Response to Dave Hunt on Reformed Theology, Part 1 of 3

Whosoever Will, the Bondage of the Will, and the Program’s Purpose

Whosoever will, let him take of the water of life freely. Whosoever will. But wait a minute. You can't have a will. Because if you have a will, then God's not sovereign. You understand? God has to be sovereign to the extent that you do not have a will.

And Calvinists would say to you, Have you read Luther's Bondage of the Will? Well, I've read Luther's Bondage of the Will very carefully, and I don't understand how leading evangelicals can praise it.

I don't find it either logical or biblical. I could drive a fleet of trucks through the holes. I'm sorry. In Lutheran, it's the bondage of the will.

And so says Dave Hunt in a presentation given, as I understand it, in February of this year, Reformed Theology Reviewed in the Light of Scripture. And that will be the subject of the dividing line today.

My name is James White, and we are going to begin a series that will include a response to Dave Hunt's attack upon Reformed Theology that was a part of this tape that is being distributed. It was sent to us, and of course, we felt it was necessary to respond to it because of the fact that we, I think, had a little something to do with getting Mr. Hunt going down this particular road in the first place.

I'm glad you're with us today. We are broadcasting live via the internet here from sunny Arizona where it is currently 104 degrees, not overly bad for this time of year. Sometimes it'll be 114 at a time like this, but it's only 104, and so I'm awfully glad that it is that much cooler.

Now, right off the bat, I suppose I should make mention of the fact that anyone who did not listen to the encounter between myself and Mr. Hunt on the subject of Reformed Theology might want to take the time to go to straightgate .com and listen to that discussion.

It took place in August of last year. I was filling in for Marty Minto on his program on KPXQ, and we contacted Mr. Hunt in light of an article that he wrote in the May, as I recall it was, 2000 Berean Call.

We had the discussion. It was a very interesting discussion, and over the months that followed, we began to hear about Mr. Hunt doing more on this particular subject. And specifically, I had sent my book, The Potter's Freedom, up to Mr. Hunt prior to the program itself, and we started to hear about Mr. Hunt writing a book, writing a book concerning the subject of Calvinism.

In light of what Mr. Hunt had said in that particular discussion, in light of the fact that he had confessed his ignorance to the Reformers and really had not been able to provide any type of exegetical response to the key passages that teach God's sovereign grace and the salvation of his elect people, I found it very strange that only a matter literally of weeks after our encounter, this type of thing would be taking place.

But in point of fact, we have confirmed that Mr. Hunt has written a book. A number of people have seen it. A number of people have spoken to Mr. Hunt about this subject, have exhorted him to be very careful, to not engage in a criticism of issues that he does not know about.

And yet he has chosen to not only go to print, but now he is doing discussions, talks, and we will be looking at one of those talks today. Now, many people would say, well, why would you want to respond to Dave Hunt?

Well, obviously, Dave Hunt has many followers. And sadly, many of his followers will accept whatever he says as gospel truth without looking at the actual issues themselves. But more importantly than that, Mr. Hunt is addressing the very heart of the gospel itself and sadly is denying the very truths that freed Europe from the bondage of the Roman system in the Reformation and those very truths that we emphasize so strongly in our ministry with Alpha and Omega Ministries.

Now, many people would say, well, shouldn't we just give Mr. Hunt a pass? He's an elderly man now. He's written some good things in the past. His book, Seduction of Christianity, was used of God. It was a timely work.

So shouldn't we just give him a pass on this? Well, that depends on where our priorities are. If we have the priorities of our society rather than the priorities of Scripture, then we'll be much more concerned about what people think about us than what God thinks of us and what we think of as truth.

But the simple fact of the matter is, Mr. Hunt is engaging in an attack upon doctrines he does not understand. We will document that over and over again the course of the next hour and a half. His understanding of Reformed theology is nonexistent.

His understanding of church history is nonexistent. He is not a theologian. He is not an exegete. He does not know any of the biblical languages, and he himself says so. He is not, to my knowledge, under the authority of elders who can give him proper guidance in this particular situation, and that makes the situation dangerous, very dangerous.

