.
93 Ibid., p. 69.
94 Ibid.

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First of all, if the task that the son did was a prerequisite to the receiving
of the reward, then the gift was not free. It may not have cost the son much,
but it cost him something. It cost him the effort of going into the royal
orchard and picking the apples. There is nothing wrong with this kind of
proposition, just as there was nothing wrong with the demands of the law as
a means of man receiving eternal life. But it still cannot legitimately be
called a gift. If the father would have given the son the gift anyway, even if
he had not picked the apples, this should be stated, in which case it would
be a gift with strings attached. If the father had given the son the gift first
and then asked him to go pick the apples at the threat of taking the gift
away if the son did not obey, this would have been Indian giving and never
a true gift at all. If the father had given the son the gift, then asked him to
go pick the apples without the threat of taking away the gift, and if the son
had, out of love and gratitude, gone and done what he father asked, this
would have been a true gift in the true spirit of giving. Anyone, in giving a
gift of love, hopes for love and reciprocation from the one to whom he gives
the gift. But no man of honesty, character and integrity, gives a gift and
then takes it away because it is not reciprocated. To the sly, cunning
scheming mind of fallen and self-seeking man, this can be characterized as a
gift, but in fact it is a morally dishonest trick by which he hopes to put others
in his power. Indeed and in truth, it is not a gift at all.
Secondly, the small service that the son did for the large prize cannot be
used to illustrate what man has to do if he is to earn eternal life. If God
offered man eternal life as a result of doing the best he could, then we
would consider it from that point of view. Even then we would still have fatal
problems if we are dealing with a mankind who cannot do anything at all
that is good in the sight of God (which Bercot plainly denies). But that is not
the case. The requirement was not small; it was enormous beyond
comprehension. It was perfection in every way. This is the only kind of
righteousness that can abide in the presence of God. Mortal man simply
could not comply. In Deuteronomy 28:1-15, this requirement is spelled out.
Man must do all that is written in the book of the law, perfectly and in every
way, in order to have the blessing of eternal life. But once the proposition is
offered and the covenant is entered into, failure to do so would bring the
curse of death. From the 15th verse on, the curses are promised if all is not
done.
In Jeremiah 31:31, God acknowledges the failure of the Old Testament.
He found fault with it, as indeed with man's failure under its terms and
conditions. He promises to cut them off for it. In that passage He says that
he will make a new covenant that will not be like the first. In the new
covenant there is no if ye shall, but only God's I will. This is because
man has no ability to successfully comply under the approach of good works
to merit God's blessing. St. Paul brings this down to New Testament theology
when he says, in Romans 3:9-18 that God has given His evaluation of every

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man. This is not, as Bercot would have us believe, the evaluation of

Augustine, Luther, Calvin or any other theologian with whom Bercot does
not agree. It is GOD speaking:
What then? are we better than they? No, in no wise: for we have
before proved both Jews and Gentiles, that they are all under sin; As it
is written, There is none righteous, no, not one: There is none that
understandeth, there is none that seeketh after God. They are all gone
out of the way, they are together become unprofitable; there is none
that doeth good, no, not one. Their throat is an open sepulchre; with
their tongues they have used deceit, the poison of asps is under their
lips: Whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness: Their feet are swift
to shed blood: Destruction and misery are in their ways: And the way
of peace have they not known: There is no fear of God before their
eyes.
There is not a one among them that possesses even the smallest shred of
goodness. How is such a man going to contribute to his own salvation by the
imaginary good works which God emphatically states that he does not
have? From verse 19 through 21 he says that the law has condemned
every man and by it every man stands in guilt and condemnation before
God, which is all that the law of God can do:
Now we know that what things soever the law saith, it saith to them
who are under the law: [in verses 11 through 16 of chapter two, St.
Paul shows that every man is under the law. If he does not have the
written code as the Jews did, he is a law unto himself because God has
put the knowledge of the difference between right and wrong in his
conscience] that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may
become guilty before God. Therefore by the deeds of the law there
shall no flesh be justified in his sight: for by the law is the knowledge
of sin.
The Law is a cold, inanimate slab of stone. It cannot get down and take
man by the hand. It can only sit there and condemn him for what he has not
done and cannot do. This is a totally different situation than the optimistic,
hopeful and invented little scene that Bercot has tried to use to confuse
works and grace.
But Bercot insists in putting his own spin on what the early Christians
believe and binding that upon us as the pure gospel of the apostles.
The early Christians believed that salvation is a gift from God but
that God gives His gift to whomever He chooses. And He chooses to

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give it to those who love and obey Him. Is their understanding really
that strange?95
This is not what the apostles believed nor an accurate and all-pervasive
assessment of what the early Christians believed. It is what Bercot believes.
We have shown how the Apostolic Fathers had no such unanimity of doctrine
and many of the ones that Bercot has relied on, as Justin, Clement of
Alexandria and Origen, were called by Schaff and other legitimate and
knowledgeable writers of Church history Christian-Gnostics. They were
renounced by the orthodox Church of their peers as heretics. These probably
were not Christians. Certainly they were not orthodox or sound in doctrine
from a biblical point of view. But in this matter of trying to determine what
the apostles believed, why go through this agonizing, imaginary, arbitrary,
contrived, edited, misapplied and inventive journey that Bercot is taking us
on? The matter is very simple. We have the complete, inerrant, written
record. Let's not get what St. Paul believed on this subject from Justin or
Irenaeus; let's get it from St. Paul himself.
But now the righteousness of God without the law is manifested,
being witnessed by the law and the prophets; Even the righteousness
of God which is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that
believe for there is no difference: For all have sinned, and come short
of the glory of God;
God, in the New Covenant, is going to make the righteousness that is
necessary to have eternal life, available to man on a different basis than law
and works.
Being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in
Christ Jesus: Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through
faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness for the remission of sins
that are past, through the forbearance of God; To declare at this time
his righteousness: that he might be just, and the justifier of him which
believeth in Jesus.
When we speak of the condemnation that man is in, the failure of the lawworks covenant, man's need and God's provision through Christ, there is
something that we are faced with that Bercot, if he knows about it, has
omitted from his formula altogether. That is the legal, or the judicial, aspect
of sin. Man is a criminal before the bar of God's justice and there is
animosity between the righteous Judge and the wayward law-breaker. The
95 Ibid.

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record must be squared and the animosity removed before reconciliation can
take place.
Suppose a man is condemned by a judge for a crime and he is coming up
for execution because he violated the law that says thou shalt do no
murder. One day before the execution he asks if he can have an audience
with the judge who sentenced him. The inquiry is made as to what the
purpose of that meeting might be. I want to convince the judge that I have
done the best I could, while in prison and since having been sentenced to
death, the man says. Surely this is all that can be required of any man.
The judge knows that I cannot atone for my sin. What an unreasonable
attitude for anyone to take. But I have made license plates for the cars of
good men. I have learned how to do nice leather work and my record is one
of good behavior. What else can this man ask of me? The criminal has
missed the point, and he will not get his interview with the judge. There is a
crime of murder on the books, and it will not be erased until the man has
been executed and his life forfeited for the life that he took.
One of the reasons for the death of Christ was to bear the wrath of God
against sinners. God's perfect justice must be served and His holiness
exonerated. The Soul that sins shall die, said the Righteous Judge, the
Author and the Giver of Life. Anyone who thinks that the Gospel of Grace
means nothing more than God's graciousness and because of that he will
ignore His own eternal decree and not require death at the hands of the
sinner, has misunderstood and misunderstood badly and fatally the
immutable justice of God and His wrath against sin and sinners. If we go
before that bar of justice in our own merit, trusting in the kindness of God to
make up the difference when we have done the best we could, it will be the
end of us. But it needn't be that way. Christ took upon Himself the sins of
the whole world and suffered, not for our sins only but for the sins of every
man. We speak now of the first of the three aspects of the Great Salvation:
Justification, which means acquittal, or to be tried and found innocent. It
does not mean pardoned. It means tried and found innocent of guilt: nothing
less than that nothing less than that ! A pardoned man is not innocent. He
is a guilty man who is let off. This is not sufficient for God's spotless, perfect
eternity. Those who will abide with God forever must bear no stain, hint,
smell or remembrance of guilt. They must be innocent. Christ stood in the
bar of God's judgment and was condemned to death. Thus Christ did not
cover our sins as the blood of bulls and goats had been able to do for their
temporary time; He took them away, off the books. The old sinner is forever
dead; he died with Christ. He does not exist anymore as to Justification and
salvation from the penalty of sin. Christ went into hell, the place of the
damned, for our sins, according to St. Peter in Acts 2:25-32. In so doing, He
removed the crime and the sentence from the record and made peace
between God and man for those who believe that God accepted Christ's

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death as satisfaction for sins, and who will rely on this doctrine of the New
Covenant of Christ's blood for his salvation.
Where is boasting then? It is excluded. By what law? of works? Nay:
but by the law of faith. Therefore we conclude that a man is justified
by faith without the deeds of the law.
Bercot would have us believe that the early Christians were persuaded
that they, by nature, could do good works and they gloried in this fact,
which to him is more exciting and hopeful than the cold and dreary
doctrine of salvation by grace alone without works. If there was nothing
else at all (and there is much) to show that he did not understand the New
Testament doctrine of Justification by Faith and Grace alone, this boasting in
himself and the imaginary boasting of the ancients would do it. Boasting is
excluded by the Gospel of salvation by Grace alone (Sola Gratia). It is not
excluded by works. If a man contributed to his salvation, he would indeed
have something to boast of: Hey, come here and see what I and God did
by our good works. We manufactured eternal life! But salvation by faith
and grace, without works, does not permit you to legitimately do that.
Bercot speaks with pride, appreciation and satisfaction about his and other
men's good works which they do by nature and which combine with God's
provision to produce salvation, but is this legitimate? Not according to St.
Paul's doctrine of the Law of Faith instead of the Law of Works. By this
law of faith (Sola Fide), works are discredited and boasting is excluded.
FALLEN MAN DID NOT PARTICIPATE, CANNOT PARTICIPATE AND WILL NEVER
PARTICIPATE IN THE GREAT WORK OF JUSTIFICATION, WHICH CHRIST
ACCOMPLISHED ON THE CROSS BY HIMSELF (Heb. 1:3). Man can only
participate in the benefits of it by faith as opposed to works.
Is he the God of the Jews only? is he not also of the Gentiles? Yes, of
the Gentiles also: Seeing it is one God, which shall justify the
circumcision by faith, and uncircumcision through faith.
Do not get sidetracked on the difference between by and through as some
have done. The point is: the Uncircumcision and the Circumcision both in the
same way faith, not works.
Do we then make void the law through faith? God forbid: yea, we
establish the law.
Does this doctrine of Justification by faith alone, without works, do insult
to God's law and the concept of the importance of good works in the later
doctrines of Sanctification? Of course it doesn't. Just the opposite is true.
Until fallen, corrupt, mortal man (Romans 3:9-18 that we have just quoted,

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not the doctrines of Augustine, Luther and Calvin) is justified by faith and
grace, is born into the family of God with a new nature and has the mind of
Christ, the law of God is as foreign to him and as removed from him as a
possibility as it was to man under the Old Testament condition. It is for the
purpose of making man righteous, not giving him a way to find God without
righteousness, that God devised and enacted the New Covenant of Grace
and Faith.
Well then, if the law of God is established by the gospel of Grace, couldn't
this mean after all, that good works the works of the law play a part in
man's Justification in a sort of a back door way? No, it does not. We must
totally, finally and forever separate the notion of man's works from the
doctrine of Justification. Until and unless we do that, we will never
understand the good works of Sanctification, how and where and why they
fit into the Great Salvation and what they mean to the Christian. In order to
remove all confusion and to explain this matter fully, the Apostle continues:
What shall we say then that Abraham our father, as pertaining to
the flesh, hath found?
Though this has been a confusing statement to many, the question here,
as it comes out fully in the chapter is, paraphrased: What did Abraham, the
father of the faithful and the Covenant of Promise, do by his good works that
helped make this salvation and Justification possible. The implied and
comprehended answer is, nothing at all.
In that very context he
continues.
For if Abraham were justified by works, he hath whereof to glory; but
not before God.
Again I offer a paraphrase, not as a translator, but as an interpreter, a
prophet of the Lord and a Bible expositor, which are my callings and gifts
from the Holy Ghost: If Abraham had done something, by his works, that
somehow contributed to his own Justification, then he would indeed have an
occasion to boast and to glory in himself, as well as in the innate goodness
of man. But while men may be confused on this subject, God is not and
neither, apparently, was Abraham. Before, or in others words, in the eyes of
and the presence of God, it simply wasn't so.
For what saith the scripture? Abraham believed God, and it was
counted unto him for righteousness.
Instead of Justification by works, or by contributing to his Justification by
works, Abraham was justified by faith alone. This is in contrast to works.

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Because of this, all glorying by Abraham or in Abraham is completely

eliminated.
Now to him that worketh is the reward not reckoned of grace, but of
debt. But to him that worketh not, but believeth on him that justifieth
the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness. Even as David also
describeth the blessedness of the man unto whom God imputeth
righteousness without works, Saying, Blessed are they whose
iniquities are forgiven, and whose sins are covered. Blessed is the man
to whom the Lord will not impute sin.
Keep firmly in mind that we are talking about the biblical doctrine of
Justification the quickening of the dead spirit, salvation from the penalty
of sin, the first aspect of salvation that makes man a part of the second
Adam, the New Race of Men, and gives him the Holy Spirit and the mind of
Christ. We are not talking about the doctrine of Sanctification as was St.
James when he spoke of Abraham. You will say to me that St. James said,
Abraham was not justified by faith alone, but by works also. I know that is
what he said, but the use of the word Justification notwithstanding, St.
James was talking about the biblical doctrine of Sanctification, which is
deliverance from the power of sin. You simply cannot build theology out of
words alone. You have to follow contexts of subject, thought and doctrine.
We simply cannot get off into that subject at the moment, though we will
before we are through with this review. But whatever St. James said and
meant, St. Paul said this which we have before us. Forget about St. James for
the moment, if you want to know what St. Paul means. If you do not, you will
forever be easy prey for heretical and confusing men and doctrines.
God's plan from the beginning, was to have a family like himself. The first
thing that happened in this world is that God gave man the option of
choosing the Tree of Life over the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil.
Man made the wrong choice and brought death upon himself.
The next dispensation was to give man a chance to reflect on what he had
done, consider the dire consequences and, through experientialism and
existentialism (truth by experience and experiment) to return to God.
Instead man used his undisciplined, humanistic freedom to so corrupt his
world that society could not continue.
The third dispensation, from Noah to Abraham, was to try to coerce man
into righteousness by threat of reprisal. Who soever sheds man's blood, by
man shall his blood be shed. This kept the race from completely destroying
itself as it had in the first dispensation, but it did nothing in terms of his
moral character.
Then, from Abraham to Moses, God attempted to create a closeness and
camaraderie with man, by making him someone special and showing him

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favor. Perhaps this would be a positive thing that would encourage man and
bring out the best in him. This did not work either.
Through the mediatorship of Moses, God set up a contract between
Himself and man and laid down a moral code that man would have to keep
in order to earn his part of the benefit. He even set up a system to educate
man about this moral code. The result was that those whom God had thus
chosen became self-righteous because of their privileged position. The very
thing that was set up for their good became the source of their downfall.
Their table became a snare. Instead of coming to grips with the demands of
the moral law, they assumed that because they had been made the
guardians of it, this automatically meant that they were better than others.
Indeed they were sincere people who were extremely dedicated and
capable of religion. They built and enacted the greatest and most beautiful
religious system this world has ever seen. Jesus Himself said of their
religion, outwardly you look beautiful. But the problem was with the heart.
And so God reasoned thusly (this is not putting words in God's mouth, but
paraphrasing what He said in the Bible):
There is no use striving with man because he is evil from his youth.
The thoughts and the imaginations of his heart are only evil
continually. His heart his inner being is dishonest and desperately
wicked above anything in creation. We are simply not going to get
anywhere by whipping a dead horse. What I must do is create a new
race of men. But if they are the creation of my hands and the dust of
the ground, like the old creation, they will simply do the same thing.
There is only one hope. They must be bone of my bone and flesh of
my flesh. They must be born to me; not created by me. They have to
come out of my inner person if they are to be like me in their hearts.
Now, obviously there is nothing that they can do to bring this about.
We have exhausted all of the options. But there is something I can do.
I can take upon myself the form of this man since I created him in
my own image there is no conflict so long as I do not take on his fallen
nature I can go down there, get involved with the race, and by a
system of new birth that is the result of my seed and my travail, I can
bring man, through death, burial, resurrection and new life, into a new
race and a new creation. But I have to keep the enacting of this
planned redemption out of the hands of men. If they become involved
in it and in their vanity and pride they will want to they will
corrupt it, just like they have everything else that they have gotten
their grubby little hands on. I have to figure out a way to make this
available to them without getting it corrupted by their evil.
This is exactly what we are talking about. Let me illustrate to try to make
the point. Suppose a wealthy young man has fallen in love with a beautiful,

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but very impoverished, girl. He doesn't care about her poverty, because he
loves her. He buys an incredibly expensive piece of jewelry for her to
express his love. He goes over to her house, sits down on the couch with
her, opens up the case and presents it to her. She looks at it for a while with
great admiration. Then she excuses herself and goes upstairs. In a few
minutes she comes down with an old, ragged bag of something, the foul,
musty smell of which pervades the whole room. What in the world is that,
the young man asks. This is a bag of torn and worthless clothes and rags
that I was going to give to the goodwill, she replies. I couldn't wash them
because my machine is broken and I have no money to fix it. But it is all that
I have, and I want to give it to you because I don't want this to be just a gift
from you. I want to participate with something.
Let me try another illustration. Suppose a girl is going away to college and
she wants an expensive foreign sports car. She is a modern girl, and she is
not going to accept any charity, she is going to earn it herself. She works all
summer in the sandwich shop and manages to save $300. The sports car
that she wants costs $80,000. Her wealthy father has been watching this
with amusement and compassion all during the summer. One day, just
before school starts, the girl comes into the house in a dejected state and
slumps on the couch. The father, who knows what is going on, asks her what
is wrong anyway. Dad, I wanted that sports car so bad, and I did the best I
could, but I didn't even come close. I was so unrealistic about it. I can't
believe how far off I was in my thinking. This girl is the apple of her
father's eye. He has been waiting with excited anticipation for this moment.
He takes her gently by the arm and leads her out to the garage. There is the
sports car that she has been working for, even with a special plate with her
name on it. The girl looks at her father with great appreciation. Then she
grows serious and says. I can't just take this as a gift. Here, take the $300 I
earned. Then I can keep my pride in myself and tell my friends that this is
something I bought, with the help of my father.
Bear with me for one more illustration. Suppose a man goes down to the
dealership and contracts for the same sports car that the girl got from her
father as a gift. He agrees to pay $2,000 a month for six years. At the end of
five years he begins to fall behind. In a few months he gets threatening
letters. One day he goes into the office and lays a check for $100 on the
counter. Look, he says to the manager, I have paid a lot of money into
this car and I want you to know that I have not been irresponsible or
indifferent. I have done the best I could. Where is your mercy and
compassion. Be fair about this thing. Take this money and give me the title
to my car. The manager looks at him with compassion but sternness.
Mercy and compassion has nothing to do with this, he says. We have deal
here. It isn't your car yet because you haven't lived up to your part of the
bargain. You are not going to get that title until you pay the last penny that
we agreed on. We have been patient with you, and we have given you more

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time by far than the agreement calls for. But you time has run out. I am
sorry. It is evident that you cannot pay the remaining balance. I am going to
have to repossess the car as of now.
The girl drives happily off to school in her new $80,000 sports car while
the man goes home dejectedly in a $250,000 bus. Yet the man worked much
harder, for much longer and paid in much hard-earned money, while the girl
paid nothing. But both are righteous and just situations. So what is the
difference? In one case there was a legal contract made that the contractee
could not live up to. In the other case, there is a gift of love from someone
who had the means. With these feeble and incomplete illustrations in mind,
read again these words of the Apostle about Justification:
Now to him that worketh is the reward not reckoned of grace, but of
debt. But to him that worketh not, but believeth on him that justifieth
the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness.
What an insult to God to offer him your filthy rags as a payment for, or a
contribution to his gift of grace. Forget about your carnal ambitions, your
pride, your self-righteous ambitions to brag about your having earned it
yourself. Take it, my friend take it! If you don't you will never have it.
God's gift is not for sale. If you want to make God angry, just try offering to
Him your pitiful dead works in exchange for the priceless gift of His Son. And
remember again, these are not the distorted words of Augustine, Luther or
Calvin; they are the words of St. Paul, the Apostle who was sent by God to
take this gospel of the free gift of God to the Gentile world. And they are
more than that. They are the inerrant words of the Almighty God.
Bercot likes to chide and throw challenges out: Don't tell me that the
early Church believed in salvation by grace without works; don't tell me that
they didn't read their Bible, and so on. So let me return the favor to him.
Don't tell me that the Bible doesn't set works against grace and faith and
say that salvation is the result of faith and grace without works!
But even so, maybe this blessing only comes to those who have been
doing the best they can. Didn't Bercot quote one early man who said in
effect that God gives His gift to whom He wills, and He wills to give it to
those who are obeying his law? Abraham was after all one of God's chosen.
Maybe God gave him righteousness by faith when He saw that he was doing
the best he could. Well, the Apostle wants to look into that:
Cometh this blessedness then upon the circumcision only, or upon
the uncircumcision also? for we say that faith was reckoned to
Abraham for righteousness. How was it then reckoned? when he was
in circumcision, or in uncircumcision? Not in circumcision, but in
uncircumcision. And he received the sign of circumcision, a seal of the
righteousness of the faith which he had yet being uncircumcised: that

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he might be the father of all them that believe, though they be not
circumcised, that righteousness might be imputed unto them also:
And the father of circumcision to them who are not of the circumcision
only, but who also walk in the steps of that faith of our father
Abraham, which he had being yet uncircumcised. For the promise, that
he should be the heir of the world was not to Abraham, or to his seed,
through the law, but through the righteousness of faith.
The Circumcision, in this and other passages, represents man's religious
good works from the Old-Testament, before-the-cross perspective. Actually it
was the sign or the seal of the covenant and was the Old Testament
equivalent of New Testament Baptism. God could have waited a few days
until Abraham was circumcised to declare him righteous by faith so that men
would see that righteousness by faith does not exclude, but cooperates with
man's good works. But God did not do that, and He had a purpose in not
doing it, according to St. Paul. It was to show men of all ages, Jews and
Gentiles, that righteousness by faith has nothing to do with man's religious
works. It was to show that any man, anywhere, could receive the
righteousness by faith and he would not be hindered by not being a part of
the religious world and having gone through the well meaning albeit
uselessexercise of doing the best he could.
But can't the works of man work together with the righteousness of faith
to produce salvation? Are Faith and Works mutually exclusive? No, they
cannot work together; and yes, they are mutually exclusive. It is an either-or
proposition. Either you earn it, or you receive it by faith and grace. It has to
be one way or the other. It cannot be both.
For if they which are of the law be heirs, faith is made void and the
promise made of none effect:
Remember that, while it isn't always true, in this case and usage of the
terms, the law and works are the same. We have already seen that in the
verses we have gone over. St. Paul adds to this concept in the 11th chapter:
Even so then at this present time also there is a remnant according
to the election of grace. And if by grace, then is it no more of works:
otherwise grace is no more grace. But if it be of works, then is it no
more grace: otherwise work is no more work. (Rom. 11:5-6)
It is either of grace or it is of works. They cannot unite in this discussion of
Justification. When you bring one into the picture, you cancel out the other
automatically. This was the problem with the unsaved Jews, in Romans 10:24:

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For I bear them record that they have a zeal of God, but not
according to knowledge. For they being ignorant of God's
righteousness and going about to establish their own righteousness,
have not submitted themselves to the righteousness of God. For Christ
is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone that believeth.
Like Bercot, faith and grace meant something different to the Jews than it
did to the Apostle Paul. It meant: God is good, gracious and kind. And we
must have faith. We must believe in the existence of God and that he will
help us so that we will not fall short if we do the best we can. We must follow
the example of Christ and His cross. But salvation has to be the result of our
keeping the law of God. We know that He is only going to be merciful to
those who do the best they can. St. Paul says that because of an attitude
like that, Israel is not saved. They are blinded by self-righteousness. They
can't get away from works for salvation. And so they have only the
righteousness of the law, which is no righteousness at all, for by the deeds
of the law shall no flesh be saved. Christ, by the gift of grace by faith, has
put an end to that depressing, futile striving for the impossible. He has put
an end to the mandate under the Old Testament that those who keep the
commandments will have the blessings. He has done this because it didn't
work (Jer. 31:31). And He has done this by voiding the Old Covenant and
making the New Covenant.
Because the law worketh wrath: for where no law is, there is no
transgression. Therefore it is of faith, that it might be by grace; to the
end the promise might be sure to all the seed; not to that only which
is of the law, but to that also which is of the faith of Abraham; who is
the father of us all.
All the doctrine of salvation by works can do is frustrate us, make us
guilty and hypocritical and keep the wrath of God abiding upon us. If the
crime is still on the books, the animosity from the court toward the criminal
is still there. And there was nothing that condemned man could do about it.
But in the covenant of faith and grace it is different. Because of the gift of
grace, requiring no good works from man, every one who hears and believes
can have it. This was God's promise to Abraham.
But isn't this business of salvation as a gift from God, with no good works
required from us, pretty hard to accept, much less to swallow by us who
have been proud of our religious tradition and heritage? And isn't the notion
that the death of one man could truly pay the penalty for all of the sins that
have ever been committed or ever will be committed, really pretty
unreasonable, illogical and contrary to our rational way of thinking? Doesn't
this frankly seem impossible? Of course it does, and, of course, to the

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natural way of thinking, it is. But remember this: so was the thing that God
told Abraham, which forms for us the example of faith in this chapter.
God told Abraham that he would inherit the world and all the peoples of it,
through his son, which Sarah would bear him. God told him to go out upon
the basis of that promise and begin to establish his life. The problem was
simple. Abraham had no son, He was 100 years old, Sarah was ninety, she
had been barren all of her life, and she was now past the bearing years so
that she couldn't have a child even if she weren't barren. We can look back
at this and minimize the difficulties, but put yourself in Abraham's position.
There was no reason in the world to believe that what God had told him was
true. It didn't make sense, it defied reason and logic and there was not one
single instance or occurrence in history to give it credence. Still Abraham
believe it anyway, and he believed it simply because God had said it; for no
other reason in the world.
As it is written, I have made thee a father of many nations, before
him whom he believed, even God, who quickeneth the dead, and
calleth those things which be not as though they were. Who against
hope believed in hope, that he might become the father of many
nations, according to that which was spoken, So shall thy seed be. And
being not weak in faith, he considered not his own body now dead,
when he was about an hundred years old, neither yet the deadness of
Sarah's womb: He staggered not at the promise of God through
unbelief; but was strong in faith, giving glory to God; And being fully
persuaded that, what he had promised, he was able also to perform.
And therefore it was imputed to him for righteousness.
Can God lie? Would He tell us something that isn't true? Is there anything
too hard for God? Abraham didn't think so, even when it went against his
sentiments, his experiences, his intelligence and his education. On this
matter of his promised son, he didn't stagger around, going back and forth
between belief and unbelief and allowing the natural ridiculousness of the
situation to defeat him. He went out upon the promise as if it had already
become a reality. Because of this faith in God's promised provision (Isaac,
according to Galatians 3, was a type of Christ), God declared him righteous
by faith. What is the point of this story being told here, which we already
know so well?
Now it was not written for his sake alone, that it was imputed to him.
But for us also, to whom it shall be imputed, if we believe on him that
raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead; Who was delivered for our
offenses, and was raised again for our Justification.

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Just as Abraham believed the illogical, ridiculous story of the birth of Isaac,
so we must believe the illogical, ridiculous story that God has accepted the
death of Christ as payment for every man's sin. We must believe that in the
death of Christ the wrath of God against sin was fully satisfied. That is what
it means to have faith in His blood. Christ took our place in judgment all
of us; He was punished by God for our sins all of them; and by His
resurrection from the grave He has provided a new, innocent, guiltless
person for us all of us as it pertains to Justification. If you believe that
if you accept the death of Christ in that context for yourself then
righteousness has been imputed to you and you have the gift of eternal life.
If you don't, you are still under the condemnation of the law and abiding in
death. This Justification doctrine of salvation without works, in contravention
to works, the opposite of works and which is unavailable to those who try to
obtain it wholly or in any part thereof by works is the way, and the only
way to God. I am sorry, Bercot, but that is just the way it is and no amount
of monkeying around with the beliefs of the early Church, no amount of
making and knocking down of straw men and no amount of misstating the
case will change that one iota fortunately thank God!
All that follows concerning righteous works and their meaning and source
in the Christian life must emanate from, and be solidly tied to this doctrine.
If you ever stray from it, you are back under the dead works of the flesh and
the terms of the law. All opportunities in this life to participate in the glory of
God by the good works that he has before ordained for us to walk in, are
owing to the beginning of our Justification by faith without works.
Therefore being justified by faith, we have peace with God through
our Lord Jesus Christ: By whom also we have access by faith into this
grace wherein we stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God.
Good works in the Christian context are a matter of the New Man in Christ,
the New Creation, the renewed mind and the Kingdom of God. The natural
man does not even see, much less understand this world of the things that
God has prepared for us. For this reason I can feel pity for Bercot and hope
that God, in His sovereign grace which Bercot does not believe in, will open
his eyes to the truth. But I cannot sympathize or compromise with him. His
vendetta against the gospel of grace makes him an enemy to be greatly
resisted at the present time. But his kind of self-righteous Judaizing is
certainly nothing new.
The Arians, Pelagians, Gnostics (their modern counterpart is the
Jehovah's Witnesses), Neo-Platonists
(their modern counterpart is
Enlightenment theology) and old Jews (their modern counterparts are the
legalists who believe in Justification by works) were out in St. Paul's day. He
set the example for us as to how to handle them and what to say to the
Church.

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I marvel that ye are so soon removed from him that called you into
the grace of Christ unto another gospel: Which is not another; but
there be some that trouble you, and would pervert the gospel of
Christ. But though we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other
gospel unto you than that which we have preached unto you, let him
be accursed. As we said before, so say I now again, if any man preach
any other gospel unto you than that ye have received, let him be
accursed. For do I now persuade men, or God? or do I seek to please
men? for if I yet pleased men, I should not be the servant of Christ.
There can be no toleration, for any reason or by any cleverness, for those
who bring us another gospel than this one of Justification by faith and grace
alone without works. St. Paul says that anything else, though it professes to
be a gospel, is really not. How true this is. The word gospel means good
news. Those of you who have read this book can see just how good a news
this miserable, defeating and depressing doctrine of salvation by works is. It
puts us back at Sinai where even the great man Moses trembled in his boots.
Of course, the gospel of salvation by faith and grace which removes
boasting does not please the self-righteous religionist who wants to glory in
the flesh, but St. Paul is not trying to please men. He is defending the
marvelous doctrine of grace, which is the only hope of an otherwise-doomed
mankind who is already in condemnation and under the sentence of death
(St. John 3:17,18). One of the burdens that Jesus had, when He came as the
Messiah to the Lost Sheep of Israel, was to teach them to take no security in
religious tradition or the sincere by dead works of the law. As the words of
the old hymn say: Grace, tis a most delightful theme. Tis grace that
rescued guilty man. . . and when I rise to worlds unknown, I'll shout, free
grace!; free grace alone.
We do not say that this rationalistic and humanistic doctrine (that is
essentially what Gnosticism means and is ) of salvation by works is not
clever or does not make a strong appeal to mans sense of fairness. Indeed
it was so strong that even St. Peter and the Apostle Barnabas was taken in
by it.
But when I saw that they walked not uprightly according to the truth
of the gospel, I said unto Peter before them all: If thou, being a Jew,
livest after the manner of Gentiles, and not as do the Jews, why
compellest thou the Gentiles to live as do the Jews? We who are Jews
by nature, and not sinners of the Gentiles, Knowing that a man is not
justified by the works of the law, but by the faith of Jesus Christ, even
we have believed in Jesus Christ, that we might be justified by the
faith of Christ and not by the works of the law. For by the works of the
law shall no flesh be justified. But if, while we seek to be justified by

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Christ, we ourselves also are found sinners, is therefore Christ the

minister of sin? God forbid. For if I build again the things which I
destroyed, I make myself a transgressor.
What St. Paul has asked St. Peter is this: If these legalists are right, and if
the liberties that we have come to as a result of salvation by grace and
freedom from the law are truly wrong, has Christ then led us into sin?
Absolutely not! It isn't Christ who is condemning me for my liberty, it is I
who am condemning myself as a result of letting these humanists get my
ear and convince me that the doctrine of salvation by faith and grace
without works is false. I am the one who has gone back and begun to build
again the thing that grace and faith had destroyed. I wasn't wrong then, but
I am now, because I have been dragged back under the curse of the works
of the law.
For I through the law am dead to the law, that I might live unto God.
I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live yet not I, but Christ liveth
in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the
Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me. I do not frustrate
the grace of God: for if righteousness come by the law, then Christ is
dead in vain.
Through the legitimate ministry of the law covenant with its salvation by
works, a school master to bring us to Christ to be justified by faith, I have
come to Christ and have been justified by faith without works. This has
happened through the New Testament truth of death, burial and resurrection
and new life, as opposed to the reformation and washing of the old man
under the Old Testament. I have died with Christ and have been reborn and
resurrected from death with Him. This has not taken my life or personality
from me. I am still alive. But I am a different person now, with the new
nature, the mind of Christ and the indwelling Holy Ghost. So this life which I
am living now is altogether different than the life of dead religious works
that I was living before my death and resurrection. Now I am alive. I have a
mind that is enlightened by Christ. I know what true righteousness is. I
understand those good works that God ordained for me from before the
foundations of the world. They come to me, not through the ritualism of
dead tradition, but through the reality of the living Christ, which reality
works out in my life as I follow by faith.
This is the grace of God at work in me and I will not frustrate it by the old
salvation-by-works mentality. If there is any truth to that, then Christ died
for nothing. I was able to do that without grace, without faith and without
Christ. I was born with the ability to do that. But that isn't the truth, no
matter who tells you, what kind of argument they put up or how they distort
my words and the other scriptures. And you of all people should know it.

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O foolish Galatians, who hath bewitched you, that ye should not

obey the truth, before whose eyes Jesus Christ hath been evidently set
forth, crucified among you? This only would I learn of you, Received ye
the Spirit by the works of the law, or by the hearing of faith? Are ye so
foolish? having begun in the Spirit, are ye now made perfect by the
flesh? Have ye suffered so many things in vain? if it be yet in vain. He
therefore that ministereth to you the Spirit, and worketh miracles
among you doeth he it by the works of the law, or by the hearing of
faith? Even as Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to him for
righteousness. Know ye therefore that they which are of faith, the
same are the children of Abraham. And the scripture, foreseeing that
God would justify the heathen through faith preached before the
gospel unto Abraham, saying, In thee shall all nations be blessed. So
then they which be of faith are blessed with faithful Abraham.
You saw the power of God at work in our lives. You experienced the new
birth. You felt that quickening power of God in your spirit. You knew the joy
of being set free from self and sin. You saw the signs of our apostleship, the
genuine miracles that could not be faked: you saw the real dead raised,
withered limbs restored and missing limbs replaced. Let me ask you
something. Do you think that this was the result of the logical
argumentation of some legalistic mind-mechanic who has been trained in
how to persuade men by words and eloquence? Do you really think that
there is any power in that? Don't you know that this was the working of the
Holy Ghost, by Christ and by faith, in our lives? What kind of witchcraft has
then caused you to think that, having begun by faith, grace and the Spirit,
you can now be matured and perfected in your lives by going back to the
deeds, the tactics and the ways of the fallen flesh? Do you not remember
Abraham in the Roman letter? Don't you remember how we explained to
you that God, from the ancient times, had testified to this dispensation of
faith and grace by the things he said to Abraham through the old Scriptures?
In the 5th chapter, speaking of the Bercot's of this world, the apostle said,
I would like to see those who trouble you in this manner cut off from the land
of the living; severed from you altogether.
St. Paul's message of salvation by grace, faith and the will of God, without
works, was a theme of the Apostle's ministry and teaching:
Be not thou ashamed of the testimony of our Lord, nor of me his
prisoner: but be thou partaker of the afflictions of the gospel according
to the power of God who hath saved us, and called us with an holy
calling, not according to our works but according to his own purpose
and grace, which was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began
but is now made manifest by the appearing of our Savior Jesus Christ,

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who hath abolished death, and hath brought life and immortality to
light through the gospel: (II Tim. 1:8-10)
Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to
his mercy he saved us, by the washing of regeneration, and renewing
of the Holy Ghost; which he shed on us abundantly through Jesus
Christ our Savior That being justified by his grace, we should be made
heirs according to the hope of eternal life. (Titus 3:5)
So much for Bercot's argument that Apostolic Christianity never taught
salvation by faith that excluded works and that this was the result of the lies
of Luther, Augustine and other Western theologians. So much for his claim
that they believed that obedience to God's laws was a precondition to
God's willingness to help in our salvation.
Yes, But The Bible Says. . .
Bercot has been telling us his version. Now he tries to defend against the
teachings of St. Paul in the Bible. He does this by making another straw
man.
Recently when I was explaining the early Christians' understanding
of salvation to a group of believers, one of the ladies was a bit
disturbed. She exclaimed in annoyance, It sounds to me like they
needed to read their Bibles more! But the early Christians did read
their Bibles. As Josh McDowell points out in Evidence That Demands a
Verdict:
J. Harold Greenlee says that the quotations of the Scripture in the
works of the early Christian writers are so extensive that the N. T.
[New Testament] could virtually be reconstructed from them without
the use of New Testament manuscripts.
Clement of Alexandria (A.D. 150-212). 2,400 of his quotes are from
all but three books of the New Testament. Tertullian (A.D. 160-220)
was a presbyter of the Church in Carthage and quotes the New
Testament more than 7,000 times, of which 3,800 are from the
Gospels . . .
Geisler and Nix rightly conclude that a brief inventory at this point
will reveal that there were some 32,000 citations of the New
Testament prior to the time of the Council of Nicaea (325).

