Misconceptions about Calvinism

Sovereign Grace Family Church

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August 23, 2022

00:00: Welcome to Conversations with a Calvinist Live Edition, and tonight we're going to be talking about misconceptions about Calvinism.
00:09: My name is Keith Foskey and I am your Calvinist.
00:14: I'm joined tonight by two good friends, friends of the show, repeat, even though one has been repeating more than the other, repeat participants on Conversations with a Calvinist.
00:28: I have Jake Korn and Matthew Henson.
00:31: Good evening, gentlemen.
00:32: It's good to see you.
00:33: Hey, to be fair, since you started the show, I've been on three other continents.
00:36: Okay.
00:37: I'm kind of busy.
00:39: It is true.
00:39: I mean, he does have that going on.
00:41: I understand.
00:42: I understand.
00:43: I'm just not as important as the United States.
00:50: Well, gentlemen, I am thankful for your participation in the show and tonight is live.
00:55: So I do want to tell the audience that we are going to be, we're not going to edit anything.
01:01: We're just going to go straight in.
01:03: And as, because it is live, you're going to be hearing it exactly as it's coming.
01:06: And tonight we're talking about the question of misconceptions about Calvinism.
01:11: And what I want to begin doing is I want to kind of give all of our positions because each of us is slightly different.
01:20: I would say Jake and I are probably closer than is Matthew, as we always reference Matthew as our not yet Calvinist friend.
01:29: And you'll notice the description of tonight's show is misconceptions about Calvinism with two and a half Calvinists.
01:35: That's what it says on the description, a conversation with two and a half Calvinists.
01:40: So tonight we are going to just take a couple of minutes each to give our own convictions on this subject.
01:47: I'm going to let Jake go first, then Matthew's going to go, and then I'm going to come in at the end.
01:52: And most of you know me, but I'll just kind of tell my story for a couple minutes as well.
01:56: Go ahead, Jake.
01:56: You've got to hit clean up there.
01:58: All right.
01:59: So one, I did not start as a Christian who was a Calvinist.
02:04: All through seminary, I would have called myself a hard-nosed fighting Arminian.
02:11: I sat through seminary classes for three years with professors and students who were mostly Reformed, and I fought them and debated them constantly.
02:19: So I grew up, you know, kind of soft Evangeli, but really believed in this whole freewill principle.
02:26: In fact, I would say the things like, you know, the only love that God really values is love that's given freely or whatever.
02:33: It was seminary, however, that really opened my eyes to the doctrines of grace.
02:38: And it was two things.
02:39: One, it was exegesis.
02:41: I know that sounds arrogant, but like learning how to study an original language changed my mind.
02:46: And then two, seeing the depth and breadth of church history and how much had been written on topics I agreed with and didn't agree with, and seeing like, oh, here I am with my opinions on having read the Bible a little bit.
03:01: Meanwhile, there's a couple thousand years of writing on this subject and many other subjects.
03:07: I should probably inform myself as to which of these arguments have been brought to the table and already dismissed for good reasons.
03:15: And so a constant theme I think you're going to hear from me tonight is like, this has been covered.
03:20: If you read this and consider X, Y, and Z, like these other guys have, you'll see why that argument actually is a dead end.
03:27: So it's really going back to the ancient languages and then seeing where brothers and sisters in the past have already kind of stamped out the ground for us.
03:38: Wonderful.
03:38: Thank you.
03:39: And so, Matthew, again, we know you're not yet a Calvinist.
03:44: And so tell everybody a little bit about where you are in this journey of faith.
03:49: And I'm not saying that you're on your way to Calvinism.
03:52: I'm not saying that.
03:54: You're not saying that, right? But as Jake just said, he wasn't always a Calvinist, and now he is able to identify himself that way.
04:03: How do you identify yourself if somebody says, hey, are you Reformed or whatever? First, what I would say is that I have, there's no contempt for Reformed theology, as you often find out on the Internet, in my heart at all.
04:18: Most of the things, maybe not most, but many of the things we're going to be talking about tonight are very bad argumentations against Calvinism.
04:24: I'm not going to support those.
04:25: And luckily, these two men here aren't going to put those on me.
04:28: They're asking, what do you believe? Don't let me caricature you with this.
04:32: And I'm going to give you guys the same grace and the grace I would give to every person who professes Reformed theology.
04:37: You guys know some folks that profess to be Calvinist that you would want nothing to do with because of the way that they overemphasize or they take some other part of ecclesiology and they make a mess of it.
04:49: So you wouldn't want to be any part of that.
04:51: So what am I? Well, I was raised in a non-denominational church that leaned on its eschatology, very dispensationalist, and its soteriology wasn't specifically defined as we are Calvinist, we are Arminian, we're this, we're this, we're this.