Now, what is more dangerous even than that is the fact that it seems Mr. Hunt is now claiming to have become an expert in the subject of Reformed theology, and that in a matter of weeks. In a matter of weeks.

Last summer, Dave Hunt said that he knew nothing about the writings, the Reformers. And yet, in the May 2001 edition of the Berean Call, he claims to know more about the Institutes of the Christian Religion, the 90 of all Calvinists.

He claims to have his office filled with the works of Calvinists that have been marked up. And yet, again, recall that while we had our encounter in August of last year, by October, which is only a matter of weeks, a manuscript was already in existence on this subject.

What kind of thinking can lead a person to believe that they could master, that they could master the entirety of Reformed theology in a matter of weeks? I've been studying it for decades, and I don't understand all of it.

I haven't quote-unquote arrived, and yet Mr. Hunt seems to believe that he has. And I do not understand that in any way, shape, or form. Now, I've mentioned what he said. I think it would be good if I play for you the first question that I asked of Mr. Hunt back in August of last year.

My concern primarily was the fact that Mr. Hunt's article attacks the truth of monergism, the fact that God alone saves and promotes the synergism that he shares in common with the Roman Catholic system, emphasizing the free will of man and the fact that grace alone cannot save.

It is necessary but not sufficient. And so I asked Mr. Hunt about this, and I want you to listen carefully. This is only August of last year. This is less than a year ago. How Mr. Hunt responded to my question.

I think between the two of us, we probably have done more debates against Roman Catholics than any other two people put together probably, certainly in the United States, and maybe on the face of the planet right now, which is sort of a scary thing to think about.

But I have debated, in fact, this past May, I debated Robert St. Genes, I'm sure you're familiar with Mr. St. Genes, and we debated justification by faith on Long Island. And one of the key issues that came out there, and this is one of the main reasons I contacted you, one of the main reasons I wrote you the letter, and this is one of the first issues I think we need to discuss today on Straight Talk Live, is the issue of monergism versus synergism, that is, the idea that there is one force that brings about salvation over against a synergistic viewpoint which views it as a cooperation, a cooperative effort between two forces, man and God.

And the reason I brought that up, Dave, as I mentioned in my letter, is that Mr. St. Genes, in representing the Roman Catholic perspective, very strongly attacked the Reformed emphasis upon the sovereignty of the grace of God.

And I guess my first question is, in light of your article, and the fact that your article very strongly presents the idea that you reject the concept of irresistible grace, and we'll get into reading some of the sections here, and I encourage you to read those sections you want to read.

In light of that, you and I are responding to one of the key issues of the Reformation in a different way. And in essence, my first question to you would be, do you feel that the Reformers, Martin Luther and John Calvin, were in error in emphasizing the deadness of man in sin and the absolute necessity, not just necessity, but sufficiency of the grace of God to bring a person to salvation?

Well, first of all, James,.

I'm very ignorant of the Reformers. I have not had time to read them. There are truckloads, I guess, of their writings. I like to just kind of pretend that we're back there in the days of the apostles before all of these things were written.

And I like to go to the Bible. So whether the Reformers said this or that, I don't know. I disagree with a lot of Martin Luther, for example, when I read his 95 Theses on indulgences. And when I read the Augsburg Confession, it sounds to me like they were still pretty much Catholics.

So I'm not trying to align myself with the Reformers or with anybody else. I just go by what the Bible says, as we all hope we do.

Well, there you have it. In fact, I think we need to hear this particular section again. Well, first of all, James,.

I'm very ignorant of the Reformers. I have not had time to read them. There are truckloads, I guess, of their writings. I like to just kind of pretend that we're back there in the days of the apostles before all of these things were written.

There you go.

Those are his own words. That is August of 2000. It is now June of 2001, ten months later. And, in fact, the material that we are going to be reviewing was recorded in February of 2001. So we're actually literally talking weeks later.

We have the commentary that we're going to have, for example, the words you heard just a few minutes ago where Mr. Hunt asserted and said that he does not find the bondage of the will to be very good.