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So please don't accuse the early Christians of not reading their

Bibles. These Christians were well aware of what Paul had written
concerning salvation and grace. After all, Paul personally taught men
like Clement of Rome.96
Again Bercot goes off tilting at windmills. What he has said has very little
to do with whether or not the Early Christians read the Bible. It is a
universally accepted fact that the New Testament was not canonized until
the days of Athanasius and Jerome. As to the writings, there were only bits
and pieces. Greenlee's statement can at best mean that most of the
teachings that are to be found in the New Testament are found after a
search in the teachings of the early Christians. Surely no one could take this
to say that the exact language of the New Testament, the original
autographs are recreated in exact form. In fact, Greenlee does not say that.
He says the New Testament could be virtually reconstructed without the
texts. This is certainly no indication that these men had read and taught the
exact form and only the exact form of the New Testament Scriptures.
This kind of an approach to the Scriptures would not suit orthodoxy at all,
which insists on the exact rendering of the originals. A reconstruction of the
text, by extracting out of the early sermons the almost exact language
leaves us in the dark. What else did they say along with these words. We
have seen in the case of Justin, Irenaeus, Clement of Alexandria and Origen,
most of what they taught and believed was heretical and not acceptable in
any way to orthodoxy. The fact that Clement, in 30 years, made 2,400
quotes from all but three of the New Testament Books doesn't tell us about
their Bible reading habits either. A man who preached a lot could make
2,400 quotes from most of the New Testament in several years and hardly
read the Bible at all. What did these quotes reveal? What was the context,
and what was the understanding? In Clement of Alexandria's case, we know
the answer. Clement was a confused man, deeply involved in Stoicism,
Gnosticism, Neo-Platonism and Greek philosophy. So much so that he
considered Christianity to be true Gnosticism and stated that the ideal
Christian would be a Gnostic. His understanding of the orthodox Christian
doctrine was fatally flawed, no matter how much he read the Bible, and that
is the issue here.
Geisler and Nix do not make an earthshaking revelation either. thirty-two
thousand quotations from the New Testament in 230 years boils down to
about 130 a year from the Church worldwide. That would be little over two
per Sunday. Is this supposed to mean something significant to us in terms of
how much the early men of the Church read their Bible? I would say that if
this is all two scholars could come up with in a historical search, they must
96 Ibid., pp. 69-70.

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not have been reading it much. And if you pull out Tertullian, the Western
theologian, it gets even less significant.
But all of that is really quite beside the point. What the woman meant,
and what she should have said (if they truly believed what Bercot was
saying they believed and we have seen that they probably did not) is that
they must not have been paying much attention to the Bible. This issue has
no connection to how much they read it. A man does not heed the Bible
simply because he reads it. Origen is reported to have been the most prolific
Bible reader of all in the Ante-Nicene period. Yet he paid little attention to
any of it, unless you believe that universal salvation, the inferiority of Christ
to God, reincarnation, Arianism, Gnosticism, Neo-Platonism, Philonism and
the final restoration of the devil himself are taught in the Bible. If early
Christians believed what Bercot claims they believed, then indeed they
would not have been listening to the Bible, if they read it. Bercot now
engages in adventurisms:
However, the early Christians didn't put Paul's letters to the Romans
and the Galatians on a pedestal above the teachings of Jesus and the
other apostles. They read Paul's words about grace in conjunction with
such other Scriptures as: Not everyone who says to me, 'Lord, Lord,'
will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only he who does the will of my
Father who is in heaven. (Matt. 7:21) He who stands firm to the end
will be saved. (Matt. 24:13) All who are in their graves will hear his
voice and come outthose who have done good will rise to live, and
those who have done evil will rise to be condemned. (John 5:28,29)
Behold, I am coming soon! My reward is with me, and I will give to
everyone according to what he has done. (Rev. 22:12) Watch your
life and doctrine closely. Persevere in them, because if you do, you will
save both yourself and your hearers. (I Tim. 4:16) 97
This is pure speculation, invention and imagination on Bercot's part. If he
has documented evidence that any early Church Father said anything to this
effect, he is duty bound to reveal it. Bercot has no idea what any of the early
Christians thought on this subject. This is what he wants you to think and
what he wants them to have thought. The scriptures that he cites as rivaling
St. Paul, and the passages that he says they immediately turned to water
down St. Paul are the ones to which he wishes to call your attention to
counteract the doctrine of salvation by faith and grace alone. Obviously the
Church, over a period of 234 years, looked at all of the New Testament. Nor
is there any reason to think that they the Apostle or anyone else would
not have wanted Christians to read anything but St. Paul. The truth is that it
is Bercot who would not like to have you focus on St. Paul without
97 Ibid., p. 70.

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immediately interpreting his meaning by St. James and others. That is

because he thinks St. James, St. John and the Synoptic Gospels support his
point while St. Paul condemns it. In this Bercot is buying into Luther's
argument a man he supposedly despises and with which none of
orthodoxy has ever agreed on that subject. But in deed and in fact there is
no conflict among biblical writers or support for Bercot anywhere in the
Bible. It was St. John who wrote: These things have I written unto you that
you may know that you have eternal life. He that has the Son of God has
life, and he that has not the Son of God has not life, but the wrath of God
abideth on him. It was St. Peter who write: being born again, not of
corruptible seed but of incorruptible, by the word of God, which liveth and
abideth forever. It was Jesus, in the St. Johns Gospel, chapter 3, who said:
Do not think that I have come into the world to condemn the world, I did not
come to condemn, but to save. He that does not believe is condemned
already because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten son
of God.
It was in the Gospels that John the Baptist said, the law came by Moses,
but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ. It was in the Gospel of John that
St. John said, He came unto his own and his own received him not, but to as
many as received him, to them gave he the power to become the sons of
God. Who were born, not of the will of flesh nor of blood nor the will of man,
but of God. It was in the Gospel of John that Jesus said, Except ye believe
that I AM [JEHOVAH] ye shall die in your sins.
The apostles and the early Christians who had true discernment (this
would exclude many of the Alexandrians) understood the passages of the
New Testament that deal with holiness, purity, the works of the Spirit and
Sanctification. Nevertheless the fact remains that, of the writers of the New
Testament, St. Paul alone explains the doctrine of Justification in Romans and
Galatians. Other writers acknowledge it, but no one of them explains it. It
was St. Paul, ordained of God as the Apostle to the Gentiles, who laid the
foundations of the New Testament Gospel with the doctrine of Justification.
Bercot does not choose to listen to St. Paul (or if he does, he immediately
counteracts the message by an out-of-context appeal to St. James) opting
rather to allow his reconstructed theology of the heretics Clement of
Alexandria and Origen to tell us what St. Paul meant.
So the real issue isn't a matter of believing the Scriptures, but one
of interpretation of the Scriptures. The Bible says that it is by grace
you have been saved, through faithand this not from yourselves, it is
the gift of Godnot by , works. (Eph. 2:8,9) And yet the Bible also
says, You see then how that by works a man is justified and not by
faith alone. (Jas. 2:24 KJV) Our doctrine of salvation accepts that first

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statement but essentially nullifies the second. The early Christian

doctrine of salvation gave equal weight to both. 98
I do not know whose doctrine Bercot is talking about when he says our
doctrine. . .essentially nullifies. . . James' teaching. It certainly isn't mine
and apparently it isn't St. Paul's. Ostensibly it is the Anabaptists and
Evangelicals that Bercot is trying to frighten because of what he perceives to
be their ignorance. I have recently taught verse by verse through both
Romans and James. I never had any problems at all with contradictions and
neither did any of my congregation. But then we understand what St. James
was teaching, and Bercot apparently does not. His approach demeans both
of the Apostles.
Again Bercot makes a hopeful statement that amounts to wishful thinking.
The early Christian doctrine of salvation gave equal
weight to both. 99
This is not true in any case but there is an interesting contradiction to take
note of here. Earlier Bercot stated that the early Church had no theologians
and they did not teach much doctrine and had few dogmatic views. Now he
says that the early Church had a clearly formulated doctrine and dogma on
salvation, that had made the objective decision to hold each of these
scriptures against the other. James was half right and Paul was half right.
What a sad and unsatisfactory view of the Scriptures that we must argue
one against the other and strike a middle-of-the-road compromise to keep
either from becoming unrealistically fanatical. This ostensibly justifies him to
go on to say that salvation is part our works and part God's grace. What a
pitiful view this is and what a serious condemnation against the early
Church.
As was pointed out earlier, the early Christians didn't believe that
man is totally depraved and incapable of doing any good. They taught
that humans are capable of obeying and loving God. But they also
believed that for a person to live obediently throughout his entire life,
he needed God's power. So obedience wasn't totally dependent on
human strength, nor totally dependent on God's power. It was a
mixture of both.
To them, salvation was similar. The new birth as spiritual sons of
God and heirs of the promise of eternal life was offered to all of us
purely as a matter of grace. We do not have to be good enough first.
We do not have to earn this new birth in any way. And we do not have
98 Ibid., p. 71.
99 Ibid.

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to atone for all the sins we have committed in our past. The slate is
wiped clean through God's grace. We are truly saved by grace, not by
works, as Paul said.
Nevertheless, we also play a role in our own salvation, according to
the early Christians. First, we have to repent and to believe in Christ
as our Lord and Savior in order to avail ourselves of God's grace. After
receiving the new birth, we also have to obey Christ. Yet, obedience
itself is still dependent on the continuing grace of God's power and
forgiveness. So salvation begins and ends with grace, but in the
middle is man's faithful and obedient response. Ultimately, salvation
depends on both man and God. For this reason, James could say we
are saved by works and not by faith alone. 100
Here is the typical dilemma of all Jehovah's Witnesses and other Arians
such as the Mormons and theological mavericks who are trying to make it
appear that they believe in the doctrine of salvation by grace and the new
birth. Bercot claims that he has shown that the early Christians believed that
man is not depraved by nature. Humans are not incapable of obeying God,
which they must do if God is to will to extend them grace. The same thing is
true, he says, of salvation. In other words, man who comes to God for grace
and salvation is not fallen by nature and his is not in condemnation before
God, He is just coming to his father, as the boy who picked the apples came
to his father, to receive some gracious gift from him which the father will be
pleased to give him because of his obedience. The words grace, faith and
the without works are misleading here. They do not mean what Orthodox
Christianity means when it uses them. Forget all of the duplicitous, aesopian
language and go to the last sentence because that is what Bercot means:
Ultimately, salvation depends on both man and God. For this reason
James could say we are saved by works and not faith alone. 101
You don't have to be a theologian to see that this is a pointed denial of St.
Paul's doctrine of Justification. Did St. James deny it too? Of course not. St.
James was not talking about the subject of Justification. You can't build
theology out of words alone, you have to build it on context, and the context
is Sanctification, or faithful Christian living.
Bercot claims that he has shown that the early Christians did not believe
that man is totally depraved and incapable of doing any good. It seems to us
that he has not shown this to be the case. This was not the doctrine of the
Ante-Nicene Orthodox Christian Church. It is the doctrine of Bercot's and the
unorthodox early churchmen mostly of Alexandria but also of Rome. Yet the
100 Ibid., pp. 71-2.
101 Ibid.

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early Church is still not the place to verify this doctrine, although no doubt
Bercot would like for us to be able to nothing better than to argue with him
about it there, on the unsteady and uneven ground of the 2nd and 3rd
centuries. As always, the place to establish the truth in this matter is from
the Scriptures themselves. We shall make a few Biblical citations.
And God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth,
and that every imagination of the thought of his heart was only evil
continually. And it repented the Lord that he had made man, and it
grieved him at his heart. (Genesis 6:5,6)
And the Lord smelled a sweet savor; and the Lord said in his heart, I
will not again curse the ground for man's sake; For the imagination
[thought] of his heart is evil from his youth, neither will I again smite
the earth with a curse as I have done. (Genesis 8:21)
Here God acknowledges that man is inherently evil and there is no point
punishing him to death because it will not do any good. Instead God has
found another way of dealing with man and the problem of evil. He smells
the sweet savor of the sacrifice, a type of the death of Christ. By this he is
placated because He can satisfy the all important matter of his vengeance
and justice and still retain man as a family.
Behold, I was shapen in iniquity. In sin did my mother conceive me.
(Psalm 51: 5)
The wicked are estranged from the womb: they go astray as soon as
they are born, speaking lies. (Psalm 58:3)
The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who
can know it? (Jeremiah 17:9)
But we are all as an unclean thing. And all our righteousness are as
filthy rags; and we all do fade as a leaf; and our iniquities, like the
wind, have taken us away. And there is none that calleth upon thy
name, that stirreth up himself to take hold of thee: for thou hast hid
they face from us, and hast consumed us, because of our iniquities.
(Isa. 64:6)
What then? are we better than they? No, in no wise: for we have
before proved both Jews and Gentiles, that they are all under sin; As it
is written, There is none righteous, no, not one: There is none that
understandeth, there is none that seeketh after God. They are all gone
out of the way, they are together become unprofitable; there is none

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that doeth good, no, not one. Their throat is an open sepulchre; with
their tongues they have used deceit, the poison of asps is under their
lips: Whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness: Their feet are swift
to shed blood: Destruction and misery are in their ways: And the way
of peace have they not known: There is no fear of God before their
eyes. Now we know that what things soever the law saith, it saith to
them who are under the law, that every mouth may be stopped, and
all the world may become guilty before God. (Romans 3:9-19)
Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by
sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned: (For
until the law sin was in the world: but sin is not imputed where there
is no law. Nevertheless death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over
them that had not sinned after the similitude of Adam's transgression,.
. . ) (Rom. 5:12-14a)
For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive. (I
Cor. 15:22)
And you hath he quickened, who were dead in trespasses and
sins; . . . at that time ye were without Christ, being aliens from the
common wealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of
promise, having no hope, and without God in the world. (Ephesians
2:1, 12)
For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but
that the world through him might be saved. He that believeth in him is
not condemned: but he that believeth not, is condemned already,
because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of
God. And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world,
and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were
evil. (Jno:3:)
Everything that comes out of man's heart, which is evil from mans youth,
is only evil and continually evil. The heart is dishonest and not only wicked,
but desperately wicked. This comes from man who demonstrated this
tendency in the womb before birth (remember that Jacob supplanted Esau in
the womb) and this was not an early tendency that the unborn fetus
developed, his mother conceived him in sin. The best that man can do is as
filthy rags before God. God has given his evaluation. They are all fools, none
of them understands anything, God is seeking them but they are not
seeking God, they are liars, they are immoral, they are blasphemers, they
are violent, they are impossible to get along with, they are back-biters, they
are stubborn and hard-headed and they do not fear God. We inherited this

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death, indeed we were all present in Adam and sinned in Adam. Romans
5:12 is in the aeorist tense and has the effect of saying that all did sin at
some time in the past, or in other words, in Adam. Just as Levi was present
in his great-grandfather Abraham and paid tithes to Melchisedec through
Abraham (Heb. 7:9,10), so we were present in Adam and sinned in Adam,
that is what this passage is saying. We all died in the first Adam and can
only be made alive in the second Adam. This truth, as we have seen, is
proclaimed by Moses, David, Jeremiah, Isaiah, King David, Jesus and St. Paul
from Genesis to the New Testament letters.
I wonder who Bercot is referring to when he talks about the apostolic
Christians who did not believe this truth? Clement of Rome believed it,
Polycarp believed it, Barnabas believed it, Augustine believed it, Jerome
believed it, Athanasius (an Eastern theologian) believed it, Chrysostom (an
Eastern theologian and the most eloquent preacher of the Ante-Nicene and
Post-Nicene Church) believed it. Ambrose believed it. He must be talking
about that same group of Eastern Mystics, Christian Gnostics, NeoPlatonists. That would be Justin, Clement of Alexandria, Origen, Arius and
Pelagius, denounced by historians as definitely not orthodox, and on
whom he has tried so hard to paint the face of historic Christianity.
Can A Saved Person Be Lost?
Here is the thorniest question in the history of the Christian Church. I will
mention several reasons (I am sure there are many) why this issue is
difficult.
First of all, it is difficult because thorough, sound, contextual, expository
teachings on this subject from St. Paul, St. Peter, St. John and St. James are
virtually non-existent in the Christian Church. The subject is there in the
Bible alright, along with the answers. But the Eastern heresies from
Alexandria; the mistaken ideas of St. Augustine which were taken up in
almost exact form in the Reformation not by Calvin and Luther as is often
supposed, but by Arminius; the foolishness of Luther; the Enlightenment
theology of Calvin; the Evangelical Conservative Theology (not to be
mistaken for Evangel- icalism) from faith to reason as a means of knowing
truth (started by Arminius and taken over by Finney the Pelagian); and the
materialism-and-higher-education-cult of the modern Church has so
confused this subject, that it would take virtually a lifetime of teaching to
straighten it out. This is not a truth that is learned intellectually and
scholastically. It is revealed from the Holy Scriptures by the Holy Ghost. It
requires a heart that has given up on the old creation with its false values
and pride and is open to the Holy Spirit and to truth. Jesus said that while it
is freely given to all takers, there are still relatively few who find it.

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Can a saved person lose his salvation? The answer, which is startling to
many who think they know me, is yes and no depending on what you
mean.
Remember that in orthodox doctrines, man is tripartite. He exists in three
parts. He is spirit, soul and body. The Great Salvation, which is in three parts,
answers to those three parts of man.
Justification has to do with the dead spirit. When a man comes to Christ
initially, it is not his soul that is saved, but his spirit is quickened and made
alive. This is what reunites him to God and makes all that follows possible.
Justification may be briefly described in the following way.
1. We are justified, or saved from the penalty of sin.
A. Justification is judicial.
B. It has to do with crime, punishment and the court and the judge.
2. Justification is the quickening of the dead spirit.
3. It is a past salvation: we have been saved.
4. It relies exclusively on the sole and finished work of Christ.
5. Man can do no works, and may not do works to receive it.
6. It is a finished work. Man does no works to maintain it.
7. From Justification there can be no death because the complete and
perfect righteousness of Christ is declared for us fully and immediately.
Without this, the guilt would not be taken away and there would be no
resurrection and new life.
8. This salvation cannot be lost since it was accomplished by the life and
death of Christ and it is maintained by the life of Christ.
Glorification has to do with the body. Death was pronounced against the
body by God in the fall. The mortal body must die. Nothing scientific
discovery, miracles or any other can halt this process. But Christ's cross
and resurrection has provided for a new body which we will get at Christ's
return according I Corinthians 15 and I Thessalonians 4. It is implied in II
Peter 3, though the body is not specifically mentioned. It is an immortal and
glorious body that is physical but not corruptible. It is not subject to
corruption, decay, pain or death. It is born in immortality as a result of the
resurrection from the grave by Jesus Christ.
1. This is a future salvation. We will be saved.
2. This has to do with salvation from the presence of sin.
3. The giving to us by God of the Holy Spirit is the Earnest of this
physical salvation to comfort and assure us that when the time arrives and
the escrow closes, we have a deal. There is a spiritual body and we shall
have it. The Bible doesn't tell us much about it. St. John said simply, We do
not know what we shall be, but when He shall appear we shall be like Him.
St. Paul said that it exceeds in glory the natural body as the sun exceeds in
brilliance the stars. Just as the stars are bright at night, so this mortal body
has glory now. But as the stars disappear into insignificance when the sun

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comes up, so the glory of the natural body will fade and disappear in
comparison to the unspeakable glory of that great body, which is like His.
Not the one that was crucified in dishonor, for we know no man after the
flesh anymore, not even Christ, said St. Paul in II Corinthians 5, but the one
that the Apostles got a glimpse of on the Mount of Transfiguration. That
body that the eternal Son had with the Father in eternity past before the
world was.
4. From that physical salvation, there can be no death.
5. This physical salvation cannot be lost.
Sanctification has to do with the life, or the soul. (The Greek word is
psuche and is pronounced psoo-kahy'. In St. Mat. 2:20, 6:25, 10:39, 16:25,
20:28, St. Mark 3:4, 8:35, 10:45, St. Luke 9:24, 12:22,28, 14:26, 17:33, St.
John 10:11, 13:38, 15:13, Acts 20:10, 27:22, Romans 11:3, 16:4, Phi. 2:30, I
John. 3:14 and Rev. 8:9 it is translated life. In St. Mat. 16:26, St. Mark 8:36,
St. Luke 12:19,20, Acts 3:23, Romans 2:9, 12:1, I Cor. 15:45, I Thes. 5:23,
Heb. 4:12, 6:19, 10:39, Jas. 5:20, I Pet. 2:11, II Pet. 2:8, III John. 2, and some
twenty other places in the New Testament it is translated life. It is not to be
confused with the somewhat different concept of zoe (dzo-ay') which means
the state of being quickened or of being alive. You have your life or your soul
because you are alive. But the fact of being alive does not grasp all that is
comprehended by your life. After physical death and before the resurrection,
you will not have a soul or a body though you will have a spirit. Biblically
speaking there can be no soul where there is no living spirit in a living body.
Thus Adam became a living soul when the spirit was breathed into his body.
Death was pronounced upon the soul by God because of sin [the soul that
sinneth, it shall die]. Like all other parts of tri-partite man, the soul can only
be redeemed and made immortal in Christ. Therefore God, through Jesus
Christ, has abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through
the gospel [II Tim. 1:10]).
1. It is salvation from the power of sin.
2. It is a present salvation: we are being salved.
3. It too is based upon the cross and the resurrection. In this present, daily
salvation, we seek to be made conformable to his death so that we might be
in the likeness of His resurrection today.
4. It is an issue of life in the present phase of the kingdom of God.
5. Like the other two aspects, it has to do with the righteousness of Christ
by faith and grace.
But there are some differences.
1. Unlike the other two, the outworking of this aspect of salvation is not
finished, though the works of Christ that make it possible are (Heb. 4:1-3).
2. It is a salvation in which we are to become involved by our works. As St.
Paul said in Galations 2, they are the works of Christ in me, but still they are
my works by faith and His power.

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3. In this salvation from the power of sin, the grace is in the provision. God
has given us the means, but, contrary to Luther, God will not live our lives
for us. It is up to us to use those means and save our lives from the power of
sin and the death that would result from sin.
4. This is what makes the whole thing relevant to you and me today.
5. It is this salvation that 95% or more of the New Testament is written
about.
6. We can lose this salvation by dereliction. In this salvation you can be
saved and lost and saved again. It was this danger of the loss of our lives, or
our souls (the two words being identical in the Greek) that the apostles
warned us about constantly.
7. Since this salvation calls upon us to save our lives and work the works
of God, it is this salvation about which St. James spoke when he said faith
without works is dead and faith alone will not save us. The reason why this
differs from Justification is that there the work was Christ's alone in which no
man can become involved. In Sanctification, a provisional gift of grace has
been given, but the work of salvation are ours.
9. It is the earning of rewards.
10. It is the inheritance of the saints in light.
11. It is our opportunity to participate in the adornments of eternity.
In Historic Orthodox Christianity a man will be glorified because he is
justified. Sanctification is of Justification and toward Glorification, but it is
not a sequential link in the chain. That concept is an Old Testament
proposition. The issue is rewards and joy in the day of Christ. It is this that
the Apostle speaks of when he says that if any man's works shall abide he
shall receive a reward and if any man's works shall be burned, he shall
suffer loss. Let us be clear what this loss is. It is more than just some
adornments. It is more than things. It is the loss of all or part of his life. So
when you have determined how important your life is to you, then you will
know how important Sanctification is. Many young people have an
extravagant idea about their mortal lives. They are young and tough, they
have lots of time to do important and useful things, and so on. Some of us
who have grown long in the tooth would like to be able to point something
out to them about the deceitfulness of that kind of thinking, but all we can
do is warn them. They will have to make their own decisions, just as we
made ours.
One of the great problems in dealing with this kind of an issue is the
shallow, narrow and inadequate way we use, understand and teach the term
salvation in today's Church. We usually have a very singular idea in mind
when we do it. But the Great Salvation is broad and many faceted. And
those who over-simplify it are not satisfied with their understandings. I know
they are not. I talk to them all of the time. They have many unanswered
questions; some they can admit and some they can't but they are always

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there in the backs of their minds. So when somebody asks me, Can a saved
person be lost?, I have to know what they mean before I answer. We need
to be able to listen to the stern and frightening warnings of Hebrews 10:2932 and 12:25-29. We need to know what it means for the Christian to draw
back unto destruction and incur the displeasure of God. It is not enough to
just repeat the verse, we need to know why and how we are of those who
believe to the saving of the soul. We need to know we can loose our souls
through dereliction. We need to know that because it's true. But we first
need to know that we cannot loose our Justification or our place in
Glorification. A child will thrive under the stern disciplines of a sober father if
those disciplines are properly oriented and presented. I know, I was raised
by one and I did thrive. I thank God for my father's disciplines. I would not
trade anything that I now posses for that heritage, even if I could. But if a
child is convinced that if he does something wrong, his father may step out
on the back porch as he nears the house and blow his head off with the
shotgun or beat him to death with a garden hoe, that son will not develop
normal in a wholesome growth. He will go into emotional shock, he will
become stunted, warped and paranoid. He will live in terror. If that kind of
grotesque and distasteful image of a natural father makes us feeling like
crying out that we stop talking about such things, how much more our
Heavenly Father. Hebrews tells us not to despise his chastening because
they are always out of love and for our good. It is a major crime and sin to
distort the wholesome and wonderful relationship of the family of God into a
sadistic tale of a maladjusted family where frightened children huddle in
their beds and wonder, each time they hear a creak in the night, if dad is
coming in to beat them unmercifully.
We do not have that same scandalized and horrible feeling if we are
talking about a Judge sentencing a criminal to prison or death. Sure there is
some sadness, but what is the alternative? To be overrun with hooligans? So
it is with the Gospel. There is one message to the man who is not justified.
There is another to the man who is justified but not sanctified. There is a
loss to be suffered and a reward to be gained in either case, but it is not the
same reward and it is not the same loss.
But how can a man not lose his gift and lose it at the same time? Isn't this
too confusing? It is not confusing at all if you have a proper understanding
of it. Let me see if I can illustrate it so you can get some light on the matter.
Let's say that a man, by his death, leaves his son a rich, magnificent farm.
That farm now belongs to the son. It is his legacy by the inheritance left to
him by his father. But along with that title to the farm comes a potential;
that of working the farm and reaping the harvest. If the son plows in the
plowing time, plants at seed time, weeds, cultivates and waters, that farm
will produce him many wonderful things. But if he idles in the plowing,
doesn't plant anything, builds no levees for watering and does not weed,
what will he have? A bunch of old briars and thorns perhaps, that are only

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good to be piled up and burned. If the farm grows over with weeds, it will
still belong to the son, for the father gave it to him. It is his by the death of
the testator. It will still have just as many acres and just as great a potential.
But he will have lost the harvest; that part of his inheritance that could have
been his if he had acted responsibly. He did not act responsibly so he lost his
inheritance; not the real estate, but the potential. Or maybe he only did half
the work and got half the potential, and so on.
So it is with salvation. We are born into the family of God. We are given
Justification and Glorification by the death of the Testator. By that same
death of the Testator, we also are given the potential of saving our lives and
laying up treasures in heaven (Heb. 9:13-19). We also have the option of
squandering our inheritance and losing them. Which we do is up to us. The
salvation of the life is not an option to the man who is not justified and born
into the family of God.
This is an altogether different discussion than Bercot is into. He is in a
sense asking if a justified man can lose his Justification, but it isn't really
even that. He is really asking if a natural born man, who can serve God
because he is not fallen by nature, decides to do God's will with God's help,
can he then become derelict and fall away from that? All he has to do is
read the book of Judges to get the answer to that. But it is a superfluous
question in the New Covenant context. The man was never saved to begin
with so how can we answer whether or not he can lose something that he
never had. It is like asking a man, when did you stop beating your wife? If
you try to give an answer you are admitting to wife beating, whether or not
you are guilty.
If any are asking whether a man can lose his Justification, the answer is
no. He didn't get it by works, he made no contribution to it by works and it
isn't in any sense his work. It was and is the work of Christ. The question of
the loss of Justification does not raise the issue of your failure or mine, but a
question of Christ's failure. That is an impossible issue to even contemplate
to the orthodox Christian. The man who can contemplate that question had
best go back and read Romans 3 and 4 and examine what he is resting the
hope of his Justification upon? I will now give you some scriptures that bear
out what I have said in this last paragraph.
To as many as received Him, to them gave He power to become the
sons of God, even to them which believe on His name: which were
born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man,
but of God. (St. John 1:12,13)
I am the good shepherd: the good shepherd giveth his life for the
sheep. But he that is an hireling, and not the shepherd, whose own the
sheep are not, seeth the wolf coming, and leaveth the sheep, and
fleeth: and the wolf catcheth them, and scattereth the sheep. The

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hireling fleeth, because he is an hireling, and careth not for the sheep.
I am the good shepherd, and know my sheep, and am known of mine.
(St. John 10:11-13)
Here Christ is not talking about the cross, but he is saying that he stands
between the sheep and all that would hurt them. The only way anything or
anyone is going to get into that fold and hurt or scatter is to kill Him first. I
don't know about you, but that makes me feel pretty safe.
My sheep hear my voice and I know them and they follow me: and I
give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall
any man pluck them out of my hand. My Father, which gave them to
me, is greater than all; and no man is able to pluck them out of my
Father's hand. I and my Father are one. (St. John 10:27-30)
Here Jesus says that the sheep are his, not because they came to Him, but
because the Father gave them to Him for a possession. If anyone tries to
take them from Him, they cannot do it, they cannot get them out from under
his control. Yet Jesus recognizes the dangerous world He is in and the
subtleties of the devil. Even if they could get them away from me, He says,
they couldn't get them away from my Father. They are mine, He gave them
to me. Nobody is going to take them from Him because He is the greatest of
all. And since they can't take them from Him, they can't take them from me
because I and my Father are one. (Bercot would like to have us not rely too
much on the Gospel of John. He prefers that we take Jesus' teachings from
the synoptic gospels (Matthew, Mark and Luke) because there is a much
more dependable oral tradition, they having been verified by three men, as
opposed to one in the case of John.)
But God commendeth His love toward us in that, while we were yet
sinners, Christ died for us. Much more then, being now justified by His
blood, we shall be saved from wrath through him. For if when we were
enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of His Son, much
more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by His life.
Here the Apostle is talking about Justification and starting to explain the
doctrine of the atonement. His argument is simple and pointed. God went to
all this trouble to find us and save us, even by putting His Son to death,
because he so much wanted to save us out of love. Our Justification was a
work of God and of Christ, not of us. Reconciliation was by His blood. If God
so loved us when we were enemies, enough to be put to the trouble of the
death of His Son, now that we belong to Him and Christ is in His presence as
our intercessor, a much more desirable ministry than suffering and dying,
God, who did so much to get us, is not going to let us go. We shall be

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preserved by Christ's life. What the Apostle has said here is very hard to
mistake, but you can do it if you are bound and determined. Wisdom is
justified of her children. If a man wants to believe something bad enough, he
will find a way.
So then it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of
God that showeth mercy. . . what if God, willing to shew his wrath and
make his power known, endured with much long-suffering the vessels
of wrath fitted to destruction: and that he might make known the
riches of his glory on the vessels of mercy, which he had afore
prepared unto glory, even us, whom he hath called, not of Jews only,
but also of the Gentiles? (Romans 9:16, 22-24)
Elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, through
Sanctifi- cation of the Spirit, unto obedience and sprinkling of the
blood of Jesus Christ: grace unto you, and peace be multiplied. Blessed
be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ which according to his
abundant mercy hath begotten us again unto a lively hope by the
resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance
incorruptible and undefiled, and that fadeth not away, reserved in
heaven for you who are kept by the power of God through faith unto
salvation ready to be revealed in the last time. . . being born again not
of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the word of God, which
liveth and abideth forever. (I Peter 1:2-5,23)
Here it is seen that the child of God is kept by the very power of God
Himself. The inheritance that we have already acquired is immortal and
incorruptible. This in full consistency with the new man, born to the New
Adam. In the old Adam we had life that was corruptible. Adam proved this by
behavior that resulted in his corruption. But the life and nature of the
Second Adam is not corruptible. Christ established this by His perfect life,
His death and His resurrection from the dead. Some believe that even from
this new life we can die. If this were true then we are not born of
incorruptible seed. It is either corruptible or it isn't. If it is corruptible, then
the eternal existence of Christ himself is at risk, for it is His life and nature
that we have, and it is of His seed that we have been born. Of course, the
Jehovah's Witnesses, whose doctrine Bercot teaches in this book in
substantial part, have no problem with that. Like Arius, their founder, they
do not believe that Jesus Christ is eternal and immortal. They believe that he
was created, that he is a lesser god, inferior to the God (Gnosticism) and
that his fate does not have the same immutability as that of God Himself.
They do not believe that Christ was physically resurrected from the dead or
that he has a body. He is a spirit only, one of the 144,000 who exist in

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heaven with God and without bodies (Gnosticism and the doctrine of Origen,
whom Bercot commends as an orthodox Christian).
But the real orthodox Christianity has never questioned that Christ is The
God, that He was raised in physical immortality or that His life is
incorruptible. Justification is a matter of birth, not reformation, as Bercot
believes. Those who are really Christians in the orthodox sense need to
resolve in their minds whether or not they believe that St. Peter was right
when he said that we are born again of incorruptible seed that lives and
abides forever. Incorruptible is the same in kind as infinite, eternal and
immortal. Nothing that is infinite, eternal and immortal can or has ever
corrupted or died. If we don't believe that, then our words about eternal
life are hollow and meaningless, projecting nothing more than a desperate
hanging on and hoping for the best through- out eternity. I pity anyone
whose concept of incorruption exists on such a humanistic, unbiblical and
unsatisfactory plane.
Texts of the Bible That Teach The Certainty of Glorification.
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ which
according to his abundant mercy hath begotten us again unto a lively
hope by the Resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an
inheritance incorruptible and undefiled, and that fadeth not away,
reserved in heaven for you who are kept by the power of God through
faith unto salvation ready to be revealed in the last time. (I Peter
1:3,4)
Here we are told that the salvation of our bodies we who are born again
of incorruptible seed and are kept by the power of God will be revealed in
that last day.
Behold, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear
what we shall be; but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be
like him; for we shall see him as he is. (I John 3:2)
We are already the sons of God. We do not know at this time what that will
mean physically in the future. But we will find out when He returns because
whatever He is like physically, that is what we shall be like.
For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so them also
that sleep in Jesus will God bring with Him. For this we say unto you by
the word of the Lord, that we which are alive and remain shall not
prevent [go before] them that are asleep. For the Lord himself shall
descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel,
and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first: Then

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we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them
in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with
the Lord. (I Thessalonians 4:14-17)
For God has not appointed us to wrath, but to obtain salvation by
our Lord Jesus Christ who died for us, that, whether we wake or sleep,
we should live together with him. (I Thessalonians 5:9-10)
The context of this passage is that the Christian should not fall asleep at
his post but that he should stay alert and watch. It is not talking about
physical death as many have supposed. The word sleep in this chapter is not
the same as in chapter four. There it is kima, which means to decease, to
fall on sleep, or to be dead. It is the word used concerning the state of
Lazarus in St. John 11:12. The word here is katheudo. It is the word that
Jesus used in St. Luke 22:46 when He asked His disciples: Why sleepest
thou? It is never used in the Bible in connection with physical death.
The word wake in verse 10 is the same as the word watch in verse 6. It is
gregoreuo. It means to keep awake, to watch, to be vigilant or to be
watchful. It cannot and does not mean to be alive physically as opposed to
being dead mortally or physically. In fact, the words wake, wakened, waken,
wakeneth, or waking are never used at all in the Greek New Testament to
make reference to being physically alive. There simply is no such usage.
And so the context, which is staying alert, as well as the language, shows us
that the Apostle is telling them that whether they are watching or not, they
will go with Him when He comes.
Why would the Apostle tell them this? Even if it were true, why would
anyone want to encourage, or at least not in this instance discourage,
dereliction? The answer is two-fold. First of all, he has just been telling them
about what will happen to the living and the dead when Christ returns. Now
he uses this to encourage them to duty. He does not want tricky men to turn
this teaching around to make it appear that it is part and parcel of the other,
so that only those who are doing all that they should be are going to be
resurrected and taken with Him. This would strike terror in the heart of every
man, for who is doing all that he should or could, or who has ever done so? I
certainly haven't! Have you? (Let's see how honest you are.)
The purpose of this counsel is to comfort one another, not to terrify one
another. Take heart, Brethren. The coming of the Lord is soon. I can
identify with this in a special way. In Korea I used to walk guard on the lonely
outpost of the ammunition dump in the dead of night when it was 15
degrees below and the wind was blowing. The humidity on that little
peninsula was about 80 percent and it was the equivalent of more than 100
degrees below zero! That was the longest two hours in the history of the
world. The on-duty officer understood this and so he would come around in
his jeep once in a while and yell out. Not much longer, now, take heart

