March 8, 2024 Show with David Reece on “The 5 Solas of the Reformation & the TULIP” (Part 3)

Live from historic downtown Carlisle, Pennsylvania, home of founding father James Wilson, 19th century hymn writer George Duffield, 19th century gospel minister George Norcross, and sports legend Jim Thorpe, it's Iron Sharpens Iron.

This is a radio platform in which pastors, Christian scholars, and theologians address the burning issues facing the church and the world today. Proverbs, chapter 27, verse 17, tells us iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another.

Matthew Henry said that in this passage, we are cautioned to take heed with whom we converse and directed to have in view in conversation to make one another wiser and better. It is our hope that this goal will be accomplished over the next two hours, and we hope to hear from you, the listener, with your own questions.

And now, here's your host, Chris Arnzen.

Good afternoon, Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, Lake City, Florida, and the rest of humanity living on the planet Earth who are listening via live streaming at ironsharpensironradio .com. This is Chris Arnzen, your host of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, wishing you all a happy Friday on this eighth day of March, 2024.

Before I introduce my guest and topic today, I just want to remind you that I will be on Long Island, New York next Friday, a week from today, at the Coral House Catering Hall in Baldwin, Long Island.

I am the emcee, once again, for Grace Christian Academy of Long Island, which is a classical Christian school operated by the church where I was formerly a member before moving to Pennsylvania, Grace Reformed Baptist Church of Long Island in Merrick, New York.

And the gala, the fundraising gala, will be held at 7 p .m., as I said, at the Coral House Catering Hall in Baldwin, Long Island, New York. I hope as many of you as possible will register for that event, and you could do so at the website of Grace Christian Academy of Long Island, G-C-A-L-I .com, G-C-A-L-I .com forward slash gala, G-A-L-A, G-C-A-L-I .com forward slash gala.

And God willing, I'll see you next Friday night at 7 p .m. at the Coral House in Baldwin, Long Island. Well, I am so thrilled, as I always am, to have my returning guest today, Pastor David Reese of Puritan Reformed Church in Phoenix, Arizona, who's also the CEO of ArmoredRepublic .com.

And today we are going to be addressing part three of a three-part series that we have been conducting on an overview of the five solos of the Reformation and the tulip as the distinctives of the Reformed faith.

And it's my honor and privilege to have you back on the program, Pastor David Reese.

Brother, it's an honor to be here. Thank you for having me. I'm excited that we got to first talk about the emphasis on Scripture and the sufficiency of Scripture as we talked about solo scriptura in the first show, that we got to then go over the remainder of the solos and really focus on the system of salvation and how we are saved by grace alone, through faith alone, in the mediatorial work of Christ alone, and how it all serves God's glory.

And I'm excited today to talk about tulip and how it guards those solos.

Great. And before we get the ball rolling on that, let our listeners know about Puritan Reformed Church in Phoenix, Arizona.

Puritan Reformed Church is a church that's focused on the sufficiency of Scripture for the doctrine, worship, and government of the church. Our desire is to make sure that we are teaching what has been revealed and not adding to it or subtracting from it, to worship God in the way that has been appointed by the Lord Jesus Christ for the new covenant era, and to see that government is in accordance with the government appointed by the king of the church.

And so we seek to do those things carefully and to be able to demonstrate these things.

From Scripture.

And so I would love to have anybody who's visiting the Phoenix area or who lives in the kind of Maricopa County, basically, I would encourage you to come check us out and to come worship with us and to have the joyful experience of singing psalms and being able to hear others singing the word of God and being able to teach each other as you're singing by hearing that and being encouraged by the sound of the congregation singing the words.

Of God.

Amen. And the website is puritanphx .com, puritanphx, abbreviation for phoenix .com, puritanphx .com. Now, tell us about this endeavor that you are spearheading, and it's something that you briefly mentioned not long ago during one of your interviews, but give us a more fully-orbed description of exactly what you are doing with this new endeavor.

