46. Arthur W. Pink, "Signs of the Times," Studies in the Scriptures, 16: 373 – 75.
Appendix 2
the infi nite merits of His blood. And so widely does this conception now prevail in "orthodox" circles, so frequently has it been dinned in their ears, so deeply has it taken root in their minds, that for one to now challenge it and denounce it as being so inadequate and one-sided as to be deceptive and erroneous, is for him to instantly court the stigma of being a heretic, and to be charged with dishonoring the fi nished work of Christ by inculcating salvation by works. . . . Salvation is by grace, by grace alone. . . . Nevertheless, Divine grace is not exercised at the expense of holiness, for it never compromises with sin. It is also true that salvation is a free gift , but an empty hand must receive it, and not a hand which still tightly grasps the world. . . . A heart that is steeled in rebellion cannot savingly believe; it must fi rst be broken. . . . Th ose preachers who tell sinners they may be saved without forsaking their idols, without repenting, without surrendering to the Lordship of Christ, are as erroneous and dangerous as others who insist that salvation is by works and that heaven must be earned by our own eff orts.46
Pink also wrote:
Divine grace is not bestowed with the object of freeing men from their obligations but rather with that of supplying them with a powerful motive for more readily and gratefully discharging those obligations. To make God's favor a ground of exemption from the performance of duty comes perilously near to turning His grace into lasciviousness.47
A. W. Tozer, like Pink, turned the charge of heresy on those who presented a message of easy-believism. Many of his sermons and writings challenge the popular gospel of our day. His messages on 1 Peter were posthumously edited and published in a book appropriately titled I Call It Heresy! Tozer stated:
[Years ago] no one would ever dare to rise in a meeting and say, "I am a Chris tian" if he had not surrendered his whole being to God and had taken Jesus Christ as his Lord as well as his Saviour, and had brought himself under obedience to the will of the Lord. It was only then that he could say, "I am saved!"
Today, we let them say they are saved no matter how imperfect and incomplete the transaction, with the proviso that the deeper Chris tian life can be tacked on at some time in the future.
46. Arthur W. Pink, "Signs of the Times," Studies in the Scriptures, 16: 373 – 75. 47. Pink, Gleanings, 291.