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soldier, you can make it. The Apostle wanted to spur them on to duty but
he did not want them to think that their Glorification was on the line.
The second reason comes out in the second letter, the beginning of
chapter 2. Some one had been writing letters, signing the names of the
Apostles to them and sending them around to the churches, saying that
Christ had already come and the resurrection was already past. It was sort of
a pre-millennial doctrine I guess, where the Lord sneaks in and out and no
one knows that He has been there. St. Paul told them not to be terrified,
troubled or shaken in their minds by spirit, word or by letters that appear to
be from us. We didn't write you any such thing and no such thing is true, he
said. There is a very simple logic to be followed here. That day of the Lord
cannot come until the rapture takes place (a falling away should be
translated The falling away, for the definite article is clearly there in the
original Greek). The Greek word apostasia, or the neutral apostasion means,
among other things, a falling away from, a forsaking, or something that
separates. We are not suggesting that it cannot mean spiritual apostasy. Of
course, it can mean that. What we are attempting to point out is that it does
not have to mean that, and in this case it doesn't. The whole argument and
context is based on The coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our gathering
together unto Him (v.1). He goes on to say that as long as the Holy Spirit is
in the world He will resist the full manifestation of the image of evil in the
children of Satan, allowing only so much of it as serves God's purpose. It is
not until the removing of the Holy Spirit with the catching away of the
Church, that Satan will be able to come fully out in the open and show
himself not only as he is, but as he wants to be seen. But it will be too late
then to do him any good, for the Lord will destroy him with the word of His
mouth and the brightness of His coming.
The whole basis of this teaching is the second coming of Christ and the
resurrection and rapture of the Church. The simple reason why they knew
that it had not happened yet was that they were still here, which they would
not have been if Christ had returned. They would already have been caught
away to be with Him. But what if Christ had come and had not taken them
because they had not been watchful enough. The Apostle said that if there
was any danger of that happening, Christ would have taken us out of here
the minute we were baptized into Him. That is not our appointment. Our
appointment is to receive physical salvation, or in other words salvation
from the presence of sin in physical immortality. This will be true whether or
not we are watching or sleeping like Jesus' disciples.
What then is to keep God's people from just casting discretion to the four
winds and living any way they want to? There is nothing to be lost. Ah, but
there is; a very great deal indeed, and not only in the day of judgment does
it have meaning, but it is the most important thing to us now. It is what
makes the whole thing relevant to you and me. It is the inheritance of the
saints in light, the unsearchable riches of Christ, the gold that doesn't wax

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old, the wealth of the Kingdom of God on earth. We will talk about that when
we discuss the next aspect of salvation, Sanctification, or the salvation of
the life or soul, or salvation from the power of sin, the salvation which can
be lost through dereliction.
And there is another thing here that has always bothered me. It is a
strange argument that those who have truly repented and come to Christ
are just looking for an excuse to behave irresponsibly and would so in a
minute, without any regard to the loss of their reward, so long as they could
be assured that they were going to make it to heaven. I don't think that is
true. There may be people who are masquerading as Christians who would
like to have it both ways, but real Christians don't think like that unless there
is some kind of serious defeat in their lives. I don't want to do that, do you?
But some man will say, How are the dead raised up? and with what
body do they come? Thou fool, that which thou sowest is not
quickened except it die: and that which thou sowest, thou sowest not
that body that shall be, but bare grain, it may chance or wheat, or
some other grain. But God giveth it a body as it hath pleased him, and
every seed his own body. (I Cor. 15:35-38)
Men are wondering how God is going to get the body back together for
the resurrection and what they are going to look like, based on what they
looked like in this world. What a foolish intellectual exercise and doubt, the
Apostle says. When you put a seed in the ground, it has to die and decay
before it can come out of that little grave. And what comes out doesn't look
like what you put in. The biggest farmer in the world would starve to death
in a hurry if all he got out of the ground was what he put in. We expect a
chance of wheat, a stalk of corn ears, a stem of barley heads, or something
like that. We don't look for that little seed we put in. And even though we
know generally what will come up, yet every plant is a little different. There
are fat ears and skinny ears, full heads and slight, big melons and little ones,
and so on. God causes it to come up, and we will not know exactly what it
will look like until we see it. But there is one thing we do know. It had better
look a lot different than that little seed that we planted, or we are in big
trouble.
All of these things in nature around us are designed to illustrate a truth
for us. No, we are not pantheists. God is not nature and nature is not God.
But God is in nature, and nature illustrates truths. It tells us that this body is
sown in the ground a tiny, insig- nificant seed that only the most ardent
naturalist would call beautiful. But everyone who is normal calls it beautiful
when they see that lovely, fragrant rose.
So also is the resurrection of the dead. It is sown in corruption, it is
raised in incorruption: it is sown in dishonor; it is raised in glory: it is

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sown in weakness; it is raised in power: it is sown a natural body; it is

raised a spiritual body. There is a natural body and there is a spiritual
body . . . and as we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall also
bear the image of the heavenly.
Now this I say, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the
kingdom of God; neither doth corruption inherit incorruption. Behold I
shew you a mystery; we shall not all sleep, but we shall all be
changed, in the moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump:
for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible,
and we shall be changed. So then when this corruptible shall have put
on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on immortality, then
shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, Death is swallowed
up in victory. O death where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy
victory? ( I Cor. 15: 42-44, 50-55)
In no single one of these passages concerning Glorification, is any
condition put on it other than Justification and being one of Christ's; and in
no one of them is any note of doubt or pessimism sounded.
Scriptures Concerning Sanctification The Salvation Of The Soul.
Since most of the New Testament letters are about this aspect of the Great
Salvation, there are a multitude of citations. I am only going to give a few of
the more pertinent ones to our subject at hand.
For to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is
life and peace. Because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is
not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be. So then they
which are in the flesh cannot please God. But ye are not in the flesh,
but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. Now if any
man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his. And if Christ be in
you, the body is dead because of sin; but the Spirit is life because of
Christ. But if the Spirit of Him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell
in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your
mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you. Therefore, brethren,
we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live after the flesh. For if you live
after the flesh you shall die, but if you through the Spirit do mortify
the deeds of the body, ye shall live. For as many as are led by the
Spirit of God, they are the sons of God. (Romans 8:6-14)
Here we are told about three men.
1. The natural man who does not have the Spirit of God and therefore
cannot please Him.
2. The carnal man, who has the Spirit of God and who is alive because of
Christ, but of whom it is said, his body is dead because of sin. Let us

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think about this man for just a moment. Who is he? He is not mortally dead
because the Spirit of Christ is dwelling in his body. This is certainly not true
of someone who has died and is lying in state awaiting his burial. It is not
talking about the non-Christian or natural man, because the Spirit of God is
dwelling in him and his spirit is alive because of Christ. So who is he? Well,
there is only one option left. He is the Christian who has sin in his life and is
not serving God.
3. Then there is the third man. This is the spiritual or the sanctified man
who, with the help of the Holy Ghost, has put to death these sinful deeds,
and is alive in his mortal body. This is not in the sense of Justification, or the
spirit, for Christ is dwelling in him and his is already alive in the spirit. But in
the sense of his life, or life in the mortal body.
This body can become free from sinful indulgences and become a temple
of the Holy Ghost. But that is not automatically true because we are alive in
the spirit. It is only true if we will make the effort. If, with the help of the
Holy Spirit, we will put to death this sin in the flesh, we will live. If we do
not, and continues to live carnally, we will live in death. If we are alive in
this body spiritually by faithful living and then begin to walk after the flesh,
we will die. In other words, we will return to the condition in which the spirit
is alive because of Christ, but the body is dead because of sin.
Moreover brethren, I would not that ye should be ignorant, how that
all our fathers were under the cloud, and all passed though the sea;
and were all baptized unto Moses in the cloud and in the sea; and did
all eat the same spiritual meat; and did all drink the same spiritual
drink: for they drank of that spiritual Rock that followed them: and
that Rock was Christ. But with many of them God was not well
pleased: for they were overthrown in the wilderness.
Now these things were our examples, to the intent we should not
lust after evil things, as they also lusted. . .wherefore let him that
thinketh that he standeth take heed lest he fall. There hath no
temptation taken you but such as is common to man: but God is
faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able;
but will with the temptation also make a way to escape, that ye may
be able to bear it. (I Cor. 10:1-6, 12,13)
Here a warning is issued to God's people (the Brethren) against incurring
God's anger through careless living and being overthrown.
Moreover, brethren, I declare unto you the gospel which I preached
unto you, which also ye have received and wherein ye stand; by which
also ye are saved, if ye keep in memory what I preached unto you,
unless ye have believed in vain. (I Cor. 15:1,2)

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Here the Apostle exhorts the Brethren that those things pertaining to their
stand in the gospel will only result in salvation if they keep them in
memory, which obviously means obedience.
Let no man beguile you of your reward in voluntary humility and
worshipping of angels, intruding into those things which he hath not
seen, vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind. (Col. 2:18)
Here the Apostle warns that if we let our self be intimidated by legalists
and traditionalists who want to channel our convictions and energies off into
Sabbath-keeping, liturgies, ceremonialism and other dead rituals of the
canceled law, we will loose our reward. We will not see what Christ has really
given to us, what we should be doing, and what we could lay up for
ourselves in heaven by a life that is not only fervently and devotedly, but
wisely, lived.
And whatsoever ye do, do it heartily, as unto the Lord, and not unto
men; knowing that of the Lord ye shall receive the reward of the
inheritance; for ye serve the Lord Christ. But he that doeth wrong shall
receive for the wrong that he hath done: and there is no respect of
persons. (Col. 3:23-25)
Here the Christian is promised a good reward for good service and a
negative reward for derelictions.
Cast not away therefore your confidence, which hath great
recompense of reward. For ye have need of patience, that after ye
have done the will of God, ye might receive the promise. For yet a
little while, and he that shall come will come, and will not tarry. Now
the just shall live by faith, but if any man draw back, my soul shall
have no pleasure in him. But we are not of those who draw back unto
perdition, but of those that believe to the saving of the soul.
Here the writer of Hebrews, after warning that God will judge his people
and will not look with indifference on those who have take the provision for
their Sanctification lightly, exhorts to faithfulness and patience, which has a
great reward. On the other hand, God is not at all pleased with those who
turn back, which turning back is to the ruin of their lives, or souls.
See that ye refuse not him that speaketh. For if they escaped not
who refused him that spake on earth, much more shall not we escape,
if we turn away from him that speaketh from heaven: Whose voice
then shook the earth: but now he hath promised, saying, Yet once
more I shake not the earth only, but also heaven. And this word, yet

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once more, signifieth the removing of those things that are shaken, as
of things that are made, that those things which cannot be shaken
may remain. Wherefore we receiving a kingdom which cannot be
moved, let us have grace, whereby we may serve God acceptably with
reverence and godly fear for our God is a consuming fire. (Heb. 13:2529)
Here the writer of Hebrews says that the day is coming when God is going
to do His best to destroy every work that we have done. He is going to put it
in the fire as the millwright puts in the ore. Anything that can be burned up,
will be. Any good millwright knows that gold will not burn, at least at the
temperatures that are used in refining. The purpose is to burn up anything
that will burn. That is the only way you can purify the gold. Thus God will
destroy what can be destroyed. But the Kingdom that He has given us now
to live our lives in (this whole book of Hebrews is about Sanctification)
contains works and values that God cannot destroy with His wrath and His
judgment. These are the works that He has before ordained that we should
walk in. They are His very own works given to us as an inheritance through
the provision for our Sanctification. And He has given us mercy, and grace to
help in time of need. By that grace we can serve God acceptably; and we
had better do it if we want to save our lives, for in a little while that fierce
judgment by fire is going to come. This is a great encouragement to the
faithful who realize that after all, in the end, it is only their deeds which shall
stand. Needless to say it is a stern warning to the careless, wayward or
indifferent Christian.
He that hath an ear, let him hear; he that overcometh shall not be
hurt by the second death. (Rev. 2:11)
The first death is that which we received from Adam. The second death is
that great Judgment of God about which we just read in Hebrews. This
urgent message to the Church tells us that by living overcoming lives, we
can insulate our lives against being negatively influenced by that. Adam lost
the meaning and purpose of life, with its enduring achievements and
rewards, but in the Second Adam we got it back. Through Sanctification we
can save our lives for eternity. This is not referring to the spirit, which is
already saved for eternity, but the soul, which is being saved or lost day by
day. There is relief from the first death through the salvation that Christ has
provided, but there is no deliverance from the second death. What is lost
there, is lost forever. Yet the faithful Christian need not worry about it.
Through faith, grace, the provision for our Sanctification and our faithful
service, the second death cannot hurt us. It cannot destroy the works that
are done in Christ.

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He that overcometh, the same shall be clothed in white raiment;

and I will not blot his name out of the book of life, but I will confess his
name before my Father in heaven. (Rev. 4:5)
Here the Church is promised that faithfulness, overcoming as it is said
here, will result in being clothed in righteousness, our names being
confessed before the Father and our names not being blotted out of the
book of life. All of these things must be understood in their context, of
course. Jesus has just been telling this Church that he is not happy at all with
what He sees there, that there isn't much that is salvageable, and that as far
as having any useful place in His program is concerned, they are teetering
on the edge. You had better get busy and hang on to what little is left there,
He tells them. In the book of Hebrews, chapter twelve, the Christian is
warned that there comes a point at which God simply retires the runner to
the sidelines. He is wandering all over the track, a danger to himself and
others, and accomplishing nothing worthwhile. Get your head down, yours
arms up, drive those knees and start acting like a distance runner or you are
going to be disqualified from this race.
Here he tells them that they are in danger of having their names blotted
out of the book. This is not the book of Justification and Glorification but the
book of Sanctification and service. It too is a book of salvation and life in
Christ. Only in this book you have to perform to say on the roles. God can't
use anyone in his program who cannot or will not measure up to the
demands of discipleship. Remember that these are messages and
evaluations to the Church about service. We must resist the ever-present
danger of trying to build theology out of words alone. Certainly words are
important and they help us understand at times. But truth comes from the
contextual flow of thought. And the context here is to the Church about
service, usefulness and rewards. Don't try to apply it anywhere else,
because it doesn't fit.
And so I return to the original question posed by Bercot. Can a saved man
lose his salvation? The answer is yes as it applies to Sanctification and no as
it applies to Justification and Glorification. I realize that this isn't really the
question Bercot asked because his humanistic, Arian doctrine doesn't even
understand the Great Salvation much less the answers that I have given.
And that is exactly, in this review, why I have given it. In this case, we have
to look at what Bercot has said as much by the inadequacy of the question
as the answer.
The Group That Preached Salvation By Grace Alone
If I were to pick out the place in this book where Bercot has gone the
farthest off the beam, it would be here. That is because it is possible, if one
wished to bend completely over backward to the very ground, to say that

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Bercot thinks he is right and is viewing the facts through colored glasses. In
this instance, however, under no scenario can we come to any other
conclusion than that Bercot has deliberately distorted, bent, concealed and
repainted the facts with the studied purpose in mind to deceive the reader.
No one who has the intelligence to write a book and who has even dabbled
in Church history, could in any way possibly have honestly come to the
opinions that Bercot sets forth here.
What Bercot has done is to turn the thing around. He is 180 degrees from
the truth. It was Justin, Clement of Alexandria, and Origen who brought
Gnosticism into the Church as a heresy. It was for this that both Clement of
Alexandria and Origen were deposed of their chairs and denounced as
heretics by their own Eastern bishops in Constantinople in Origen's case
at least even by Demetrius, the Churchman in Alexandria who was
responsible for putting him in that position to begin with.
Gnosticism had absolutely nothing whatever to do, in any way, shape or
form, with the doctrines of salvation by grace alone, sovereignty of God,
predestination, foreknowledge, election or any of that. Gnosticism was not
concerned with the Bible at all. The Gnostics didn't believe in Jesus Christ as
God, or in anything that came close to an orthodox concept. In fact, they
believed exactly what Origen, Arius, Pelagius and the Jehovah's Witnesses
believe: That Christ was a lesser god and a created being, that there was no
physical resurrection from the grave by Him, that there is no actual, physical
destruction of the earth and that salvation is a aesopian word that really
focuses attention on how high you climb on the ladder of secret knowledge
and on which level you will live life in the future. They didn't even believe in
the God of the Bible.
While the Alexandrian School, and the theologians of it that I have
mentioned, were fully involved with Gnostic thought, arguing that it was
acceptable to Christianity, that Christianity was true Gnosticism and true
Gnosticism was Christianity, and that the ideal Christian was a Gnostic,
Augustine, Jerome, Athanasius, Ambrose and Tertullian had no regard for it
whatsoever, there is no history of a strong influence in the North African
school of theology and there is little or no history that I am aware of that it
made any inroads into Western theology as did Platonism and
Aristotelianism later on. This was an Eastern phenomenon. The historical
record is quite clear on this point. It was Athanasius who put a stop to it in
the Church by standing down Arius, who had formulated it into a doctrine
(from the influences of Clement of Alexandria and Origen) that he tried to
sell as a Christian, though no one at Nicaea was buying. The theologians
that I have just named from Alexandria (with the very notable exceptions of
Barnabas, Athanasius and Chrysostom) were Gnostic Christians so-called
and they are the ones that Bercot is trying to pass off as orthodox. But
before I recite for you what Justin, Irenaeus, Clement of Alexandria and
Origen believed and taught, I want to give you a brief but accurate

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description of Gnosticism and its principle beliefs. Remember as you read

this that Gnostics were not a narrowly defined group of people, though
Arianism was, later on. They had no set theology nor well defined doctrine.
That is not to say you couldn't recognize them or their doctrine; it is just to
say that if someone were to ask who exactly they were, where was their
base of operations and where exactly did they come from, it would not be
possible to answer that definitively. They were many people from many
places, like Enlightenment liberals in the Church today. If you were to try to
locate them in general terms, it would be in the East, in close association
with Greek philosophy, Eastern Mysticism and Stoicism. In the Church they
were to be found in Alexandria and Constantinople almost exclusively. Their
existence, if at all, in the North African School, in Rome and in the Western
Church, was insignificant in Church History. That is not to say there weren't
any at all; there must have been some, surely. But they did not have their
hands around the neck of Western theology as they did in Alexandria (not so
much in Constantinople, for it was Constantinople that removed Origen from
his chair for this heresy and many others).
The word Gnosticism is derived from a Greek word which means
knowledge. Gnosticism was not a movement in that it had no unity of
purpose or persons. In was a grab-bag of many movements, all of which
stressed philosophy and empirical knowledge rather than faith. There were
many little groups, led by some guru who had his own particular slant on
things but in the end came to the position of a superior mystical knowledge
of the spiritual realm, not from faith or the gifts of the Holy Ghost, but
through an eastern-meditation type of discipline. The Gnostics were the forerunners of apologists (Justin, Clement of Alexandria and Origen). They
accepted in their own way and definition mans need for salvation, and the
idea of God and heavenly beings. They felt that they were an intellectual
elite who had to purify religion of the crude and common ideas that they
considered to be too materialistic, such as a physical body for Christ and a
physical resurrection. In the end, Gnosticism was a kind of dualism that believed the world to be divided between two cosmic forces good and evil.
Having much in common with Greek mythology, they believed that the evil
forces were concerned with material things. Therefore they concluded that
the creator of the material universe had to be evil. This creator could not
have been deity because a material creation was not only evil but indecent.
They therefore explained creation by a series of emanations, as the rays
emanate from the sun. There were supernatural powers (plural) who were
capable of producing other inferior powers. Charles Bigg, the Oxford scholar,
declared that they kept at this until they had produced a long chain of
divine creatures, each weaker than its parent, and arrived in the end at
one who, while powerful enough to create, is silly enough not to see that
creation is wrong. This, in their opinion, was the God of this world and the

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God of the Jews. I am not certain whether the Gnostics thought that this was
Satan, though many commentators believe that they did. The Gnostics responded favorably, for some unexplainable reason, to a good God sending
Christ into this world, so they thought of deity as the power who sent a
subordinate power into this world to rid men of matter. Christ could have no
contact with matter, so at Jesus baptism, the Christ descended into him and
at his arrest, it withdrew. That body that was scourged and slain was not the
Christ. There were factions in this group, as we said. One such argued that
Jesus did not really have a body at all (one who argued this was Origen, the
Gnostic-Christian heretic), that it was a hallucination. All Gnostics agreed
that Christ could not be human. Many Gnostics recognized a proletariat and
a bourgeoisie. The lower spiritual class lived by faith, and the upper class,
the illuminated or the perfect, lived by knowledge. Then a third class was
seen by some. It was a spiritually disadvantaged class that had been
created by some capricious power, and those in this class were incapable of
gnosis, even under the best guru.
It is not hard for even the most uninitiated to see that this abominable,
corrupt Eastern garble could not have been behind salvation by grace and
faith alone, sovereignty of God, predestination, election and foreknowledge.
The thing that is hard to see is how Bercot can find the cheek to make the
distorted and twisted accusation that this nonsense was the origin of these
very orthodox Christian doctrines; and unless you understand that the
Jehovah's Witnesses believe that any kind of tactic, lying, misrepresentation
or what have you, is justified by their cause, you will never understand it.
Does Bercot know that this is not the truth? Of course he knows it, but he
doesn't care. After all, didn't Rahab lie about the spies and didn't God send a
lying spirit to tell Balaam to go to Balak? Arius, the Jehovah's Witnesses and
all anomalous Eastern humanists such as Bercot, are descendants of this
doctrine. Now you can perhaps see why they did not believe that Jesus
Christ was the God, though he is a god, and why they did not believe that
Christ was physically raised from the grave. For a long time the Jehovah's
Witnesses argued that there was no physical resurrection for any one. But
when it became evident that there had been more than 144,000 Jehovah's
Witnesses, they created another class of other sheep, who are physically
resurrected, but who never go to heaven, where no material thing can exist,
but stay on this earth, which is never to be destroyed. They are the
disadvantaged class of Gnosticism who cannot gain the true gnosis or
knowledge. That is why they are not privileged to be spirit beings (spirits are
much superior, being free from materialism) and go to be with God. These
are not resurrected in any orthodox sense. In fact they are completely
destroyed at death, body, soul and spirit, but God recreates their likeness
from His memory.
People like Bercot and the Jehovah's Witnesses, who, at the very least,
gave him his religious foundation, are not concerned with learned people

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who see through their shallow and arbitrary schemes. Their intended victims
are the ignorant and the unlearned who can be duped into believing
anything from a man who has patted them on the back a little and told them
a few things they want to hear. In this book, which appears to have been
specifically designed for plain people (even more so in his later book,
Common Sense), that is exactly the tack he is taking. His statements are
completely arbitrary and without historical foundation; but it makes no
difference, if his intended audience believes them and doesn't know any
better.
As surprising as all of this may be to you, what I'm about to tell you
is even more bizarre. There was a religious group, labeled as heretics
by the early Christians, who strongly disputed the church's stance on
salvation and works. Instead, they taught that man is totally
depraved. That we are saved solely by grace. That works play no role
in our salvation. And that we cannot lose our salvation once we obtain
it. I know what you're thinking: This group of heretics were the real
Christians and the orthodox Christians were really heretics. But such
a conclusion is impossible. I say it's impossible because the group I'm
referring to are the Gnostics.102
Those who were thinking that the group that Bercot described as heretics
were the orthodox Christians were entirely correct. It is Bercot who is wrong.
One of the oldest known axioms in religious thought is that any good lie has
to have some truth in it or it will not fool anyone. The early part of Bercot's
description of the Gnostics is pretty close.
The Greek word gnosis means knowledge, and the Gnostics claimed
that God had revealed special knowledge to them that the main body
of Christians did not have. Although each Gnostic teacher had his
individual version of teachings, they all basically taught that the
Creator was a different God than the Father of Jesus. This inferior God
had acted without the authority of the Father in creating the material
world.103
At this point Bercot begins to drift.
This Creator basically botched things up and man is inherently
depraved as a result. The God of the Old Testament is this inferior

102 Ibid., p. 73.

103 Ibid.

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Creator who possesses different qualities from the God of the New
Testament.104
It wasn't that the Gnostics believed that the creator botched things up;
they believed that the creation of the material universe was indecent since
anything material is evil. The botch was in the decision to create the
material universe in the first place. Since Bercot is condemning the Gnostics
in an attempt to convince you that salvation by grace came from their
doctrines and since he also does not believe in a material, physical
resurrection of Christ, he shoots the story off of its true course. In his chiding
of the Gnostics, he cannot come out in favor of materialism because once he
rebaptizes anyone who was baptized originally believing that it was an
outward symbol of an inner truth instead of believing that the water actually
regenerated them (and that is why they have to be rebaptized into the
Kingdom. How can those who were the original rebaptizers object to that
once they see that they have been misled by the Bercot-created Gnostics)
he must teach them against material reality as an enduring and eternally
surviving theological reality. So he twists the reason why the Gnostics were
angry with the creator god.
Now that he has slanted the trajectory away from the truth, he
accelerates.
Because humans are the flawed work of this inferior God, they are
totally unable to do anything toward their own salvation. Fortunately
for mankind, the Father of Jesus took pity on humans and sent his Son
for our salvation. 105
The words of the first sentence are Bercot's trigger words. The rest of it is
just thrown in to mislead. The point he wants you to get is that it is the
Gnostics who do not believe that man can do anything toward his own
salvation. He is going to try to parlay that into a condemnation of the true,
orthodox Christian doctrine, using St. Augustine as his whipping boy. Under
this ruse, he has actually made light of God's sending Christ into the world
for our salvation, which Bercot does not believe. He believes that Christ the
man, the created being, was here for our example and nothing more.
You may ask how can he say that Christs death was atoning and that he
died for our sins and thus provided our salvation? Here is what a classic
Jehovah's Witness means when he says that he believes in Jesus Christ and
that the cross provided for our salvation. Follow this carefully, because it is
what Bercot has been saying from the opening pages of this book:
104 Ibid.
105 Ibid., p. 74.

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God created man in perfection. Man fell from that perfection though
he did not loose his godlike nature. In order to try to lead man back,
God gave him a law. But man, because of the bad example of Adam
[who to them is not a real person but a figurehead], was discouraged
and did not think he could keep the law. It wasn't that he was bad by
nature, it was just that he had a bad example set for him.
Then God, realizing that man needed a pull, sent Christ into the
world to accomplish man's salvation in that sense. Christ was a
creation of God from another era and place. He was the son of God
and he was a god. He had actually been physically born to God as a
result of some sort of intercourse [which may have been more
mystical and less material than what we are used to] between God
and the hosts of heaven who are the mother. Christ set a good
example where Adam had set a bad one. In that sense and that sense
only he is the second Adam. Adam is a figurative term, just as the first
Adam was not real, but figurative, the word actually meaning nothing
but man. Christ kept the law of God, thereby showing that man, the
creature, could keep the law of God the Creator (remember that Christ
is not God, but a god, and is a created being, just like you and I, being
man and in the image of the Creator, are gods. Didn't Jesus say, I
said, ye are gods? [John 10:34]). But what good did that do us? That
was Jesus, the son of God. He was not human. He was not subject the
same things we are. But then Christ died from persecution as a result
of his witness for Jehovah, the only true God. When we saw that, we
said, so, he was only a man after all. It is true then that man is
basically good and can keep the law of God with the help of Jehovah
[God instead of Jehovah, for the sake of missionaries who are
working with the uninitiated.] In that sense, and that sense alone,
Jesus died for our sins and the death of Christ was redemptive. It was
only in the sense of example and assistance, because that is all we
need. We don't need a new nature. We are not fallen. We only need
the good example of Christ and some help from God. As for the cross,
it is there that Christ set the example of suffering martyrdom for the
sake of earning our salvation. That, and only that, is the meaning of
the cross. You can call this reformed life a new birth in a legitimate
sense. You can call God's act of sending Christ to be our example
salvation by Grace. You can call Christ's example of suffering,
salvation by the blood of His cross, just so long as you do not imply
by these terms, that man really is fallen and depraved and that some
work that does not include our own is needed to save him. (The
foregoing is a paraphrase, not a quotation.)
Now you know what the Jehovah's Witnesses believe and what Bercot
(though he has left that group and has started his own sect) has been

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driving for all along. And now you know why he is so bitter and
destructive toward the orthodox doctrine of salvation by faith and grace
alone. You may say, I have some problems with the doctrine of salvation by
grace and faith without works. Well, but your problems are Christian
problems, not the problems of heresy. You have the problems that Arminius
had with Calvin, not the problems of Pelagius and Arius who were not
Christian, had with Athanasius and Augustine. The Brethren, Mennonites,
Amish and others are Arminian in their theological origins, not Pelagian or
Arian like Bercot. But more on that later, too.
Now Bercot, having stuck in some of his salient points, goes back to a
Gnostic precept to try to give his explanation authenticity.
However, because the flesh is inherently depraved, the Son could
not have actually become a man. Rather, the Son of God simply took
on the appearance of man, but he was not truly man and he never
really died or was resurrected. 106
This is a fairly accurate Gnostic statement, but it has nothing to do with
the beliefs of the apostles, Clement of Rome, Polycarp, Augustine or any
orthodox person. This was the view of Origen, as we have seen and as I will
show more fully in a moment.
And don't miss what Bercot is doing here. He is painting a picture of the
doctrine of Christ coming into the world and dying for the sins of man to
provide salvation by faith and grace as a result of his finished work as
being so ridiculous that you will actually turn from it. He is not saying that
this is what the Gnostics believed. He says it is what St. Augustine and the
Church after Nicaea believed. You may think that this is silly, but they have
pulled this off with millions of people around the world and mostly those who
hold the unbiblical and unbalanced view of salvation by works.
Since everything about man is inherently flawed, our works can play
no part in our salvation, but rather we are saved purely by the grace
of the Father. 107
Bercot tries to ease back over to the attack against orthodox Christian
doctrine, making it appear that it is an extension of Gnosticism. But it is not.
Just the opposite is true. It was the Gnostics: Clement of Alexandria, Origen,
Arius and Pelagius who did not believe this doctrine. As we cited earlier, it
was the Scriptures from Genesis on, St. Paul in Romans 3 and 4, II Timothy 1
and Titus 3, Clement of Rome, Polycarp, Athanasius, Augustine, Chrysostom,
Jerome, Ambrose and the orthodox Christians who believed it.
106 Ibid.
107 Ibid.

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Let me point out to you again what the Alexandrians believed (the ones
cited above):
ORIGEN, Bercot's Star Witness:
In the year 203, though then only eighteen years of age, he was
nominated by the bishop Demetrius, afterwards his opponent,
president of the catechetical school of Alexandria, left vacant by the
flight of Clement. To fill this important office, he made himself
acquainted with the various heresies, especially the Gnostic, and with
the Grecian philosophy; he was not even ashamed to study under the
heathen Ammonius Saccas, the celebrated founder of Neo-Platonism. .
. . He exerted an immeasurable influence in stimulating the
development of the catholic theology and forming the great Nicene
fathers, Athanasius, Basil, the two Gregories, Hilary, and Ambrose,
who consequently, in spite of all his deviations, set great value on his
service. But his best disciples proved unfaithful to many of his most
peculiar views, and adhered far more to the reigning faith of the
church. Forand in this too he is like Schleiermacherhe can by no
means be called orthodox, either in the Catholic or in the Protestant
sense. His leaning to idealism, his predilection for Plato, and his noble
effort to reconcile Christianity with reason, and to commend it even to
educated heathens and Gnostics, led him into many grand and
fascinating errors. . . .Also in regard to the dogma of the divinity of
Christ, though he powerfully supported it, and was the first to teach
expressly the eternal generation of the Son, yet he may be almost as
justly considered a forerunner of the Arian heteroousion, or at least of
the Semi-Arian homoiousion, as of the Athanasian homoousion.
These and similar views provoked more or less contradiction during
his lifetime, and were afterwards, at a local council in Constantinople
in 543, even solemnly condemned as heretical. . . His great defect is
the neglect of the grammatical and historical sense and his constant
desire to find a hidden mystic meaning. He even goes further in this
direction than the Gnostics, who everywhere saw transcendental,
unfathomable mysteries. His hermeneutical principle assumes
a
threefold sensesomatic, psychic and pneumatic; or literal, moral and
spiritual. His allegorical interpretation is ingenious, but often runs far
away from the text and degenerates into the merest caprice; while at
times it gives way to the opposite extreme of a carnal literalism, by
which he justifies his ascetic extravagance. 108
CLEMENT OF ALEXANDRIA
108 Schaff, II, 787-92.

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Clement was the father of the Alexandrian Christian philosophy. He

united thorough biblical and Hellenic learning with genius and
speculative thought. He rose, in many points, far above the prejudices
of his age, to more free and spiritual views. His theology, however, is
not a unit, but a confused eclectic mixture of true Christian elements
with many Stoic, Platonic, and Philonic ingredients. His writings are full
of repetition, and quite lacking in clear, fixed method. He throws out
his suggestive and often profound thoughts in fragments, or purposely
veils them, especially in the Stromata, in a mysterious darkness, to
conceal them from the esoteric multitude, and to stimulate the study
of the initiated or philosophical Christians. He shows here an affinity
with the heathen mystery cultus, and the Gnostic arena. His extended
knowledge of Grecian literature and rich quotations from the lost
works of poets, philosophers, and historians give him importance also
in investigations regarding classical antiquity . . . .
The three leading works which he composed during his residence as
teacher in Alexandria, between the years 190 and 195, represent the
three stages in the discipline of the human race by the divine Logos,
corresponding to the three degrees of knowledge required by the
ancient mystagogues, and are related to one another very much as
apologetics, ethics, and dogmatics, or as faith, love, and mystic vision,
or as the stages of the Christian cultus up to the celebration of the
sacramental mysteries. The Exhortation to the Greeks, in three
books, with almost a waste of learning, points out the
unreasonableness and immorality, but also the nobler prophetic
element, of heathenism, and seeks to lead the sinner to repentance
and faith. The Tutor or Educator unfolds the Christian morality
with constant reference to heathen practices, and exhorts to a holy
walk, the end of which is likeness to God. The Educator is Christ, and
the children whom he trains, are simple, sincere believers. The
Stromata or
Miscellanies, in seven books (the eighth,
containing an imperfect treatise on logic, is spurious), furnishes a
guide to the deeper knowledge of Christianity, but is without any
methodical arrangement, a heterogeneous mixture of curiosities of
history, beauties of poetry, reveries of philosophy, Christian truths and
heretical errors (hence the name). He compares it to a thick-grown,
shady mountain or garden, where fruitful and barren trees of all kinds,
the cypress, the laurel, the ivy, the apple, the olive, the fig, stand
confusedly grouped together, that many may remain hidden from the
eye of the plunderer without escaping the notice of the laborer, who
might transplant and arrange them in pleasing order. It was, probably,
only a prelude to a more comprehensive theology. At the close the
author portrays the ideal of the true Gnostic, that is, the perfect
Christian, assigning to him, among other traits, a Stoical elevation

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above all sensuous affections. The inspiring thought of Clement is that

Christianity satisfies all the intellectual and moral aspirations and
wants of man. [[Clement actually said that the ideal Christian would
be a Gnostic.]
JUSTIN MARTYR
The most eminent among the Greek Apologists of the second
century is FLAVIUS JUSTINIUS, surnamed Philosopher and Martyr.'' He
is the typical apologist, who devoted his whole life to the defense of
Christianity at a time when it was most assailed, and he sealed his
testimony with his blood. He is also the first Christian philosopher or
the first philosophic theologian. . . .His education was Hellenic. . .
.Justin is the first among the fathers who may be called a learned
theologian and Christian thinker. . . . But, like all the Ante-Nicene
writers, he had no clear insight into the distinction between the Old
Testament and the New, between the law and the gospel, nor any
proper conception of the depth of sin and redeeming grace, and the
justifying power of faith. His theology is legalistic and ascetic rather
than evangelical and free. He retained some heathen notions from his
former studies though he honestly believed them to be in full harmony
with revelation. Christianity was to Justin, theoretically, the true
philosophy, and, practically, a new law of holy living and dying. The
former is chiefly the position of the Apologies, the latter that of the
Dialogue. He was not an original philosopher, but a philosophizing
eclectic, with a prevailing love for Plato, whom he quotes more
frequently than any other classical author. He may be called, in a loose
sense, a Christian Platonist. He was also influenced by Stoicism. He
thought that the philosophers of Greece had borrowed their light from
Moses and the prophets. . . The Logos endowed all men with reason
and freedom, which are not lost by the fall. He scattered seeds of truth
before his incarnation, not only among the Jews, but also among the
Greeks and barbarians, especially among philosophers and poets, who
are the prophets of the heathen. Those who lived reasonably and
virtuously in obedience to this preparatory light were Christians in
fact, though not in name; while those who lived unreasonably were
Christless and enemies of Christ. Socrates was a Christian as well as
Abraham, though he did not know it. None of the fathers or schoolmen
has so widely thrown open the gates of salvation. He was the broadest
of broad churchmen.109
It is easily seen that Gnosticism is not compatible with the doctrine of
salvation by grace and faith alone. It is compatible with the doctrine of the
109 Schaff, II, 719-23.

