The Gospel Betrayed

8/12/2019 The Gospel Betrayed

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The Gospel BetrayedDave Hunt

The most significant event in almost 500 years of church history took place March29, 1994. Leading evangelicals and Catholics signed a joint declaration, "Evangelicals

and Catholics Together: The Christian Mission in the 3rd Millennium." The document

overturns the Reformation and does incalculable damage to the cause of Christ. The

news release said:

They toiled together in the movements against abortion and pornography, and nowleading Catholics and evangelical are asking their flocks for a remarkable leap offaith: to finally accept each other as Christians...[E]vangelicals including PatRobertson and Charles Colson joined with conservative Roman Catholic leaderstoday in upholding the ties of faith that bind [them]....They urged Catholics and

evangelicals...to stop aggressively proselytisation of each other's flocks.

John White, president of Geneva College and former president of the NationalAssociation of Evangelicals, said the statement represents a "triumphalistic moment"

in American religious life...

Other evangelical endorsers included the heads of the Home Mission Board andChristian Life Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention, the nation's largestProtestant denomination, and Bill Bright, founder of Campus Crusade forChrist...Mark Noll of Wheaton University...[Os Guinness, Jesse Miranda (Assemblies

of God), Richard Mouw (President, Fuller Seminary), J.I. Packer and HerbertSchlossberg].

Robert Simonds, Southern California chairman of the National Association of Evangelicals,"applauded the declaration" and said he hopes it will bring "increased co-operation between

evangelicals and Catholics...." But the fruit of such "co-operation" has not been good in thepast. Evangelicals working beside Catholics, Mormons, Moonies, et.al., for common social orpolitical aims (for example, in Pat Robertson's Christian Coalition) will not witness to their"partners in action" for fear of offending them and breaking up the coalition. Such

compromise laid the foundation for this alliance -- a development monitored closely and

approved by the Vatican.

I neither impugn the motives nor question the salvation of the evangelical signers. Yet Ibelieve the document represents the most devastating blow against the gospel in at least 1,000years. Already the declaration is being "translated into Spanish, Polish, Portuguese andRussian for circulation throughout Latin America and Eastern Europe." Soon it will have a

revolutionary impact world-wide.

Having carefully read the 25-page fifth draft marked "Not for general circulation," Iappreciate the loving concern for both truth and unity expressed therein. Some key

differences between Catholics and evangelicals are noted without compromise. But the mostimportant difference -- what it means to be saved-- is not mentioned and, in fact, is directly

denied.


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Amazingly, the document claims that all Catholics are Christians, hold the same faith as

evangelicals, and are our "brothers and sisters in Christ." If so, then the Reformation was atragic mistake which we all must denounce! On this said juncture in church history, the last

words of Hugh Latimer ring in our conscience. Bound back-to-back to the stake withNicholas Ridley, Latimer, England's most effective gospel preacher at the time, was heard to

exclaim as the flames engulfed them, "Be of good comfort, Master Ridley, and play the man.We shall this day, by God's grace, light such a candle in England as I pray shall never be put

out." How incredible that the last spark of the Reformation "candle" is now beingextinguished by evangelical leaders who owe so much to the very faithfulness of suchmartyrs!

For 1,000 years before the Reformation, there were always groups of evangelical Christiansoutside the Catholic Church, millionsof whom were slaughtered for obeying Scripture insteadof Rome. Pope Pius III killed 60,000 in one day when his forces wiped out the entire town ofBeziers, France, an act which he considered the "crowning achievement of his papacy."

Martin Luther acknowledged his debt to these earlier martyrs:

We are not the first to declare the papacy to be the kingdom of antichrist, sincefor may years before us so many and such great men (whose number is large

and whose memory is eternal) have undertaken to express the same thing so

clearly and plainly.

Through the example of these Vaudois, Albigenses, Waldenses and other early evangelicals,and from the Bibles they preserved, a few Roman Catholic priests and monks realised thattheir Church didn't preach the truth and that they and their fellow Catholics were not saved,but lost. Men like John Wycliff (1329-84), Jan Hus (1373-1415) and Johannes Geiler vonKayserberg (1445-1510) believed the gospel and began preaching it. They hoped their Church

could be reformed. In response, Rome consigned many of these faithful gospel preachers to

the flames. Later Luther and other Reformers, all Roman Catholics, also became convincedthat neither they nor their fellow Catholics were saved. They began preaching salvation bygrace through faith instead of Catholicism's false gospel of sacramental rituals and works. For

this they were excommunicated and untold thousands more were martyred.

