There are other, perhaps related questions that arise under this heading. For example, is the logical order of the application of redemption by the Holy Spirit (the ordo salutis) merely a “pedagogical device”? (229) Such a conclusion would surprise all the Protestant Reformers since they spent their lives figuratively and literally contending that we are not justified because we are sanctified (with which Frame agrees). That is not a mere pedagogical device. That is the material cause of the Reformation. Frame himself teaches an ordo salutis in the way he relates effectual calling to regeneration (231).

Those who love the Reformation solas will likely wince to read that “subjection to Christ as Lord” and “a willingness to obey” is a “second element” of trust as an element of faith (240). Why not simply say that submission to Christ’s Lordship and good works are the logically and morally necessary consequences of new life and true faith? This is how the Reformed churches speak in BC 24. Yet, Frame is quite good on the role of trust in the act of faith. Again, the dialectical quality of Frame’s theology manifests itself. Does salvation come through faith and repentance as “two sides” of a coin? (245–46) We know how faith functions in salvation since its object is Christ the Savior. To what does repentance look? How much repentance is necessary for salvation? Of what quality must that repentance be in order to be saving? Would it not be more helpful and orthodox to say that repentance necessarily follows faith as an inevitable and necessary fruit of new life and true faith? We might ask the same about Frame’s endorsement of so-called “Lordship Salvation” (246). This will lead some readers to conclude that he is endorsing John MacArthur’s The Gospel According to Jesus, which, as regular readers and listeners know, is, to put it mildly, not without significant problems.¹

Given his affirmation of “Lordship Salvation,” the reader will perhaps not be surprised to read him denying any “dichotomy here between gospel and law” and writing, “I don’t think that Scripture justifies a sharp distinction between law and gospel” (310) All the Protestant Reformers disagree as do their orthodox successors. Luther’s recovery of the incipient distinction between law and gospel in Augustine’s On The Spirit and the Letter was one of the five most important theological elements in the early Protestant Reformation.² Calvin echoed Luther and Melanchthon on this, as did Beza, Ursinus, and William Perkins, who wrote:

The basic principle in application is to know whether the passage is a statement of the law or of the gospel. For when the Word is preached, the law and the gospel operate differently. The law exposes the disease of sin, and as a side-effect, stimulates and stirs it up. But it provides no remedy for it. However the gospel not only teaches us what is to be done, it also has the power of the Holy Spirit joined to it. . . . A statement of the law indicates the need for a perfect inherent righteousness, of eternal life given through the works of the law, of the sins which are contrary to the law and of the curse that is due them. . . . By contrast, a statement of the gospel speaks of Christ and his benefits, and of faith being fruitful in good works.³

This is basic Reformation theology. It was understandable that Frame might not have been aware of this distinction fifty years ago, but the evidence of the role of the distinction between law and gospel in Reformed theology is widely available and he is without excuse for his cavalier treatment of this issue.

A few other comments are in order on his account of the doctrine of salvation before we press on to other topics: I am struck by the absence of the solas when he refers to grace and faith in justification and salvation. He defends the Reformation doctrine of justification without works, but except for sola Scriptura, the solas themselves are absent (251–56). He spends four pages on adoption, which might reflect his debt to the Sonship Theology.⁴ He does discuss union with Christ but not as a topic, nor as part of the ordo salutis (230–31, 268). Readers should compare his language regarding union with that of the Westminster Shorter Catechism:

Q. 30. How doth the Spirit apply to us the redemption purchased by Christ?
A. The Spirit applieth to us the redemption purchased by Christ, by working faith in us, and thereby uniting us to Christ in our effectual calling.

The “thereby” in the answer tells us that we are brought into mystical union with Christ through faith.⁵

Frame discusses assurance under sanctification rather than under justification. Quite unnecessarily he juxtaposes the Heidelberg Catechism with the Westminster Standards on assurance (275). In question 21, the Heidelberg is describing faith in itself, not as we experience it. The Westminster Divines, writing eight decades later, affirmed that definition but also accounted for the believer’s experience, as had the Synod of Dort.⁶