He could drive a fleet of trucks through the holes in logic in bondage of the will. Now, I guess it's possible that Dave Hunt is a photo reader, that he can read material at 500, 1 ,000 times faster than I can and assimilate it far faster than I can.

I suppose that's a possibility. But given what we're going to hear today, I do not believe that that is the actual reality because of what we are going to read from Mr. Hunt. Now, before we start listening to a few of the assertions that he makes, I think I need to point out that so far in our discussions, and I have sent a few letters to Mr. Hunt.

In fact, I received a letter from his ministry asking if I would look over the manuscript of his book. I wrote back and said, I'd be glad to. However, I don't believe, Dave, that you have any right to write this book.

I don't believe in your position to do that. I don't think you have the background to do so. He not only says in this tape, but I heard him say just a few weeks ago at a conference we were both speaking at in Indianapolis, that he says, I know nothing about Greek.

It might as well be Chinese. So he knows nothing about the original languages, has no theological background, and yet he's addressing a subject that is simply far beyond his capacity to address. And as a result, has sadly gone into some simply silly teachings that we'll look at later on.

So far, he has refused to see that he is presenting a theological position that is mainly traditional, not exegetical. His refusal to see his traditions is what is most dangerous about his new crusade against the doctrines of grace.

He will simply quote a verse. He'll give you his Arminian traditional interpretation that is frequently not even semi-related to the original text, assume that that's the obvious meaning, and therefore use that as an argument against the doctrines of grace.

Now, in putting the material together for today's program, one of the big problems that I had to face, and this is something that everyone knows who has ever heard Dave Hunt speak, and it's not necessarily a bad thing, it's just the way he is, Mr. Hunt has never finished any talk on the same subject with which he began.

If he starts on the subject of Mary, he'll finish on a subject in the New Age, or if he starts in the New Age, he'll finish on a subject in Islam, or whatever. And he will cover a minimum of 5 to 50 subjects in between.

He wanders all over the landscape, and he's done this in every single talk I've ever heard, and I've heard him speak a number of times. Now, what happens is, this makes attempting to respond to him very, very difficult because the topic's all over the road.

And so what I'm going to try to do is, I'm a Calvinist, not because of John Calvin or because of Augustine or anyone else, because the Scripture's plain and simple. And anyone who obtains this tape from the Berean Call will discover that the majority of this discussion was an ad hominem attack upon John Calvin and Augustine.

And we're going to take some time to look at some of that later on, but I don't think that's the important thing because I'm not a Calvinist because of John Calvin. I think it is important to point out that Mr. Hunt has given away the store.

He calls Augustine the premier Roman Catholic, which is absolutely absurd. Augustine did not believe many of the things that define Roman Catholicism to this day, so to call him the premier Roman Catholic is just absolutely beyond my understanding.

But many of the things that Dave said in this tape about church history were utterly beyond my understanding as well, and all I've ever done is taught the subject. But that's secondary to the actual issue of the biblical material, and so what I've tried to do is to go into the material, try to keep it pretty much related to where it originally appeared, but pull out the biblical argumentation, the theological argumentation, put all this stuff together and see how that hopefully will work.

But to start, I think it's important to recognize Dave's own view. One of the things that a lot of people noticed when he and I spoke together last year was that he would say things like, well, my God wouldn't do this.

Maybe the Calvinist God would do that, etc., etc. And that made a lot of people wonder, is he saying this is a different gospel? Is he identifying Calvinism as being cultic? Well, I want you to hear what he says here about the parallel that he draws between his change of position on Catholicism and then his study of Calvinism.

Some meetings we would have a question and answer time, and some of the ex-Catholics would raise their hands and challenge me. You write about cults, you write about false religions, how come you don't mention the Catholic Church?

And I would say, well, you know, I mean, Catholics, I mean, they believe in God, they believe Jesus died for their sins, and so forth, they have some, maybe some peculiar doctrines, but they're basically Christians.