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goodness of man and salvation by works. The early Churchmen who Bercot
cites as not believing in salvation by faith and grace alone and who believed
in salvation by works, were the Gnostics, Eastern Mystics, Stoics and
humanists of the Church who set pagan philosophies over the Bible. On the
other hand, we have seen that the origin of this doctrine was the Bible and
St. Paul in Romans, not 3rd and 4th century philosophers, as Bercot would
have us believe.
Now Bercot begins to indulge in presumption and again demonstrates a
contempt for the intelligence of his reader. He strikes the pose that he has
proven that the doctrine of salvation by grace and faith alone has come
from Gnosticism, when in reality he has done little but indulge in speculation
and arbitrary statements. Upon that illusory foundation he begins to try to
build:
In case you have any lingering doubts on whether the Gnostics were
true Christians, notice what the Apostle John himself said about them:
Many deceivers, who do not acknowledge Jesus Christ as coming in
the flesh, have gone out in to the world. Any such person is the
deceiver and the Antichrist.'' (2 John 7) The Gnostics were the ones
who denied that Jesus had come in the flesh, and this is to whom John
is referring. He makes it clear that they were deceivers and Antichrists.
So, assuming our evangelical doctrine of salvation to be true, we are
faced with the uncomfortable reality that this doctrine was taught by
deceivers and Antichrists before it was taught by the church. 110
Anyone may say anything and I suppose it becomes truth to those who
take it to heart. But Bercots inventions bear no resemblance to reality. They
are so far off the mark that they are not in the arena where truth is being
contested. The truth is:
1. Those who believe in salvation by faith and grace alone have nothing at
all in common with the Gnostic heresy.
2. The Pelagians and the Alexandrian witnesses that Bercot uses do have
a tie to Gnosticism.
3. It is the Gnostics and the Alexandrians, specifically Origen, who do not
believe that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh.
4. There is no indication or evidence that St. John had Gnostics in mind,
though they would have fit the bill nicely.
5. Bercot flatters himself as to his cleverness, by assuming that he has
made any hard or meaningful connection between evangelical doctrines and
Gnosticism. His statement that salvation by faith and grace alone, without
works was taught by deceivers and anti-Christs is impudent, upstart,
110 Bercot, p. 74.

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insulting and fanciful unless you wish to call St. Paul (in Romans 3:25 - 4:1-5)
a deceiver and an anti-Christ:
Being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in
Christ Jesus: Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through
faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness for the remission of sins
that are past, through the forbearance of God; To declare at this time
his righteousness: that he might be just, and the justifier of him which
believeth in Jesus. Where is boasting then? It is excluded. By what
law? of works? Nay: but by the law of faith. Therefore we conclude
that a man is justified by faith without the deeds of the law.
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.
Now to him that worketh is the reward not reckoned of grace, but
of debt. But to him that worketh not, but believeth on him that
justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness. Even as
David also describeth the blessedness of the man unto whom God
imputeth righteousness without works, Saying, Blessed are they
whose iniquities are forgiven, and whose sins are covered. Blessed is
the man to whom the Lord will not impute sin.
Instead of Justification by works, or by contributing to his Justification by
works, Abraham was justified by faith alone. This is in contrast to works.
Because of this, all glorying by Abraham or in Abraham is completely
eliminated. If this is not the biblical doctrine of Justification by faith alone,
then words mean nothing and we may as well not bother to study the Bible.
Of course, that would suit Bercot fine. Like the Catholic priests before
Vatican II, he would be glad to take our Bibles away from us and replace
them with his books, full of half-truths, untruths and false doctrines and that
present the same warped and syncretic view of the gospel and Church
history.
What They Believed About Predestination And Free Will
Bercot appears certain he has convinced all of his readers that the
evangelical Church, through the years, is just a bunch of Gnostic heretics in
disguise. Certainly that is what he has said and if you believe him, then I
guess he has showed it to be true to you. With this version of lies and
slanders against the Bible, the Apostles, the Orthodox Church Fathers and
the Gospel of salvation by grace and faith, Bercot has done much more than
play fast and loose with the truth; he has distorted it capriciously.

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But he is carrying on with his bluff and his arcane logic. From here on out
when he says they, when referring to Calvin, Luther or Augustine, he means
that vile evangelical salvation-by-faith-and-grace gang. More and more the
doctrine of the Jehovahs Witnesses shows through. His use of the term
Christian, Christ, grace, faith are empty of any real or meaningful orthodox
content.
Many evangelical Christians think that Luther's Reformation returned
the church to the standards of the early believers. Many also suppose
that today's evangelical Christians are teaching the same things as
Luther. However, both of those assumptions are incorrect.
It probably surprised you to learn that our present doctrine of
salvation by faith is different from what the early Christians taught. It
may surprise you even more to know that our doctrine of salvation is
also different from what Martin Luther and other leaders of the
Reformation taught. In fact, we teach only half of the Reformation
doctrine of salvation.
While it's true that Luther some times said that man is saved by
faith alone, he also taught that man is so totally depraved that he is
even unable to have faith in God or accept the gift of salvation.
Therefore, the only persons who have saving faith are those to whom
God has given such faith. And God has given such faith only to those
whom he arbitrarily predestined before the creation of the world. By
arbitrarily, I mean that, according to Luther, God's decision to give
faith to some, and not to others, wasn't based on any desire, faith,
righteous actions, or prayers on the part of the recipient.
In the end, Luther could only bemoan, This is the highest degree of
faithto believe that he is merciful, the very One who saves so few
and damns so many. To believe that he is just, the One who according
to His own will, makes us necessarily damnable. So the Reformation
didn't teach that man is saved by faith alone or that he is saved by
accepting Christ. It taught that the predestined are saved by grace
alone and the rest of mankind are eternally damned. It's a popular
myth that John Calvin initiated this doctrine of predestination, but
Calvin was simply repeating established Reformation theology. So
today, those who say that the offer of salvation is open to everyone
contradict a basic Reformation doctrine. After the Reformation,
evangelical Christians tried for centuries to convince a scoffing world
that our lives and eternal fates were arbitrarily predestined by God,
and that this was a God we should love. How ironic, therefore, that
originally it was the Christians who tried to convince a scoffing world
that our lives and fates were not predestined.111
111 Berccot, pp. 75-6.

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There are a number of issues raised here that we will address. First of all,
Bercot is again making up things, based on the platform that he has piled
together in the most rickety of fashions. These constitute more than a
mortal danger for those who stand on them. They are in fact a trap. So pay
no attention to his claim that the early Christians went around trying to
convince men that their lives were not predestined. Actually they never
went around trying to convince them on that subject one way or the other.
They preached to them the gospel of repentance and conversion through
the blood of Christ and the new birth. Once inside the Church, they taught
them biblical doctrines.
Secondly, Luther does not represent the doctrines of the true orthodox
Church. By orthodoxy and the orthodox Church, I'm not talking about Arian,
Pelagian, Jehovahs Witness doctrines that Bercot is trying to brand as
orthodox. I am talking about the doctrine of the New Testament Scriptures,
as written and taught by the Apostles. From time to time there have been
true leaders and true doctrines, along with the many false doctrines. Those
true leaders and true churches have taught the true Orthodox Christian
doctrine, with varying degrees of impurity. But it is always the doctrine of
the Bible and the Apostles and Prophets of it that we resort to, not the early
Christians of Bercot's religious novel. Both the doctrines of Predestination
and Free Will are clearly spelled out in the Bible. Luther didn't invent either
one of them, the early Christians didn't invent them and Bercot didn't invent
them, though he has invented his version of what these doctrines are, where
they came from and what they mean.
Since Bercot has chosen to attack the doctrine of Predestination as being
the work of Gnostic heretics, we will see what the Bible has to say about it.
But before we do, there is something else I think needs to be inserted at this
point. Bercot has tried to convince his target Anabaptist audience that
their theological moorings, while they may not have come from Pelagius
(Bercot is wary here because you don't have to be much of a scholar or a
reader to discover that Pelagius was a non-Christian heretic), were none-theless very close to Pelagius' views. This notion is without merit. The Brethren,
Mennonite, Amish and Plain-People movements were not founded upon
unbiblical heresies, but upon the solid rock of truth. It is true that the
Brethren, being a part of the non-Roman Catholic Christian world, were not
Calvinistic or Lutheranistic. But they were not Pelagian in any sense of the
word. They were in fact Arminian after the general views of the Dutch
theologian Jacobus Arminius. There was indeed a controversy, one that has
never yet died, between Calvin and Arminius over Predestination, Election
and Sovereignty. But it wasn't a controversy as to whether these were
biblical doctrines. Arminius, like most of his followers after him including the
Brethren, could read and had too high a regard for the Bible to callously
disregard any of its teachings. If you are going to say that predestination is

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not a biblical doctrine, you are going to have to tear a number of pages out
of your Bible, as we shall take note. Before going further with this, I want to
acquaint you with who Arminius was, what Arminianism is and what he and
Calvin were arguing about. This will give you a look at the historic Brethren
and other Arminian views of Sanctification.
Arminianism is the beliefs of a 17th century Dutch professor,
Jacobus Arminius. He tried to stand against Calvinism and its version
of predestination. Arminius himself believed in a limited form of
sovereign predestination that was based on God's foreknowledge that
the individual would use his free will to accept Christ as Savior. He
believed in free, unmerited salvation by grace alone, but that man had
to maintain his salvation by good works. Arminius believed that men
could lose their salvation. Contrary to popular belief, Arminius was not
Pelagian. He believed in the fall and the total depravity of man. He
believed in the need for prevenient grace to act upon our wills in order
for us to accept Christ and be saved, based on John 6;44, John 15:16,
Romans 9:16, and II Timothy 1:9 and 10 among others. In his treatise
on Romans 9, he argued for a limited form of predestination and
election. In his Declaration of Sentiments, published in the fall of 1608
and sent to the Hague, he offered his polemic against
Supralapsarianism and made a plea to the Netherlands Christians to
accept his limited-predestination view and rescue the doctrine of
predestination from Calvin and the extremists. In his commentary on
Romans 9, Examination of Perkins Pamphlet and Declaration of
Sentiments, he argued against the Sublapsarianism of Luther and
Augustine. In Sublapsarianism, Adam's sin was freely chosen but after
that, every man's destiny was determined by the absolute sovereignty
of God who stepped in and took charge when man lost control of his
destiny and his world, over which he had been appointed dominion in
the creation. In his Declaration of Sentiments, Arminius gave twenty
arguments against Supralapsarianism. He claimed that these same
arguments applied against Sublapsarianism, but this was misguided.
One of the principal doctrines of Arminianism is that Christ suffered
for our sins but that he did not pay for them. If He paid for them, then
every man would have to be saved, since no condemnation and
judgment would remain. In Arminianism, every penitent sinner will see
how much our redemption cost and will therefore cease from anarchy
and submit to divine rule in God's Kingdom. This view, which is known
as the governmental theory of atonement is based on Arminius'
theology, though it is refined and best expressed by others, such as
the Methodist theologian John Miley in his book The Atonement of
Christ, published in 1879.

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Arminius believed in infant baptism, as did Wesley, Luther and

Calvin, and it was practiced until rather recently in Arminianism.
Wesley preached Arminius' doctrine, not out of any appreciation or
debt to Arminius, which he did not have, but because it was a vehicle
to oppose Calvinism. Wesley and Whitefield divided over this issue, as
Whitefield felt that Arminianism was dulling the all-important sense of
sin and making man complacent by yielding up the vital concept of an
Almighty God. This led to a split in the Methodist Church. Arminius was
much concerned with human liberty and freedom in the social and
political, as well as spiritual sense. Like Calvin, only in reverse, his
arguments against the absolute Sovereignty of God were more
rational than biblical. And, like Calvin, his views betrayed an
underlying misunderstanding of Sanctification. This characterized
many men in the theological world just after the Renaissance and as
the ages of Reason and Enlightenment were taking shape. Arminius
was no more of an offender in that regard than was Calvin, but he laid
a much greater emphasis on evangelism, which was principally what
endeared him to John Wesley. This was of course good in and of itself,
but the methodology of reason rather than inspiration and revelation
was to take a heavy toll upon the Christian Church. Through his logical
arguments and his humanistic approach to Christianity and the Bible,
Arminius opened the door to Evangelical Conservatism (q.v.), which
was the fundamental contribution of Christianity to the ages of Reason
and Enlightenment, and which changed forever the way the West
looked at the Bible.112
Through the years many Arminians have been convinced that the doctrine
of predestination, election and prevenient grace has not been a part of their
heritage. This is simply not true. When Bercot accuses those who believe in
predestination of being Gnostic heretics, it is important to keep in mind he is
talking about the great men of our heritage including Menno Simons and
Alexander Mack. Never forget that it is one thing to argue the meaning of a
biblical and orthodox Christian doctrine. It is wholly another thing to argue
against a Christian doctrine and the Bible that teaches it, as Bercot is doing.
I know he makes token acknowledgments of the Bible in the process of
explaining it away. But the devil did this in the wilderness temptations, as
has every false prophet from Simon the Sorcerer to the present time. To
argue the meaning of the doctrine of Predestination, as Arminius did with
Calvin, is fair and acceptable. But to argue against it is not.
Let us now look at a brief summary of Pelagius and Pelagianism.

112 D.E. Cripe, Apples of Gold in Pictures of Silver, (Columbia, Calif: Jordan Publishing House, 1992),
pp. 21-2.

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Pelagianism is the system that solidified from the doctrines of Pelagius,

who taught that man did not inherit Adams sin, man is free to act sinfully or
righteously as he pleases. Death is not a consequence of Adams
disobedience. Only Adams example was corrupt and only through his
example did he introduce sin into the world. There is no correlation between
Adams sin and mankind's moral condition; it is possible not to sin, though
most men have. God predestinates no one, and man, after he is forgiven by
faith, has the power within himself, without the Holy Ghost (in whom
Pelagius did not believe), to live a life pleasing to God. The Christian life is a
matter of Stoic and ascetic self-control. Again we see the Alexandrian
trademarks of Justin, Clement and Origen and Arius. 113
Pelagian doctrine is not the doctrine of the Bible, the Apostles, the AnteNicene Fathers, Orthodox Christianity through the years or the Brethren
(more broadly, the whole Anabaptist or any of the Plain People)
movement. But it is the doctrine that Bercot is teaching in this book. He
twists things around to make out that the early Christians did not believe in
predestination and that it is a doctrine that was started by Augustine and
carried on by Luther. But Bercot is misinformed, uninformed or both. In fact,
Augustine held views almost identical to Arminius. Neither Luther nor Calvin
are orthodox. Arminius believed in predestination and election as he defined
it, but neither Calvin nor Luther believed in the free will. Arminius' view of
predestination was not entirely orthodox, but he believed in it, which made
him an orthodox theologian, where Calvin and Luther were not, at least on
this subject.
Does The Bible Teach Predestination?
That the Bible teaches predestination cannot be sincerely or sensibly
argued against. We wonder how or why anyone who reads the Bible and
claims to believe that it is inerrant and the only guide to the faith and
practice of the Church, would believe otherwise. We are not talking now
about what all it does or doesn't mean. We are not going to get into that
here. We are saying that, whatever it means or doesn't mean, the Bible does
teach it!
Likewise the Spirit also helpeth our infirmities: for we know not what
we should pray for as we ought: but the Spirit itself maketh
intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered. And he
that searcheth the hearts knoweth the mind of the Spirit, because he
maketh intercession for the saints according to the will of God. And we
know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to
them who are the called according to his purpose. For whom he did
113 Ibid., p. 115.

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foreknow, he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of

his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many Brethren.
Moreover whom he did predestinate, them he also called: and whom
he called, them he also justified: and whom he justified, them he also
glorified. What shall we then say to al these things? If God be fore us,
who can be against us? He that spared no this own Son, but delivered
him u p for us all, how shall he not also with him also freely give us all
things? Who shall lay anything to the charge of God's elect? It is God
that justifieth. Who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died, yea
rather, this is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who
also maketh intercession for us. (Romans 8:26-34)
The Holy Ghost assists us in our weaknesses. Because we do not know
what God's will for our lives is, we do not know how to pray intelligently. But
when we pray, the Holy Ghost prays with us and for us. When the Father
hears our prayers and looks into the depths of our hearts he sees and hears
the prayers of the Holy Ghost. The Holy Ghost does know how to pray
correctly. He makes prayers that are perfectly consistent with God's will for
our lives. When the Father searches the heart, He hears us prayers that are
being made in consistency with the will of God. Because of this, all of those
who are seeking God's will for our lives can have perfect confidence that
every thing that happens to us is for the very best possible. The reason that
we know that, is because of what is revealed to us about God's predestined
plan His prearranged destiny for our lives:
1. Everyone has a calling to the ministry.
2. God has already acquitted us of wrong in the things that we are going
to do, before we ever do them. He has justified us.
3. Everything that God has allowed in our lives, or will allow in them, is
designed to assure that in the end we have been full participants in the
glory: we will have been where the real glory is, we will have done the truly
glorious things in life, as God counts glory. We will not miss out on the glory
now, and it will be even more glorious in the future when the dark glass is
removed and we see what it all means.
There will be those in life, inside the Church and out of it, who will seek to
discredit and condemn the faithful Christian for the things that he does. But
that will not succeed in the end, because God, who has answered the perfect
prayers of the Spirit, fully underwrites the operation it is His own
predestined plan for our lives. To criticize the faithful servant of God is all
the same as criticizing God Himself, for what is happening in our lives was
planned before the world was formed. They are tied to the achievements of
the Cross of Christ (not the examples as Bercot sees it, but the power of the
resurrection and the new life.) and beyond that they are assured by the
present, daily intercessory work of Christ as He sits at the right hand of the
Father and presides over the operation of sending answers to prayers in the

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form of the things divinely decreed in our lives, to be sure that they are
justified by the blood of the cross and in keeping with His desires for His
Church.
What is the conclusion that we come to about this matter of the things
that happen in our lives. If God, who predestinated a plan for us, called us to
the work, justified us in our deeds, and gave us a full share of the glory of
life and of Christ, is on our side and is standing up for us, who can
successfully oppose us, stand against us or frustrate us? St. Paul goes on to
point out that nothing in this life: wars, criminals, evil powers in the
heavens, false prophets, adversities in business, even to the point of going
hungry and being without cloths and a roof over our head, no lust or
subtlety of life, nothing in the heaven above, nothing in this earth, nothing
in hell beneath, nor even physical death, can tear us loose from the love and
the care of God, which is secured in the achievements of the Cross and the
present high Priestly work of Christ, our leader.
If this is not teaching that God has predestinated a plan for our lives, from
before the world was, that is being worked out in time and history, and it is
going to come to pass no matter what, then what it is teaching? And if you
agree that it is teaching predestination, is St. Paul then a Gnostic heretic?
Brethren, these claims are foolish. Every man is entitled to his own opinion
without being railed upon so long as he uses honest tactics and good will.
But no man is permitted to deliberately distort the record of history and the
Bible itself in the interest of promoting sectarian biases.
But you say, it isn't being worked out apart from our free will. Of course it
isn't being worked out apart from our free will. St. Paul never said it was, St.
Augustine never said it was, and true orthodox Christianity never said it
was. The fact that Luther and Calvin said that it is means nothing. Luther
and Calvin do not represent orthodox Christian doctrine. Their doctrines of
predestination are unorthodox precisely in the fact that they argue to the
exclusion of the free will; just as Bercot is unorthodox for arguing the free
will to the exclusion of predestination. They didn't come along until more
than 1,500 years after St. Paul and the start of the Church. Furthermore, a
very small, percentage of professing evangelical Christians believe, or have
ever believed in Calvin's doctrine of no free will, or Luther's Sanctification
doctrine of vicarious obedience. Most Christians, even the ones who quote
and repeat these doctrinal titles, do not even know what they mean. Bercot
is tilting at windmills when he tries to tar all of evangelical, orthodox
Christianity with that brush. It isn't true and it never has been. Orthodox
Christians, who have never formulated their beliefs by logical and rational
argumentation but on the Bible itself, have always been able to see that the
Bible teaches both.
You may reply that I have mentioned St. Augustine, and he did not believe
in both. Well, I have a division near the end of this review, reserved for

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trying to right some of the wrong impressions about the great Church Father.
I do not want to pre-empt that discussion now. But it has become a game
with everyone who does not believe, or thinks that he does not believe in
sovereignty, election, predestination and salvation by grace ( I think that
those who truly do not believe in those things, like Bercot, are fewer than
you might think when it is all said and done, including perhaps yourself) to
take uninhibited and unkind shots at St. Augustine. I wonder what ever
happened to the Biblical teaching not to receive an accusation against an
elder except in the mouths of two or three witnesses that every word may
be established. Just to put you on your guard concerning this matter, I am
going to quote something from St. Augustine himself, taken from the City of
God, on the subject of sovereignty and free will:
But the religious mind chooses both, confesses both and
maintains both by the faith of piety. . . . Now, against the
sacrilegious and impious darings of reason, we assert
both that God knows all things before they come to pass
and that we do by our free will whatsoever we know and
feel to be done by us only because we will to do it.114
As for the matter of sovereignty ruling out the free will, he said in that
same chapter:
But it does not follow that, though there is for God a
certain order of all causes (a predestined plan as of
Romans 8), there must therefore be nothing depending on
the free exercise of our own wills, for our wills themselves
are included in that order of causes which is certain to God
and is embraced by His foreknowledge, for human wills are
also causes of human actions; and He Who foreknew all
the causes of things would certainly not have been
ignorant of our wills.115
In other words, St. Augustine has here said the identical thing as Arminius,
the true guiding theologian of Brethren doctrine: God's sovereignty, election
and predestination is based on his foreknowledge. When God made up his
predestined plan, He was not ignorant of what men in time and history
would will to do. This is altogether an orthodox view. I know personally it is
the view of the Grace Brethren. They do not now, and never have believed
in Calvin's views of no free will and limited atonement neither one of
114 Augustine, The City of God, Great Books of the Western World (Chicago, Encyclopedia Britannica,
Inc.), 29th Printing, l987, Book Five, Chapter 9, p. 214.
115 Ibid.

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which is orthodox. So let us by all means be careful, Brethren, about

slandering one of the great fathers of the Church and one who has
contributed much to our own beliefs, though we may not know it. You may
say that someone like Bercot does so in ignorance. I personally doubt that
Bercot's problem is as simple as ignorance. But even if it were, that is no
excuse. The Bible doesn't say don't receive an accusation against an elder
except in the mouth of two or three witnesses, that every word may be
established, unless the slanderer is ignorant of the facts and means well.
How do you know if he is ignorant or if he is simply lying to you to deceive
you? And what relief is this to the character of the man who has been
slandered? The point is, don't receive these accusations at all and then you
do not have to worry about it.
You may ask, What about Bercot himself? Isn't he an elder? Do we have
the right to receive accusations against him? The answer is no, Bercot is not
an elder. We do not know who he is or where he has come from, or what he
does, or who his elders are or have been, or where he fellowships, or
whether he fellowships. And those who have gone down to see him have
been turned away rudely. Apparently this man has something to conceal. If
he is still associates with the Jehovah's Witnesses or has some other secret,
this is not the kind of behavior or record that earns him trust. He falls under
the condemnation of Titus 1:10, 11: For there are many unruly and vain
talkers and deceivers, specially they of the circumcision: whose mouths
must be stopped, who subvert whole houses (this means the same as
churches today, for they met in houses), teaching things they ought not for
filthy lucre's sake. Does this apply to Bercot? Perhaps not, but perhaps so.
How much money has Bercot made off of this book, and why will he not
receive the Brethren with joy and openness?
I am an elder of twenty-seven years. My doctrine and my manner of life is
open and fully known. Anyone can come to my fellowship any time they
want to, to meet my fellows and to hear what we teach and see how we live.
I have more than a privilege, I have a solemn duty and responsibility to
answer these kinds of arbitrary slanders against Orthodox Evangelical
Christianity. Certainly the orthodox Church has it's problems. It always has
had and it always will. But callow, forward and uninformed youths like Bercot
will not be the ones to identify them and solve them. Leave that to the
elders of every church who have proven their love for the brotherhood
through many years of selfless service and their doctrine through many
hours of patient and faithful biblical teaching. The doctrine that a prophet
has no honor in his own country is for the carnal and the insincere. Look to
yourselves and your own leaders, who have ministered the word of God unto
you and who watch for your souls as good shepherds who must give an
account, for the doctrine, correction and instruction in righteousness. This
little lawyer-like dash through Church history and the Bible, that Bercot
has engaged in, shows us nothing but cleverness, slight of hand and the

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ability to bend the facts to fit the preconceived case for the purpose of
getting off a guilty clientor convicting an innocent oneand fooling a
gullible jury whom he hopes to charm with his flattering, albeit shallow
accolades. What have we to do to play the imaginary game of an emperor
who has no clothes when there are, in our very midst, kings and priests unto
God, clothed in white raiment clean and pure?
But more on predestination in the Bible.
Having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus
Christ to himself, according to the good pleasure of his will, to the
praise of the glory of his grace, wherein he hath made us accepted in
the beloved, In whom we have redemption through his blood, the
forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of his grace. . . in whom
we have also obtained an inheritance, being predestinated according
to the purpose of him who worketh all things after the counsel of his
own will: that we should be to the praise of his glory, who first trusted
in Christ. (Ephesians 1:5-7,11,12)
First of all, we are predestinated to Justification. This is by Jesus Christ,
and it is according to God's pleasure and will. It has nothing to do with man's
pleasure and will. This predestinated Justification by Christ and the pleasure
and will of God redounds to the glory of God's great grace. We were not
acceptable to the inner circle of God's beloved people, but he has made us
accepted in the beloved. He has done this through the riches of His grace by
redeeming us and taking away our sins through Christ's shed blood.
And then we are predestinated as to Sanctification, the Christian life and
rewards:
. . . in whom also we have obtained an inheritance, being
predestinated to fulfill his purpose and live according to His will. This is said
to . . . us who first trusted in Christ.
You may say to me, yes, but there are only three verses in the Bible that
talk about predestination. Well, how many does there need to be? Suppose
there was one verse in the Bible that said: Let's get this straight! No one is
predestinated by God to or for anything, either Justification or
Sanctification.
It doesn't say that of course, but if it did, would you
consider it definitive? There is only one place in the Bible where it says that
the Lord God formed man from the dust of the ground and breathed into him
the breath of life. Do you doubt that doctrine because there is only one
verse? Certainly there can be differences as to what they mean, and
certainly you are not obliged to accept my abbreviated explanation. But no
one should say that the Bible does not teach predestination. Yet Bercot does
say this:

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So originally, it was the pagan world, not the Christians, who

believed in predestination. 116
If this is true, then St. Paul, in Romans 8 and Ephesians 1, is a pagan, not
a Christian. Judge for yourself.
But How Did They Explain Bible Passages That Seem To Teach
Predestination?
In this section Bercot appears to be ready to take the Scriptures in hand
and tell us why predestinated does not mean predestinated. In the final
analysis, however, he does not do that, which is truly not surprising, since it
would be quite impossible to do with impunity. What he does is to give a
quotation from the Gnostic heretic Origen against foreknowledge and
election. Here Bercot is resorting to games. If he says he is going to explain
away foreknowledge and election, we shall have to quote passages about
foreknowledge and election. But Bercot does not do that. He says that he is
going to explain away predestination. Yet Origen's Gnostic and humanistic
argument does not mention the word predestination. However Bercot does
mention predestination. Before quoting Origen he tries to make the
connection by another one of his infamous and patented self-serving
pronouncements:
From what I have observed, manyperhaps most evangelical
Christians say they believe in predestination. Yet, their prayers and
actions show they really don't. Others simply throw up their hands,
admitting, I don't know what I believe. 117
It is accommodating, albeit patronizing, of Bercot to tell evangelical
Christians what they do not believe, even though they say they do. We
wonder exactly who he is talking about? This leads back to the illusive
question, where has Bercot been going to Church and who are all of these
convenient examples unnamed and unidentified by denomination and
church that are around when he needs someone to say what he wants
them to? This tells us nothing concrete and makes no point except that this
is what Bercot wants us to believe. But to try to give sophistication to his
claim, he veers off to Scriptures that do not deal with predestination. Instead
he focuses on choice, election and foreknowledge. These subjects are fine,
but this leaves us hanging about how he and Origen are going to explain
away Roman 8 and Ephesians 1. In the end he does not. However, it may
have persuaded some of his readers that he has explained it. By association
and transfer he infers that it was not Christians, but pagans, that believed in
116 Bercot, p. 78.
117 Ibid., 79.

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election. If it were so, this would mean St. Paul, St. Peter, St. Augustine, St.
Chrysostom and even our theological progenitor Jacobus Arminius (just as
much a saint as Augustine and Chrysostom) were not Christians, but
pagans, for they all believe and taught both predestination and election.
Since it is in the Bible, it would also mean that the Bible is not inerrant,
which the Jehovah's Witnesses believe the King James is not. They have
rejected the Byzantine Text and have gone back to the Alexandrian, that
conglomeration of pieces drawn together by Clement of Alexandria and
Origen in an arbitrary and capricious fashion. The Orthodox Fathers
considered those fragmented scrolls to be written specifically for the
purpose of justifying the Gnostic heresies of the Alexandrian school, so they
would not use them. Now textual scholars have agreed that Hort lied and
falsified documents and that the famous Alexandrian Text is a fraud that
never existed! Thus it seems that the Arians are left without a Bible, which
probably suits Bercot just as well. He seems to do better in building his
doctrine without a Bible to get in his way and make problems for him.
Bercot makes a condescending statement.
I have wrestled with these seemingly contradictory passages most
of my adult life.118
The fact that Bercot wrestled with them all of his adult life adds nothing to
whether or not they are true and what heresy is (to some of us who have
grown long in the tooth, this is not a very impressive statement in any case.
How long can his adult life have been? It is not like we are talking about
Methuselah here). If others can believe a lie, then why can't Bercot? Are we
asked to believe that if he struggled with them, then obviously they must be
false? This would seem to be the implication of his words. Why else would he
have made this statement which is lacking in decorum for a man of his few
years and limited experiences?
Bercot's quote from Origen reveals little, other than the humanistic,
intellectual, pseudo-Christian wrangling of this confused young man who
was removed from his for Gnostic and Eastern Mystic Heresy. He built a
logical argument to say that God did not harden Pharaohs heart. The
problem is that the Bible said he did:
And the Lord said unto Moses, When thou goest to return into Egypt,
see that thou do all these wonders before Pharaoh, which I have put in
thine hand: but I will harden his heart, that he shall not let the people
go. (Exodus 4:21)
118 Ibid.

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That is not from Augustine or Luther, but the Holy Bible. You may reply
that God didn't really harden Pharaohs heart. He hardened his own heart by
obstinance that is what Bercot and Origen are trying to say. I know that is
what they are trying to say. The problem is, that isn't what God said, and it
isn't what St. Paul said in Romans 9. St. Paul said that God not only
hardened Pharaoh's heart, but he hardens anyone's heart that he wants to.
He is God, and He will do as He pleases. Where do you get off thinking that
you have anything to say about what God does, or to pass judgment on it if
you don't like it? Who is God around here, anyway? You think you can pass
judgment on God. That must mean that you think you are wiser, more
moral and your opinions more weighty? That is like the pot saying to the
potter. I don't like being a little dumpy, brown pot for eating beans out of. I
want to be a nice, long stemmed crystal vase to set on the mantle and hold
beautiful and fragrant flowers. To which the potter is apt to reply, You know,
I don't think I like the looks of you either. I think I will just mash you back
into clay and make something different. We forget that we are the created
thing, not the creator. Just like the pot, God made us out of clay. And when
he made Pharaoh, he said, Now I am going to make a vessel of wrath, fitted
to destruction. And that is what he did, just like He did with the nation of
Israel, which is really the point of the passage, for it is they, not Pharaoh, to
whom Paul refers when he talks about the vessels of wrath fitted to
destruction. No wonder so many Christians have trouble understanding the
situation with the nation of Israel. God didn't harden Pharaohs heart, no
matter what the Bible says, because He just couldn't do that. Not my God!
And God couldn't harden the hearts of the Nation of Israel so He would be
justified in casting them away and destroying them. But the point is that is
exactly what He did; with both Pharaoh and the nation of Israel. Do you
have a problem with that? I am sorry to hear it, but I don't. My God can do
no wrong and He can do as He pleases. Like St. Augustine, I do not engage
in the impious and daring vice of sacrilegious rationalism when it comes to
clear declarations of the Scriptures. I will leave that to the heretical Gnostic,
Origen.
Bercot concludes this chapter about as he has started with an arbitrary
rephrasing of history to suit his notion:
Although not believing in predestination, the early Christians
strongly believed in God's sovereignty and in his ability to foresee the
future. For example, they understood God's prophecies about Jacob
and Esau to be a result of His foreseeing the future, not a result of His
arbitrarily predestining those men to a particular fate. But they saw a
significant distinction between foreseeing something and causing it.119
119 Ibid., p. 82.

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No one but a novice whose arrogance is untempered by wisdom would try

for a complete separation between the Sovereignty of God and
Predestination. But it is a tempest in a teapot in any case because the
Apostolic Christians did believe in predestination, as we have seen. Bercot
not only did not disprove this fact, but really didn't try to disprove. He made
a statement at the beginning and now he makes one at the end, but didn't
even touch the subject in between.
Now he tells us that God's plan for the ages was limited to man's will and
choice. He sums up the great subjects of sovereignty and foreknowledge in a
willful statement of indecent brevity. Bercot's elusive early Christians did
not believe that St. Paul knew what he was talking about when he said that
before the children were ever born or had ever done anything good or bad,
God chose Jacob and rejected Esau. This was to make the very point that
God's will and purposes do not stand in man's deeds, but in God's sovereign
election entirely independent of man's actions. But even so, Bercot insists
that the early Christians knew that God's sovereignty and election had
nothing to do with it. God could look ahead and acknowledge what was
going to happen but he had no power to influence, it, control it or decree it.
The Jehovah's Witnesses openly admit that they don't believe that Christ is
God. To hem, there is no person of the Holy Ghost to worry about, there is
only the spirit of God. Now Bercot tacitly acknowledges that they don't
believe that Jehovah is God. He is nothing more than an involuntary and
helpless observer of the unfolding of the events of time and history.
It is said by some that Gnosticism and Agnosticism meet on the other side
of the Eastern circle. When a man believes that all truth is the result of
gnosis or human knowledge, he is ultimately forced to admit that he is not
sure if anything is true. Which leads inevitably too the question, does
Bercot believe in anything in the final analysis or is he just chasing himself
around in the empty theological caverns of his own unenlightened mind?
What Baptism Meant To The Early Christians
In this chapter Bercot gives his version of what the early Christians
believed about baptism. Again he seeks to lay the foundation of what he is
going to say, not from the Bible or the doctrine of the Apostles of the
orthodox Church but his own experiences and ostensibly superior
understanding.
I still remember the first time I read Jesus' words to Nicodemus:
Truly I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he
cannot enter the kingdom of God. (John 3:5 NAS) I was a young boy
at the time, and I was reading that verse in a small Bible study group.
The teacher asked the question, What does it mean to be born of
'water'? I thought for a moment and quickly raised my hand. Jesus
must have been referring to water baptism, I blurted out, feeling

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proud of myself for having figured this out. However, to my chagrin,

the teacher explained that this was a common misconception and that
'being born of water' was not water baptism. Through the years I was
able to correct others who mistakenly thought that this passage refers
to water baptism. I felt very knowledgeable to be able to explain the
correct view.120
Bercot has been off again on one of his excursions in the evangelical
world. As a boy he was in a Sunday School class and the teacher asked him
about John 3:5 (we had thought he had been raised a Jehovah's Witness).
Even as a young boy he understood Jesus to mean that this passage was
talking about water baptism. He gives us to understand that this occurred to
him out of the Blue: I thought for a moment, and quickly raised my hand.
We tend, however, to believe that he had been taught this, otherwise how
would he even have known about water baptism, much less be inclined to
apply it to this passage? It is not strange that a young boy who had been
taught water baptism from this passage, or even who had been taught
about water baptism period, would associate it with these words. What is
strange is that anyone skilled in the doctrines of the Bible would see water
baptism here. Jesus is talking to this learned religious leader, who was fully
familiar with the water baptism of John the Baptist, about things in the
spiritual realms concerning which Nicodemus, by his answers and questions,
apparently had no conception. He was talking about being born all over
again. Nicodemus tried to give this a literal, physical interpretation. How
can someone, who is full grown and old, go back in his mother's womb and
come out all over again? But Jesus told Nicodemus that he was not talking
about physical birth. He was talking about a spiritual birth in a realm that
cannot be seen, known or anticipated by the natural mind. The wind blows
where it wants to and you can hear the sound of it, but you can't see it. You
don't know where it came from or where it is going. This is how it is with
spiritual birth, and those who are born of the spirit. The thing which
Nicodemus wanted to talk to Jesus about, could not be discussed until
Nicodemus was spiritually reborn. If the birth that Jesus was talking about
was spiritual in nature and something that this learned religious leader, who
had been out to see what John was doing in the wilderness, could not
comprehend, why would anyone automatically think that the water was
physical and that it was talking, as Bercot comes to, of an actual physical
washing away of sins by the water of Baptism? Yet Bercot arbitrarily states
that this was the universal understanding of all the early Christians.
Jesus must have been referring to water baptism, I blurted out,
feeling proud of myself for having figured this out. However, to my
120 Ibid., p. 85.