It is refreshing to see someone defending church discipline, which Frame does ably (303), but we know Frame’s relatively latitudinarian approach to the visible church from his 1991 book, Evangelical Reunion: Denominations and the One Body of Christ,⁷ in which he called for a merger of a broad range of “evangelical” denominations, under which he subsumed the Reformed. Here again, we see the effect of his dialectical approach to theology when he affirms the marks of the true church but then punts when it comes to applying them (apparently theology is not always the application of God’s Word) to the relations between the Baptistic evangelical churches and the confessional Presbyterian and Reformed churches (301–02). When it comes to the sacraments, Frame has his preferences, but that is all they are. He cannot understand why we cannot all just get along. This is the agenda of the neo-Evangelical coalition of Carl Henry et al., but it is not the agenda of the Synod of Dort, the Westminster Assembly, or the Reformed churches.

I was glad to see a chapter devoted to the means of grace, and especially to see him picking up Louis Berkhof’s language of “channels by which God gives spiritual power to his church” (325). But, what Frame giveth with the right hand, he takes away with the dialectical left when he affirms “fellowship” and private Bible study as means of grace (327–32). Under that heading, by his own admission, he does not discuss the sacraments (341). It is unclear whether he thinks sacraments are means of grace. For those just discovering the Reformed confession, this is not standard Reformed theology. We refer to the preaching of the gospel, the use of the sacraments, and prayer as means of grace.⁸

On the sacraments he sides, as a matter of “personal belief” with infant baptism (348), which is good since he taught in Presbyterian seminaries for decades and his communion, the Presbyterian Church in America confesses it, but one gets the sense that, for Frame, the debate with the Baptists is not worth the fuss.

On eschatology, he sides, moderately, with the postmillennialists and affirms the existence of a hell of eternal punishment (368–71, 386).

Finally, there are three things to note about his account of Christian ethics: 1) It is thoroughly controlled by his triperspectivalist approach—in that regard, the reader learns more about Frame than he does about the Christian life; 2) there is no discussion of natural law; 3) rather unexpectedly, there is only the briefest discussion of the moral law. Beginners in Reformed theology looking for some indication of how Reformed people think about the formation of virtue and how to apply the moral law to the issues they face will likely leave this volume dazed and confused.

This volume will become a period piece. Readers looking for a more reliable introduction to the Christian faith will do well to consult Berkhof’s Manual of Christian Doctrine or Horton’s Pilgrim Theology.

Notes

1. See R. Scott Clark, “The Gospel According to John (MacArthur)“.
2. For more on this distinction see our Resources On The Law/Gospel Distinction. On Calvin’s relationship to Luther see R. Scott Clark, “‘Subtle Sacramentarian’ or Son? John Calvin’s Relationship to Martin Luther,” Southern Baptist Journal of Theology 21, no. 4 (2018): 35–60. For more on the law and gospel, see R. Scott Clark, “The Distinction Between Law And Gospel Emerged From Augustine’s Struggle With Pelagius.”
3. William Perkins, The Art of Prophesying, (Banner of Truth Trust: Edinburgh, 1996), 54-55.
4. For some background on this movement, see Geoffrey Thomas, “The Movement Called ‘Sonship,’” Banner of Truth, December 1, 2000.
5. For more on union with Christ see our resource page.
6. See these essays on the Canons of Dort and assurance: R. Scott Clark, “The Canons of Dort (10): Unconditional Grace Gives Assurance”; “Canons of Dort (24): Synod’s Pastoral Concern For Assurance”; “Canons Of Dort (30): God’s Gracious Assurance Of Perseverance.”
7. John M. Frame, Evangelical Reunion: Denominations and the One Body of Christ (Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1991).
8. Editors will want to correct a typographical error on p. 343, where Frame uses ex opera for ex opere.

©R. Scott Clark. All Rights Reserved.

John M. Frame, Concise Systematic Theology: An Introduction To Christian Belief. A Revised and Enhanced Edition of Salvation Belongs To The Lord, ed. John J. Hughes (Phillipsburg, NJ: P&R Publishing, 2023).

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Post authored by:

• R. Scott Clark

  

  R.Scott Clark is the President of the Heidelberg Reformation Association, the author and editor of, and contributor to several books and the author of many articles. He has taught church history and historical theology since 1997 at Westminster Seminary California. He has also taught at Wheaton College, Reformed Theological Seminary, and Concordia University. He has hosted the Heidelblog since 2007.

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