05:11: I will say that when the topic of things like predestination and election came up, people got very nervous.
05:20: And by nervous, I literally mean it was all predestination was almost whispered under your breath.
05:25: It wasn't something people wanted to talk about.
05:27: And so I didn't have a fear of it.
05:29: It just always was, well, that's not what I was raised with.
05:32: So it can't be right.
05:33: And all of us as baby Christians, that's kind of how we are for a while.
05:38: Well, as time goes on, I go to college and I went to a church that was on that, on soteriology, a direct opposite.
05:47: They were a five-point affirming Calvinist reformed Baptist church, plurality of eldership model.
05:53: I mean, just a bunch of different changes that I hadn't seen before in a church on the ecclesiology and the soteriology.
06:00: Is this the church you met Aaron in? Yes, this is where I met Aaron.
06:03: So this is up in Rome, Georgia when I was there for college and I attended there for four years.
06:08: It's kind of a God thing how I got there, but it's beyond the scope of the show.
06:11: Anyway, as a Calvinist, we affirm everything is a God thing, but we call that Providence.
06:20: So but I was, I was challenged on a lot of the stuff and like, you know, there would be a sermon, um, through some of your cornerstone passages, your Ephesians ones, your Romans nines, your, uh, your John sixes, maybe.
06:33: Maybe a little bit of, uh, I guess, uh, first John, um, on, on people leaving the faith and Hebrews and stuff like that.
06:41: And it's not that they were, the thing I respected is they were not specifically at the time.
06:45: They were not specifically trying to preach Calvinism.
06:48: They were just exegeting the Bible and saying, here's how we came out on these passages.
06:52: And I respected that a lot.
06:54: And I didn't always share their conclusions, but I respected it a lot.
06:57: Um, unfortunately, as I left in the past last couple of months, and then after that, they went in a more, I'm going to call it obnoxiously reformed track.
07:06: It became a lot more, if you don't hold to this, then you don't believe your Bible.
07:11: If you don't hold to this, then you clearly don't know how to exegete.
07:15: And our church believes this.
07:17: And it wasn't, if you don't believe this, get out.
07:18: But it was like, you are, you're a second tier member.
07:21: If you can't get on board with the doctrines of grace as we're defining them.
07:24: And that was a huge, like, Oh no, honey, that's not a thing.
07:28: Um, so in a sense I was sort of, I sort of learned to live in the middle a little bit.
07:35: And I don't mean to be like, Ooh, I'm not a Minion or Calvinist.
07:38: I think that's really irritating.
07:39: But, but what I learned to do was to say, all right, well, John Calvin had a particular soteriology that he espoused and maybe Calvin didn't get it right on every point, or maybe he got it.
07:51: He stated his conclusion to an extent that I wouldn't go as far as I don't want to throw Calvin out.
07:56: I don't want to throw, um, I mean, I've got, you know, I've, I've read some reformed theology here and there.
08:03: Um, I don't want to throw all of these guys out and say, they're not exegeting the Bible correctly.
08:07: It's just, I wouldn't take their conclusions quite as far.
08:10: And I'll, I'll close with this Keith, um, at dinner one time, your wife asked me about, you know, why aren't you a Calvinist yet or whatever.
08:16: And so she's like, let's start at the T what do you think about total depravity? And I said, well, you know, I said, does the Bible teach that, that there is a, you know, a deadness and inability, all of these things, of course it does.
08:29: But then what are the conclusions drawn from that? When we get to that all crucial application phase of the sermon, how far are you going to go there? Because that is where me and John Calvin and, and, uh, and I keep going back to him cause it's conversation for the Calvinist.
08:44: That's where we would probably differ.
08:45: Um, so Jake calls me a three and a half point Calvinist.
08:50: Um, you know, maybe I'm half T half U half L half I half P I'm not sure how you would exactly break it down.
08:56: Um, but I'm someone with a deep admiration for the exegetical methods that, that reformed theology comes to, I have no disrespect whatsoever for gentlemen like yourselves that hold fully to it.
09:07: I don't think it's some doctrine of demons or any nonsense like that.
09:10: Um, I'm comfortable with it.
09:11: It's just not something I quite hold to yet.
09:14: Yeah, I did say yet just for you.
09:16: Oh, how good that feels to hear him say the qualifying word of yet.
09:23: That's a nice thing to hear.
09:25: Um, well I will, um, I'll jump in for a, for a minute and just, as I said, I've told my story on the show before, so I won't take too long, but, uh, went to seminary, went to a Southern Baptist seminary that was not Calvinistic.
09:36: So I was not taught Calvinism in seminary, but while I was in seminary, I was the guest speaker at a, at a youth camp.
09:46: And the man who was leading the youth camp one year before had been challenged by some reformed teaching.