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chagrin, the teacher explained that this was a common misconception

and that being born of water was not water baptism. Through the
years I was able to correct others who mistakenly thought that this
passage refers to water baptism. I felt very knowledgeable to be able
to explain the correct view. So it took the wind out of my sails when I
discovered that the early Christians universally understood Jesus'
words to refer to water baptism. 121
You must have realized by now that when Bercot says that all of the early
Christians universally understood something, he is referring to his limited
quotations from principally Justin, Irenaeus, Clement of Alexandria and
Origen, the so-called Christian Gnostics of the Eastern Religious School. And
once again, it was the Gnostics who taught differently than the church
saying that humans can't be reborn or regenerated through water baptism.
Irenaeus wrote about them: This class of men have been instigated by
Satan to a denial of that baptism which is regeneration to God.
It is intriguing that Bercot continues to believe that he can get away with
the completely arbitrary practice of turning Church history completely and
reorganizing it to suit his own fancies. As often as he continues to do this,
we will continue to refer you to our earlier definitions of the beliefs of these
men in the light of established, honest and reliable historians. Bercot is
giving us the position of Gnostic heresy from Alexandria as if it were
orthodox, which it is not. On the other hand, there was not a prominent
Gnostic of note (Justin, Clement of Alexandria and Origen were) in the entire
Western Church. There were Aristotelians, Platonists and Neo-Platonists to
be sure, but no Gnostics.
In the following quote, Bercot talks without saying anything of note.
In today's evangelical church, water baptism is often regarded as a
rather insignificant matter, at least in the process of salvation. 122
What does this mean? Does it mean that there are many who believe that
baptism is an unimportant subject? Does he mean that there are those who
believe that it is important, but do not believe that the water of the
baptistery or the river is a part of the redemption process? Does he mean
that there are those who believe that we must be baptized to be saved but
that this, like Jesus' discussion with Nicodemus, is spiritual, of which the
outward ordinance can at best be a testimony?
Here it would be necessary for Bercot to clarify if he wishes an indictment
against evangelical Christianity to stand up. He would, for example, have to
121 Ibid.
122 Ibid., p. 86.

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define what he means by evangelical Christianity? Does he include in it

Pentecostals, Charismatics, Tel-evangelists like Roberts, Swaggert and
Copeland? Certainly there are a lot of erroneous beliefs in so-called
Christianity today. But that is not a legitimate indictment against orthodox,
evangelical Christianity.
As for what Jesus meant by His words to Nicodemus, it is best to let him
tells us Himself, rather than getting the answer from Bercot's GnosticChristian witness in Alexandria.
And being assembled together with them, commanded them that
they should not depart from Jerusalem, but wait for the promise of
the Father, which, saith He, ye have heard of Me. For John truly
baptized with water; but ye shall be baptized with the Holy Ghost not
many days hence. (Acts 1:4,5)
Clearly here, Jesus indicated a change: . . . not water. . . but . . . The Holy
Ghost. . . Of course, this is nearly what John the Baptist had told them:
I indeed baptize you with water unto repentance: but he that
cometh after me is mightier than I, whose shoes I am no worthy to
bear: He will baptize you with the Holy Ghost and with fire: (St. Mat.
3:11)
The baptism that takes away sin and puts one in the kingdom of God is
not water but the Holy Spirit, Jesus said. This was not the water of the river,
but the blood and the water that flowed from His side.
It is the washing of his death, of his life, or regeneration and of the Word
of God. (c.f. Ephesians 5:26 and Titus 3:5) It is the baptism of the Holy
Ghost, a mystical and unseen matter of the Spirit, that Justifies and puts us
into Christ and His Kingdom. That is the blood.
It is the water of his life and of His Word that cleanses and makes pure in
our daily lives. That is Sanctification and that is the legitimate meaning of
water baptism in the New Testament context. This has been the position of
the Anabaptists and the Brethren from antiquity.
You may think that Bercot is only saying that baptism is a physical act of
obedience that outwardly manifests an inner truth, much like the Brethren
have believed for hundreds of years. But this is not what Bercot is getting at,
as we shall see. After some preludious words, he quotes the humanist Justin
Martyr to establish his point of view.
However, baptism carried the utmost significance to the early
Christians. They associated three very important matters with water
baptism: 1. Remission of sins. They believed that water baptism
canceled all past sins. For example, Justin Martyr wrote, There is no

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other [way to obtain God's promises] than thisto become acquainted

with Christ, to be washed in the fountain spoken of by Isaiah for the
remission of sins, and for the remainder, to live sinless lives. They
based their views of baptism and remission of sin on the following
Bible passages, among others? 123
And now what are you waiting for? Get-up, be baptized and wash
your sins away, calling on his name. (Acts 22:16) 124
He saved us, not because of righteous things we had done, but
because of His mercy. He saved us through the washing of rebirth and
renewal by the Holy Spirit. (Titus 3:5) Corresponding to that, baptism
now saves younot the removal of dirt from the flesh, but an appeal
to God for a good conscience. (1 Pet. 3:21 NAS) Repent, and let each
of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of
your sins. (Acts 2:38 NAS)125
Since we are already dealing with too many issues, I will make no
reference to the obvious inferiority of the New American Standard
Translation (Hort's brainchild) where it changes the answer of a good
conscience to God to an appeal to God for a good conscience. The point
we want to deal with is the most literal, legalistic and unorthodox concept of
actually washing away our sins in the literal water. This of course is what the
religiously humanistic Greek philosopher Justin Martyr has just said. Surely
no one can mistake this for orthodox Christianity. Justin is the one who has
included everyone, even pagans if they are good pagans, in Christianity.
What Justin is talking about is a Gnostic kind of elitism that calls upon those
who would be in the highest class to be initiated into the club. The phrase,
to live sinless lives is to be understood in the most mystic, intellectual,
philosophical sense. It is not necessary to be a Christian. True gnosis, or
secret knowledge gained by Eastern transcendental-type meditation ( a
thing which man is born with by nature) is what is required. Schaff gives
Justins words context and perspective.
He is also the first Christian philosopher or the first philosophic
theologian. . . . His education was Hellenic. . . .His theology is legalistic
and ascetic rather than evangelical and free. He retained some
heathen notions from his former studies though he honestly believed
them to be in full harmony with revelation. Christianity was to Justin,
theoretically, the true philosophy, and, practically, a new law of holy
123 Ibid.
124 Ibid.
125 Ibid.

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living and dying. The former is chiefly the position of the Apologies,
the latter that of the Dialogue. He was not an original philosopher, but
a philosophizing eclectic, with a prevailing love for Plato, whom he
quotes more frequently than any other classical author. He may be
called, in a loose sense, a Christian Platonist. He was also influenced
by Stoicism. . . . He illuminated and transformed his Platonic
reminiscences by the prophetic Scriptures, and especially by the
Johannean doctrine of the Logos and the incarnation. This is the
central idea of his philosophical theology. Christianity is the highest
reason. The Logos is the preexistent, absolute, personal Reason, and
Christ is the embodiment of it, the Logos incarnate. Whatever is
rational is Christian, and whatever is Christian is rational. The Logos
endowed all men with reason and freedom, which are not lost by the
fall. He scattered seeds of truth before his incarnation, not only among
the Jews, but also among the Greeks and barbarians, especially
among philosophers and poets, who are the prophets of the heathen.
Those who lived reasonably and virtuously in obedience to this
preparatory light were Christians in fact, though not in name; while
those who lived unreasonably were Christless and enemies of Christ.
Socrates was a Christian as well as Abraham, though he did not know
it. None of the fathers or schoolmen has so widely thrown open the
gates of salvation. He was the broadest of broad churchmen.126
Are you sure you are ready to take your Christian view of baptism from a
man who was a Platonist and a Stoic and who believed that Socrates, the
pagan Greek philosopher, was a Christian, even though he didn't know it,
and who threw open the doors of the Kingdom to virtually anyone in the
world if he meant well, even if he had no knowledge of Christ and the Bible?
Bear in mind what a quagmire of pagan thought you have fallen into when
you talk about Justin's views of baptism.
Now Bercot takes a Roman Catholic view of baptism and actually defends
the Roman Catholic Church as practicing things that are closer to orthodoxy
than evangelicalism or Anabaptism. That is because he wants to argue that
grace is administered in the sacrament and you have to get into
Lutheranism, Anglicanism, or Catholicism to find anyone who believes that.
Because he has already cut himself off from Lutheranism, which is actually
the least heretical of the three if such a term is possible, he settles on
Catholicism.
Since this washing was completely independent of any merit on the
baptized person's part, baptism was frequently referred to as grace.
I was surprised to find that the early Christians used the term grace
126 Schaff, II, 719-23.

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to refer to a specific act such as baptism. Several years ago when our
adult Sunday School class was studying the beliefs of the Roman
Catholic Church, we discussed their use of the word grace to refer to
sacraments administered by the priest. I remember thinking to myself,
Catholics sure can get things fouled up! I realize now that the
Catholic use of the term may be more akin to the way the New
Testament Christians understood the word. 127 [Notice that
Fundamental, Evangelical, Protestant Christianity is once again the
villain, the bad guy and the fool.]
This is as Roman Catholic as you can get, there is no doubting that. In
spite of saying all along that works are necessary for salvation, he is now
saying that saving grace is administered in the sacrament of baptism
independent of any merit on the baptized person's part. We wonder where
the doctrine that salvation was a combination of man's merits and God's
grace disappeared so suddenly?
Justin has said that there is no other way to become acquainted with
Christ. According to Bercot the fountain spoken of in Isaiah is water
baptism (though it is doubtful that the confused and heretical Justin could
even think that clearly or wished to be that narrow with Socrates and his
Greek-philosopher friends.) What a pity when a man has to appeal to a
Christian-Gnostic heretic and to the worst features in Catholicism to make
his point because no other teaching in orthodox, evangelical Christianity will
do it. This doctrine in Catholicism is virtually the same as transubstantiation
(that the bread and the cup are changed into the literal body and blood of
Christ in the sacrament).
He returns to Nicodemus and John 3:5.
New Birth. Based on Jesus' words to Nicodemus, the early
Christians also believed water baptism was the channel through which
a person was born again. Irenaeus mentioned this in a discussion
about baptism, As we are lepers in sin, we are made clean from our
old transgressions by means of the sacred water and the invocation of
the Lord. We are thus spiritually regenerated as newborn infants, even
as the Lord has declared: 'Except a man be born again through water
and the Spirit, he shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven.' (John
3:5)128
The literal washing in water is seen here as the thing that causes the new
birth to take place. The water is the womb and coming up out of it is the
127 Ibid., pp. 86-7.
128 Ibid.,p. 87.

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breaking forth in birth. (Irenaeus, not nearly as heretical as the other three,
may not have been talking about water baptism, since he doesn't mention it
by term and most baptismal regenerationists do.)
Not only did Jesus, in Acts 1:4,5, as we noted, give this a different
meaning, but so did St. Paul in I Corinthians.
I thank God that I baptized none of you, but Crispus and Gaius; Lest
any man should say that I had baptized in mine own name. And I
baptized the household of Stephanas: besides that I know not whether
I baptized any other. For Christ sent me not to baptize, but to preach
the gospel: not with the wisdom of words, lest the cross of Christ
should be made of none effect.
No matter what you make of this verse, and I am not going to expound on
it at the moment, if regeneration takes place in the physical act of water
baptism, then in no sense could St. Paul have separated the preaching of the
gospel from baptizing them in water. Baptizing them in water, in this
instance, was in danger of rendering the message of the cross ineffective.
What St. Paul was concerned with was the baptism of the Holy Ghost
(nothing to do with Pentecostalism and Charismatic Humanism) that John
the Baptist in the wilderness and Jesus in the 1st chapter of Acts, were
talking about.
Bercot appeals to the witness of another Gnostic Christian to carry the
saving grace that is received in the sacrament beyond not only anything
that orthodoxy, the Anabaptists and the Brethren believed, but beyond
anything that Augustine, or the Roman Catholic Church, present or past,
believed.
Spiritual Illumination. The early Christians believed that the
newly baptized person, after receiving the Holy Spirit, had a clearer
vision of spiritual matters, receiving illumination as a child of God and
a citizen of His kingdom. Clement of Alexandria discussed all three of
these spiritual events associated with baptism: This work is variously
called grace, and illumination, and perfection, and washing. Washing,
by which we cleanse away our sins. Grace, by which the penalties of
our sins are canceled. And illumination, by which that holy light of
salvation is beheld, that is, by which we see God clearly.129
All of this is accomplished through the physical washing of the physical
water. Bear in mind now, that Bercot is paraphrasing and reworking the
views of these men. Even though Bercot's views are far from Christian or
129 Ibid.

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orthodox, they are nearly as paganly non-Christian as Justin and Clement of

Alexandria. When you hear this excerpt from Clement, remember his
statement that the ideal Christian is a Gnostic and true Gnosticism and true
Christianity are one and the same. The ancient Greek philosophers had
nothing at all against religion. Even pagans like Socrates appealed to the
gods. They had lords many and gods many and they worshipped not a few.
These aesopian phrases by Justin and Clement could have meant just about
anything in the philosophical and religious world of Greek mysticism,
Stoicism and Gnosticism. But the one thing they didn't mean is what the
Bible means. Still their heretical philosophizing is not offensive to a man
who, on the other hand, cannot stand St. Augustine and the Creed of Nicaea,
the Nicene Creed and the Athanasian Creed.
His final appeal is to Cyprian, a Western, Roman bishop, who was a
ritualist and weak in the scriptures and doctrine as we have noted. Even so,
it is not at all clear that Cyprian means what Bercot makes out.
In a letter to a young Christian friend, Cyprian explained his own
baptism in a similar fashion, Considering my character at the time, I
used to regard it as a difficult matter that a man should be able to be
born again.... Or that a man who had been revived to a new life in the
bath of saving water could be able to put off what he had formerly
beenthat he could be changed in heart and soul, while retaining his
physical body.... I used to indulge my sins as if they were actually a
part of me, inherent in me. But later, by the help of the water of new
birth, the stain of former years was washed away, and a light from
above serene and pure was infused into my reconciled heart. Then
through the Spirit breathed from heaven, a second birth restored me
to a new man. 130
We have only Bercot's word that Cyprian is referring to water baptism,
though he may have been. Still Cyprian says that he was not born again by
the water washing away his sins. He says that after the washing of the
water, the Spirit breathed on him from heaven, and then a second birth
restored him to a new man. This statement bears much more testimony to
the AnabaptistBrethrenOrthodox belief that baptism is the outward
symbol of an inner truth, than it does to that which Bercot has been arguing
for. You may think that I am mincing words with Bercot, but you will see
shortly that I am not. Bercot is actually going to get around to telling
Anabaptists, in a nice but unmistakable way, that they are not regenerated,
orthodox Christians (they have come the closest to the orthodoxy of the
early Christians) because they were not baptized for the right reason and
with the right understanding and belief.
130 Ibid.

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In his zeal to be all things to all men, Bercot now goes too far and begins
to contradict himself.
Baptism Was Not An Empty Ritual
In short, baptism in early Christianity was the supernatural rite of
initiation by which a new believer passed from being the old man of
the flesh to being a newly reborn man of the spirit. 131
One had best be suspicious of these words. It is hard to tell what passing
from the old man of the flesh to a newly reborn man of the spirit (small s
again) might mean to a religious humanist who does not believe in the Holy
Ghost. But since he is implying that he means something orthodox we will
take them at face value for the moment to show his duplicity. Here is the
ritualistic initiation concept. It was a rite of initiation. By that rite, man
passed from the flesh to the spirit.
However, please don't equate their practice with the empty ritual of
the Post-Nicene church. The early Christians didn't separate baptism
from personal faith and repentance. Baptism wasn't some magical
ritual that could regenerate a person if it wasn't accompanied by faith
and repentance. They specifically taught that God was under no
necessity to grant forgiveness of sins simply because a person went
through the motions of baptism. A faithless person was not reborn
through water baptism.132
Though baptism had no efficacy if the heart was not right, there was
efficacy in the water to regenerate if it was.
In his First Apology, Justin Martyr explained to the Romans how faith,
repentance, and baptism were inseparably intertwined: Those who
are convinced that what we teach is true and who desire to live
accordingly are instructed to fast and to pray to God for the remission
of all their past sins. We also pray and fast with them. Then we bring
them to a place where there is water, and they are regenerated in the
same manner in which we ourselves were regenerated. They then
receive the washing with water in the name of God (the Father and
Lord of the universe) and of our Savior Jesus Christ, and of the Holy
Spirit. For Christ said, 'Unless you are born again, you shall not enter
into the kingdom of heaven. (John 3:5) 133
131 Ibid., p. 88.
132 Ibid.
133 Ibid.

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In this citation, Bercot has shot himself in the foot. We are not suggesting
that it is because the doctrine of Justin Martyr has suddenly become
acceptable to the Christian Church. Indeed that will never be the case with
knowledgeable, Spirit-led, orthodox men. The reason is in another direction.
Here Justin clearly states that men were regenerated before they were
baptized: Then we bring them to a place where there is water, and they are
regenerated in the same manner in which we ourselves were regenerated.
They then receive the washing with water in the name of God (the Father
and Lord of the universe) and of our Savior Jesus Christ, and of the Holy
Spirit.
In other words, they were not baptized until they were first regenerated,
just, as we ourselves had been, said Justin. There is no telling what Justin
means by regenerated. No doubt it would not be satisfactory to any
orthodox Christian. But it does show that Bercot has been misrepresenting
their beliefs to document his own. Of course, as I have been pointing out, he
has been doing this all along. To support the argument that the early
Christians, of whom Justin is one of his heroes, believed that a man was
regenerated in baptism, he brings up a quote that says plainly that they
were regenerated before baptism. You may say that it doesn't matter; that
they were obviously going to go ahead and be baptized, but that is hardly
the point. The point is that the matter of water baptism was not the means
of their sins being washed and their souls or spirits being regenerated . So
the whole argument that Bercot has been making for the last five pages,
and by which he is going to accuse the Anabaptists of being unsound in
doctrine, falls on its face. But there is more inconsistency.
Were Unbaptized Persons Automatically Damned?
One thing that particularly impresses me about the early Christians
is that they never put God in a box. For example, they always believed
that God would do what was loving and just toward pagans who had
never had the opportunity to hear about Christ. 134
Bercot has been railing on Gnostic Christians to use name association in
making orthodoxy out to be Gnostic heretics. But we have seen that this is a
syncretic claim. The truth is in just the reverse position. Now the Gnosticism
of Bercot and his Eastern humanist theologians begins to come out. God will
do that which is just and loving toward pagans who never heard about
Christ. This is indeed what they believe and Bercot does too. And so it seems
that Christ not only never needed to die, but the heathen world would have
been better off if He had not. Once they have heard about Christ, they stand
134 Ibid., pp. 88-9.

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to be damned. But if they never hear about him, the fair and loving God will
not require it of them.
This too is part of the gobbledygook of Bercot's doctrine. Justin, Clement
of Alexandria and Origen believed that everyone will be saved in one place
or another, in one form or another in the end. Remember that these men
believed that the soul did not have immortality and that there is no eternal
torment. This is not the orthodox argument of annihilation, which is based
upon Scripture and which many of us have looked at rather carefully. In the
orthodox argument, the issue is whether unsaved men will be put to death
by the judgment and cease to be or whether they will live for ever with God
in the new creation. But this Gnostic argument is that every one will be
saved in the end because God is love. Origen even carried that to the
extreme that the devil and the fallen angels would be restored. In this we
see that the Mormons, the Jehovah's Witnesses and Bercot had the same
theological origins.
It was from Origen that the Mormons got the doctrine that Christ and the
devil are brothers and that since the devil is Christ's greatest enemy, he is
also the greatest object of His love. Since the Christian principle is love for
one's enemies and since the love of God and of Christ will know no defeat,
everyone will, be saved in the end, even the devil.
It is not clear that the Jehovah's Witnesses go that far in that particular
direction. It is not even clear that they believe in a real devil. What is clear is
that they do not believe that the earth is going to be destroyed, or any man.
In Origen's theology of reincarnation, we just keep coming around until we
finally get it right. He got these persuasions from Eastern Mysticism and
Gnosticism. They believe that we will always have some guru and that we
will eventually gain the higher knowledge that is necessary to become some
sort of a god. Some Gnostics believed that there is a third, disadvan- taged
class that simply cannot gain gnosis even by the best guru. These would
seem to be the forerunners of the other sheep of the Jehovah's Witness
doctrine, who will never go to heaven, but will remain on this earth
physically because they have never achieved gnosis and therefore can
never escape the inferiority of material bodies that Eastern philosophical
salvation is trying to spare us from becoming. Remember that Bercots
main prophet, the Gnostic Origen, did not believe that Christ had a real body
and he doubted whether he Origen had one or not. Their beliefs that
pagans who never heard of Christ are not in danger of God's judgment and
wrath are the notions of Skeptics, Gnostics, Stoics and Greek philosophical
religion. Does Bercot believes it too? Apparently so.
Likewise, they believed that although baptism was the normal
channel of grace and the means of rebirth, God was not necessarily
bound by it. For instance, they believed that babies who died in
infancy were saved, even though they would not normally be baptized.

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It was Augustine, writing centuries later, who taught that all

unbaptized infants are damned. Another example was that of martyrs.
Many new believers were martyred before they ever had a chance to
be baptized. The early church knew that the God of love would not
abandon such persons. The church said that, in a sense, they had
been baptized in a baptism of blood. So although early Christians
stressed the significance of baptism and its role in the new birth, they
didn't portray God as a cold, inflexible Being who could work no other
way.135
Now we find out, to our astonishment, that even though Christ supposedly
told Nicodemus that a man would never see the Kingdom of God unless he
was baptized in water, and although regeneration and new birth could only
take place in physical, literal water baptism that there was absolutely no
other way for sins to be washed away still one could be saved without
being baptized. What does this do to Bercot's whole argument of
regeneration and cleansing from sins, only by being washed in the water? If
it isn't necessary then what is this whole accusation against evangelicals for
not holding baptism in high enough esteem and trying to prove the
superiority of the Alexandrian Gnostic-Christian theologians all about? Is it
about anything? Yes it is. It is about Augustine and the doctrine of the need
for baptism of infants in order to be saved, but that is for later. Bercot,
feeling that he has made his point about baptismal regeneration sufficiently
well so as to endear himself to Anabaptists, now changes his slant for the
rest of his attack on true orthodox Christianity. And don't be misled by the
phrase, washed in blood. Bercot has already explained what he thinks the
blood of Christ's cross means. It means martyrdom. It is an example of
ultimate service and sacrifice, nothing more.
The Evangelical Rite Of Passage
Interestingly, we evangelicals seem to recognize the need for
some type of initiation ceremony or rite of passage to mark the
Christian rebirth. But strangely enough, we have generally rejected
the historical ceremony of the baptismal rebirth and have developed
our own special ceremony the altar call. When Peter preached to the
Jews on the day of Pentecost, his hearers asked him, What shall we
do? (Acts 2:37) Did Peter tell them to walk up to the front of the
crowd and invite Jesus to come into their hearts? No, he told them,
Repent, and let each of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ
for the forgiveness of your sins. (Acts 2:38 NAS) After Philip explained
the gospel to the Ethiopian eunuch, what did he do? He immediately
135 Ibid., p. 89.

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baptized him. (Acts 8:34-38) Likewise, when God demonstrated to

Peter (by the outpouring of the Spirit on Cornelius) that Christianity
was open to Gentiles, the first thing that Peter did was to baptize
Cornelius and his family. (Acts 10:44-48) When Paul preached in the
middle of the night to the Philippian jailer and his household, did Paul
then hold an altar call? No! The Scriptures say, Then they spoke the
word of the Lord to him and to all the others in his house. At that hour
of the night the jailer took them and washed their wounds; then
immediately he and all his family were baptized. (Acts 16:32,33) 136
We might have pointed out to Bercot that St. Peter did tell them: Repent
therefore and be converted that your sins may be blotted out, when the
times of refreshing shall come from the presence of the Lord; and he will
send Jesus, which was before preached unto you. This is essentially what
most evangelical ministers who give altar calls tell people.
We could point out to him that he has used an example where the people
heard the gospel, they accepted it in their hearts, they were born again and
received the Holy Ghost in to their hearts, and manifested that fact with one
of the sign-gifts so that no one could doubt it and that St. Peter
acknowledged that God had received them. After being saved, regenerated,
born again and filled with the Holy Ghost, they were baptized. But we will
not bother, since Bercot has moved on from this.
What he wants to do now is to chide evangelicalism for altar calls. So we
will move with him and point out that the example of Cornelius and his
household, much like the one from Justin, is the same in kind as an altar call:
a person, as in the case of the Phillipian jailer, or a group of people as here,
receiving Christ into their heart and becoming Children of God, and then
making a public profession, after which time, when all were satisfied with
their genuiness, they were baptized. In Justin's description, they prayed and
fasted with them. Then they came out in the open and knelt down and
received Christ into their hearts and were regenerated as, said Justin, every
Christian had been. It was only after that they were baptized. I saw this go
on in an evangelical, Brethren Church for many years.
Don't mistake my meaning here. I don't think altar calls are necessary. In
twenty-seven years as a practicing preacher and pastor I have never given
one. I have seen many people come to Christ in that time, and a goodly
number baptized (in our church by me) without an altar call. And I also think
that people can mislead others about what an altar calls means, just as
Bercot has tried to mislead people as to what the sacrament of baptism
means. The act of coming forward is no more redemptive than the act of
water baptism. But I also think that there are men who understand its
136 Ibid., p. 89-90.

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limitations and meaning and who still choose to practice it who are on good
ground, both with respect to history and the Scriptures.
Bercot chides evangelicals for feeling the need to associate our
spiritual birth with a fixed day and hour (it is a bit disconcerting to me that
Bercot continues to associate himself with evangelical Christians when he
considers them to be the ultimate heretics and he despise them so much).
This is interesting in light of Bercot's views of the last chapter. If one's sins
are actually washed away in the act of water baptism and if it is in that bath
that he is regenerated and born again, it would seem to me that it would be
impossible not to be able to fix one's rebirth, not only to the day and the
hour, but to the minute or a few seconds. But now, it seems, perhaps (since
the heathen can be saved without accepting Christ, or even hearing about
him, and one need not be baptized be saved) Bercot does not believe this
after all.
Who Better Understands The Apostles?
In this chapter Bercot again changes directions. Early on he argued that
Christianity was not cultural and the early Christians did not hold it to be so.
But then he was trying to get us away from the true orthodox witness, to
convince us of his exclusive knowledge and force us not to place the words
of theologians, doctrinarians, scholars, Fathers and Honored Churchmen
above, or even on a level with simple, moderately educated farmerministers who were not fathers. We might have gone with that, since we too
are suspicious of Scholars and seminarians, if he had not tried to pass off
Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, Clement of Alexandria, Origen and Tertullian (whose
witness he hardly mentions because he supports virtually none of Bercot's
points) as examples. These men were super-educated in the highest Greek
Schools, who all read and wrote classical Greek and who are historically
established beyond argument as the most brilliant, scholarly theologians in
early Church history. We are tempted sore to be offended that Bercot has
such a contempt for our intelligence or our knowledge of even the most
basic elements of Church History.
But now his purpose has changed. It is to force us to accept the views of
Christianity that he says the early Church held, and what he says the
Apostles meant when they wrote the Scriptures.
They Had the Advantage of Time.
In order to prove this, he quotes from a conflict that Origen was having
with Marcion. He points out that Marcion was a Gnostic teacher but fails to
mention that Origen was too. Origen states that Marcion considered Origens
doctrine to be corrupt, and he considered Marcions to be. On this, they were
both correct. Bercot's point is that the one who formed his ideas the latest in
time was the one who was wrong. Then Bercot proceeds to build upon this
assumption as if it were an axiom that is leaded in rock.

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But this is an unworthy argument altogether. Are we to seriously believe

that the views of Marcion, the Gnostic heretic, were more correct than
Alexander Mack, our founder, because he formed his opinions more than a
thousand years earlier and closer to the Apostles? This notion is in itself
humanistic, Gnostic nonsense. The truth is written in the Scripture and is
revealed by the Holy Ghost. What point in history it comes to be understood
by men has nothing to do with its authenticity. The Gospel came to light
later than the law of Moses. Does that mean that Moses was right and Christ
was wrong? Nothing in the Bible is cultural when it comes to eternal truth.
Nothing that was written in the Scripture is better understood by having
lived closer to the Apostles. Bercot argues that there were little changes that
made many differences through the years that we can't know about since
we weren't there, that we don't know what the Apostles meant as well as
the early Christians because we don't understand classical Greek. Bercots
claims that we don't have the advantage of knowing the culture and
therefore we don't know what they really meant and that we never talked to
the Apostle John (neither did Justin, Irenaeus, Clement of Alexandria and
Origen) are a spurious argument and an exercise in folly. Nothing is more
indicative of that than the humanistic statement: hearing the Apostles
explain their own writings wasn't simply a nicety, it was a necessity. This is
far off of the mark, from an orthodox Christian point of view. The Christian
teaching is that the Word of God, which is inerrant and forever settled, is not
the personal or private opinion of any of the men who wrote it (II Peter 1:201). The man who will understand it is the one whose mind the Holy Ghost
will enlighten. The whole idea of writing these things down was because the
apostles could not see all of the people in person. Beside that, if we believe
that holy Men of God spoke as they were moved by the Holy Ghost, then
writing is much better than hearing verbally; because truth established by
writing will never change, but no one ever explains the same thing the same
exact way twice. Bercot's doctrine does despite to the inerrancy of the
Scriptures and to the ministry of the Holy Ghost. But remember again that
Bercot does not appear to believe in the person of the Holy Ghost and he
does not believe in the inerrancy of the Scriptures, for he says that they
have been deliberately altered through the years, so that what we have is
not the truth.
What he is getting at, as it comes out on page 113, is that the early
Church went by Oral Tradition, not the Written Word. Therefore the oral
tradition is more important than the written word. And the true oral tradition
is the one that Bercot is giving us, not the one put out by Church Fathers,
theologians, scholars, Western Churchmen, Augustine, Luther, the Roman
Catholics, Calvin, Arminius or any of the Bibles that we have today except
the New World Translation. That is alright, because there is none needed.
What we are really talking about is different states of wisdom and
understanding brought on by gnosis, which projects different levels of

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existence in eternity by works. This is taught to us by religious gurus who

have secret and arcane knowledge. It has nothing to do with scholarship,
education beyond the normal, or theology. It has to do with purity and being
on the right channel back to the wisdom of Origen and Alexandria.
Since you have probably been brainwashed by evangelical Christianity
against the Eastern texts, you can go by the oral tradition of the early
Christians, which is better anyway, since that is how they did it. Oral
Tradition established for the Church what her practices, theology and
doctrine should be. Here Bercot, after condemning theologians throughout
the book, begins to talk about theology. It is not that which is established by
theologians or the Bible, but his version which he says has come down from
worker-preacher, non-professionals. In short, what Bercot is telling us about
the early Church takes precedent over the Bible, legitimate Church history,
orthodox Christian doctrine or evangelical Christianity. If anyone has had
any doubt about where this is headed, surely the light is beginning to come
on.
Were The Teachings of the Apostles Deliberately altered?
In this chapter Bercot tells us that the written Bible we have today has
been tampered with and cannot be trusted. Only the views of the early
Church as he has given them to us can be trusted, because they, being the
closest to the Apostles, were pure. But nothing after that, when Augustine
and others got hold of it and corrupted it, can be relied upon. This includes
every text of the Bible but the Septuagint and the Alexandrian text. Bercot
cites the New American Standard because it is the closest to Horts
Alexandrian (though it is now accepted by the vast preponderance of textual
scholars that there was no Alexandrian Text as such!) Hort, an
Enlightenment theologian, which is the modern version of GnosticChristianity, appealed to the Alexandrian School for his facts, theology and
Bible. (No doubt you can begin to see the correlation here between antiTrinity,
anti-deity-of-Christ,
anti-historic-Christian-Orthodoxy
of
the
Enlightenment and the Alexandrian, Gnostic, Origen, Arian doctrines.) To
Bercot there are no essential differences in the terms: heresy, the Western
Church, Augustine, the Western or King James Text and Evangelical
Christianity.
Bercot appeals to the emotion and what he perceives to be the tyronism
of his readers. If these men had been dishonestly twisting the teachings of
the Apostles, would they have been willing to die for Christ? This is
scraping the bottom for documentation. Multitudes of Buddhist Monks,
Shinto Priests, Mohammedans and even idealistic secularists such as the
peace movement, the ecology movement and animal rights activists, have
willingly suffered and died for false causes. Iranians by the millions gladly
died for the fanatical Ruhollah Khomeini. An eye-witness reported that the
Arab who drove the truck of explosives into the Marine barracks in Lebanon

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was grinning from ear to ear. There are still people alive today who saw the
ecstatic smiles on the faces of Kamikaze pilots as the dove their planes into
war ships. If there is any sure message to it, deliberate, fanatical martyrdom
probably proves false doctrine, rather than true. Men who understand truth
do not want to die, just as Jesus and St. Paul did not. They will, when there
are no options, but they don't want to and they will avoid it when they can
do so with honor. Jesus prayed to the Father with strong crying and tears
that he might be delivered from death. The psychotic fascination with, and
deliberate inviting of torture and death, of which Ignatius was guilty, is
foreign to holy men.
The Brethren have known much persecution and martyrdom in their
history, and the honor of those experiences for righteous and necessary
causes cannot be denied. But no light of praise falls on morbid, humanistic
fanatics who made martyrdom the test of spirituality (if indeed there were
such people among the early Brethren). Like all truth, the willingness to
suffer for Christ's sake must be in the spirit, not the letter, if it is to be
praiseworthy to God or man. The willingness of men to die for Christ, or to
be said to have died for Christ tells us nothing in and of itself about the
purity of their beliefs, the soundness of their doctrine or the wisdom and
correctness of their theology. But a preoccupation with martyrdom probably
tells us something about their lack in these areas. Remember Bercot told us
earlier that Ignatius (who was denounced by the other Orthodox Fathers as
having deliberately and fanatically brought suffering down on himself and
other Christians by his morbid fascination with martyrdom) was an example
to follow:
Ignatius, overseer of Antioch and a companion of the apostle John,
was arrested for his Christian testimony. While he was enroute to
Rome for trial and execution, he wrote letters of admonition and
encouragement to several Christian congregations. He told one
congregation, It is necessary, therefore, to not only be called by the
name Christian but to actually be a Christian.... If we are not ready to
die in the same manner of His suffering, His life is not in us. (I John
12:25) To another he wrote, Bring on the fire and the cross. Bring on
the packs of wild beasts. Let there be the breaking and dislocating of
my bones and the severings of my limbs. Bring on the mutilation of
my whole body. In fact, bring on all the diabolical tortures of Satan.
Only let me attain to Jesus Christ! . . . I would rather die for Jesus
Christ than to reign over the ends of the entire earth.'' Shortly after
penning those words, Ignatius was brought before a screaming mob in
the Coliseum of Rome, where he was torn to pieces by wild animals. 137
137 Ibid., p. 56.

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Thus it would seem that to actually be a Christian, insofar as Ignatius

was concerned, meant to dare the Romans to bring on the wild animals, to
break his bones and to torture him. This is Bercot's example of what Jesus
meant. It is interesting that Ignatius' peers in the early Church did not agree
with that. I submit to you that this proves neither superior doctrine, a
closeness to Christ, nor a superior courage. It identifies an unstable man
who was not sound in doctrine and who was caught in the letter, that kills,
not the spirit that brings life. One wonders if this attitude in Bercot has
something to do with the rejection and the persecution complex that the
Jehovah's Witnesses have developed through the years as a part of their
religious achievement and defense.
Even without the testimony that noted historians (like Philip Schaff, W.B.
Eerdmans, and Walter Elwell) have given us of the Gnostic, Stoic, Greek
philosophical humanism of Alexandria, it would seem more than possible;
indeed it would be likely that these are the men who would distort the true
doctrines. It has always been the fanatics and idealistic zealots, who have
left the path of Christ for intellectual, philosophical, psychological, emotional
and religious extremism, deliberate martyrdom and the pseudo-Christian
mysticism of the East.
Bercot argues that the early Christians were men of integrity and that
they would not have changed the teachings of the Apostles. In fact he goes
further:
What about their integrity? Were the early Christian leaders men of
God or were they unscrupulous seekers of wealth and power? The
overwhelming evidence is that they were humble men of God. 138
Bercot alleges overwhelming evidence to support his claim. But that is not
the overwhelming evidence, as we have seen it. The evidence is that Justin,
Irenaeus, Clement of Alexandria and Origen were highly educated, complex,
philosophical men of confusion and pagan leanings, who seriously distorted
the truth. Bercot would have us believe that these men lived so early on in
the Church that distortion and heresy simply had no time to develop. But
this anemic argument is out of touch with biblical and historical reality. There
were grafters like Simon, attention seekers like the girl with the spirit of
divination, troublemakers like Alexander the Coppersmith, and many antiChrists in those days, according to St. John. It was the Gnostic Origen who
argued that Jesus Christ had not come in the flesh, that he was a phantom.
And this was not just an argument as to whether or not He was a real
physical being or an apparition. In his subordination doctrine, he argued that
Jesus Christ was a created being, inferior to God. While he came from
138 Ibid., pp. 118-19.