Such is the heritage of today's evangelicals, which this document now rejects. We are asked to

believe that the Reformers were deluded, that like all active Catholics today they were savedbut didn't know it; the tens of millions of Catholics who since then have received Christ by

faith along and left the Catholic Church have also been deceived; the whole evangelicalchurch of today is equally deluded about what it means to be a Christian. Colson, Robertson,

Bright, et al. have revised both history and doctrine.

Evangelicals would decry the complacent attitude that everyone raised in and/or attending aProtestant church is a Christian. Lost sinners need to be saved. How, then, did leadingevangelicals decide that all active Catholics are Christian and must not hereafter be

evangelised? The agreement states that both Catholics and evangelicals accept the Apostles'Creed; that Christ "suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died, and was buried." That

creed, however, does not express the gospel that saves (Rom. 1:16) that "Christ died for oursin (1 Cor. 15:1-4). Mormons affirm the Apostles' Creed, but they aren't Christians. Nor does

affirming it make Catholics (or Protestants) Christians.

Catholicism's false gospel hasn't changed. It diametrically opposes the evangelical view ofwhat Christ's crucifixion and forgiveness of sins means. Let me quote from Vatican II,

Flannery's Edition, Vol. I (the same teaching is affirmed by the new universal Catechism ofthe Catholic Church just released by the Vatican). This is what Catholicism teaches and

Catholics believe and practice today:


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Christ's death earned "satisfaction and merits" which have been deposited intoa "Treasury" to which have been added "the prayers and good works of the

Blessed Virgin Mary [and] the prayers and good works of all the saints[beyond what they needed for their own salvation].

From the most ancient times in the Churchgood works were also offered to God forthe salvation of sinners...Indeed, [by], the prayers and good works of holy people..the penitent was washed, cleansed and redeemed... Following in Christ's steps, thosewho believe in him have always... carried their crosses to make expiation for theirown sins and the sins of others. They were convinced that they could [by such good

works and sacrifices] help their brothers to obtain salvationfrom God...(pp. 64-66)

Out of this "treasury of the Church" salvation/redemption is dispensed in instalments by

Catholic clergy through the seven sacraments. One never passes "from death to life" (Jn 5:24)but is always earning salvation with the Church's help. In fact, excommunication is the

penalty for saying one is saved and knows he has eternal life through faith in Christ's finishedwork. The very heart of the gospel which evangelicals affirm is denied by Catholicism in all

its creeds, catechisms, canons and decrees and dogmas, and those who dare to affirm it areanathematised. Vatican II's first page declares,

For it is the liturgy [sacramental rituals] through which, especially in the

divine sacrifice of the Eucharist, the work of our redemption is accomplished.

So redemption/salvation is in process of being effected by Church sacraments. But Paulwrote, "In whom we have [present possession, an accomplished fact through Christ]

redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins" (Eph 1:7; Col 1:14). Hebrews 7 says,"...by his own blood he entered in once [for all time] into the holy place [heaven], havingobtained eternal redemption for us." Redemption is finished! But that truth is consistently and

insistently denied.

Even Christ's death is an ongoing process, so the Mass is not a remembranceof a finished

work but a sacrifice which obtains forgiveness of sins and from which "grace and merits"flow in partial instalments. This is from thePocket Catholic Dictionary:

The Mass is a truly propitiatory sacrifice [by which] the Lord is appeased

[and]...pardon wrongdoings and sins... Finally the Mass is the divinely

ordained means of applying the merits of Calvary. Christ won for the world all

the graces it needs for salvation and sanctification. But these blessings are

conferred gradually and continually...mainly through the Mass...The priest is

indispensable, since he alone by his powers can change the elements of breadand wine into the body and blood of Christ...the more often the sacrifice [of

the Mass] is offered the more benefit is conferred [i.e.; Calvary wasn't enough]

(pp.248-9).

The Mass continues to transmit instalments of grace even after one has died, as relatives buy"Mass cards" which are laid upon the altar during Mass in the name of the deceased in order

to shorten purgatorial suffering. Christ's death couldn't get us to heaven, but Masses, HailMarys, good works, "bearing one's cross" for others, etc, will do so. Earned "indulgences"

also shorten time in purgatory. Charles Colson says indulgences are no longer part ofCatholicism (The Body,p. 271). In fact, Vatican II devotes 17 pages to indulgences (pp. 62-

79) and anathematises anyone who rejects that doctrine(p. 71)!