Well, I was speaking from ignorance, and when I studied what the Church, not what some ex-Catholics said, or what some theologian at Notre Dame says, but when I studied the documents of the Roman Catholic Church, what the highest authority says, the canons and decrees of the councils, the Council of Trent, for example, which contains more than 100 anathemas damning evangelicals to hell for not believing what they believe.

When I studied the catechism, now there used to be various catechisms, now they have the universal catechism that came out of Rome with the Pope's endorsement and so forth, so they can't say, well, that's the Baltimore catechism, or that's that, no, we've got one catechism.

Now when I studied the canons and decrees of the councils, when I studied the Code of Canon Law, when I studied what the Catholic Church officially teaches, I was shocked. And as one result of that, I wrote a book called A Woman Rides the Beast.

We also have a video. Some of you may have read it or seen that. Well, I must confess the same thing has happened to me with Calvinism. When I began to research and really study, I've had to go through everything because I can't say things that are not true.

I can't speak from ignorance. I've had thorough discussions with some of them. I've read his Institutes. I haven't highlighted. I've read The Bondage of the Will by Martin Luther. I've read Augustine.

I've gone back and very thoroughly researched, and I must say I was shocked. That's why I say it's déjà vu. It's all over again.

I don't know about you, but it sounds to me like there is a very clear parallel being drawn there between discovering that Roman Catholicism is a false religion and resulting in his writing A Woman Rides the Beast, etc., etc., and what we then have in this study of Calvinism.

And I think if you then attach that with these words...

Jay Adams, in his book Competent to Counsel, says this. The counsellor cannot say to the counselee, Christ died for you, because you don't know whether he's one of the elect. Now, is that a different gospel?

It seems to me that Paul preached the gospel to whosoever will.

Well, that sounds to me, anyways, like Mr. Hunt is saying that this is a different gospel, that in point of fact Calvinism is presenting a gospel other than that which is a gospel that can save, that Calvinism is presenting some sort of a perspective that would be heretical or cultic in its viewpoint.

That's really the only way that I can understand that kind of a comment. Maybe you see it in a different way, but that does seem to be what's being said. Now, early on, Mr. Hunt gave a brief citation of a passage.

And one of the things that has concerned me is I know he has The Potter's Freedom. I know he has The Five Points of Calvinism by Edwin Palmer. I know he has some of Arthur W. Pink's works. And since I know those books, I especially know The Potter's Freedom, then I don't have any way of cutting him slack, shall we say, for being ignorant of Reformed apologetics, of how we defend our position.

And so if he presents stuff that does not in any way, shape, or form begin to even show the slightest familiarity with the best that we have to offer, let alone even the weakest we might have to offer, then I have a problem with that.

You see, I've always believed that we should respond to the strongest of our opponents, not the weakest of our opponents. That's what we do with our ministry. But it does not seem that Mr. Hunt agrees.

And of course, Mr. Hunt was involved with the Godmakers books and things like that, and there were problems there too. So there is a history of not necessarily responding to the strongest that's out there.

But that certainly is the case here as well. For example, here at the very beginning, we have something that sounds very familiar to anyone who listened to the original encounter that we had back in August of last year.

Let's just begin by quoting a couple of verses from the Bible. Let's take the verse that I presume every Sunday school child knows, John 3, 16. At least that was the first thing I learned, I think, as a boy in Sunday school.

For God so loved the world. Let's stop there for a minute. If you're a Calvinist, it doesn't mean world. It means the elect. For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever.

Is that what it says? It sounds like an ordinary person reading that and putting the ordinary meaning on words, you would think that would mean whosoever. But to a Calvinist, it means the elect. Just to start out and explain things.

For example, John 3, 16. Well, of course, that's Dave's favorite verse. Problem is, if he had taken the time to look at the books that he says he has been studying so well and in studying them so deeply, he would know there's a number of problems with his position.

It would seem incumbent upon him to deal with the fact that the word world is used many different ways by John in his own gospel. In John 17, Jesus said, I do not pray for the world. So if we're going to take it the way Dave Hunt does, did Jesus not pray for everyone in his high priestly prayer?