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another time and another place, he was little more than a man like we are. It
was exactly the kinds of doctrines that Origen taught which St. John had in
mind. So how is it that Bercot chooses to ignore this? For all his impassioned
pleas and warnings that if we dare to look at it the way it was, our own
spiritual life may suffer, the fact is that religious men who called themselves
Christians in the second and third century (among whom were Justin,
Clement of Alexandria and Origen), did indeed distort the truth and do it
with deliberation.
Bercot says they were humble men all who agreed on everything of
importance, were not dogmatic and were very gentle and loving with one
another. Though Bercot talks precious little about what he thought, he
originally claimed Tertullian as one of his eight writers to witness to his
views of Church history. Is Bercot really that unskilled in Church history? Or
does he think that we don't know any better and will not take the time to
find out? Listen to this description of Tertullian by the great historian, Philip
Schaff:
Tertullian's theology revolves about the great Pauline antithesis of
sin and grace, and breaks the road to the Latin anthropology and
soteriology afterwards developed by his like-minded, but clearer,
calmer, and more considerate countryman, Augustine. For his
opponents, be they heathens, Jews, heretics, or catholics, he has as
little indulgence and regard as Luther. With the adroitness of a special
pleader he entangles them in self-contradictions, pursues them into
every nook and corner, overwhelms them with arguments, sophisms,
apophthegms, and sarcasms, drives them before him with unmerciful
lashings, and almost always makes them ridiculous and contemptible.
His polemics everywhere leave marks of blood. It is a wonder that he
was not killed by the heathens, or excommunicated by the Catholics.
His style is exceedingly characteristic, and corresponds with his
thought. It is terse, abrupt, laconic, sententious, nervous, figurative,
full of hyperbole, sudden turns, legal technicalities, African
provincialisms, or rather antiquated or vulgar latinisms. It abounds in
latinized Greek words, and new expressions, in roughnesses, angles,
and obscurities; sometimes, like grand volcanic eruption, belching
precious stones and dross in strange confusion; or like the foaming
torrent tumbling over the precipice of rocks and sweeping all before it.
His mighty spirit wrestles with the form, and breaks its way through
the primeval forest of nature's thinking. He had to create the church
language of the Latin tongue. In short, we see in this remarkable man,
both intellectually and morally, the fermenting of a new creation, but

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not yet quite set free from the bonds of chaotic darkness and brought
into clear and beautiful order. 139
If this is a humble, honest man of God, 140 ,living in . . . an age when
nobody was very dogmatic on matters beyond a few central Christian
doctrines.141 When one of the noticeable features of early Christianity is
the relative lack of ridged theological dogma, 142 then God spare me from
ever running into a religious wild man who is dogmatic, rigid and lacking in
humility.
They Assembled And Preserved Our New Testament.
In this statement, Bercot is not only engaging in wishful Arian thinking, he
is also taken in by the Hortian line of a superior Alexandrian manuscript,
that, as it now turns out, never existed at all. It was not the second century
theologians of Alexandria that canonized the Scriptures, thus preserving
them and delivering the Church from heresy, but it was Jerome, Athanasius
and Augustine. Clement of Alexandria and Origen made few endeavors on
behalf of canonization, choosing rather to live with oral tradition, which left
wide open the door to Eastern Mysticism, Neo-Platonism, Stoicism,
Philonism (Philo's doctrines) and of course Gnosticism Bercot's whipping
boy that was actually championed in the Church by his very own witnesses.
It is not necessary at this juncture to go into the long and well established
testimony of history to show that the earliest book containing our twentyseven books of the New Testament appeared in A. D. 367 in a letter from
Athanasius. There was no formal discussion of the canon until the Council of
Carthage in 397, which decreed that nothing should be read in the Church as
divine Scripture except the canonical writings. Then the twenty-seven books
of the New Testament are listed as comprising the canonical writings. One of
the things that motivated Jerome, Athanasius and Augustine was the need
to keep out such writings as the letters of Ignatius and some of the
anomalous writings of Origen and other Gnostic mystics. The grand
experiment and adventure of Fenton J. A. Hort to reverse that decision and
produce an early completed canon from Alexandria has ended in the
colossal failure of scandal, deceit, faked documents, false data and
unsubstantiated claims. Even Horts supporters are now forced to admit that
there was no Alexandrian Text. It was an invention of Horts that has at last
been thoroughly exposed as a myth.
To try to further confuse the unlearned and appear to have higher,
esoteric knowledge, Bercot mentions spurious writings, as if they were
139 Schaff, II, pp. 824-25.
140 Bercot, p. 119.
141 Ibid., p. 15.
142 Ibid.

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weeded out by the Alexandrians and a document preserved which amounted

to the canonizing the Scriptures.
For one thing, numerous spurious gospels and apostolic letters
were circulating. In fact, there were more fake accounts of the life of
Jesus and the acts of the apostles than there were genuine ones. Have
you ever heard of the Gospel of Thomas? What about the Gospel of
Nicodemus? Or the Acts of Philip or the Acts of Andrew and Matthias?
Have you ever read the Revelation of Paul or John's Book on the Death
of Mary? Probably not. The reason is that the early church did not
accept those writings as genuine. 143
Again the truth lies in a different direction. No such discussion of spurious
gospels ever took place at Nicaea.
The formation of the NT cannon was not a conciliar decision. The
earliest ecumenical council, Nicaea in 325, did not discuss the canon.
The first undisputed decision of a council on the canon seems to be
from Carthage in 397 which decreed that nothing should be read in
the church under the name of the divine Scriptures except the
canonical writings.144
This is the earlier-mentioned canon drawn by the great Church Father
Athanasius after years of consultation (mostly through the exchange of
letters) with Augustine, and it did not appear until A.D. 367. The Old
Testament canon, which had already been formed by that date, was
accepted by the Church Fathers as Holy Scripture. Nor should anyone be
fooled by the Apocrypha argument. These books, which were in the Bible,
were clearly distinguished from Holy Scripture. They were put in there out of
deference to the Jews because they were books of high authority in Jewish
history. In the 1700s when the Christian Zionism fallacy had faded, they
were taken out of the King James (they were in the original version of 1611)
but they were left in the Douay-Rheims. Although the Catholic Church has
appealed to them to justify prayers for the dead (In II Maccabees 12:45,
Judas Machabeus, walking through the field of slain Israelite soldiers after
the great victory over Menelaus, offers the opinion, it is therefore a holy
and wholesome thought to pray for the dead, that they may be loosed from
their sins) sound Christian leaders of all persuasions have never regarded
them as holy Scriptures.
143 Ibid., p. 120.
144 Walter A. Elwell, Evangelical Dictionary of Theology, (Grand Rapids, Mikchigan, Baker House,
1984), p. 141.

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In order for views to be extended credibility, there must be a credible

stating of the facts and credible presentation of evidence. It is hard to
attribute this kind of integrity to Bercot on either account. His next
statement here has the same lack of integrity as the one made earlier:
All of Jesus' teaching was oral. He didn't leave even a single word of
written instruction for the church. When the church was founded on
the day of Pentecost, the only Christian teaching it had was oral. 145
Do you believe that the teaching of the words of Jesus in the early Church
amounted to nothing more than hand-me-down stories? Do you believe that
there was no unique inspiration in the men who wrote the gospels, which
resulted in the unique and inerrant Scriptures? Do you believe that there
was a time in the Church, for several hundred years, when the Church had
nothing more than oral tradition to go on? Do you believe that Jesus never
meant for His words to be written down, or that the Old Testament doesn't
teach Christianity in it's prophesies, Messianic words, and symbolisms? Did
not Jesus quote from His own words in Revelation 2, and warn against taking
anything from or adding anything to the Words of this Book? Wasnt this in
the first century, before the death of St. John? How can Bercot say that all
the early Church had was oral tradition and hope to be taken seriously?
You may say to me that isn't Bercot's point. But the problem, you see, is
that it is his point. He is saying that the Bible was assembled and preserved
through the teachings and oral traditions of the early Christians whom he
cites. The Bible that you have is not the Word of God. It has been corrupted
by unorthodox heretics, like Augustine, Luther and Evangelical Christians.
You must rely on Bercot and his witnesses to tell you what the truth is and
what the Bible really said. The real Bible has been lost in Alexandria all of
these years, and it has only recently been rediscovered and pieced it
together from Hort's Alexandrian Text. And what it says is not what you and I
have been taught. What the Bible really says is what Bercot tells us the oral
tradition of the early Church taught.
To assure us of this, he pleads with us to realize that men would not have
given their lives in martyrdom if they were not the ones who were right, and
Bercot would not have this higher, exclusive knowledge if he were not right
about what they taught, no matter what history says. Of course, Bercot
knows what these Gnostic-Christian, Eastern Mystics from Alexandria taught
in general terms and it is exactly what he believes. Man is basically good, he
doesn't need a savior, he only needs a good example to follow and a little
help from God, Christ is not God, he did not physically arise, but spiritually
rose from the grave, the earth will never be destroyed, no man will ever be
lost, there are just different levels of gnosis, and so on.
145 Bercot, p. 113.

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You may think that this is too intriguing and that we have taken to flights
of fancy. Bercot surely isn't teaching these things. Oh, but he is:
If the church had wanted to depart from the teachings of the
apostles, all it had to do was to accept some of those spurious books
and reject some of the genuine apostolic writings. Or the church could
have simply altered the genuine apostolic writings to make them fit
the teachings of the church. Nobody would have called the church's
hand on this, since everybody else outside the church was already
doing these very things. This leaves us between a rock and a hard
place. If we say that the early Christians were dishonest men who
deliberately marred the teachings of the apostles, we have to admit
the likelihood that they would have also dishonestly altered their
writings. In fact, when we defend the veracity and authenticity of the
New Testament writings to skeptics, we invariably cite the use and
testimony of the early Christians as one of our main bases of authority.
The integrity of these men is particularly noticeable in their decisions
on which books to include in the New Testament canon. For example,
knowing the early Christian doctrine of salvation and works, we would
naturally expect to find that the early church placed great emphasis
on the Letter of James and accepted its canonicity without question,
while resisting the Letter to the Romans. But just the opposite is true.
The early Christians rarely quoted from James, and many churches
questioned its authenticity. In contrast, they quoted abundantly from
Paul, and they included his letters in the New Testament canon without
hesitation. What incredible integrity! 146
Bercot has engaged in sleight of hand. Earlier he quoted the early
Christians as relying on James to refute the doctrine of salvation by grace
and faith alone. Now, to try to emotionally establish their integrity, he says
that they rarely quoted from James, though they certainly would have liked
to. He has again switched things around to suit his point of the moment. It
doesn't make any difference to him that this is an internal contradiction in
his argument. He appears to be laboring under the assumption that if you
are still with him at this point, it is because he is saying things that you want
to hear. Bercot is using Luther's argument against James, which the early
Church was completely unaware of, to try to make it appear that they bowed
to the weight of the scriptures, which the men from Nicaea on did not have
the character to do. But only a few pages ago, Bercot was telling us that
there was no set Scripture in the early Church, so they went by oral
tradition. If that is true, then what is all of this talk about the Alexandrians
defending the integrity of the New Testament Scriptures, which weren't even
146 Ibid., pp. 120-121.

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fully known at that time? Here Bercot is simply chasing around in circles and
throwing dust in the air, trying to run enough strays in your direction to
make you think the herd is coming your way. What sterling integrity the
men of the 2nd and 3rd century had.
But the men of the 4th century that is a whole different thing. Suddenly
this sterling integrity that has to be there because of the age in which they
lived, is lost altogether. With the turning of the calendar from 299 to 300,
the whole thing goes out the window. The same church fathers that surely
we would not be cynical enough to doubt in the 3rd century, abruptly turn
into a band of charlatans that we would have to be fools to believe. They
have no high principles, they have lost the oral tradition of the Scriptures
that was so vital to the men of the 3rd century according to Bercot, and they
resort very easily to things that it is just unthinkable to accuse men of the
3rd century of. But this is not difficult for Bercot to handle. He has already
shown us his ability to change Church history by the wave of his hand. Like
a thespian, he comes out in an entirely different costume for Act II:
I don't see this type of integrity in the man from whom so many of
our evangelical doctrines stemMartin Luther. One of Luther's
noteworthy accomplishments was his translation of the Bible into
German. But his translation contained prefaces to each Bible book that
steered the reader's attention away from parts of the Bible that didn't
fit Luther's theology. 147
So there you have it. Bercot does not see it; and that, for practical intents
and purposes, resolves the issue. Thus the testimony of 17 centuries of the
orthodox Christian Church (including our own heritage) is swept away by the
wave of the hand of one converted Jehovah's Witness who by his own
admission is still confused and learning. Herein is a marvelous thing! We
have seen the first three centuries through Bercot's eyes even though
contrary to accepted Church history in one way. Now we can, we must
and we shall look at Church history in an entirely different light, all based
upon the simple statements: What integrity in the 2nd and 3rd centuries,
but I don't see this integrity from now on. And this from the man who,
against all legitimate testimony of writings and historians, insists that he
knows exactly what the early Christians believed and taught
But there are ranks in reserve, in this war of Bercots on Historic, Orthodox
Christianity, in case the hopeful approach fails. The whole thing came about
through the influences of Luther (I don't see this type of integrity in the
man from whom so many of our evangelical doctrines stemMartin
Luther), though Luther did not come along until 1,100 years after Nicaea.
We have always felt that Luther was given entirely too much credit for the
147 Ibid., p. 121.

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ills of the Church since the Reformation. Very few Christians that I meet;
know anything about what Luther believed and most of them don't care. But
to blame him for the things that happened from 323 to the 1500s that is
enough to give one pause.
Nicaea
We will now move to Nicaea and skip over the intervening parts because
they are of little consequence to the evaluation of this book. They are at
best attempts to imply common ground, which we do not have if the
doctrine is false. The thing that is of significance here is Bercot's vendetta
against the Council of Nicaea. It would take a lengthy treatise in itself to deal
in any adequate way with what went on at Nicaea, but it is not necessary to
do so in order to get to the few points that disturb Bercot.
First of all, let me say that in all my years in the Church, I have never
heard anyone defend Constantine. We are no more in agreement with
Constantine than Bercot is and we are just as convinced of his evil influence
on the Church. So we can dispense with the issue of Constantine and his
interference in the Church by consensus. He was a heretic, a pretender and
a bad influence. But that has had little or nothing to do with the Church and
her life an mission. There is a lingering effect in the Roman Catholic Church
but that has had negligible influence on any of us. There are principally
three things that happened at Nicaea and the century that followed, that are
a grief of mind to the theological descendants of Origen, like Bercot.
The Canon
When the canon of the whole Bible, including the New Testament
Scriptures was approved, it was not by Constantine, because both the
Eastern and the Western Bishops both ignored and defied Constantine (good
or bad though that may have been). They never felt that he was the leader
of the Church. The argument that finally led to the division was over the
relative importance of the Bishops of Constantinople to the Bishops of Rome.
It was the Church and its leadership that accepted the canon not at Nicaea
but at Carthage in 397, some 74 years later. It was one of the brightest days
in the history of the Church for it put an end to the ability of the Gnostic
Christians in Alexander (not to be confused with Constantinople) to teach
from, give credence to, and argue for the veracity of non-Christian, Gnostic,
Stoic, Neo-Platonic and Greek- philosophy ideas and writings. Remember
that it was Clement of Alexander who argued that true Gnosticism and true
Christianity were one and the same, true perfect wisdom of the highest
order, learned by religious and philosophical man by true gnosis; and that
the ideal Christian would be a Gnostic. It was Justin who argued that
Socrates, because he was a good pagan, was a Christian even though he
didn't know it, and it was Origen who argued that man had existed
somewhere before and he had been sent here by God to work out some of

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his problems and to obtain to true gnosis (humanistic knowledge and

wisdom is about as close as you can come to explaining what this term
really means), that redemption applied to creatures on other planets, in
other galaxies and to fallen angels and the devil and that Christ was only a
created being, inferior to God. Arius took up this line of argument. Bercot, in
a major understatement that betrays his true feelings, refers to Arius' views
as expressing some unorthodox views. . . over a hypothetical question. .
.about the origin and nature of the Son of God. Athanasius, one of the
greatest of the Church fathers and a Bishop at Alexandria, took Arius on
over this in one of the most furious debates that had taken place to that
time. At Nicaea, Athanasius was successful in having Arius and the Arian
heresy, which was in fact the Gnostic heresy of Clement and Origen taken to
a more precise level, denounced. From that time, until Constantine restored
Arius, it was a punishable offense in the Church for this doctrine to be
taught. This did much to clean up the mess in Alexandria for a good while,
though it did not stay permanently.
Bercot does not actually come out clean and accuse Nicaea over the
cannon, but he implies and infers it. Even so, Bercot cannot blame Nicaea
for his bitter resentment of the acceptance of the Byzantine Text instead of
the Eastern Text (which it now turns out, did not exist) for Nicaea had
nothing to do with it except as it laid the ground work for its handling of
Arius and the Eastern heresy.
The Holy Trinity
Secondly, though Bercot does not get into it (for the obvious reasons that
he is not going to get far with Anabaptists coming out against the Trinity)
the doctrine of the Trinity was what was openly at issue in the Nicene
Council. Arius not only did not believe in the Son as being The God and
equal to the Father in all respect, and did not believe in the pre-existence of
Christ, arguing that He was a created being, but he, like Origen, did not
believe in the person of the Holy Ghost at all. It wasnt that Origen and Arius
believed He was an inferior person to God (as they did concerning Christ)
but they didn't believe that it was a person at all. They believed that the
spirit of God was nothing more than the spirit in God, just like your spirit and
mine. To have the spirit of God in you meant to be like-minded toward
God. If you haven't realized by now that this is what Bercot believes, then
you haven't been paying attention to the book. I am not going back to
remake the argument at this point, but I will pull up one quotation.
At the same time, the early Christians didn't believe that they could
overcome all of their weaknesses and remain obedient to God day
after day simply on their own strength. They needed additional power
from God. But it wasn't a matter of sitting back and asking God to do
all the work. They believed that our walk with God is a joint project.

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The Christian himself must be willing to sacrifice, to pour his energy

and very soul into the project. But he also must recognize his need for
God's help. As Origen explained, He makes Himself known to those
who, after doing all that their powers will allow, confess that they need
help from Him.
The early church believed that a Christian must earnestly desire
and seek God's help. It wasn't a matter of a one-time request, either,
but a continual process. Clement taught his students, A man by
himself working and toiling at freedom from sinful desires achieves
nothing. But if he plainly shows himself to be very eager and earnest
about this, he attains it by the addition of the power of God. God
works together with willing souls. But if the person abandons his
eagerness, the spirit from God is also restrained (the emphasis is
mine).148
I have a question for you. Would you write a book, go back and edit for
errors and put it out to the public with God's Spirit spelled with a small s?
Why did Bercot do it? The reason is a very simple one. Bercot is in a crisis
here. He wants to make the source of man's power look as orthodox as
possible to keep people coming his way but he cannot make reference to the
Person of the Holy Ghost because Jehovah's Witnesses (at the least, Bercots
religious background and foundation), the theological descendants of Arius,
do not believe in the Holy Ghost or the Holy Trinity. They call it that illogical,
three headed monster that was started by the heretics in the Roman Church
at Nicaea. The Godhead is nowhere spoken of in the Bible, they say. I have
often pointed them to Romans 1:20 and Colossians 2:9. It is at that point
that they lay down the King James and pull out the New World Translation. I
have shown them in St. John 14:15-23 that Jesus used the names the Holy
Spirit, Christ and the Father completely interchangeably: I will come unto
you, I will go away and the Holy Ghost will come unto you, and My Father
will come and make our abode with you. They are not impressed; the spirit
is an it, not a he, they say. They argue that the Bible never says that Jesus is
The God. I have shown them Hebrews 1:8, where the Father said to the
Son, in the Greek interlinear version of their own Bible: The throne of you,
The God, ( thes ) is forever. But the Jehovah's Witnesses and others of
the Arian persuasion, are determined. That is because their whole identity is
tied up in the Gnostic, Arian belief that Jesus Christ is not equal to God and
that he did not rise physically from the grave.
Nicaea was attended mostly by Eastern bishops. In spite of Bercot's
assurances, the most important Roman bishops never attended the Nicene
Council (in direct disobedience to Constantine's mandate; so you see how
much power Constantine had with the Church). It was mostly the Eastern
148 Ibid., pp. 60-61.

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bishops, led by Athanasius from Alexandria, who succeeded in getting Arius

condemned as a heretic and thrown out of the Church and the country. All
along Bercot blames Constantine for this, but it was not Constantine's
instigation. Constantine went along unenthusiastically from the start
because he feared the bishops of the East. Another thing that Bercot
implies, if he does not state, is that Constantine was identified with the
Western bishops. That is not true. Constantine is the one who moved the
center of Church authority from Rome to Constantinople, a city built in his
own honor. As a result of this a division opened up between East and West.
Constantine was an Easterner for the most part, and much more closely
aligned with Alexandria than Rome, theologically. Indeed, Nicaea was an
Eastern city up in Turkey somewhere. This whole condemnation of Arius was
inspired by dissatisfaction with the Eastern bishops with what had been
going on in Alexandria. They had lost their grace with the heretical doctrines
of Clement of Alexandria and Origen. They simply were not going to put up
with Arius.
The truth is that it was Constantine himself who, at the insistence of his
own sister Constantina and her father-confessor Eusebius of Caeserea,
reversed the title of heretic and brought Arius back from exile, to the
dismay of his own Eastern Bishops. As a result, Arianism made a comeback
in Alexandria and took over the doctrine of the School again in time.
In the East, Arianism prevailed. Constantinius, second son of
Constantine the Great, and ruler in the East, together with his whole
court, was attached to it with fanatical intolerance. Eusebius of
Nicodemus was made bishop of Constantinople (338), and was the
leader of the Arian and the more moderate, less consistent Semi-Arian
parties in their common opposition of Athanasius and the orthodox
West.149
So you see it was actually Constantine who supported Arius and was
against the orthodoxy of the Church as defined by Athanasius, Chrysostom,
Jerome, and Augustine.
There was not, as Bercot states, an attempt to reopen Nicaea and undo
the terrible wrongs done there, as Bercot sees it. The truth is that there
was not an attempt to undo anything. The intention was to add more to
what had already been done by a shifting of emphasis. The Creed of Nicaea
was not satisfactory to the sound theologians of the orthodox Church on the
subject of Christ's humanity, or of the Holy Ghost. Emphasis had been
placed on Christ's deity to the detriment of His humanity and the Holy Ghost
had been treated in an indifferent fashion. It was changed at Constantinople
149 Phillip Schaff, History of the Christian Church, Vol. III (Grand Rapids, Michigan, WM. B. Eerdmans,
reprinted 1987), p. 263.

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in A.D. 381.150 But even that Creed (the Nicene Creed from Constantinople in
A.D. 381 not to be confused with the Creed of Nicaea in A.D. 325) was not
satisfactory on the subject and so the Athanasian Creed was later widely
adopted (though it source and its author remain unknown). It which was
really the most satisfactory of all from an orthodox point of view. But
because the Arians were back in control in Alexandria and because the
Athanasian Creed corrected unsatisfactory language concerning the Holy
Spirit, the East rejected it. But it didnt rest there. The Chalcedon Creed of
A.D. 451 recognized the Nicene Creed with modifications and additions and
it was formally changed to a satisfactory language concerning the Trinity by
Constantinople II in A. D. 553.
There simply isn't time to go into all of these things. They are interesting
studies in themselves, but they involve more detail than we can give them.
The thing done at Nicaea, that has Bercot and his crowd so angry, is that the
Gnostic heresy (that Christ is a created being and inferior to God) was put to
rest forever in the orthodox camps. Though it does not prevail today in
Alexandrian theology (it has from time to time), that is still how Alexandria
started out with Clement and Origen. It was a nest of philosophizers, Eastern
mystics, humanists, Stoics, Platonists, Philonists and Gnostics from the
outset. Every heresy in the modern Church started with Alexandria and
passed down through the mad philosophizing of Origen.
The orthodox Christian should know what was so important to the Gnostic
Arians to make them fight so hard. What difference should it have made to
pagan philosophers, who professed to believe in God, if the West wanted to
believe that Christ was equal to the Father? The answer is that it is part and
parcel of the humanistic doctrine of salvation by works that Bercot has
described earlier. We have just seen that neither Bercot, Justin, Clement of
Alexandria nor Origen, really means salvation. Each of them believes, by
his own words, that everyone if he is sincere, a Christian or the worst of
heathens will be saved in the end, even if he has to come around a few
times to get it right.
When they talk about salvation, they mean something entirely different
than orthodoxy means. By bringing men into salvation, they are talking
about an exclusive system that gives them more and more control over
men's lives. As with most humanistic doctrines, it is a power thing. The
guru who has the most secret knowledge can lead you to the highest form of
gnosis. They are locked in the same kind of misleading struggle as sociology
professors in colleges who compete with parents for the minds of their
children, trying to convince them that unless they forsake the parents, the
home, the Church and everything they have been taught, they are lost. But
150 There has always been a controversy as to whther or not the Creed was actually discussed and
formulated at the Constantinople convention in A. D. 381, or if it had its begining in some other time
and place. So far as I can tell, the orthodox position is that it was hammered out at the Council in A.
D. 381.

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the question is, lost to what? saved from what? and saved to what? The
answer is always the same: you are lost in old-fashioned ignorance and they
are going to save you by enlightening you. This is what we have in our
society today. This is the product of the Enlightenment. It is, in one
legitimate identification, a modern form of Gnosticism. It seems so obvious
when we see it from afar, but it is so subtle when it is among us. There is
something about not being able to see the forest for the trees.
What is this higher form of exclusive understanding supposed to do for
us? Why are these men so dedicated to it, that they give their whole lives to
it? It is ego, vanity, pride: it is man setting himself up as God. It is the
motivating force behind all false religion. It is the very thing that keeps man
from God.
Today, as in the days of Arius, it is Christ the Son of God, the truth
concerning the fall of man, the doctrine of salvation by grace alone and faith
alone that offers man hope, that condemns heresies and breaks the power
of false doctrine over the life, the home, the church and the society. No
wonder those who are set in opposition to the gospel, hate it so much and
make up such extravagant lies to distort it.
In the world of humanism there is secularism and religion. The Jehovah's
Witnesses are the exemplification of religious humanism. These are the
modern day Gnostics; the true spiritual descendants of Origin and Arius. It
was the exposing of their false doctrines that triggered their eternal hatred
for Nicaea and Athanasius. But while Nicaea had its short comings, that is
not the way Orthodoxy has looked at it through the centuries.
The Nicene Creed, in the enlarged form which is received after the
second ecumenical council, is the only one of all the symbols of
doctrine which, with the exception of the subsequently added filoque
(modern Filloque), is acknowledged alike by the Greek, the Latin, and
the Evangelical churches, and to this day, after a course of fifteen
centuries, is prayed and sung from Sunday to Sunday in all countries
of the civilized world. The Apostles Creed indeed, is much more
generally used in the West, and by its greater simplicity and more
popular form is much better adapted to catechetical and liturgical
purposes; but it has taken no root in the Eastern church; still less the
Athanasian Creed which exceeds the Nicene in logical precision and
completeness. Upon the bed of lava grows the sweet fruit of the vine.
The wild passions and the weaknesses of men, which encompassed
the Nicene council, are extinguished, but faith in the eternal deity of
Christ has remained, and so long as this faith lives, the council of
Nicaea will be named with reverence and with gratitude. 151
151 Schaff, III, pp. 631-32.

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In Bercot we see the religiously slanted views of a theological neophyte

who has twisted all of Church history to make it project an ancient
theological world of his imagination and invention that never existed. Nicaea
never meant anything noble to Bercot and the Arian Gnostics from
Alexandria, but it has always been looked upon as one of the times in
history when orthodox Christianity faced a strong challenge and won by true
Christians of the orthodox faith. We might well take the position that the
punishment fits the crime and leave him to his misery. But the insult that he
has paid to godly men of integrity, including the heritage from which the
Brethren arose, is something that is not so easy to ignore. The advantage
that he has taken of sincere, albeit simple, men who have never
distinguished themselves for their doctrinal discernment but whose
generous hearts of love and trust leave them vulnerable, is particularly
worthy of strong rebuke.
The Aftermath of Nicaea
Bercot is sulking because the Arian heresy did not succeed in Nicaea.
Knowing the infamy attached with the name of Arius, he will not come out
and say what is bothering him. Instead he uses the cloak and dagger
approach. He slanders everyone who believes that Jesus Christ is Jehovah
with reckless abandon. He rails on those who were interested in creeds. We
are not necessarily defenders of creedal Christianity. But one must
understand that the Creed of Nicaea was written, and sound Church leaders
were not just exactly satisfied with its wording. Arius had managed to get
too many concessions at Nicaea. The Nicene Creed, which resulted from the
Constantinople Convention (yet another Eastern theological initiative that
Bercot blames on the West) was far superior. One of the tip-offs in this whole
book should be the way in which Bercot (who doesn't hesitate for a moment
to lash bitterly into Augustine and Athanasius, two of the greatest of the
Church fathers) treats Justin, Clement of Alexandria, Origen, Arius and now
Pelagius, with gloves on: Poor misguided but well meaning Pelagius, who
had the misfortune to run into that diabolical Augustine, it is as if he is
saying. The reason for this is because while he does not want to come out in
the open and defend Pelagius (that would leave him too vulnerable to
criticism) yet just as in the case of Arius, it is Pelagius' views that he wants
to speak well and gently of, because it is Pelagianism over orthodoxy that
Bercot favors in this instance.
What did Pelagius believe and teach? Pelagianism is the doctrines of
Pelagius who taught that man did not inherit Adams sin, man is free to act
sinfully or righteously as he pleases. Death is not a consequence of Adams
disobedience. Only Adams example was corrupt and only through his
example did he introduce sin into the world. There is no correlation between
Adams sin and mankind's moral condition; it is possible not to sin, though

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most men have. God predestinates no one, and man, after he is forgiven by
faith, has the power within himself, without the Holy Ghost (in whom
Pelagius did not believe), to live a life pleasing to God. The Christian life is a
matter of Stoic and ascetic self-control.
If your interest has held up while reading Bercot's book, you will have
heard this doctrine clearly sounding through.
The Most Influential Christian of All Time
Like most men in the religious world who are enamored with the sound of
their own voices and who have just enough knowledge to be dangerous,
Bercot indulges in the favorite pastime of slandering the great Church
Father, St. Augustine of Hippo. To attack someone of Augustines historical
magnitude is supposed to give them stature, I guess. And like most men
who engage in such unbiblical railing against elders, virtually everything,
maybe everything in fact, that Bercot says about Augustine is wrong.
Unfortunately for us, the New Testament wasn't written by Western
minds, but by Hellenic Eastern minds. Augustine himself could read
little or no Greek. This is highly significant, because Greek is the
language of the New Testament and of the vast majority of the early
Christian writings. Perhaps that's why Augustine departed from early
Christianity in so many areasmore than any other Christian teacher
of his time. It's unfortunate that he had such a brilliant mind, because
as a result of his genius, he took the entire Western Church with
him.152
Notice the interesting inconsistency here in the process of trying to
prejudice minds against Augustine. He started out his book by belaboring
(against true history) that Justin, Irenaeus, Clement of Alexandria and
Tertullian were not scholars, theologians or highly educated men. They were
simple, hardworking men, he says, of modest, though better than average,
education. Now he switches around to condemn St. Augustine because he
could . . . read little or no Greek, which was the language of the New
Testament. Apparently now Bercot means to tell us that those who can
read Greek are better suited to understand the Bible and teach it than those
who cannot. Since Bercot does not appear to believe in the person of the
Holy Ghost in any concept that is remotely orthodox, I suppose this could be
a consistent position. Yet it is inconsistent with his earlier claims, which were
obviously meant to engender sympathy with Anabaptists who Bercot
apparently sees as simple, hardworking old boys of better than average
education, who are not scholars, theologians or highly educated
(apparently Bercot has not been listening to the same preachers among the
152 Bercot, pp. 147-48.

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Brethren that I have). Again, Bercot cannot have it both ways. If he wishes to
uphold the efficacy of simple, earnest men in the ministry and in control of
the doctrines of the Church, that is all right with us. But he must then leave
off condemning Augustine for not being as highly educated as the men of
Alexandria.
But Bercot will not do that. As a further act of inconsistency, he attributes
the misleading of the Church to Augustine's brilliance. Bercot now proceeds
to give his own revised, edited and contrived list of Augustine's beliefs:
The list of doctrines and practices that Augustine either initiated or to
which he gave his authority is impressively long. The following is only
a partial list of what he taught: that Mary was born and lived her entire
life without actual sin;
1. that unbaptized infants are eternally damned;
2. that sex within marriage is an inherently debased
business;
3. that war can be holy;
4. that there will be no literal millennium;
5. that there is no forgiveness of sins outside the
Catholic church;
6. that some of the practices and teachings of the apostles no
longer apply to
Christians because the apostles lived in a
different age;
7. that there is a purgatorial fire;
8. that the dead can benefit from the sacrifice of the
Eucharist;
9. that it is proper for a Christian state to persecute
heretics;
In response to Pelagius' teachings, Augustine went to the opposite
extreme [Bercot here gives the impression that St. Augustine reacted
to Pelagius in formulating his doctrines. This is another untruth.
Augustine defended his doctrines with Scripture, pointing out that
these were the doctrines of St. Paul and of true Christian Orthodoxy.
Augustine held all of his views on predestination, sovereignty and
election before the Pelagian controversy] and developed the following
set of doctrines:
1. As a result of Adam's fall, man is totally depraved. He is
absolutely unable to do anything good or to save himself. In fact, he's
even unable to believe or have faith in God.
2. Therefore, humans can believe in God or have faith in Him only if
by grace He first gives them this faith or belief. Man has no free will to
choose, either to believe or not to believe.

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3. God's decision to save one person and condemn another, to give

faith to one person and withhold it from another, is totally arbitrary.
There's nothing we can do to influence God's choice.
4. Before the creation of the world, God arbitrarily predestined (not
simply foreknew) who would be saved and who would be damned.
There's nothing we can do either in this life or the next to change these
matters.
5. The elect, those who were predestined for salvation, cannot
possibly lose their salvation. Those predestined for damnation cannot
possibly be saved.
6. No one can know whether or not he or she is of the elect. God
gives many people the gift of faith so that they believe, are baptized,
and walk in Jesus' commandments. However, some of them haven't
been predestined for salvation and ultimately won't persevere. The
gift of perseverance is a separate gift from that of faith. We have no
way of knowing who in the church has been given the gift of
perseverance.
7. Salvation is totally a matter of grace. Faith is a gift from God.
Obedience is a gift from God. Perseverance is gift from God.
8. Pelagius couldn't stand up against Augustine's withering
argumentation, and his erroneous views never took root. However, by
overreacting to the errors of Pelagius, Augustine obliterated the
original early Christian teachings of free will and man's involvement in
salvation. In their place was the, cold, grim doctrine of absolute
predestination. 153
This is probably the low point of Bercot's book. To call the doctrine of
salvation by grace and by faith alone, on the merits of Christ's Cross,
without works, a cold, grim doctrine, while replacing it with the idea that
man is basically good and salvation is part mans works and part God's help,
which by implication is supposed to be a warm and encouraging doctrine
is the exemplification of what it means to twist things 180 degrees.
In condemning St. Augustine, Bercot attacks things that St. Augustine
either invented, or he lent his voice to. We must first of all make it clear
that Augustine was not responsible, as no man is, for everything that
everyone in Christendom thinks. Nor is he guilty of blood simply because he
does not spend his whole life refuting things with which he might not be in
full agreement. But Bercot is nothing if not an opportunist. By this tactic he
can throw out a lot of ideas and imply that they are the views of St.
Augustine. If he is challenged, he can claim that they are things that
Augustine lent his voice to by not condemning. This is a very difficult thing
to answer if one is not using legitimate documentation to show that
153 Ibid., pp. 151-52.