09:54: And so for a whole year, he studied it, and then he challenged me with it.
09:57: And for a whole year, I studied it, and then another year.
10:01: And so it took me a while.
10:03: The first time I remember ever really being comfortable was I went to a Founders Ministries conference in 2005, I think it was 2006, somewhere in there, and met Tom Askell.
10:16: I met a man who I loved, Roy Hargrave, uh, who is now with the Lord.
10:20: And, uh, these were men who answered a lot of questions that I had.
10:24: A lot of the questions we're going to talk about tonight, they answered them in a way that I thought was, was reasonable, biblical, and, uh, helpful.
10:32: And so, uh, it took a little while for me to start calling myself a Calvinist.
10:36: In fact, the only reason for people who want to know why I call myself a Calvinist, it was almost thrust upon me because there were people in the church who wanted to remove me for being a Calvinist.
10:47: And I remember walking into a restaurant.
10:48: I've told this story before.
10:49: I walked into a restaurant and a, and a local Southern Baptist pastor who didn't like Calvinism saw me, and I didn't even know he knew who I was.
10:58: And he said, that guy's a Calvinist.
11:00: And I said, well, I guess the label has, has preceded me.
11:04: I guess my reputation has preceded me.
11:06: So ever since then, I just say I'm Keith Foskey and I'm a Calvinist.
11:09: And that's sort of how the show and all the monikers and everything that go with the show.
11:13: That's how it all came about.
11:15: For me, it's almost like a joke because yeah, I am.
11:17: I believe it.
11:19: Um, I don't think that it's, I don't think it's the only thing that matters, but I'm not willing to, or I'm not unwilling to say that that's who I am.
11:28: I do want to stop real quick before we go on.
11:30: And I want to say this, uh, for those of you who are listening live and, uh, you're interested in sending in questions or a couple of ways for you to do that.
11:37: The first way is you can do it at conversations with a Calvinist group page.
11:41: You can just go onto the group page.
11:42: You don't have to be a member to actually comment.
11:44: It's a, it's an open group.
11:46: You can go in, leave a comment and, uh, ask a question right on this video.
11:51: If you do that on, um, just say, which is, uh, Jake's page, he'll see it and he'll be able to, to engage with it.
11:59: And, uh, I also have my email open.
12:01: And by the way, I just want you to know while these men are talking, if you see my moving around, I'm not ignoring what they're saying.
12:07: I'm engaging with the rest of what's going on.
12:10: I had a guy one time say, it looks like you're not paying attention.
12:13: I am.
12:13: I really am, but I'm having to do other things while I do this.
12:16: So I'm watching my email.
12:18: I do have one email that I'm going to bring out later, uh, the address specifically to Matthew Henson.
12:23: Uh, so that'll come up later, but, uh, but I'm getting fan mail.
12:27: Let's go.
12:28: Yeah.
12:28: And the people knew you were coming.
12:31: Okay.
12:31: And we also have a, we also have a list of, uh, misconceptions that we've gathered on just say, so if we run out of material, we can start going through some of that list real quick.
12:40: Explain what just say is because I know not everybody knows what that is.
12:43: So, so I talk about Calvinism a lot on the internet and, uh, I just started to notice that people would, would misstate reformed positions often, you know, generally in their criticisms.
12:56: So I invented a tag group.
12:58: So on Facebook, a tag group is one of those short sentences and all blue letters.
13:03: Uh, and it, the tag group is just say, you don't understand reformed theology and move along because I was just, I, I exited my cage stage.
13:11: I no longer wanted to argue on the internet.
13:13: And so, you know, instead of going back and forth with this person's misconception, we're arguing a straw man that I don't have time for.
13:20: Just, just say you don't understand it.
13:22: And let's, it's just faster that way.
13:23: So I just started dropping that for fun.
13:26: Uh, the tag groups grown to almost 2,800 people by this point, um, mostly Calvinist, but a lot of people just trying to learn.
13:34: And, uh, what they'll do is they'll share the tag out there in the wilderness with somebody else and then screenshot the instance and we'll, you know, learn and have a good laugh.
13:43: So please come visit us.
13:44: Please join the group.
13:45: As long as you're there for good reasons, we'd love to have you.
13:48: Absolutely.
13:49: So join that group and, uh, just, uh, just own it out there, Matthew, you have another group, uh, something about Roman Catholicism.
13:56: I do, I have a group that is entitled.
14:00: I regret to inform you that the papists are indeed at it again, um, because, uh, Rome does not sleep and they continue to, uh, they continue to do silly things.
14:10: And it is my, it is my group for poking gentle fun at Roman Catholics.
14:14: Um, we do want to see them, uh, the Orthodox, uh, council of Trent Roman Catholics.
14:19: We want to see them know the Lord.
