“True Good News vs. False Good News” is an article from Dr. Gordon H. Clark’s papers. Both the original scan and a transcribed document are here made available. If you notice any typos on the typed document please email the administrator at douglasdouma@yahoo.com.
**Items from the unpublished papers of Dr. Gordon H. Clark should not be considered his definitive statement on the particular topic addressed. These papers are being provided for educational value. For Dr. Clark’s official positions consult his published writings.**
Unpublished 84. True Good News vs. False Good News (original)
Unpublished 84. True Good News vs. False Good News (typed)
Notes: From the papers of Dr. Gordon H. Clark. From “The Home Evangel”, date unknown.
A friend of mine with a developed sense of curiosity, on a visit to Chicago, attended a service in a Buddhist Temple. They gave him some tracts to take home.
One of these tracts was a pamphlet of Daily Thoughts for a month, each Thought consisting of a selection or verse from the Buddhist Scriptures. The first Thought deserves our thought. It said,
“By oneself evil is done, by oneself one suffers; by oneself evil is left undone, by oneself one is purified. Purity and impurity belong to oneself; no one can purify another.”
To begin with the last phrase first: what terrible news is this! This is not Good News, this is not the Gospel. We must all suffer for our sins, the Buddhists say, no one can atone for them, no one can expiate them, no one can propitiate God for us. The full wrath of a holy God must be borne by ourselves alone!
Fortunately no one need be a Buddhist if he knows Christ. No one need accept this false bad news, if he has heard the true Good News. Let us loudly and constantly proclaim the Good News that God hath made Christ “to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him.” For Christ “His own self bare our sins in His own body on the tree, that we being dead to sins should live unto righteousness” (I Peter 2:24).
“Weary of earth and laden with my sin,
I look at heaven and long to enter in;
But there no evil thing may find a home.
And yet I hear a voice that bids me, Come.”
G.H.C.