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Augustine did in fact support such views. Bercot does not do that. Augustine
is vulnerable and Bercot fires at will.
But St. Augustine must be allowed to speak for himself and not be saddled
with the baggage that Bercot wants to load on his wagon. We will concern
ourselves with St. Augustine's views, not with views that he was aware of
and, to our knowledge, took no issue. Let it be said, however, that St.
Augustine took issue with practically every view in the Church with which he
did not agree in the process of formulating his own views. These are
recorded in The City of God. I prefer to think that Bercot has never read this
book. I would not care to believe that he is misrepresenting St. Augustine
deliberately, all the while knowing better, though based on his overall
performance in this book, we have to consider that possibility.
We can start with the first thing that Bercot says about Augustine.
According to him, St. Augustine picked up the mild doctrines of Athanasius
on the veneration of the Virgin Mary and it was Augustine who was
responsible for Maryolatry. The truth is that St. Augustine did little more than
to rescue the Virgin Mary from the Eastern heresies who placed her in the
same category as the sun goddess, the goddess Diana an other corrupt
human-deity goddesses of the Greek, Gnostic world and theology of
Alexandria. Augustine, while he did not take issue with Rome over the
doctrine of the Virgin which was far from what it is today but was beginning
to go too far (there was in those days no immaculate conception, ascension
into heaven or Mother-of-God dogma), actually had little to say on the
subject. The man who started the heresy about Mary and gave Maryolatry
it's foundation was one of Bercot's witnesses. It was Irenaeus who said that
Christ, as the second Adam, literally retraced the steps of the first Adam and
Mary was the second Eve. As in the case of most of the heresies of the 4th
and 5th centuries, it had its birth in Alexandria.
Irenaeus developed the idea that Christ, fully man as well as fully
God, retraced the steps of Adam, with a different result. Because
Christ passed through every age of life, all humanity share in his
sanctifying work.
The Gnostics claimed to possess secret traditions passed down from
the apostles. To counter this Irenaeus developed an argument
involving another kind of apostolic succession. He claimed that the
churches preserved public, standard beliefs handed down from
apostolic times by the teachers in the churches. Irenaeus thus
developed Christian theology in several ways; for example, the 'canon
(or rule) of truth' preserved in the church as the key to interpreting
Scripture; his view that the Eucharist contains 'an earthly and a divine
reality'; and the place of the virgin Mary (the new Eve) in his theology.

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At the same time he tried to base his teachings and arguments on

Scripture.154
It is true that Irenaeus was a Christian, where Origen was almost certainly
not, Justin probably was not and Clement of Alexandria was borderline at
best. Irenaeus did not go along with the Gnosticism of Clement or Origen
and he condemned the opening of the doors to the Kingdom to every good
old boy that happened to come along, though he were a pagan like
Socrates. Our purpose here is not to be harsh with Irenaeus but simply to
show that it was with him that the doctrine of the veneration of Mary
originated, and not from St. Augustine.
Augustine did not believe in Sovereignty and predestination to the
exclusion of the free will as has been claimed. Unlike Calvinism, Orthodoxy
has never felt the necessity, because of a belief in the doctrines of Election,
Sovereignty and Predestination, to deny the doctrine of the Free Will of Man.
St. Peter simply answered these truths which seem to be contradictions to
the rational minds of fallen mortals, by referring, in his 2nd letter to the
Church, chapter 3, and verse 16, to those things which are hard to be
understood. St. Augustine answered this issue, in The City of God, Book Five,
chapter 9, when he said of sovereignty and free will:
But the religious mind chooses both, confesses both and maintains
both by the faith of piety. . . . Now, against the sacrilegious and impious darings of reason, we assert both that God knows all things
before they come to pass and that we do by our free will whatsoever
we know and feel to be done by us only because we will to do it.155
As for the matter of sovereignty ruling out the free will, he said in that
same chapter:
But it does not follow that, though there is for God a certain order
of all causes (a predestined plan as of Romans 8), there must therefore
be nothing depending on the free exercise of our own wills, for our
wills themselves are included in that order of causes which is certain
to God and is embraced by His foreknowledge, for human wills are
also causes of human actions; and He Who foreknew all the causes of
things would certainly not have been ignorant of our wills.156
Here we have quoted Augustine himself to show that he did indeed
believe in the Free Will of man. I have said before and I will say again,
154 Eerdmans Handbook to the History of Christianity, p. 76.
155 Augustine, City of God, Book Five, Chapter 9, p. 214.
156 Ibid.

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Augustine's beliefs on this were very close to Jacobus Arminius, the founding
theologian of the Brethren movement. For comparisons sake, I will give a
synopsis on him again.
Arminianism is the beliefs of a 17th century Dutch professor, Jacobus
Arminius. He tried to stand against Calvinism and its predestinationism.
Arminius himself believed in a limited form of sovereign predestination that
was based on God's foreknowledge that the individual would use his free will
to accept Christ as Savior. He believed in free, unmerited salvation by grace
alone, but that man had to maintain his salvation by good works. Arminius
believed that men could lose their salvation. Contrary to popular belief,
Arminius was not Pelagian. He believed in the fall and the total depravity of
man. He believed in the need for prevenient grace to act upon our wills in
order for us to accept Christ and be saved, based on John 6;44, John 15:16,
Romans 9:16, and II Timothy 1:9 and 10 among others. In his treatise on
Romans 9, he argued for a limited form of predestination and election. In his
Declaration of Sentiments, published in the fall of 1608 and sent to the
Hague, he offered his polemic against Supralapsarianism, and made a plea
to the Netherlands Christians to accept his limited-predestination view and
rescue the doctrine of predestination from Calvin and the extremists. In his
commentary on Romans 9, Examination of Perkins Pamphlet and
Declaration of Sentiments, he argued against the Sublapsarianism of Luther
and Augustine. In Sublapsarianism, Adam's sin was freely chosen but after
that, every man's destiny was determined by the absolute sovereignty of
God. In his Declaration of Sentiments, Arminius gave twenty arguments
against Supralapsarianism. He claimed that these same arguments applied
against Sublapsarianism, but this was misguided.
One of the principal doctrines of Arminianism is that Christ suffered for
our sins but that he did not pay for them. If He paid for them, then every
man would have to be saved, since no condemnation and judgment would
remain. In Arminianism, every penitent sinner will see how much our redemption cost and will therefore cease from anarchy and submit to divine
rule in God's Kingdom. This view, which is known as the governmental
theory of atonement is based on Arminius' theology, though it is refined
and best expressed by others, such as the Methodist theologian John Miley
in his book The Atonement of Christ, published in 1879.
Arminius believed in infant baptism, as did Wesley, Luther and Calvin, and
it was practiced until rather recently in Arminianism.
Wesley preached Arminius' doctrine, not out of any appreciation or debt to
Arminius, which he did not have, but because it was a vehicle to oppose
Calvinism. Wesley and Whitefield divided over this issue, as Whitefield felt
that Arminianism was dulling the all-important sense of sin and making man
complacent by yielding up the vital concept of an Almighty God. This led to
a split in the Methodist Church. Arminius was much concerned with human
liberty and freedom in the social and political, as well as spiritual sense. Like

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Calvin, only in reverse, his arguments against the absolute Sovereignty of

God were more rational than biblical. This characterized many men in the
theological world just after the Renaissance and as the ages of Reason and
Enlightenment were taking shape. Arminius was no more of an offender in
that regard than was Calvin, but he laid a much greater emphasis on
evangelism, which was principally what endeared him to John Wesley. This
was of course good in and of itself, but the methodology of reason rather
than inspiration and revelation was to take a heavy toll upon the Christian
Church. Through his logical arguments and his humanistic approach to
Christianity and the Bible, Arminius opened the door to Evangelical
Conservatism, which was the fundamental contribution of Christianity to the
ages of Reason and Enlightenment, and which changed forever the way the
West looked at the Bible.
Augustine was not a Christian Zionist, or Chiliast as they were known in
those days. It is not correct to say that Augustine did not believe in a
millennial Kingdom until you have defined what you mean. Men have
believed the truth of the Revelation passage before the present schemes as
to the meaning were invented. But Augustine, like most of Christianity in the
first two centuries and all of it from the 400s on, believed that the Kingdom
of God on this earth was the Church. They did not believe that the Kingdom
was to be turned into a Jewish issue to be acted out in a natural, national
scene in Israel someday. Bercot is not a Christian Zionist either. The
Jehovah's Witnesses believe that this earth is never going to be destroyed
and that the future physical kingdom is going to be here on this earth
forever. It would appear that, like St. Paul with the Sadducees and the
Pharisees, he is trying to pit the Zionists against the non-Zionists for his
advantage, knowing that he doesn't agree with either.
In truth, the early Christians were in dispute over this matter. Philip Schaff
gives a good, not too lengthy, assessment:
The most striking point in the eschatology of the Ante-Nicene age is
the prominent chiliasm, or millennarianism, that is the belief of a
visible reign of Christ in glory on earth with the risen saints for a
thousand years, before the general resurrection and judgment. It was
indeed not the doctrine of the church in any creed or method of
devotion, but a widely current opinion of distinguished teachers, such
as Barnabas, Papias, Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, Tertullian, Methodius and
Lactantius, while Caius, Origen, Dionysius the Great, Eusebius (as
afterwards Jerome and Augustine) opposed it.
The Jewish chiliasm rested on a carnal misapprehension of the
Messianic kingdom, a literal interpretation of prophetic figures and an
overestimate of the importance of the Jewish people and the holy city
as the center of that kingdom. It was developed shortly before and

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after Christ in the apocalyptic literature, as the Book of Enoch, the

Apocalypse of Baruch, 4th Esdras, the Testaments of the Twelve
Patriarchs, and the Sibylline Books. It was adopted by the heretical
sect of the Ebionites, and the Gnostic Cerinthus.
The Christian Chiliasm is the Jewish Chiliasm spiritualized and fixed
upon the second, instead of the first coming of Christ. It distinguishes,
moreover, two resurrections, one before and another after the
millennium, and makes the millennial reign of Christ only a prelude to
his eternal reign in heaven, from which it is separated by a short
interregnum of Satan. The millennium is expected to come not as the
legitimate result of a historical process but as a sudden supernatural
revelation. The advocates of this theory appeal to the certain promises
of the Lord, but particularly to the hieroglyphic passage of the
Apocalypse, which teaches a millennial reign of Christ upon this earth
after the first resurrection and before the creation of the new heaven
and the new earth.
In connection with this the general expectation prevailed that the
return of the Lord was near, though uncertain and unascertainable as
to its day and hour, so that believers may be always ready for it. This
hope, through the whole age of persecution, was a copious fountain of
encouragement and comfort under the pains of that martyrdom which
sowed in blood the seed of a bountiful harvest for the church.
Among the Apostolic Fathers BARNABAS is the first and the only
one who expressly teaches a pre-millennial reign of Christ. He
considers the Mosaic history of the creation a type of six ages of labor
for the world, each lasting a thousand years, and of a millennium of
rest; since with God one day is as a thousand years. The millennial
Sabbath on earth will be followed by an eighth and eternal day in a
new world, of which the Lord's Day (called by Barnabas the eighth
day) is the type.
PAPIAS of Hierapolis, a pious but credulous contemporary of
Polycarp, entertained quaint and extravagant notions of the happiness
of the millennial reign, for which he appealed to apostolic tradition. He
put into the mouth of Christ himself a highly figurative description of
the more than tropical fertility of that period, which is preserved and
approved by Irenaeus, but sounds very apocryphal.
JUSTIN MARTYR represents the translation from the Jewish Christian
to the Gentile Christian chiliasm. He speaks repeatedly of the second
parousia of Christ in the clouds of heaven, surrounded by the holy
angels. It will be preceded by the near manifestation of the man of sin
who speaks blasphemies against the Most High God, and will rule
three and a half years. He is preceded by heresies and false prophets.
Christ will then raise the patriarchs, prophets, and pious Jews,
establish the millennium, restore Jerusalem, and reign there in the

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midst of his saints; after which the second and general resurrection
and judgment of the world will take place. He regarded this
expectation of the earthly perfection of Christ's kingdom as the keystone of pure doctrine, but adds that many pure and devout Christians
of his day did not share this opinion. After the millennium the world
will be annihilated, or transformed. In his two Apologies, (in his later
years) Justin teaches the usual view of the general resurrection and
judgment, and makes no mention of the millennium, but does not
exclude it.
The other Greek Apologists are silent on the subject, and cannot be
quoted either for or against chiliasm.
IRENAEUS, on the strength of tradition from St. John and his
disciples, (by word of mouth for Irenaeus never talked to John) taught
that after the destruction of the Roman empire, and the brief raging of
antichrist (lasting three and a half year or 1260 days), Christ will
visibly appear, will bind Satan, will reign at the rebuilt city of Jerusalem
with the little band of faithful confessors and the host of risen martyrs
over the nations of the earth, and will celebrate the millennial Sabbath
of preparation for the eternal glory of heaven; then, after a temporary
liberation of Satan, follows the final victory, the general resurrection,
the judgment of the world, and the consummation in the new heavens
and the new earth.
TERTULLIAN was an enthusiastic Chiliast, and pointed not only to the
Apocalypse, but also to the predictions of the Montanist prophets. But
the Montanists substituted Pepuza in Phrygia for Jerusalem, as the
center of Christ's reign, and ran into fanatical excesses, which brought
chiliasm into discredit, and resulted in its condemnation by several
synods in Asia Minor. After Tertullian, and independently of Montanism,
chiliasm was taught by COMMODAIN towards the close of the third
century, LACTANTIUS and VICTORINUS of Petau, at the beginning of
the fourth. Its last distinguished advocates in the East were
METHODIUS (d., a martyr, 311), the opponent of Origen, and
APOLLINARIUS of Laodicea in Syria.
We now turn to the Anti-Chiliasts. The opposition began during the
Montanist movement in Asia Minor. CAIUS OF ROME attacked both
Chiliasm and Montanism, and traced the former to the hated heretic
Cerinthus. The Roman church seems never to have sympathized with
either, and prepared itself for a comfortable settlement and normal
development in this world. In Alexandria, ORIGEN opposed chiliasm as
a Jewish dream, and spiritualized the symbolical language of the
prophets. His distinguished pupil, DIONYSIUS THE GREAT (d. about
264), checked the chiliastic movement when it was revived by Nepos
in Egypt, and wrote an elaborate work against it, which is lost. He

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denied the Apocalypse to the apostle John, and ascribed it to a

presbyter of that name. EUSEBIUS inclined to the same view.
But the crushing blow came from the great change in the social
condition and prospects of the church in the Nicene age. After
Christianity, contrary to all expectation, triumphed in the Roman
empire, and was embraced by the Caesars themselves, the millennial
reign, instead of being anxiously waited and prayed for, began to be
dated either from the first appearance of Christ, (or from the
conversion of Constantine by some extremists) and the downfall of
paganism, and to be regarded as realized in the glory of the dominant
imperial state-church. AUGUSTINE, who himself had formerly
entertained chiliastic hopes, framed the new theory which reflected
the social change, and was generally accepted. The apocalyptic
millennium he understood to be the present reign of Christ in the
Catholic (Universal) church, and the first resurrection, the translation
of the saints and martyrs to heaven, where they participate in Christ's
reign. It was consistent with this theory that towards the close of the
first millennium of the Christian era there was a wide-spread
expectation in Western Europe that the final judgment was at hand.
From the time of Constantine and Augustine chiliasm took its place
among the heresies, and was rejected subsequently even by the
Protestant reformers as a Jewish dream.157
And so you can see that St. Augustine (who himself entertained chiliasm
for a time) was not responsible for the doctrine that there will be no postsecond-coming Millennial Kingdom, and that the Church is the Kingdom of
God on earth in this dispensation, as Bercot at least implies. He supported it,
but so did the rest of orthodoxy. If you are to condemn St. Augustine for this,
you condemn the whole Protestant movement, including most of the men of
the Swiss and German Reformation, among whom were most of the
founders to the Anabaptist and Brethren movements. There were
Anabaptists who held for millennialism, but they were comparatively few in
number.
The truth is that Christian Zionism died out in the Church in the 5th
century and did not surface in any meaningful way until last century, under
the influence of J.N. Darby, D.L. Moody and C.I. Scofield. It probably would
never have seen the light of day again if Scofield had not plagiarized
Darbys notes and put them out as his own in the Scofield Reference Bible.
Moody was a good, simple, unlearned man who loved the Lord and had a
zeal for evangelism. Darby was a man on a mission. His goal was to get
Zionism back into the Church. He was able to associate this with Calvinism,
though this connection is of doubtful validity for Calvin was not a Zionist.
157 Schaff, II, pp. 614-619.

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Darby and D.L. Moody were perceived as being the champions of Calvinism
in an era when Westley, Whitefield and Finney had all but taken over the
Christian world with Arminianism (not the Arminianism of Arminius, however,
but the Enlightenment version of Finney, a Pelagian theologian.) Scofield
was a self-seeker and an opportunist. He had left his wife and daughters to
fend for themselves, abandoned his pulpit in Dallas and gone to Chicago to
be with Moody. He assumed, many believe without invitation, many
ministries that Moody had previously carried out, convincing Moody that his
health would not stand the pace. When his wife finally divorced him for
abandonment, he married again, though he never told Moody, Darby, his
Church in Dallas (the forerunner of Dallas Theological Seminary) or any of
his associates in Chicago, that he had been married before or had a wife and
daughters. Scofield showed Darby's notes to the Oxford Press, but never
told them that hey were Darby's. After a long and convoluted relationship
with him, Oxford Press finally put out the Scofield Reference Bible, which
made Scofield famous and a lot of money besides. Many people from the
evangelical world, who were tiring of the oppressive theology of Finney,
turned to this Bible because of the integral reputation that D.L. Moody had
given the movement. I will not go further with this, but if you want an
interesting study sometime, get The Incredible Scofield and His Book, by
Joseph M. Canfield, Ross House Books, Vallecito, California, 1st Ed., 1988.
Augustine did not start nor support the doctrine that St. Peter was the
rock upon which the Church was founded and that the Pope or the Roman
bishop in Augustines day because Augustine was not a Roman Catholic and
there was no Roman Catholicism until Gregory the Great in the 5th century,
and certainly none before Leo, with whom Augustine had little to do was a
supreme and infallible authority. Augustine was one of the most outspoken
critics of that view in the early Church.
Augustine, the greatest theological authority of the Latin church, at
first referred the words, On this rock I will build my church, to the
person of Peter, but afterward expressly retracted this interpretation,
and considered the Petra to be Christ, on the ground of a distinction
between Petra and Petrus; a distinction which Jerome also makes,
though with the intimation that it is not properly applicable to the
Hebrew and Syriac Cephus. I have somewhere said of St. Peter
thus Augustine corrects himself in his Retractions at the close of his
life that the church is built upon him as the rock; a thought which is
sung by many in the verses of St. Ambrose:
Eloo ipsa petra ecclesite Canente, culplun diluit. (The Rock
of the church himself in the cock-crowing atones his guilt.)
But I know that I have since frequently said, that the word of the
Lord 'Thou art Peter, and on this petra I will build my Church' must be

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understood of him, who Peter confessed as Son of the living God; and
Peter, so named after this rock, represents the person of the church,
which is founded on this rock and has received the keys of the
kingdom of heaven. For it was not said to him: 'Thou art a rock'
(Petra), but, 'Thou art Peter (Petrus); and the rock was Christ, through
confession of whom Simon received the name Peter. Yet the reader
may decide which of the two interpretations is the more probable. In
the same strain he says, in another place: Peter, in virtue of the
primacy of his apostolate, stands, by a figurative generalization, for
the church. . . When it was said to him, the kingdom of heaven, in this
world is by various temptations, as if by floods and storms, yet it does
not fall for it is founded upon a rock, from which Peter received his
name. For the rock is not so named from Peter, but Peter from the
rock. For the reason why the Lord says, upon this rock I will build, is
that Peter has said: Thou art the Christ the Son of the Living God. On
this rock which thou has confessed, says he, I will build my church.
For Christ is the rock upon which Peter himself was also built; for other
foundation can no man lay than that which is laid, which is Christ.
Thus the Church which is built upon Christ has received from him, in
the person of Peter, the keys of heaven that is the power of binding
and loosing sins.
This Augustinian interpretation of the petra has since been revived
by some Protestant theologians in the cause of anti-Romanism. . . but
on the other hand, like Cyprian and Jerome, he lays great stress upon
the essential unity of the episcopate and insists that the keys of the
kingdom of heaven were committed not to a single man, but to the
whole Church, which Peter was only set to represent. With this view
agrees the independent position of the North African church in the
time of Augustine toward Rome, as we have already observed it in the
case of Arius, and as it appears in the Pelagian controversy, of which
Augustine was the leader. This father, therefore, can at all events be
cited only as a witness to the limited of the chair. And it should also, in
justice, be observed, that in his numerous writings he very rarely
speaks of that authority at all, and then for the most part incidentally;
showing that he attached far less importance to this matter than the
Roman divines.158
Likewise Augustine did not teach, support nor believe in papal infallibility.
Of course, this doctrine did not come in until after the Reformation, but
Augustine, not believing in the absolute authority of the Roman Chair, would
certainly not have supported it.
158 Schaff, III, 306-8.

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Augustine believe that men had to repent, make confession and be

baptized (immersion was the method of baptizing in those days - sprinkling
was not in practice in Augustine's day.) He did not believe that any man
was saved who tried to make a charade out of repentance, running only to
the baptismal water, with no thought of an amended life:
They say, accordingly, that the Catholic Christian, no matter what
his life be, has Christ as his foundation, while this foundation is not
possessed by any heresy which is separated from the unity of His
body. And therefore, through virtue of this foundation, even though
the Catholic Christian by the inconsistency of his life has been as one
building up wood, hay, stubble, upon it they believe that he shall be
saved by fire, in other words, that he shall be delivered after tasting
the pain of that fire to which the wicked shall be condemned at the
last judgment. . . (p. 576) What it is to have Christ for a foundation,
and who they are to whom salvation as by fire is promised.
But, say they, the Catholic Christians have Christ for a foundation,
and they have not fallen away from union with Him, no matter how
depraved a life they have built on this foundation, as wood, hay,
stubble; and accordingly the well-directed faith by which Christ is their
foundation will suffice to deliver them some time from the continuance
of that fire, though it be with loss, since those things they have built
on shall be burned.
Let the Apostle James summarily reply to them: If any man say he
has faith, and have not works, can faith save him? who then is it,
they ask, of whom the Apostle Paul says, But he himself shall be
saved, yet so as by fire? Let us join them in their inquiry; and one
thing is very certain, that it is not he of whom James speaks, else we
should make the two apostles contradict one another, if the one says,
Though a man's works be evil, his faith will save him as by fire, while
the other says, If he have not good works, can his faith save him?
We shall then ascertain who it is who can be saved by fire, if we first
discover what it is to have Christ for a foundation. And this we may
very readily learn from the image itself. In a building the foundation is
first. Whoever, then, has Christ in his heart, so that no earthly or
temporal thingsnot even those that are legitimately allowedare
preferred to Him, has Christ as his foundation. But if these things be
preferred, even though a man seem to have faith in Christ, yet Christ
is not the foundation to that man; and much more if he, in contempt of
wholesome precepts, seek forbidden gratifications, is he clearly
convicted of putting Christ not first but last, since he has despised Him
as his ruler and has preferred to fulfill his own wicked lusts, in
contempt of Christ's commands and allowances. (p. 581)

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For what does it profit a man that he is baptized, if he is not

justified? Did not he Who said, Except a man be born of water and of
the Spirit, he shall not enter into the kingdom of God, say also,
Except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the
scribes and Pharisees, ye shall not enter into the kingdom of
heaven?159
Very contrary to popular thought, and not only disappointing to me a
supporter but to many of his enemies who have accused him on this, St.
Augustine believed that saved people could be lost:
He then who is in the unity of Christ's body (that is to say, in the
Christian membership), of which body the faithful have been wont to
receive the sacrament at the altar, that man is truly said to eat the
body and drink the blood of Christ. And consequently heretics and
schismatics being separate from the unity of this body, are able to
receive the same sacrament, but with no profit to themselvesnay,
rather to their own hurt, so that they are rather more severely judged
than liberated after some time. For they are not in that bond of peace
which is symbolized by that sacrament. But again, even those who
sufficiently understand that he who is not in the body of Christ cannot
be said to eat the body of Christ are in error when they promise
liberation from the fire of eternal punishment to persons who fall away
from the unity of that body into heresy, or even into heathenish
superstition. For, in the first place, they ought to consider how
intolerable it is, and how discordant with sound doctrine to suppose
that many, indeed, or almost have forsaken the Church Catholic ( the
Church Universal, or Christianity), and have originated impious
heresies and become heresiarchs, should enjoy a destiny superior to
those who never were Catholics, but have fallen into the snares of
these others; that is to say, if the fact of their Catholic baptism and
original reception of the sacrament of the body of Christ in the true
body of Christ is sufficient to deliver these heresiarchs from eternal
punishment. For certainly he who deserts the faith, and deserter
becomes an assailant, is worse than he who has not deserted the faith
he never held. And, in the second place, they are contradicted by the
apostle, who, after enumerating the works of the flesh, says with
reference to heresies, They who do such things shall not inherit the
kingdom of God. And therefore neither ought such persons as lead an
abandoned and damnable life to be confident of salvation, though
they persevered to the end in the communion of the Church and
comfort themselves with the word He that endureth to the end shall
159 Augustine, City of God, p. 584.

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be saved. By the iniquity of their life they abandon that very

righteousness of life which Christ is to them, whether it be by
fornication, or by perpetuating in their body the other uncleanness
which the apostle would not so much as mention, (here St. Augustine
condemns Homosexuality in the Priesthood) or by a dissolute luxury,
or by doing any one of those things of which he says, They who do
such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God. Consequently, they
who do such things shall not exist anywhere but in eternal
punishment since they cannot be in the kingdom of God. For while
they continue in such things to the very end of life, they cannot be
said to abide to the end; for to abide in Him is to abide in the faith of
Christ. And this faith, according to the apostle's definition of it,
worketh by love. And love, as he elsewhere says, worketh no evil.
Neither can these persons be said to eat the body of Christ, for they
cannot even be reckoned among His members. For, not to mention
other reasons, they cannot be at once the members of Christ and the
members of an harlot. In fine, He Himself, when He says, He that
eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood, dwelleth me, and I in him,
shows what it is in reality and not sacramentally, to eat his body and
drink His blood; for this is to dwell in Christ, that he also may dwell in
us. So that it is as if He said, He that dwelleth not in me, and in whom I
do not dwell, let him not say or think he eateth my body or drinketh
my blood. Accordingly, they who are not Christ's members do not
dwell in Him. And they who make them as members of a harlot, are
not members of Christ unless they have penitently abandoned evil,
and have returned to this good to be reconciled to it. 160
As we will later say, St. Augustine did not have all of the doctrines correct,
as indeed no man did but Christ himself. I do not believe that St. Augustine
has here attained to the understanding of St. Paul in the Romans passage,
any more than did Arminius, Luther, Calvin or Warfield. It seems to me that a
better grasp of the three-fold salvation (Justification, Sanctification and
Glorification) as it applies to tri-partite man (body, soul and spirit) is needed.
But to justify or polemicize St. Augustine's doctrine is not really the point of
the moment. It is to show what Augustine believed, how it lines up with
Arminius, and how it is more in keeping with the views of Arminius and the
Brethren, than with Calvinism. Remember that this is a book review of
Bercot, not a treatise on Augustine's theology. This realization has been
covered over by men deficient in knowledge who have made a game (and a
very unbiblical one, I might add, for certainly the great church father is
entitled to the amenities afforded elders in I Timothy 5:19.) of picking on St.
Augustine for grotesque things that he neither taught nor believed. Bercot
160 Ibid., pp. 580-1.

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hopes to work backward and apply the sins of Luther and Calvin to
Augustine and in this way, undermine orthodox Christianity, but this simply
will not work. For an unlearned, unstable and confused novice like Bercot to
take on the great Church Father, put imaginary words in his mouth and then
condemned him for things he did not believe is not in any wise acceptable to
me. I trust that it is not to you either.
St. Augustine believed that men would only be saved if they used their
wills to make a choice for Christ and his salvation. He also believed that the
Church should evangelize and that we, not knowing who was elected to
salvation and who was not, should pray for all men that they should be
saved. He did not believe that this meant that we could assure the salvation
of all men simply by praying for it.
That also is called the will of which He does in the hearts of those
who obey His commandments; and of this the apostle says, For it is
God that worketh in you both. As God's righteousness is used not
only the righteousness wherewith He Himself is righteous, but also of
that which He produces in the man whom He justifies, so also that is
called His law, which, though given by God, is the law of men. For
certainly they were men to whom Jesus said, It is written in your law,
though in another place we read, The law of his God is in his heart.
According to this will which God works in men, He is said also to will
what he Himself does not will, but causes His people to will; as He is
said to know what he has caused those to know who were ignorant of
it. For when the apostle says, But after that ye have known God, or
rather are known of God, we cannot suppose that God there for the
first time knew those who are foreknown by Him before the foundation
of the world; but he is said to have known then, because then He
caused them to. But I remember that I discussed these of expression
in the preceding books. According to this will, then, by which we say
God wills what he causes to be willed by us, from whom the future is
hidden, He wills things which He does not perform.
His saints, inspired by His holy will, desire many things which never
happen. They, e.g., pray for certain individualsthey pray in a pious
and holy mannerbut what they desire, He does not perform, though
He Himself by His own Holy Spirit has wrought in them will to pray.
And consequently, when the saints, in conformity with God's mind, will
and pray that all men be saved, we can use this mode of expression:
God wills and does not performmeaning that he Who causes them to
will these things Himself wills them. But if we speak of that will of His
which is eternal as His foreknowledge, certainly He has already done
things in heaven and on earth that he has willed, not only past and
present things, but things still future. But before the arrival of that

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time in which He has willed the occur of what he foreknew and

arranged before me, we say, It will happen when God wills But if we
are ignorant not only of the time in which it is to be, but even whether
it shall be at all, we say, It will happen if God willsnot because God
will then have a new will which He had not before, but because that
event, which from eternity has been prepare in His unchangeable will,
shall then come to pass.161
As to predestination and election to salvation, this was almost in exact
alignment with the practical effects of Arminius' doctrine of limited
predestination. Still it must be admitted that Arminius and Augustine had
problems in the area of Augustine's sub-lapsarianism, but that is really a
different issue. In sublapsarianism, Augustine advanced the argument that
God did not predestinate, elect or foreordain the fall, but that after the fall,
God stepped in and took over, predestinating and electing all things in his
sovereignty from that time on. This differed from the supralapsarianism of
orthodoxy where God planned all things, even the death of Christ, from
before the foundations of the world. (Rev. 13:8, Eph. 3:9, II Tim. 1:9,10)
Arminius believed in infralapsarianism, that nothing was planned before and
that God's workings with men are a reaction to the events of time and
history. But Arminius did not mean by this that God did not know before or
predestine and elect before. He meant that in His foreknowledge, God's plan
was only formed as a reaction to what he saw happening in time and history.
God only elected and predestinated for salvation those whom He could look
ahead and see would accept Christ. He only predestinated to damnation
those whom he could see would not accept Christ for whatever reason,
whether rejection or ignorance. Thus for Arminius, God hardened Pharaoh's
heart so that he would not let the children go from before the foundations of
the world. But that was only because he looked ahead and saw that Pharaoh
would not choose to obey. To St. Augustine, only the sin of Adam was not
planned as a part of God's plan. Still Augustine did not believe that
predestination eliminated free will, he did not believe that we should not
evangelize and he did not feel that we could take a cavalier attitude toward
the lost, since you and I do not know who is elected and who is not. This was
the position of St. Paul. I do all things for the elects sake, so that they may
obtain salvation, he said. St. Paul didn't know who they were, and so he
preached the gospel to all men, knowing of a certainty that any one who
heard could accept and be saved if they chose to. It was the reverence of
men like St. Paul and St. Augustine that kept them from stripping God of His
attributes of sovereignty and foreknowledge on a rational ground in
upholding the free will, when the Bible so clearly teaches both.
161 Ibid., pp. 587-88.

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Augustine has been accused, not only by Bercot, but others, of having an
unchristian attitude about sex in marriage, which he considered to be evil.
Again this is an accusation that is made for the most part in an intellectual,
historical and factual vacuum. Augustine did indeed struggle with the
subject of sensual lusts, even in Christian marriages. But he did not struggle
as did the Puritans or even Alexander Mack, who led a commune of married
people to attempt to live in celibacy for a number of years. Augustine would
never have advocated or tolerated anything like that. He had high
commendation for the marriage relationship and in no way chided or
discouraged it. Augustine was not one of the leaders in the celibacy for the
priesthood movement (which was not a mandatory Church law as it became
in the Roman Catholic Church later on. In understanding both Augustine and
the early Church it is important to remember that Augustine was not a
Roman Catholic. He was catholic in the same sense that the whole Church
was catholic, or universal, in those days. And Augustine was not the Father
of the Roman Catholic movement as often accused. He opposed the power
of the Roman bishop, arguing for more autonomy in other areas and
individual Churches.) Augustine's struggle was with lust in our physical
members, which he did not feel were sanctified in all respects by the
marriage bed. This is still true today in most fundamental and evangelical
churches. But Augustine, in our view, would never have said, as William
Jennings Bryant, the Puritan said last century in answer to Darrow, there was
no doubt in his mind but that the Bible taught that sex was original sin.
Whoever, then, has Christ in his heart, so that no earthly or
temporal thingsnot even those that are legitimate and allowedare
preferred to Him, has Christ as a foundation. But if these things be
preferred, then even though a man seem to have faith in this, yet
Christ is not the foundation to that man; and much more if he, in
contempt of wholesome precepts, seek forbidden gratification, is he
clearly convicted of putting Christ not first but last, since he has
despised Him as his ruler and has preferred to fulfill his own wicked
lusts, in contempt of Christ's commands and allowances. Accordingly,
if any Christian man loves a harlot and, attaching himself to her,
becomes one body, he has not now Christ for a foundation. But if any
one loves his own wife and loves her as Christ would have him love
her, who can doubt that he has Christ for a foundation?
But if he loves her in the world's fashion, carnally, as the disease of
lust prompts him, and as the Gentiles love who know not God, even
this the apostle, or rather Christ by the apostle allows as a venial fault.
And therefore even such a man may have Christ for a foundation. For
so long as he does not prefer such an affection or pleasure to Christ,

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Christ is his foundation, though on it he builds wood, hay, stubble; and

therefore he shall be saved as by fire. 162
The subject of sex in Christian marriage has always been a delicate and
thorny issue sort of like gathering bouquets of wild roses, I guess. St.
Augustine's views, while unfortunate, unnecessary and sad, (the words cited
above are not Augustine's worst moment on the subject and could, if
standing alone, be accepted as orthodox. But there are morewords which I
will not cite for you for they are lacking in decorumthat cannot be
considered orthodox, by me in any case) are not nearly as extreme as most
that have been offered by holy men through the years, even by our own
founders.
Augustine had other views which are also objectionable and unsound,
such as the baptism of infants, purgatory and the resurrection of aborted
fetuses in their little unborn forms to come before judgment. (It should be
remembered too that the subject of unborn and infant children has also
been a difficult subject with many churchmen through the centuries and the
present position of most Church groups is far from solidified or satisfactory
from a biblical point of view. St. Augustine's, in the final analysis, was
probably no more unsatisfactory than most.) But taken on balance he was
one of the most biblical of the early Church men. His well rounded thoughts,
his firm but gentle character and his willingness to step up to his duties,
have given him an honored position in the orthodox Christian Church. Any
effort to compare the vague, confused, pagan-religious, Gnostic-Christian
humanistic view of the early Alexandrian theologians to Augustine's is a
hopeful and hopeless adventure. Any effort, as Bercot's, to claim superiority
for them is a harsh condemnation of the theology, knowledge of Church
history and biblical understanding of the person trying to make the case.
Pelagius, His Doctrine and His Fuss With St. Augustine
It has been alleged, by Bercot, and others at times, that Pelagius was
simply overwhelmed by the superior oratory of St. Augustine and that he
was over matched in the debate. The truth is that Pelagius and St. Augustine
never met and had a debate. Pelagius steered clear of the African Synods of
416 and 417 convention because he was afraid of St. Augustine. Therefore
let us erase the oratorical advantage and the advantage of personality
immediately as being a legitimate factor (at the very least, in the matter of
the African Synods of 416 and 417 where Pelagianism was to all practical
intents and purposes, banished from orthodoxy), for it was not. What a man
cannot do in person in a debate, he ought to be able to do in his writings
and in the qualified oratory of his supporters, who were at the African
162 Ibid., p. 581.