So, yeah, what I've been realizing is that a lot of people kind of feel stuck in sort of the secular world in terms of not knowing how to invest dollars to seek to see Christian businesses advance. They want to be able to put capital into supporting Christian businesses and Christian management and to be able to build a culture that's Christian inside of businesses.

And they also, a lot of times, people are going, well, I don't know where to work in order to kind of get out of that, right? They're either in some sort of weird wokedom, or they have to deal with, like, all sorts of other worldviews that are being imposed, and they want to be able to work in a place where they can plainly share their faith and to be able to apply the word of God and to seek to apply the law of God and to not be pushed to work on the Lord's Day, right?

And so those are, I've been really seriously trying to pull things together and to increase that. And I think that what I've done, I have a deal that's closing on March 15th, Lord willing. So I'd appreciate prayers for anybody to make sure that goes well and working on that deal for a while.

And so I'm excited about that. But what I'm generally doing, I'm trying to accelerate the speed that we can do this, that we can pull together, you know, acquiring businesses and helping to fund starting Christian businesses and seeing those be built out.

So reesefund .com, and Reese is with a C, so R-E-E-C-E, so reesefund .com is where I'm beginning to deal with that. So it's currently on a kind of a coming soon thing. But I wanted to have that there, and we'll have a contact page soon there where people can start to reach out.

But I'm looking for people to start expressing if they have a desire to be able to help to support this by either investing or helping to, you know, to help to support us with deals. If they've got a business they want to sell, that kind of thing.

And so people right now, they can just reach out to me at dreece, at ArmoredRepublic .com. That's my email. So it's just dreece, or again, that's Reece, R-E-E-C-E, so dreece, at ArmoredRepublic .com.

And, you know, if you're interested right now and in the future, we'll have an easier way for people to start getting through things through that website. But I'm just trying to help to accelerate this.

And I think that an important part of discipleship is not just, you know, we have the Lord's Day where the church gathers together, but we're supposed to seek to work together as unto the Lord throughout our day.

And so I'm trying to create environments where that can occur more and to give opportunity to Christians and to seek to relieve some of the oppression of the wicked secular culture around us.

Great. That sounds like an extraordinary, a phenomenal idea, and I hope that you get a lot more people interested in what you are doing. I'll also give our listeners our web—or, I'm sorry, our email address for any questions they may have over our discussion today on an overview of the Five Solas of the Reformation and the Tulip as the Distinctives of the Reformed Faith.

This is part three, as I already mentioned before. And if you have a question, send it to ChrisArnzen at gmail .com, C-H-R-I-S-A-R-N-Z-E-N at gmail .com. Give us your first name at least, your city and state of residence, and your country of residence if you live outside the USA.

So please pick up where you would like to begin part three of our discussion.

Absolutely. So when we talked before, we talked about how our doctrine has to come from Scripture alone. We talked about how salvation is by grace alone. We talked about grace being the demerited favor of God.

It's an attitude of God that He powerfully saves us by His desire for our well-being, for His glory, that He gives the gift of faith, which is understanding and believing the revealed.

Doctrine.

And so we believe the doctrine revealed in Scripture, and that doctrine is about what Christ did and who He is. And so Christ is the only mediator. He's the only meritorious cause of our salvation. He's the one who paid for all our sins, and He's the one who provides us with a righteousness to cover us so that we're counted as righteous in the sight of God.

And then we talked about how all of that works together so that God is the only one that can boast. God is the only one who gets the glory for salvation. Now, that is the centerpiece of what we would call evangelical religion.

And when we think about TULIP, TULIP is guarding the solas against innovations, unbiblical doctrines that were brought in by people called the Ramonstrants, or the Arminians, who were really bringing in heresies from the Middle Ages.

And these heresies are the heresies that seek to undermine salvation by grace. And so historically, you have what's called Pelagianism, which is the assertion that ultimately man is born good or neutral, that he is chosen by God because of the conditions that he meets, that Christ either atoned for everybody or there's not really even an atonement, but instead we don't need an atonement.

It depends on how you read some of these things. The idea that grace is universal and some people don't even need grace. And also this idea that some people, you can lose your salvation. Those are sort of these ideas that are laid out there.

