Ray Comfort is of the Way of the Master series and of Living Waters. He is another source of apologetics and isn’t afraid to speak the discomforting truth that people need to hear. Two of his famous videos are Hell’s Best Kept Secret and True and False Conversion which talk about the problem of today’s churches. The two videos show the problem of modern-day evangelism and the marks of a truly saved person vs. one who isn’t truly saved.
It’s easy to say Comfort teaches works. However, he gives this comforting truth from Hell’s Best Kept Secret about eternal security:
What it is, is a sad admission to the amount of confidence we have in the power of our message and in the keeping power of God. If God has saved them, God will keep them. If they’re born of God, they’ll never die.
If he’s begun a good work in them, he’ll complete it to that Day. If he is the author of their faith, he’ll be the finisher of their faith. He’s able to save to the uttermost them that come to God by him. He’s able to keep them from falling and to present them faultless before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy. Jesus said no one will pluck you from my Father’s hand.
Comfort’s emphasis has been targeting fake converts. We can see how often it is today that we have people who profess to be saved but their lifestyles say otherwise. Matthew 7:16-20 says that by their fruits you will know them.
From The Evidence Bible, we can read this quote about fake converts:
“These are perhaps the most frightening verses in the Bible. Vast multitudes of professing Christians fit into the category spoken of here. They call Jesus ‘Lord,’ but they practice lawlessness. They profess faith in Jesus, but have no regard for the divine law. They tell ‘fibs’ or ‘white’ lies, take things that belong to others, have a roaming eye for the opposite sex, etc. They are liars, thieves, and adulterers at heart, who will be cast from the gates of heaven into the jaws of hell.
If works salvation is dangerous then so is Antinomianism. The problem of today’s gospel preaching is that people think they can “receive Christ” as Savior but not as Lord and that they can live any way they want. True, Romans 4:5 says to him that works not but believes is counted to righteousness, it doesn’t mean that a person was not rescued from sin to righteousness. Ephesians 2:10 says that Christians are equipped unto good works. James 2:14-26 warns that any faith that has no works is not a genuine faith. These people today even falsely accuse those who warn of a possibility of false conversion to be teaching “works salvation”. Yet, only fake converts would even dream that they have a license to sin. Christians do and will sin but they can’t completely fall away.
What does Comfort mean to forsake or to turn from sin? Creation Today’s article “Is Ray Comfort Right on Repentance” mentions the following:
To believe in Jesus Christ, the Son of God, is to make the choice to bow down at His feet and accept that He is your Lord and Savior. Whatever lies you used to believe about your sin or about God, you change your mind and are persuaded to accept the truth. You accept that your sin is an evil rebellion against the Holy God. When you believe in Jesus, you put your trust in HIM accepting that He alone can save you, and that He will cleanse you from all unrighteousness. Turning into the light is turning away from the darkness—one motion, a 180° turn.
This forsaking of sins starts from within (during repentance) and it works itself from without. This is to repent of your sins (change your mind about them) which leads to a changed life as a result of salvation. Nobody can truly savingly believe without this repentance from within. It starts from within and works itself without. However, this doesn’t mean that the repentance is perfect. Paul Washer also warned about not to expect a perfect repentance. Washer doesn’t teach about sinless perfection either. Christians are at best both righteous saints and repentant sinners. The Church is a hospital for repentant sinners yet it’s also a museum of righteous saints. It’s a club of the saints who are repentant sinners. It’s a hospital to mend the wounds and this museum proves how effective it helps repentant sinners to walk the path of righteous saints. We need to stop thinking that the Church is just a hospital for sinners. If it was no museum of righteous saints then it was ineffective as a hospital.
What can also be mentioned is that Comfort is also into the role of apologetics. One good resource that I might want to have is The Evidence Bible. The late Robert Charles Sproul Sr. also has a couple of good apologetics materials such as Now That’s a Good Question and Defending the Faith. I do have an old copy of the late D. James Kennedy’s book Why I Believe but I feel I need another apologetics book to defend my faith. He is also a contributor to Christian Apologetics Research Ministry (CARM). He has some good videos about facts and figures about the Christian faith.
Reformed Baptist Christian Blogger 