In fact, Jesus differentiated between those the Father had given him out of the world and the world in that prayer, something that Mr. Hunt says the Bible never does, as we'll see later on. But not only that, he seemingly assumes that the word world in John 3, 16 is all-inclusive of every single individual.

And yet does he not then notice, because he makes no comment about this, that the passage says for God's love of the world that he gave his only begotten son, that whoever believes in him should not perish.

Well, wait a minute. Why say that the love of God is for every single individual and then introduce a particularity? A particularity into the text where it's only the believing ones that receive this love.

It's only the believing ones who will receive eternal life. There's a particularity in the text. But not only that, but Mr. Hunt, the word whosoever, if you again would understand the original text, as everyone knows, I think, who's looked into it, and this is all through the material that Mr. Hunt claims to have mastered now, you know that there is no term there that is translated, well, there's just a universality of this love.

The text reads so that all the believing ones, the whosoever is, whatever believing one it might be, Jew, Gentile, male, female, bond, slave, free, whatever, whoever believes would receive eternal life.

And yet Mr. Hunt reads into the text a concept that is nowhere to be found in the Greek text at all. As they see, the normal person just reading the words, well, what words, Mr. Hunt? The words that John wrote or your English translation 2 ,000 years later with an Arminian tradition standing behind it.

You see, that's where we need to understand. That Mr. Hunt may say, well, you know, I think it's just terrible what you Calvinists say, that you should have to learn to do exegesis and stuff to deal with this.

You all think that only you can do this. This is a subject that down through the history of the church has always involved. The examination of the biblical text with care. And there's nothing arrogant or wrong to say we need to examine the actual text themselves so we don't make silly errors.

That's not being braggadocious. That's not being arrogant or prideful. That's showing proper respect for the text. And that's why I said to Mr. Hunt when I heard that he was writing a book, Dave, you shouldn't do this.

You don't have the ability to do this in a way that's proper and pleasing to God. Oh, how dare you say that? No, I think God's truth deserves to be respected. I think God's truth deserves to be respected.

What do you think? 866 -854 -6763. When we come back from this break we'll continue listening to the comments of Dave Hunt. Reformed theology reviewed in the light of scripture or is it reformed theology tortured in the light of tradition?

We'll be talking about as we continue here on The Dividing Line. We'll be right back. And welcome back to Dividing Line. My name is James White and we are looking at the tape that was produced in February of 2001 offered by the Berean Call Ministry from Dave Hunt entitled Reformed Theology Reviewed in the Light of Scripture.

And it is interesting to note that from Dave's perspective the primary error regarding Calvinism is this.

I think an overemphasis upon God's sovereignty is at the foundation of Calvinism. Such an emphasis that God must be sovereign to the extent that He causes everything that happens. Even the moving of a finger, the typist errors, even sin, God has foreordained.

God tells Adam and Eve don't eat of the tree, but God foreordained that they would. And He made them eat of the tree and then He punishes them for doing what He caused them to do. Therefore, sovereignty is taken to such an extent that God has to be the one who causes.

Everything. Now, it is unfortunate, obviously, in light of the tremendous amount of work that has gone into the explication, the biblical exegesis of the doctrine of God down through the centuries, that Mr. Hunt has chosen to ignore the work of those who have come before him.

Chosen to ignore the tremendous amount of information that is there regarding God's absolute decree. Mr. Hunt has no decree of God. Mr. Hunt, like all Arminians, in essence, has to leave the shape of the future to man, to the creation itself.

While God has foreknowledge, He admits God has foreknowledge, but He only has foreknowledge because He exists outside the realm of time. The actual form of things that takes place in time itself is determined by the actions and the wills of man.

And that type of theology, of course, is the very type of theology that I find greatly dishonoring to God and completely incapable of providing a meaningful interpretation of Isaiah, a meaningful interpretation of many of the statements of the psalmist.

I'm not going to repeat everything that's in the Potter's Freedom or God's Sovereign Grace regarding the sovereignty of God and His decrees. Let's just say that so far I have not seen Mr. Hunt even attempt to address the passages that very clearly present God's utter sovereignty and His decrees.