So semi-Pelagianism kind of modifies and weakens some of those things. And then Arminianism is sort of similar to or a type of semi-Pelagianism. These were contrasted with Augustine, who asserted that salvation was all of grace, that sovereignly God is the one who graciously saves us, that he chooses sovereignly who he's going to save, he powerfully works to save them, that we have no power to save ourselves, and that Christ's death is for the purpose of bringing those whom God has chosen to be saved, and also that God upholds his saints.

These are sort of the key points of dispute. Now, what we find is during the 1600s, as this dispute is occurring at the council, the Senate of Dort, you have this laying out of a response to an attack.

So the Arminians or the Remonstrants had posted essentially points of protest against what was then the Belgic Confession and the Heidelberg Catechism that had been adopted by the Dutch Reformed Church.

And so these were five points that were objections, and they were objections about the idea that, you know, maybe humans are not totally incapable of any good. Maybe the election that God does is not based upon his sovereign will, but instead based upon something he's foreseeing in man or something like that.

And you have these undermining of the various points. So these five responses are five bulwarks or defenses of salvation by grace alone, especially, but also they touch on the other solas. So, for example, when we get to them, you know, one of them is really focused on the work of Christ, limited atonement is focused on defending salvation being by Christ alone, and the perseverance of the saints that we'll talk about is focused on this idea of salvation really is by faith alone, and if you're justified, you can't lose it.

And so that is also defending the idea of salvation by grace alone. So these are the things that are being defended. This is what TULIP is about. So I want to explain the components of TULIP in a very brief way, and then my intention is to sort of go through them in a longer form.

And so I'll start by giving a brief explanation of the components of TULIP.

Great.

So as we start with TULIP, the first one is the T, and the T is total depravity. And total depravity is an assertion about human nature. So what's naturally in us, what we're capable of from our own resources.

And so what it teaches is the doctrine, first of all, that we are born in sin or we're conceived in sin, right? Psalm 51 says I'm conceived in iniquity, is what David says. And this idea that we are sinful from conception.

Our very first moment, the very first moment that we are brought into existence, the first moment of our procreation, we are sinful. We are sinful in that first of all, we inherit guilt from Adam. Secondly, we ourselves have a corrupt nature.

So we're not glorifying God. We don't have faith. We are in a position of corruption. And then every moment, every moment we are sinning because we're not glorifying God as we ought. So those three categories of sin that we start out in are, again, the guilt of Adam, that's credited to us.

We have the corruption of the nature, and then we have the particular sins we commit. So we're sinful from conception. We're corrupt in our whole nature. That means every part. There's no bastion of goodness.

There's no island of light. There's no preservation of anything good there. Now, one of the things that people will object to there is that they'll say, you know, well, what about the light that lights the minds of all men, like in John 1?

Well, that's the image of God. That's the basis of accountability, as Paul explains in Romans. And it's not something that is us being good. It is instead this idea that we have information and we have thoughts that make it so that we either have truth that we're suppressing, or we have the ability with those things to arrive at conclusions that we fail to reach.

So we're accountable for culpable ignorance, and we also suppress truths as they enter our minds. So there's information in our minds that we suppress, and there's failures to draw conclusions that we ought to draw.

So that's the light establishes our sinfulness, or kind of make it so we're accountable as a part of that. So the inexcusability of man. So we have no ability to do any good in ourselves, and we are in constant transgression of the law of God because of our unbelief, because of our failure to glorify God, and because of the fact that we're not believing the word generally, and we're not believing the word particularly, at like particular commands to apply, and we are not doing particular acts of obedience.

And so that's the extent of that total depravity. So then we think about the U of TULIP, right? TULIP is total depravity, unconditional election, limited atonement, irresistible grace, and perseverance of the saints.

And so the U, people will often cite it as just unconditional election, which is if God chooses sovereignly, but he also reprobates sovereignly. So the U, as it's written out in the Canons of Dort, were unconditional election and reprobation.