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synods in his behalf. Under a favorable climate, in a diocesan synod

convened by Bishop John of Jerusalem in Palestine, Pelagius was allowed to
attack the character and doctrine of St. Augustine in his absence (he was
not invited to attend) and misrepresent his view, sneering, What matters
Augustine to me. Orosius, a bishop not prejudiced for Pelagius, objected,
saying that any man who presumed the right to speak in such a slandering
and contemptuous manner against the bishop to whom the whole North
African Church owed her restoration (this was apparently a reference to St.
Augustine's settling of the Donatist controversies) deserved to be excluded
from the communion of the Whole Church. John of Jerusalem did not like
Augustine for his condemnation of the views of Origen, who John admired,
so he spoke disparagingly of St. Augustine and made an impudent and
mocking claim: I am Augustine. It was by his tutelage and protection that
Pelagius was able to make his case. Yet when Augustine was allowed to
speak for himself, Pelagius steered clear of him, Pelagianism was
condemned as heresy and banned from the Christian realm and Pelagius
himself was considered a heretic.
The reason Augustine prevailed and won the day is simple. Pelagius' views
were unbiblical and unorthodox and simply could not be legitimately
supported persuasively on a theological and biblical ground. Pelagius'
theology was pretty simple and uncom- plicated, though of course like most
views of that nature it can be made to have wide application. The outline of
them is brief.
Pelagius taught that man did not inherit Adams sin, man is free to act
sinfully or righteously as he pleases. Death is not a consequence of Adams
disobedience. Only Adams example was corrupt and only through his
example did he introduce sin into the world. There is no correlation between
Adams sin and mankind's moral condition; it is possible not to sin, though
most men have. God predestinates no one, and man, after he is forgiven by
faith, has the power within himself, without the Holy Ghost (in whom
Pelagius, like Arius from whom his views descended, did not believe), to live
a life pleasing to God. The Christian life is a matter of Stoic and ascetic selfcontrol.
Augustine did not argue with Pelagius' views over the matter of
asceticism, though as we have noted, he was not one of the strong
promoters of that view. Augustine's concerns focused on Pelagius' attack on
the orthodox doctrine of the Fall and how it affected Adam's children, and
his disparaging views of the Holy Trinity. The simple conclusion to be drawn
from the evidence is that Augustine was able to keep this view out of the
formal doctrines of the Church by sound theological and Biblical refutation.
Augustine's arguments focused on the doctrines of orthodoxy as derived
from the Bible.
1. In Adam all die and in Christ all are made alive.

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2. Sin entered the world through Adam and passed, from father to child,
upon all men.
3. From Adam to Moses men did not die as the result of transgressions,
because in the absence of the written code, there were none, but because of
inherited sin from Adam.
4. Man is wayward from his youth and born in sin, estranged from God.
5. It was not a matter of man first seeking God, but God first seeking us;
therefore, though man must make his choice for Christ through free will,
repent and be baptized into Christ and the Church which is His body, still in
the absence of prevenient grace (grace which works on our hearts through
the wooing of the Holy Ghost to cause us to want to seek truth and light) no
man could come to Christ. Jesus said, no man could come to me except my
Father draw him. To St. Augustine, this did not mean that man had no will in
the matter as we have seen. It meant that Pelagius was wrong when he said
that man was not fallen, that he was good by nature and could seek and
obey God on his own, without regeneration and without grace and the help
of the Holy Ghost.
6. All of this was the sovereignty, the grace and the mercy of God, who
existed in three persons, The Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost.
In Carthage, in 418, the African council, attended by two hundred bishops,
defined their opposition to Pelagius and his views in a written report and
declaration that said, among other things: Whosoever says, that Adam was
created mortal, and would, even without sin, have died by natural necessity,
let him be anathema.
Though people like Bercot, who do not agree with that doctrine and who
try to find a way to condemn Augustine, try to add political and
ecclesiastical intrigue into the African synods, there does not appear to have
been any influence. The councils agreed with Augustine and most of the
other Churchmen and they pronounced Pelagius' doctrines as heresy and
Pelagius himself as a heretic.
Because of Pelagius' weakening of the doctrine of the Holy Ghost in the
minds of many who had come under his influence, Augustine had felt the
need for an addition to the Creed that came out of Nicaea (which was
weakened on the subject to give the supporters of Arius some consolation)
which would make a stronger statement on the Holy Ghost and the Trinity
itself. The Nicene Creed had provided that stronger wording, though St.
Augustine, who had not yet been baptized into the Church in 381, had
nothing to do with it. A stronger creed appeared in the form of the
Athanasian, though no one that I know of is exactly sure where it came from
or who was responsible for it. The Carthage council in 397 documented the
canon of the New Testament Scriptures, but there is no evidence of any
controversy over a Creed, though it must be admitted that some people
think this was the origination of the Athanasian Creed. If so, St. Augustine
probably did have a hand in it, but there is no verification of this. All of this

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has added additional fuel to the fires of the Jehovah's Witnesses and other
followers of Arius and Pelagius down through the years who choose to see
the hand of St. Augustine everywhere from 387 when he was baptized into
the Church, particularly from 391 when he was appointed a priest at Hippo
in North Africa and more particularly from 395 when he was appointed
bishop. But unless you are into intrigue, that is about all there is of
substance to say about the matter of Pelagius versus St. Augustine. From
the Orthodox point of view there never were legitimate biblical and
theological issues to fight over. The question was simply one of how much
difference of opinion could be allowed before it became hurtful heresy and
how long could Pelagius be allowed to go on giving the opinion that the
matter was nothing more than an argument over two orthodox opinions.
Augustine, being the bishop of note in Northern Africa, had the authority and
influence to make that decision to his own satisfaction and to get the matter
before the council, which he did.
If one wishes to look for plots he may do so and, I would suspect, find
many avenues to travel down. But stripped of all of its frills, this is what it
was about and what came about as a result. In it, St. Augustine did the
orthodox Christian Church a great service.
Needless to say the controversy did not come to a complete end there.
The followers of Gnostic-Origen heretical beliefs have always been around
and are with us today, most noticeably in the doctrines of the Mormons and
the Jehovah's Witnesses. Additionally, it was not long before the doctrines of
Semi-Pelagianism and Semi-Arianism gained followings.
Semi-Pelagianism
Semi-Pelagianism was a position taken by some theologians in the 5h and
6th centuries who refused to stand too closely to what they considered the
unnecessarily extreme views of both Pelagius or St. Augustine with respect
to their relative positions on the roles played by the sovereignty of God and
the free will in mans salvation. The term Semi-Pelagian is a somewhat
modern term that is reported to have appeared first in the Lutheran Formula
of Concord in 1577, and is identified with the theology of the Jesuit Luis
Molina. Semi-Pelagians agonize over this term since they are not at all
enthusiastic about being known as half-Pelagians. They would much prefer,
and some have suggested that it would be much more accurate, to refer to
them as half-Augustinian. The problem with that arises when one considers
that Semi-Pelagians have made it openly and vocally clear that they are not
willing to live with the ultimate consequences of Augustine's theology.
Just who all the Semi-Pelagians are is nebulous. On the one extreme they
can be called a rather narrow group who do not believe in any form of
foreknowledge or predestination. On the other, most of those who are called
Calvinistic Baptists and Calvinistic Brethren could be called Semi-Pelagian

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since they believe in free will. The problem here is that Augustine too believed in free will, as we have noted in The City of God, Book Five and
chapter 9, where, in his answer to Cicero, St. Augustine said:
Now, against the impious and sacrilegious darings of reason, we
assert both that God knows all things before they come to pass and
that we do by our free will whatsoever we know and feel to be done by
us only because we will it...but it does not follow that, though there be
for God a certain order of all causes, there must therefore be nothing
depending on the free exercise of our own wills, for our wills
themselves are included in that order of things which is certain to God
and is embraced by His foreknowledge, for human wills are also
causes of human actions; and He Who foreknows all the causes of
things would certainly among those causes not have been ignorant of
our wills.
He goes on to say, in chapter 10, which is entitled, Whether our wills are
ruled by necessity, It is manifest that our wills by which we live uprightly
or wickedly are not under such a necessity; for we do many things which, if
we were not willing, we should certainly not do. 163
Vitalis of Carthage too attacked St. Augustine for things that he did not
believe or teach. To correct these misunderstandings, St. Augustine
published Grace and Free Will and Rebuke and Grace in which he attempted
to point out that he did indeed believe in the Sovereignty of God and
election as fervently as he was accused, but that it was only inductive
reason that led men to conclude that he could not therefore believe in free
will, which he also passionately affirmed. But these pleas went largely
unheed- ed then as indeed they do today, as men divided along rational
lines that they them- selves have imagined and logically concluded. After St.
Augustines death, things worsened as his defenders, beginning with Prosper
of Aquitaine, and his detractors, such as Vincent of Lerins, misunderstood
Augustines position and attributed to him things that he never said or
believed. It is inaccurate therefore to say that anyone who believes in the
Sovereignty of God and the Free Will of man is Semi-Augustinian, since this
was indeed the theology of St. Augustine. If one said that he believed that
half the means of salvation was due to sovereignty and half was due to
natural man and natural causes as the free will, then he would not be
Augustinian at all, since the great Church Father believed totally in both. He
would, however, be Semi-Pelagian.
The controversy about the Semi-Pelagian issue declined as a historically
significant matter after the Synod of Orange in A.D. 529. At that synod,
163 Ibid., pp. 214-15.

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Cesarius of Arles succeeded in establishing as dogma certain precise articles

that went against the Semi-Pelagians. In A.D. 531, Boniface II approved the
decisions of the council and gave them ecumenical authority. But the issues
raised by this controversy are with us to this day.
Semi-Arianism
Semi-Arianism started with the views of theologians in the 4th century
who were reluctant to hold either a strict Arian or a strict Nicene position
with respect to Christs Sonship. After the Council of Nicaea in A.D. 325,
Orthodox Christianity, led by Athanasius, established use of the term
homoousios that meant that Christ, the Eternal Word (Logos), was of one
substance with the Father. The Arians held that Christ was anomoios which
meant that he was a created being and that he was unlike the Father in
substance. Semi-Arians adopted the term homoiousios, that conveyed the
notion of Christs being of like substance but left open the extent to which
He differed from other created beings. They were willing to refer to Christ as
Divine, hedged as to whether He was created and openly denied that he was
fully equal to the Father in all respects as to the Godhead
Some Semi-Arians have complained that the term associates them too
closely with Arianism and that Semi-Nicene would be a more accurate and
fair title. Semi-Nicene has in fact been widely used throughout history, but
Orthodoxy will not agree, pointing out that Semi-Arians do in fact deny that
Christ is fully one with the Father, giving them nothing whatever in common
with the Nicene declaration. It does emphasize more fully, however, why St.
Augustine wanted the Nicene Creed (Constantinople Convention, 381) more
particularly defined on the Holy Trinity and the Holy Ghost.
These controversies will continue as long as this earth stands, but the
position of the Historic Orthodox Christian Church if fully and clearly
established. Bercot cannot deny it with impunity. He can confuse the
unlearned and he can throw dust in the air, but he cannot change it.
Anabaptists
The final issue that we shall choose with Bercot is his views of the
Anabaptists. We shall look at:
1. His misguided notion that this is an honored term and that those to
whom it is applied and, in the case of the Brethren, misapplied, are flattered
by it.
2. His mistaken notions about their beliefs as to war and capital punishment.
3. Their views on baptism and what it meant.
5. Why Bercot is taking issue with the Anabaptists over their
understanding of baptism.
The people of the Swiss and German Reformation, who were involved in
the second movement started by those who believed that Luther and

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Zwingli did not go far enough in separating from the power and dictatorial
nature of the organized church, did not take kindly to being called
rebaptizers and those who were labeling them as that did not mean to be
complimenting them. It was, in fact, a condemnation of their doctrine. This
is because one of the central issues in this controversy was over baptism.
Like most counter-culture movements, the Anabaptists lacked
cohesiveness. No single body of doctrine and no unifying organization
prevailed among them. Even the name Anabaptist was pinned on
them by their enemies. It meant rebaptizer and was intended to
associate the radicals with heretics in the early church and subject
them to severe persecution. The move succeeded famously. Actually,
the Anabaptists rejected all thoughts of rebaptizers because they
never considered the ceremonial sprinkling they received in infancy as
valid baptism. They much preferred Baptist as a designation. To
most of them, however, the fundamental issue was not baptism. It was
the nature of the church and its relationship to civil governments. They
had come to their convictions like most other Protestants through
Scripture. Luther had taught that common people had a right to search
the Bible for themselves. It had been his guiding light to salvation
why not theirs?164
They never accepted the label Anabaptist (meaning rebaptizer)
a term of reproach which was coined by their opponents. They
objected to the implication that the ceremonial sprinkling which they
had received as infants had in fact been a valid baptism. They denied
that their baptism of believing adults was arrogant and superfluous. 165
The movement was broad and opened on many fronts, but we shall
confine our discussion to the Brethren aspect of Anabaptism. The Brethren
did not believe in the baptizing of infants. They were convinced (one of the
few accuracies in Bercot's comments about them and one which has design,
as we shall see) that baptism had no meaning if it wasn't performed on an
adult who had truly repented and been regenerated. They not only believed
that it was the outward manifestation of an inner truth, but (and a
realization that is lost on many today) that it was a Sanctification, not a
Justification issue. Originally the Brethren did not believe that it was
absolutely necessary to one's salvation, though later on the, struggle over
baptism became a hard and fast identification and requirement. Early on
they denied plainly that their views of discipleship had anything to do with
works for Justification, saying that it was a Sanctification issue:
164 Bruce L. Shelley, Church History Made Plain, (Waco, Texas: Word Books, 1971), p. 266.
165 Eerdmans, p. 399.

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The Reformers were understandably dismayed when news spread of

Anabaptists interrupting Protestant sermons or attracting the most
earnest of their parishioners. They were also concerned that the
Anabaptists' emphasis upon life as well as belief seemed to challenge
the basic Reformation principle of 'by faith alone'. In vain did the
Anabaptists protest that their ethical teachings were not a means of
obtaining salvationbut rather a necessary expression of the new life
in Christ which resulted from salvation. In fact, the Anabaptists
argued, these teachings stemmed from specific scriptural
commandments.166
Like their theological founder Arminius, the Brethren originally believed in
the Reformation principle of Sola Fide (by faith alone). The doctrine then
regressed back toward the notion that while there was no regeneration in the
act of baptism, still there was no true belief without it. This has been
Brethren doctrine for years; both Arminian and Calvinistic. I have heard it
taught over a period of many years in the Grace Brethren: You don't have to
be baptized to be saved. But if you are truly saved, there will be at least
some good works in your life. Since baptism is the first work of obedience,
anyone who will not be baptized is not saved. But I want to impress upon
you that this is not where it started out. I stress that point because, in my
view, the early Brethren were the ones who were correct. In fact the
argument that one could be saved without undergoing the physical
ordinance was very much a part of the original revolt against Rome and then
eventually against Lutheranism and Presbyterianism. But that shoots off in a
slightly different direction, which we will not follow now.
So far as the early Brethren were concerned, no one who had been
baptized in the Roman or Lutheran Churches as infants, or for
regeneration were baptized. They were not rebaptizing people, they
were baptizing them, legitimately and for the first time. Their critics were
accusing them of rebaptizing those who had already been baptized, out of
hardheadedness, rebellion and the desire to start a new movement. The
early Brethren could not be responsible for what people were accusing them
of, but they did not like the title, all the same.
In trying to appeal to the Mennonites, German Baptists, Amish, Old
Brethren and the like, Bercot has made the mistake of thinking that this is an
honored, revered and greatly appreciated title, when in fact it is not. Only
the Amish wear it with pride. That is because the notions of Jacob Amman
166 Ibid., 402.

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were somewhat different from those which came down from Menno Simons,
Blaurock (Jorg Cajacob) and Alexander Mack.
How could Bercot, who seems to have laid his plan so well, fall into that
error. The reason is simple enough, or so it seems to me. The Jehovah's
Witness, are true rebaptizers. This is not really because they believe that
the water washes away sins, and only in baptism is one regenerated, as
Bercot seems to say. Bercot is engaging in aesopian language. He has
already stated that you not only don't have to be baptized to be saved, but
you don't even have to be a Christian to be saved. You can be a heathen
who never heard of Christ, and God, in His grace, will do the right thing.
But Bercot knows that most of those whom he identifies as Anabaptist do
believe that you have to be baptized to be saved. If he can convince you
that your doctrine of baptism is one that has been corrupted by Augustine,
Luther, Calvin and the evangelicals, then maybe just maybe you aren't
saved. Then he may be able to convince you that you need to be rebaptized
in the right way, or at least for the right reasons. The only group around
today, in his view, who have preserved the Arian view of truth is the
Jehovah's Witnesses or at least one who has their doctrine. This whole thing
is not about salvation in the orthodox or usual sense, it is about power and
mind control, mob and mass psychology. What you need is true gnosis (or
knowledge) not by faith and grace but by the humanistic theology of Justin,
Clement of Alexandria, Origen, Arius, Pelagius and all of the best guru's
down to the present time, who are the Jehovahs Witnesses, or someone of
their persuasion. Theirs is the superior intellectual and rational view, and
they have their revamped version of Church history and their condemnation
of the orthodox fathers, to give them credence. Of course, this is fanatical,
bizarre and off beat. But you have to realize something here, we are talking
about the Jehovah's Witnesses, a non-Christian group of heretics that are as
dangerous and far off of the track as anything in pseudo-Christianity today.
Of course, they believe that they are the only true Church and that you need
to come into their group to be saved. There are many groups around
today, including most of the Brethren, where you would have to be
rebatpized to be taken in as a member. I remember a large denominationwide fight among the Grace Brethren over this very issue in the 60s and
70s. I remember Mother telling me the story of when my two grandfathers,
along with Oliver Cover, wanted to end the division and bring the Old
Brethren back into the German Baptist Church. The thing that prevented this
from happening was the requirement that they all be rebaptized. Rebaptism
isn't a ridiculous notion at all, if you think you are the one that is right in the
matter. If you don't know that the Jehovah's Witnesses believe that you need
to get out of your heretical group and join theirs; if you don't know that this
is the passion that drives them; and if you don't know that they will adopt
and justify any kind of deceitful and misleading language and resort to just
about any kind of trick to accomplish that goal, then you need to be so

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informed. They don't think this is ridiculous at all. They believe that it is their
mission in life. They believe that they are working their way into the
presence of God by this. They believe that they can convince many people
to do that, and they are proven right hundreds of time a day! Bercot may
be well on his way to convincing many of the Brethren this very hour. Their
victims include people from the Roman Catholics, the Brethren, the Baptists,
the Lutheran, the Methodists and on and on.
Bercot chides the Anabaptists for not having been against capital
punishment. This is not a large point, for most of the Brethren today, having
more interest in the world around them and the safety of their wives,
children, homes and streets than the men of antiquity, are not against it. But
it further shows how really uninformed or loose with the facts Bercot is in
the final analysis. The people of the early Baptist movement (for this is what
it was, not Anabaptist) believed very much in non-resistance to persecution
both individually and governmentally:
A second Anabaptist principle, the principle of love, grew logically
out of the first. In their dealings with Non-Anabaptists, they acted as
pacifists. They would neither go to war, defend themselves against
their persecutors, nor take part in coercion by the state. 167
Part of their concern was motivated by radical elements within the
movement:
Catholic and Lutheran fears of the Anabaptist radicals deepened
suddenly in the mid-1530s with the bizarre Munster rebellion. Munster
was an Episcopal city in Westphalia near the Netherlands. In 1532 the
Reformation spread rapidly throughout the city. A conservative
Lutheran group was at first strong there. But then new immigrants,
who were apostles of a strange figure called Jan Matthijs, led to
fanaticism among those in power. Many looked for the creation of the
Lord's earthly kingdom in Munster. Church historians call such views
chiliasm, meaning belief in a thousand-year earthly kingdom of Christ.
When the bishop of the region massed his troops to besiege the city,
these Anabaptists uncharacteristically defended themselves by arms.
As the siege progressed, the more extreme leaders gained control of
the city. In the summer of 1534 a former innkeeper, Jan of Leiden,
seized the powers of government and ruled as an absolute despot.
Claiming new revelations from God, Jan introduced the Old Testament
practice of polygamy and by September took the title King David.
With his harem King David lived in splendor, yet by a strange
167 Shelley, Church History Made Plain, p. 272.

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cunning he maintained morale in the city in spite of widespread

hunger. He was able to keep the bishop's army at bay until June 1535.
The fall of the city brought an end to David's reign. But for centuries
thereafter Europeans upon hearing Anabaptist thoughts of the
Munster rebellion. It stood for wild-eyed, religious fanaticism. 168
And so one of the issues by which Bercot hopes to be able to establish
authority over his audience is based on another misconception of history. While
the point itself is not large, the matter here is. Jehovah's Witnesses (Bercot had
his training from the J.W.s ) are trained to do certain things when they go out
to do missionary work:
1. Find where your audience is vulnerable to flattery and endear yourself to
them.
2. Establish your knowledge in their eyes by a clear, brief, easy-tounderstand, fast moving presentation of ideas to which they will be
sympathetic, thinking that you and they are talking the same language, but
which are definitely peculiar to you and your group so that it will have shock
value and interest appeal. It makes little difference if it is true and factual or
not. The goal is evangelism and proselytism, not education.
3. Once you have them in your net, jerk the pole. Find areas where you have
convinced them that they are wrong. These must be vital areas where the fear
can be put into them, or where they are naturally set up to be swayed in large
numbers. With the Anabaptist, there are two such areas that are ready made:
baptism and non-resistance. There are a number of baptismal regenerationists
among them and there are also a number who do not believe in capital
punishment. A third area would be evangelism. Chide them for their lack in this
matter. Many of them are already feeling guilty and there are many arguments
that go on among them over this subject even some divisions.
There was a heterogeneousness within the Anabaptist (or the Baptist)
movement. The Brethren, from the start were known for their evangelicalism.
Anabaptists had also spread in large numbers eastwards to the Tyrol
and Moravia. The early missionary who took the message eastwards
along the Alps to the Tyrol was Jorg Cajacob (Blaurock), who had been
the first adult to be baptized. . . Over the centuries, these descendants
lost many of their Anabaptists characteristics. Seeking purity, they
became legalistic. In the interests of sheer survival, they lost
evangelistic zeal. They became known as excellent farmers, good
people, and the Quiet in the Land. Not until the late 19th century
did they experience revival.169
168 Ibid., pp. 210-11.
169 Eerdmans, pp. 402-3.

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There was a constituency that was humanistic to the core:

Other radicals, given significant weight to reason alongside the
Scriptures, came to reject aspects of traditional theology, principally in
Christological and Trinitarian matters. Michael Servetus, burned in
Calvin's Geneva for his views, is a noteworthy example of
antitrinitarianism. Antitrinitarianism attained institu- tional form in the
pacifistic Polish Brethren, later known as Socinians, and in the
Unitarian churches in Lithuania and Transylvania. A remnant of the
latter survives into the twentieth century. Other modern Unitarians
inherit
the
intellectual
if
not
the
historical
legacy
of
antitrinitarianism.170
Benjamin Franklin, the Deist, is reported to have had early ties with
Unitarian groups. When Alexander Mack came to America, Franklin, because
of his affiliation with the liberal elements (this has always been a
pronounced constituency within the Brethren movement, due in part to their
unbiblical democratic structure and the high intelligence of the German and
Swiss people, which is not always a blessing by any means, as witnessed
today by the Church of the Brethren the parent unit in American which
is theologically liberal to the core in most cases) of the Anabaptist
movement, looked him up and befriended him. How much theological
influence Franklin may have had is not known. The early doctrines and
practices of Mack and his followers were so confused and contentious that
one may not have noticed.

170 Ibid., p. 403.

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CHAPTER FOUR
A Summary Evaluation
We will be brief in summarizing:
1. Without serious argument, Bercot (who claims to no longer be associated
with them and is starting a group of his own which he apparently hopes to build
up with proselytes from the Anabaptist groups) is teaching at the least a form
of Jehovah's Witness doctrine, which is the modern version of the Arian heresy.
The occurrence of men leaving those types of groups, organizing their own
group based upon the same doctrines, and then trying to distance them selves

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from those parent groups by making disparaging statements about them in

order to project originality, has happened many times before in Church history.
But the mark of Jehovahs Witness heresy shows clearly in the things that he
says and writes. If he is an unlearned young man who is seeking truth and has
not yet found it, then he is poorly advised to write such a book and allege such
deep insights and such crimes against noble men of the faith and the Church
and attempt to start yet another denomination with himself as leader.
Personally, I do not attribute any such innocence to him. To me he is clearly a
man on a mission, with a carefully thought-out agenda, which is to creep into
the fold of the Anabaptists and to raid the flock through sleight of hand, false
doctrine and deceit. He is trying, unsuccessfully I hope, to neutralize the
leadership with flattery and a dishonest call for a unity which is based upon
unbiblical, religious humanism.
2. Bercot's version of Church history is far off the mark insofar as any
accuracy and valid interpretation is concerned. To believe that this is done in
ignorance, stretches credulity. Bercot has gone so far afield as to call upon the
Church to accept Jewish heresy, the Septuagint (which is held in suspicion by
Orthodox Christianity because of the subjectivity of the Jewish Scholars who
brought it forth) as superior to the King James, apochryphal books as inspired
Scripture and contemporary religious writings, oral traditions and the pagan
humanism of heretical Gnostic Christians such as Origen and Clement of
Alexandria as being on a level, importance-wise, with Scripture in order to
make his case. It is not hard to imagine that a lawyer could be that ignorant,
innocent and personally misled (one has only to read Jesus own words on the
subject of lawyers) but it borders on impossible to believe that a Christian who
is led by the Holy Ghost (not Bercots holy spirit, but the real One) could ever
arrive at such utter nonsense, heresy and historical error.
3. Some of the early churchmen cited by Bercot, most notably Clement of
Rome, Polycarp and
Barnabas were Apostolic Fathers. Others, such as
Hippolytus and Tertullian, were Ante-Nicene and Nicene Fathers. Others, such
as Justin called Philosopher and Martyr, Clement of Alexander, Origen and
Lactantius, were not fathers, but were theological writers. This was not by their
own choice or for any noble reason. It was because their doctrines were held to
be suspect by the Orthodox Church of their day, both Rome and
Constantinople, and the Orthodox Church since that time.
4. There was no controversy in Church history between the simple laymen
who were ordinary people and the scholars, theologians, dogmatists and highly
educated who took over by the astounding events of Nicaea, as Bercot says.
There were uneducated laypersons who made their mark in that time, as there
have been in all eras of the Church, and they have always been the mainstay of
the Church. It is to them first that God comes with His gifts and callings

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according to I Corinthians 1 and 2. We do not know who they were and, since
they left no writings, may never know until the day of judgment. But the kind of
division that Bercot is trying to work for his own purposes is invalid. Whoever
they were, as an entity, they were for, not against, salvation by faith and grace
or the practice of allowing the written Word to be the only guide to the faith
and practice of the Church. This is really the controversy that Bercot has tried,
unsuccessfully in my view, to contrive. Scholars and seminary trained
theologians have frequently gone wrong. But they have gone wrong because
they departed from the simplicity of Christ and the Scriptures, not because
they have departed from the oral traditions of the heretical Alexandrian
philosopher-theologians.
5. The legendary names of history belonged to men who were highly
educated, highly intelligent, professional religionists who spent their time
studying, writing and teaching. They were not farmer-preachers at all. This is
not an honest effort to distinguish between simplicity and human wisdom. It is
an effort on Bercot's part to draw an imaginary line in the sand back there and
to say:
Everyone who doesn't want to be a part of the Roman-ConstantineAthanasius-Augustine-Luther-Calvin-Evangelical heresy, step back over it.
When you do, you will find the only possessors of true wisdom, not
obtained strictly from the Bible with the help of some imaginary Ghost
who doesn't exists as an individual and the third person of the Godhead,
but from the Bible (which can never be understood because of the
limitations of the language of mortality) and oral traditions of the
ancients and their true understanding of what the Apostles meant,
superior wisdom, logic and personal integrity that grace people have
stolen by convincing you that mankind is depraved and incapable of this
kind of gnosis.
This is willful fancy on Bercots part that is not true and with which orthodoxy
wants no part. And there is an inherent contradiction so plain and significant
as to render the whole argument senseless. If the language in which the Bible
is written is so limited and ambiguous that men of God, under the guidance of
the Holy Ghost, cannot understand its meaning, then how could the men of the
1st and 2nd centuries understand the meaning of this language? How could
they understand the meaning of those who taught orally in this same
language? And how could they be sure that the traditions and customs that
those early Christians supposedly (that is, according to Bercot, not true Church
history) established, were not the traditions of men who did not understand,
just as men today who hear the words of the Apostles through the written Word
cannot understand?

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6. Bercot's doctrine of salvation is not Christian and could never result in the
salvation of anyone. It is worse than salvation by the deeds of the law. It is
legalism and humanism further corrupted by Gnosticism, Stoicism, NeoPlatonism, Philonism and just about every other religious and philosophical
heresy known to man including reincarnation and final restoration.
7. Bercots tactics of slandering all of the honorable men of the Church is
unacceptable to Christian people who abide by the teachings of the Scriptures.
If God was going to reveal something new and startling to you which He isnt
because there are no new revelations that are not already contained in the
Book He would not do it by sending a man to break every rule about the
honoring of leaders, that He has put in the Book for us to go by. There is old
and simple historic, orthodox truth that has been lost; but it will be regained by
a genuine and honest examination of the Scriptures and a willingness to purge
out the leaven of the flesh, not by a Rosicrucian-type rediscovery of lost
knowledge by a cute boy-wonder who has only distinguished himself, by his
own admission, for his casting about, uncertainty, following of false theological
trails and an impertinent attitude toward the elders of the Church.
8. Once having established his non-Christian, humanistic doctrine of salvation
by mans inherent and inalienable goodness, coupled with Gods good will, he
appears to consent to every doctrine of salvation by faith and grace in order to
deceive his readers and disarm his critics. This kind of using of Christian and
Biblical terms in lighthearted, deceitful and aesopian ways cannot be trusted,
accepted or believed. This man is an out-and-out deceiver and no amount of
conciliatory talk can change it.
9. Bercots book is in plain contravention of the facts at times, in serious
historical error, lacking in spiritual and doctrinal discernment, makes no clear
and legitimate case for any of his arguments and is lacking in decorum and
professional courtesy. In the words of Shakespeare: that which makes the
unskillful laugh can only make the judicious grieve. In my view, Bercot takes
on most of the doctrines of orthodoxy and touches on most of the important
basic doctrines of the Church and fails at every point.
10. Bercot steals the language of orthodoxy and claims it for his own. But in
this too, he fails to convince in the end analysis. It seems clear that Bercots
views are not orthodox, Biblical, fundamental, conservative or Christian.
11. But Bercots most damning heresy is his attack upon the integrity of the
Holy Scriptures and the clear orthodox principle that the Bible is the only guide
to the faith and the practice of the Church. This note was sounded by St. Paul
to Timothy, when he told him:

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All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for

doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: that
the man of God may be perfect, throughly [completely and totally]
furnished unto all good works. I charge thee therefore before God, and
the Lord Jesus Christ, who shall judge the quick and the dead at his
appearing and his kingdom; preach the word; be instant in season, out of
season; reprove, rebuke, exhort with all long-suffering and doctrine. (II
Tim 3:16-4:2)
He warned against men like Bercot when he went on to say:
For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but
after their own lusts shall heap to themselves teachers, having itching
ears, and they shall turn away their ears from, the truth and shall be
turned unto fables. (4:3,4)
Fables is as good a word as any to describe the homemade and contrived
notions set forth by Bercot in this religious fiction.
St. Peter addressed the subject when he said:
Moreover I will endeavor that ye may be able after my decease to have
these things always in remembrance. For we have not followed cunningly
devised fables, when we made known unto you the power and coming of
our Lord Jesus Christ, but were eyewitnesses or his majesty. For we
received from God the Father honour and glory, when there came such a
voice to him from the excellent glory, This in my beloved Son, in whom I
am well pleased. And this voice which came from heaven we heard,
when we were with him in the holy mount. We have a more sure word of
prophesy; whereunto you do well that you take heed, as unto a light that
shineth in a dark place, until the day dawn and the day star arise in your
hearts: knowing this first, that no prophecy of the scripture is of any
private interpretation. For the prophecy came not in old time (from the
old time, or at any time) by the will of man: but holy men of God spake
as they were moved by the Holy Ghost. (II Pet. 1:15-21)
The Apostles message is simple. He wants the Church to always have the
truth available, and to be able to distinguish it from the cunningly devised
fables of false religionists such as Bercot. This will be done by hearing,
believing and keeping the truth that the Bible is not the words of men, but the
Word of the living God. At no time did anything in the Bible come from the
minds of men. It originated, was administered by and came from God Himself
as the Holy Ghost manipulated the minds and the pens of those who were
selected to write the things that God, by His Spirit, has directed into the canon
of the Scriptures. The Christian is pictured as a man on a dark and slippery

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path in the dead of night. This is the only light in an otherwise inky darkness,
and it alone will keep us out of the precipice.
The Orthodox Christian dogma is that God, who has been able to preserve
His word, has also been able to preserve it. It was He, in the final analysis, by
His Holy Spirit, who directed what was to be put in the canon of the Scriptures.
From the human, as well as the divine point of view, it was to prevent the very
kind of heresy that was being put out by Justin, Clement of Alexandria and
Origen from being read in the Churches as Scripture and deceiving the Church
(the same kind of heresy that Bercot is promoting) that God ordained the
canon, divinely keeping out what he did not want in. As for the Apochryphal
Books, they were included as an addendum because they contained Jewish
history. But they were always clearly distinguished from Holy Scriptures by Old
Testament Jews and by the New Testament Apostles, prophets and Fathers
alike. Only the Roman Catholic Church, because of a later developing doctrine
concerning prayers for the dead which is supported by Judas Machabeus in II
Maccabees, has tried to claim any inspiration for them.
Jesus Himself documented and limited the Holy Scriptures when he said at
the end of Revelation:
For I testify unto every man that heareth the words of the prophecy of
this book, If any man shall add unto these things, God shall add unto him
the plagues that are written in this book: and if any man shall take away
from the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take away his part
out of the book of life, and out of the holy city, and from the things which
are written in this book. (Rev. 22:18,19)
It is impertinent and irreverent to suppose that Jesus Christ, the Prince of the
Kings of the Earth, the Incarnate God and the Head of the Church, did not know
what the canon of the Scriptures was or would be when He said these words. It
is equally insulting to the Head of the Church to argue that He would allow His
Church to be misled into believing that it following the word of God for 1800
years from the second century to the present time when in fact it had nothing
but the corrupted and exclusive words of false religionists, or that He was
impotent to do anything about it, and would allow such a thing without making
clear to His Body what was going on. Bercots position on this is the last refuge
of a scoundrel, a heretic and a conceited fool.
In Ephesians 4:10-16, St. Paul warned against such men as Bercot and
instructed that the flock of God should listen to its elders, preachers, teachers
and prophets, so that they not be ready victims for such winds of doctrine,
sleight of hand, cunning and craftiness. In II Corinthians 11: 1-4, St. Paul
specifically identifies the Bercots of this world as serpents who come preaching
another gospel, with the specific agenda of spiritually seducing you. These
are false prophets, he said in verses 13 through 15, who have transformed

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themselves into the apostles of Christ. And no marvel, for Satan himself is
transformed into an angel of light. Therefore it is no great thing if his ministers
also be transformed as the ministers of righteousness, whose end shall be
according to their works. In Titus 1:9-13, St. Paul labels a man like Bercot as a
vain and unruly talker and deceiver, teaching Old Testament doctrines of
salvation by law and works. He calls him a liar and an evil beast and says that
his mouth must be stopped. Bercots promoting of the seriously flawed Jewish
Septuagint makes him a just candidate for the title of a spreader of Jewish
fables, going from house to house, deceiving the people and making
merchandise of them. Such mouths must be stopped, the Apostle says.
In first John 4:1-3, the Church is warned against receiving a rebel like Bercot
who, in that passage, as well as in II John 7 and 8, he is called an antichrist.
In II Peter 2, those of Bercots stripe are called false prophets, presumptuous,
self-willed, despisers of dignitaries and governments, natural brute beasts to
be taken and destroyed, arrogant and shallow little men who are not afraid to
launch tirades against people and things they does not understand, followers of
Balaam, dry wells, clouds without rain, speakers of great swelling words of
vanity, servants of corruption and deceivers of struggling souls. St. Jude
describes this kind of man when he says: For there are certain men crept in
unawares, who were before of old ordained to this condemnation, ungodly men,
turning the grace of our God into lasciviousness, and denying the only Lord
God, and our Lord Jesus Christ. (Jude 4)
Lasciviousness does not always, or even in the majority of cases, refer to
sensual lusts. Here it speaks of the intellectual and spiritual lusts: pride,
vanity, arrogance, blasphemy and setting ones self against the Grace of Christ
and the Christ of Grace. Jude goes on, in verses 8-16, to describe Bercots kind
as a filthy dreamer, a despiser of dominion, a railer against honorable men
(though Michael the archangel would not rail against even Satan), a knownothing, a stray from the truth, a follower of Balaam, a man on an orgy of selfrighteous indulgence with no sense of shame or fear, a tree with withered fruit,
twice dead, possessing shallow roots and having been uprooted, a raging wave
of the sea spiting up his muddy froth on the endless beaches of false religious,
humanistic deceit, a wandering star, a murmerer, complainer, a speaker of the
vain words of the phariseeical lawyers, playing to his own vanity and seeking a
following of his own.
Who Is The Mystery Man?
In only one of his original goals is he successful. He has asked that the
real heretic stand up. But even this has not gone as he had planned. In a
literary and expository way he has learned the lesson of Ananias and
Sapphira. He is the one who raised the issue and the question, hoping by
deceitful appearance to gain some advantage in the eyes of the people. Had
he not done so, he might not have been found out. But in his zeal to set a

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snare for others, he has entangled himself. He is hoist with his own petard
as the French say. I am he, I am he, he boasts and pleads loudly,
apparently forgetting what the original question was. At last he has said
something with which we can all agree. Congratulations, David! You set out
with a plan to win, and you have. You have proven to us beyond all
reasonable doubt that thou art the man. The real heretic has just stood up
and he is none other than David C. Bercot.

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