The only one that we'll get to today, he does make an attempt to deal with Ephesians 1 .11, but he doesn't deal with Acts 4 .28. He doesn't deal with how God makes all things work out to the good if that is not a part of His sovereign decree.

It's just simply not a part of the presentation that Mr. Hunt makes. And so therefore, it's very easy to mock the relationship between God's decree and Adam and Eve and to just simply pass over the assertions that are made in Scripture that it was God's decree that Jesus Christ was nailed upon the cross, that it was His predestination to cause this to happen, and yet men are held accountable for their sinful actions.

He just doesn't deal with them. And that is why we have noted this before and I will make it known again. Mr. Hunt, we're going to send this tape up. Dave, we've had good conversations in the past. I think we'll have good ones in the future.

But you are touching here the very heart of systematic theology, the very heart of apologetics. And Mr. Hunt, I challenge you to debate. I challenge you to debate me on this subject. I want to do a Friday night, Saturday morning, Saturday evening debate.

I want each session to be at least three hours long. That's a total of nine hours. And I want to debate these issues formally, in a moderated way, videotaped and audiotaped. I believe that if you were right, you would have absolutely positively no reason not to do this.

That if you're right, that what I'm doing in promoting the Reformed faith, as you will say later on, you call it a libel on God's character. But, the simple fact of the matter is I do not believe that your position can withstand any type of cross-examination.

And so far I have not seen you forced to deal with the biblical passages that have caused Reformed exegetes to believe what they believe. And so I challenge you, sir, to a debate on this subject, Friday night, Saturday morning, Saturday night.

It would be a marathon, but it would be worthwhile to the Church, because the Church needs to hear this discussion. Most people know that I've challenged Norman Geisler to debate, but he won't. He has turned down offer after offer after offer to engage in this very same debate.

Well, Mr. Hunt, if you are going to present this kind of material, if you're going to go around saying that Reformed theology offers a libel to the character of God, I challenge you, sir, to debate the issue.

Let's do it. Let's arrange it. I know of at least two different cities, people in two different cities right now that want to host it. Actually make that three. Maybe we can, you know, do it in all three.

That would be fine too. Doesn't matter to me. Let's do the debate. Let's talk about what you are claiming in this particular tape and in the book that you have written on this subject. Now, we continue on.

Mr. Hunt gave a review of the various points of Calvinism, and the very fact that these reviews, the various outlines that he gives are in error shows that there is a major problem in his understanding.

Let's listen.

T-U-L-I-P. T, total depravity. By total depravity, you would agree that people are depraved. But they mean unable to believe the gospel. Therefore, because they're unable to believe the gospel, they must be regenerated before they get saved.

Now, that's I think a strange doctrine. Because I thought that regeneration, Jesus is talking about it to Nicodemus, is he not? And you are born again by believing the gospel that Christ died for your sins upon the cross.

The Calvinist says, no, man is totally depraved, which means he is unable to believe the gospel, unwilling and unable. Therefore, he must be regenerated, he must be given new life before he can believe the gospel, before he can have faith.

Now, those of you who have heard the encounter that we had last summer knows that Mr. Hunt finds this very, very strange. And yet, in that encounter, he was unable to respond to the passages that I presented that clearly showed regeneration as being something that takes place prior to faith, that faith is a gift of God.

He did not respond to the information in the Potter's Freedom that documents the fact that man is incapable, because of his total depravity and spiritual death, of doing anything that is pleasing to God.

Romans 8, verses 7 -8. I have not heard any response to that either. And it's interesting to note that in the next section of the presentation of the various five points of Calvinism, Mr. Hunt, in discussing unconditional election, basically goes back to attacking total depravity, which should tell us something about the fact that obviously he does not believe that man is truly dead in sin.

In fact, he's going to make that very clear in this next section. And he does not understand the theocentricity of the Reformed perspective. His tradition is so anthropocentric, so focused upon the man and his response, that he does not understand the focus of Reformed theology.

Listen to what he says here.