And so the idea here is that God, first of all, has no conditions imposed on himself. There's nothing except for his own nature and plans, and his own nature includes being logical, but this idea that there's nothing except for God's own nature that is a condition that God is dealing with.

He doesn't have like this situation he's got to fix. He's not surprised by the fall. He's not cleaning up the mess after the fact. He unconditionally, without any conditions imposed on himself, chooses who he is going to create for the purpose of his own glory in showing mercy upon them.

He also chooses who he's going to create for his own glory, for the purpose of justly punishing for sin. Now, he also elects angels. There are righteous angels, and for them, he's electing them and choosing them for the purpose of displaying his justice as he rewards them for their good works.

So he's electing them and then predestining them to do the good works to reward them. Okay, so there's election of men for mercy, election of angels for righteous reward, and there's reprobation of men for punishment for the justice of God, and there's reprobation of angels for punishment for the justice of God.

And so this is also unconditional in the sense that God doesn't look down the corridor of time for the fulfillment of some condition by man or by the angels and choose who he's going to pick. No, even for the angels who are rewarded for their own righteousness, he elects them and upholds them in righteousness so that they'll meet the conditions.

Man, he elects knowing that we're not meeting conditions, and he elects and has Christ meet the conditions. So the unconditional election and reprobation is God's choosing who to save and who to condemn on the basis of what he wants to do, and the basis of the sin of people that he has predestined, and on the basis for those men who are saved of the righteousness of Christ that he predestines to have be fulfilled in Christ's ministry on the earth.

So he does this for his mere good pleasure, for his glory, and he chooses whom he will save in Christ and who he will condemn justly for sin. Then there's limited atonement, and limited atonement is Christ's work on the cross to redeem his elect, and in this he provides a full satisfaction for those whom Christ intended to save.

In other words, he pays for all their debts. That's the elect. Everyone that Christ came to save had a sin debt, and he paid that sin debt in full on the cross, and it was only for the elect. He didn't pay for anybody else, anybody except for the elect, and he did not pay for any of the sin of the reprobate.

He didn't pay for any of the sins of the fallen angels either. He only paid for the sins of the elect human beings he intended to save, and so this atonement is limited in the sense that it is limited to a full satisfaction for those whom it's intended for.

Furthermore, the atonement of Christ also involves his perfect obedience, his perfect fulfilling of the whole law, and his perfect fulfilling of the whole law provides a positive basis for counting the elect as righteous.

So this limited atonement is the full satisfaction of the debts of the elect and providing a perfect righteousness for the elect and for the elect only. And then when we get to irresistible grace, the eye, irresistible grace is the assertion again that grace is demerited favor.

It's a love, it's a desire for the good of the object. It's a desire to save the object, and so God does all that he pleases. If he desires the good of a person, he's going to bring about the good of that person.

He's going to bring about the ultimate good, and for a sinner, the good of that sinner would include the salvation of that sinner. So if God desires to save a person, then he will accomplish that goal.

He cannot resist, we cannot resist his plans, and he is powerful. He chooses us, and if he will effectually bring about salvation of all whom he's chosen. So the demerited favor of God is that irresistible thing that brings about the conversion of people, not against their wills, it's by causing their wills to change.

So God causes people to understand things they previously did not understand, to believe things they previously did not believe, and that results in a change of desire, and it results in a change of choice over time.

But faith is a gift that is created in us by supernatural work of God, and that irresistible grace is particular, and it is effectual, and it causes people to go from darkness to light. It causes them to go from blindness to sight.

It causes them to go from being dead to being alive. This is regeneration, this is the new birth, this is the taking away of the heart of stone and giving a heart of flesh, and so this is the doctrine of irresistible grace.

And lastly, in the Tulip, we get to the perseverance of the saints, and God gives the gift of faith, and he maintains the gift of faith. Christ is the author of our faith, and he's the perfecter of our faith.

He's the finisher of it. He gives it to us, and all those whom he justifies, he will glorify. He causes those who get the beginning to get the end. He doesn't start building a tower and then stop halfway.