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"But surely you don't deny thatsomeCatholics are saved!" is the objection when one presents

the truth about Catholicism. That some Catholics may be saved is possible, but that is a farcry from this document's implications that allare saved. And to be saved, a Catholic would

have to believe the true gospel and reject Catholicism's false gospel. One can't believe twocontradictory propositions at the same time: one can't believe Christ obtained redemption

through His blood and also believe redemption is being accomplished through Catholicliturgy; one can't believe salvation is by faith and "not of works"and at the same time believe

that good works earn salvation (see quote above).

Paul declared that "all have sinned" (Rom 3:23) and need to be "saved" from God's eternaljudgement upon sinners. He also insisted that one can be saved onlyby believing "the gospelof Christ" (Rom 1:16). The early church "turned the world upside down" (Acts 17:6) with the

preaching of this gospel, a gospel which Roman Catholicism has denied for 1,500 years.

I have been in contact with thousands of Catholics who were saved and left that Church.Notoneever heard the true gospel preached there.Not onewas saved by being a Catholic, but by

believing a gospel which is anathema to Catholics. In a recent survey of 2,000 homes in Spain

only two Protestants knew the gospel, while 1,998 Catholics though good works, churchattendance, etc. would get them to heaven. In their 15 years of evangelising in Spain,missionaries with whom I spoke had never net oneCatholic who was saved or who knew howto be saved. Knowing that these millions of Catholics are lost causes evangelicals there to

work day and night to bring them the gospel!

And now we are asked to refrain from sharing the gospel with those who desperately need it

and to assume them already saved, when their own doctrines forbid this assurance. It isoutrageous that leading evangelicals have placed nearly 25% of the world's population off

limits for evangelisation! Missionaries must now leave Catholic countries such as Spain, Italy

and those in Latin America -- such is the tragic implication of this document!

Paul told the Philippian jailer that if he would believe on the Lord Jesus Christ (that is,personally put his faith in Him as His Saviour who had died for His sins and risen again) hewould be saved. That being "saved" was a once-for-all transformation effected by placingone's complete trust for eternity in the finished work of Christ alone has been proclaimed by

generations of preachers such as Wesley, Whitefield, Spurgeon and Moody and by missionarygiants such as C.T. Studd, Hudson Taylor and David Livingstone. We are now being told,

however, that such men and women who gave their lives to bring the gospel to the lost wastedtheir time if they preached to Catholics who thank God with tears that someone loved them

enough to tell them the truth!

Instead of rejoicing in these souls being saved, Colson says he and others had become

"distressed by the clashes arising from the growth of evangelical Protestantism in traditionallyCatholic Latin America and, more recently, in traditionally Catholic or Eastern Orthodox

areas of Central Europe and Russia." God to Latin America, Mr. Colson, and see thepaganism and spiritism mixed with Catholicism! See the tragedy of souls by the millionsgoing into a Christless eternity because they have been deceived by Roman Catholicism!Thank God that millions of Catholics are accepting the gospel and now know they have

eternal life (1 Jn. 5:13)! Yet the signers of this treacherous document denounce theconversions of Catholics and ask us to stop rescuing them from hell!

We have warned of growing ecumenism, explained the difference between the false works

gospel of Catholicism and the Biblical gospel, and exposed the growing unity betweenCatholics and the very evangelical who have signed this agreement. I have sent photocopies

of pertinent sections from Vatican II, Trent and catechisms to some of these men, with noresponse to the issues. They cannot be excused on the grounds of ignorance.


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The most tragic result of this historic development will be to prevent the gospel from being

presented to lost millions who have now been wrongly reclassified by evangelical leaders asChristians. A disaster of almost equal proportions will result from this document's

endorsement of Catholicism's false gospel, thereby encouraging multitudes to believe it.Unless we speak up boldly, the much needed warnings against some of Satan's cleverest lies

will be silenced.

If we truly love lost souls about us, no matter what their religious affiliation, we will increaseour efforts to bring them the truth of the gospel before it is forever too late. Pray with us that

TBC will be used mightily to bring lost souls everywhere into the light of the glorious gospelof our Lord Jesus Christ. Let us together stand firm against the spiritual darkness whichthreatens to extinguish the candle that martyrs like Latimer and Ridley so faithfully lit.

[This PDF version created by Christian Ministries (2005).]

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The Gospel Betrayed