For you, unconditional election, you have nothing to do with your salvation. Now they take it to an extreme. For example, they say, well, if you could believe, then that's a work. No, that's not a work.

The Bible distinguishes between faith and works, does it not? How about Romans chapter 4, verse 5? Now to him that worketh not but believeth. Isn't that distinguishing works from faith? Or how about by grace do you say through faith, not of yourselves, not of works.

It's by faith, not of works. But the Calvinist says, oh no, if you could even believe, you cannot do anything. You cannot even believe, but God sovereignly determines certain ones that he will regenerate so that they can believe the gospel.

So that's unconditional election. It's not dependent upon anyone's faith. I thought it said by grace are you saved through faith. Paul said to the Philippian jailer, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved.

Ah, but you are dead in trespasses and in sins. How can a dead person believe? You see, God has to do it all. Just as Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead, Lazarus couldn't do anything. Wait a minute, you don't equate spiritual death with physical death.

If you want to do that, a physically dead person can't rebel. They can't disbelieve either, right? So, you can't equate spiritual death with physical death. Furthermore, does it not say of us as believers, Romans 6, you are dead to sin.

Is that not true? Does that mean you couldn't sin? Then the person who is dead to God, it doesn't mean that he can't return to God either. Okay.

Well, again, Mr. Hunt claims to have all of these books at his disposal. Claims to have read them. Claims to understand them. And yet, all of the Reformed people in the audience are going, he has no idea what he's talking about.

How can you have these books available to you that discuss these things that would give you an understanding of what the position is and yet so badly misrepresent it? When we talk about a man being dead in sin, we are talking about the fact that man as the fallen son of Adam is without that divine life that is a part of what we are supposed to be when we are in union with God.

And that as a result, that individual is in rebellion against God, cannot do what is pleasing to God, Romans 8, 7 -8. That the will of that person is enslaved to sin, as Jesus taught. He who commits sin is a slave to sin.

And as a result, the deadness refers to incapacity. An inability to do what is good, not an inability to do what is wrong, Mr. Hunt. And so, there is, again, this has all been explained in the material that Mr. Hunt claims to have mastered.

I think that's what we know most is that there is this, I've read all this stuff and it's all wrong and here's why, and yet those of us who know we have read all this stuff, and not just since August of last year, and in fact some of the stuff we wrote, know that either Mr. Hunt didn't read it or he didn't understand when he read it.

One of the two. But it is interesting that instead of dealing with unconditional election, what's the normal response to unconditional election? Well, it's to assert that God foresees our faith and that that becomes the condition for his electing us, so on and so forth.

He doesn't even make that point. Go that direction. I don't get the feeling that he is aware that that is the direction that most Armenians go with that. But as we will see a little bit later on, Mr. Hunt actually goes into some very unusual beliefs in his presentation here that go far beyond what most Armenians do.

Now, I'd like to start taking some of your phone calls at the top of the hour. I'd like to have about half hour worth of your interaction with what you've heard so far. So if you'd like to be calling in now, 866 -854 -6763.

866 -854 -6763 is the number, and we can discuss some of the things you've heard up to the top of the hour if you'd like to participate on the dividing line today. Now, of course, after unconditional election, what comes next?

The terrible, horrible L. And he does bring this up a number of times. But here is one of the first statements, and listen to how this is placed. You can't help but hear the sinister sound in the background.

Listen to this.

Total depravity, unconditional election, limited atonement. That's shocking to many people. Christ did not die for everyone. We have to come back and talk about that when we talk about God's love. Because if Christ died for everybody, then some of his blood was wasted.

And if people could reject the gospel, then they're in charge and God is not. We want to come back and talk about that.

Well, he never really did get back to talking about that, but this part especially.

Limited atonement. That's shocking to many people.

That's shocking to many people. Hey, that's shocking to Dave Hunt. Let's be honest. Dave Hunt finds limited atonement absolutely reprehensible. And yet, as we pointed out last year, what he presents in its place is the idea that, well, if God's truly to be loving, then he has to love everybody the exact same way.