God is a wise builder. God is a wise commander. God begins work, and he finishes what he starts. He always accomplishes the goals that he intends to bring about. And so if he desires the salvation of a man, he gives him faith, and then he also preserves him in the faith, and that preservation of the faith causes the man to persevere in the faith.

So God's preserving work causes the saint to persevere in the faith. And so we think about this idea of the perseverance of the saints. It's not just an assertion that people get saved, and then they can lose their faith, but they're still saved.

No, it's the assertion that a person, when they are given faith, will be maintained in the faith. They will never lose their faith. They will always have that faith because God preserves it in them. And so we can have assurance of salvation, knowing that God who saves will not let us go, that no creature can take us from his hand, and he doesn't change his mind.

His compassions change not. And so we can have an assurance of salvation on the basis of the fact that the God who saved us is the God who will preserve us. So that's the doctrine of the perseverance of the saints.

So that is a short flyover of the content that we'll be talking about in more detail.

Great, and this is a great time to go to our first commercial break, so I don't have to interrupt you mid-sentence. And once again, if anybody has a question about this very important theme, and I have seen very recently how angry many of our brothers in Christ who do not agree with us on this, how angry they get, and ranging from mild disagreement to nastiness.

But I hope that some of those folks are listening today, and that the Lord opens up their eyes so that they may more fully understand and fall in love with these teachings. But if you have a question, send it to chrisarnson at gmail .com.

C-H-R-I-S-A-R-N-Z-E-N at gmail .com. Give us your first name at least. City and state and country of residence, please only remain anonymous if your question involves a personal and private matter, such as you are in a church that is non-Calvinistic or even anti-Calvinistic, but you have begun to become fascinated perhaps by Reformed theology, and you're starting to find more and more agreement with it, and you'd rather not identify yourself at this point.

I understand that. You might even be the pastor of the church yourself, going through that same journey of theological understanding. We would understand reasons like that. Would compel you to remain anonymous.

But please, if it's a general question, give us your first name at least. City and state and country of residence at chrisarnson at gmail .com. We'll be right back. Don't go away.

Armored Republic exists to equip free men with tools of liberty to defend God-given rights against the twin threats of tyranny and chaos. If you own a rifle to resist tyrants and criminals, then you should own body armor and a med kit for the same reasons.

A rifle stops evil, body armor and a med kit keep you in the fight and preserve your life. Armored Republic is a body of free craftsmen united to create tools of liberty. We are honored to be your armorsmith of choice.

Civilian ownership of body armor is about increasing decentralized power and by comparison, reducing the advantages of centralized power. The danger of centralized power is often represented by the word king.

As Americans, we hate the word king applied to any mere man.

We are Armored Republic.

And in a republic, there is no king but Christ. Arm yourself with tools of liberty at armoredrepublic .com.

Chris Armisen of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio has had a long-time partnership with our friends at CVBBS, which stands for Cumberland Valley Bible Book Service. They specialize in supplying Reformed and Puritan books and Bibles at discount prices that make them affordable for everyone.

CVBBS has been a family-owned book service since 1987, operating out of Carlisle, Pennsylvania. They seek to bring you the best available Christian books and Bibles at the best possible prices, and now they're also shipping worldwide.

Browse the pages at ease, shop at your leisure, and purchase with confidence at Cumberland Valley Bible Book Service. Order online worldwide at CVBBS .com. That's CVBBS .com. Or you can order by phone at 717 -249 -0231.

That's 717 -249 -0231. For orders of $50 or more, use promo code IRON for an extra 5 off their already discounted prices. And please, let our friends at CVBBS know that you heard about them on Iron Sharpens Iron Radio.

I'm Phil Johnson, Executive Director of Grace to You with John MacArthur. I've been a frequent guest on Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, and I highly recommend this show. But today I want to tell you about one of its advertisers, Rare Document Traders.

Far and away my favorite source for quality Charles Spurgeon memorabilia. Are you looking for that special, unique gift for your pastor or missionary friend or a loved one? Why not purchase a piece of church history that any believer would cherish?

Rare Document Traders is your one-step source for Spurgeon's handwritten manuscripts and letters, as well as other rare books and collectible items from church history. In 15 years that they've been in business, they've earned a stellar reputation in the Reformed community with thousands of satisfied customers all around the world, including me.

Visit RareDocTraders .com today. That's RareDocTraders .com. Don't forget to mention you heard about them on Iron Sharpens Iron Radio. That's RareDocTraders .com. I'm Brian McLaughlin, president of the SecureComm Group and an enthusiastic supporter of Chris Arnson's Iron Sharpens Iron Radio program.

The SecureComm Group provides the highest level of security, close-circuit television, access control, and communication systems for Manhattan's top residential buildings, as well as churches, commercial properties, municipalities, and more.

We custom install exactly what you need to protect yourself, including digital recording, off-site viewing, and connectivity from most smart devices. From simple code-activated systems to the latest technology using facial recognition, the SecureComm Group has it.

We also provide the latest in intercom and IP telephone systems. In addition, we provide superior networking platforms. We'll create, maintain, and secure your local network. Whether it's a Wi-Fi or a hardwire network, we'll implement the latest secured firewall, endpoint solutions, and cloud backup.

I would love to have the honor and privilege of helping protect the lives and property of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio listeners and their associates. For more details on how the SecureComm Group may be of service to you with the very latest in security innovations, call 718 -353 -3355.

That's 718 -353 -3355. Or visit SecureCommGroup .com. That's SecureCommGroup .com. This is Brian McLaughlin of the SecureComm Group, joining Chris Arnzen's family of advertisers to keep Iron Sharpens Iron Radio on the air.

Here at Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, praise God for the generous monthly financial support of Royal Diadem Jewelers, educated by and affiliated with the American Gem Society, Jewelers of America, and the Gemological Institute of America.

For the perfect custom-designed engagement ring or any one-of-a-kind piece of jewelry created exactly according to your imagination and specifications, Royal Diadem Jewelers has you covered. No matter where you live in the world, Royal Diadem will walk you step-by-step through every stage of the process and even hold a high-tech internet virtual visit using state-of-the-art jewelry design technology to serve you.

They start by listening carefully to determine your needs. They're interested in making what you want, not what they want to sell you. From rough design to digital model, to photo-realistic image, to wax prototype model, to the finished product, they're continually listening to your input, likes and dislikes, making any changes necessary along the way.

This will ensure that your custom jewelry will turn out exactly as you dreamed and well beyond your expectations. Visit royaldiadem .com. That's royaldiadem .com today. Sterling Vandewerker, owner of Royal Diadem Jewelers, his wife, Bronnie, his business partner and manager, Brian Wilson, and the entire family, thank you all for listening to, praying for, and supporting the work of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio.

And with Easter and Mother's Day and Father's Day coming up, please consider buying a loved one or even having a custom-designed piece of jewelry created for a loved one from royaldiadem .com. And remember, folks, they are still offering Iron Sharpens Iron Radio 100 of the profits from any sale of jewelry to an Iron Sharpens Iron Radio listener, as long as that listener simply mentions, I heard about royaldiadem .com and Iron Sharpens Iron Radio.

That's all you need to say, and we will be guaranteed 100 of the profits from that sale. But we don't know how long they're going to be extending this amazing offer to us, so please go to royaldiadem .com today to at least get the ball rolling on your purchase of jewelry.

Perhaps it's something that they already have in stock that you'd like to buy, or having a custom-designed piece of jewelry created. Whichever route you want to take, please go to royaldiadem .com today to at least get the ball rolling and mention Iron Sharpens Iron Radio to further ensure that we will receive 100 of the profits from that sale of jewelry.

That's royaldiadem .com. Mention Iron Sharpens Iron Radio. We're now back with Pastor David Reese of Puritan Reform Church in Phoenix, Arizona. This is part three of a discussion we have been having on the five solos of the Reformation and the five points of Calvinism.

Right now, we are focusing our attention for this final of the three segments on the five points of Calvinism. If you have a question, send it to chrisarnson at gmail .com. Chrisarnson at gmail .com. Give us your first name at least, city and state, and country of residence.

I would like to have you clarify something, if you don't mind, Pastor Reese. Good thing. When you were mentioning earlier, you were actually focusing upon unconditional election. You also said God reprobates others that he does not elect, and you've used reprobates as a verb.

And some non-Calvinists and even vehemently anti-Calvinists have a totally false understanding of what that exactly means. They seem to think that we are teaching that men who are dead in their sins might otherwise have come to Christ with a saving faith had God not stopped them, as if mankind was a clean slate morally, and that God made the person a child of the devil, whereas he had an opportunity and a, quote-unquote, chance to come to Christ before that otherwise.

But this is not what we teach. Let me just quickly quote what the 1689 London Baptist Confession of Faith says in Chapter 3, Paragraph 3. By the decree of God for the manifestation of his glory, some men and angels are predestined or foreordained to eternal life through Jesus Christ, to the praise of his glorious grace, others being left to act in their sin, to their just condemnation, to the praise of his glorious justice.

So at least the confession here, the Baptist Confession, and I'm sure the Westminster is probably very close or identical, God is merely leaving the non-elect, the reprobate, in their already sinful state.

And if you want to pick up where I left off there.

I think you find both the language of God's decreeing and planning from eternity past, but you also find the idea of the leaving. And I think there's a number of important points here. I mean, first of all, nobody who is fallen has anything good in them from which they could do the good work of anything, any good work.

They can't do the good of believing. Believing is required in the first commandment. The first commandment requires us to know and to acknowledge the true God. And so when faith is a part of the basis of our own justification, then it would be a good work.

So the angels, for example, the righteous angels, a part of why they are justified before God is because of their believing God and his word. And so their faith is a part of the merit of their justification.

For us, our faith is not a meritorious thing. It's a gift that connects us to the merits of Christ. And so when we think about faith, even though it's required by the law, our faith is not like an act of obedience that is counted to us itself for us to be righteous before God.

It connects us to the righteousness of Christ. And so we have nothing in ourselves whereby we could believe. And so God must act to give us faith or we will never have faith. But I think you'll read in the Confession, this is in both the London Badges and the Westminster, the idea that the decree of God extends even to the first fall.

So I think the Arminian might say, okay, well, why did God predestine the fall then? Right. And we go, well, God predestined the fall because his intention was to display his justice in rewarding good and his justice in punishing evil.

And he also wanted to display his mercy in saving some who deserve punishment. And so that's the purpose for the fall. It's for the glory of God to display his justice and his mercy. And so they might go, well, that seems evil.

God predestined evil or had the intention for evil to occur in history. And so that right there, that's the thing that ultimately I'm objecting to. And so here's the main answer to that. The main answer to that is God is the definition of good.

You are bringing in a standard of goodness that is foreign to the Bible to judge God. God is above the law. There is no law above him. And there's no judge to call him to give an account. So he's above the law and he's the highest judge.

Without God, there is no definition of good. So it is good that God predestined for Satan to commit evil, for Judas to commit evil, for men to commit evil, for fallen angels to commit evil. And it is good that he punishes it.

And it is good that he also forgives some men who are fallen. That goodness is defined by the fact that God did it and defined by the fact that it serves his good purpose of displaying his glory. Now, people say, well, then that means I can just do good.

I could just do things that people would call evil. And it's good as long as it glorifies God. Let's sin that grace might abound, for example, right? I'm going to sin and that'll make God's grace more clear.

No, that is to confuse yourself with God. God is above the law. God kills a man. It's not murder. If he takes property, it's not stealing. So you, on the other hand, are under the law and there's a judge for you.

God is the judge. The law is the standard. God is above the law and he has no judge above him. What he does is by definition good. You are a man. You're a creature. And so if you seek to ignore a law that has been imposed on you by God and you ignore the judge, God, then you are playing the fool because you are thinking of yourself as God rather than God as God and you as a creature.