14:21: Um, and we want to see them, um, you know, uh, in, in a fellowship that, that teaches the Bible and all that.
14:27: Um, and so it's for, it's for gentle fun.
14:30: I don't want people to be, again, I don't, you'll find a theme this night.
14:33: I'm not interested in, in that's the demons or they're the devil, or I just, there's a time and a place for that.
14:40: And 99.8% of the time, it's not what it's not the time or place for that.
14:44: And so it's, it's a fun group that we get to do things like that with.
14:47: And Jake and I are cross admins of each other's group.
14:51: So that's right.
14:51: I'm the, I'm the secret.
14:53: Um, let me use the correct terminology.
14:55: Not yet.
14:55: Calvinist.
14:56: Uh, that is, uh, that is an admin over at a reformed group.
15:00: So what do you know? And I think that that is so ironic because one dude didn't know that.
15:04: And he posted, he goes, wait a minute.
15:06: There's a super non-Calvinist, uh, moderator on the, we'll get, I'm sure we will.
15:12: We, we will get into some, um, some, uh, echo chamber, uh, discussion, like on what that can do to your, to your thinking later on.
15:20: I'm sure.
15:20: But anyway, without, I don't want to soak up any more time.
15:24: All right.
15:25: Well, the first thing I'm going to do is I'm just going to throw out one initial, almost immediate objection that almost I get from everyone.
15:33: And this will be, this will be this, the one that kicks us off.
15:36: I didn't plan the guys.
15:38: I didn't tell the guys, Hey, this is what we're going to do first.
15:39: I just, this is the one that was on my mind after this.
15:42: We'll start asking you guys, which ones you want to talk about? And then we'll go to the list from just say, uh, but the one that is so common.
15:50: And I hear this, I get this in emails.
15:53: I get this in text messages and things when people are engaging me from the show is the, is the idea that if you believe that God predestines men, uh, and women to, to eternal life, then you have to believe that men and women have no freedom in their will.
16:13: And, and the, and the argument usually comes about in the, uh, the argument usually is, is, is, is poised in such a way that they would say, you believe men are puppets and God is pulling all the strings.
16:28: And so I'm going to let Jake be the first to respond.
16:32: And, uh, then I'm going to see if Matthew agrees or disagrees with his response.
16:37: And, uh, Matthew, again, you have, you, you have the benefit tonight of, of, of being able to challenge us at any time.
16:44: Sure.
16:45: I may hop in at times, but I'm gonna let you guys do most of the talk.
16:49: And when it comes to the answering, uh, unless I just feel like I want to say something.
16:53: So Jake, what do you say to the puppet question? So I want to start off by saying I am not an expert at systematics, like by any stretch.
17:02: If I had to say, I have a theology specialty, I lean toward biblical theology, not systematics.
17:07: That being said, um, one, this is another one that has been well-trod and has been well-trod since before Calvin, like the, the sheer determinism has been around in many forms since like the church started arguing at all.
17:25: Um, so to kind of side branch in another argument, you'll get a lot of times people will say, well, you know, determinism didn't exist until John Calvin in the church.
17:34: Nobody had taught that in the church automatically.
17:37: I know you've done no reading.
17:38: You've done no reading because that is historically, that is not true.
17:42: Um, so, so one, I would say humans are absolutely completely free in their will to act in the way that humans born of Adam will always act.
17:54: We are completely free as creatures to act with our creaturely will.
17:59: This is a historic position known as compatibilism, that our will is compatible with God's decreed of will, the will of his, his ultimate decree.
18:09: When God says something will happen, it will in fact happen.
18:12: So what does that mean? We are free to choose salvation and we will never choose salvation on our own.
18:21: We won't.
18:22: Humans are free to choose salvation in the same way that, that fish are free to fly.
18:27: Um, it is not a thing that our nature will allow for.
18:31: We need a supernatural, um, uh, intervention from, from the Holy Spirit to be able to, to do that.
18:40: Um, and I think that's supported by, you know, the, the statement of the new covenant in, in Ezekiel, the idea of the heart of a stone being replaced with the heart of flesh.
18:51: And then this, the law being written upon our, our hearts.
18:55: Um, and, uh, more than that, all of these arguments would come down to, if you've done the homework of having a good ordo salutis, which means what is the order of salvation when a human being is saved? How does the order of those events happen? When were you, because you have to deal with the fact that the word predestined and the word elector in the Bible, when were you predestined? When were you elected? When were you called? When were you justified? When will you be glorified? And if you look and you do a thorough study of the Bible, when these things were stated to have occurred, right? Your predestination happened at the laying of the foundation of the earth before you were born, before the earth, this is part is key before the earth was formed, which means before Adam had his alleged choice, one way or the other, those who were predestined were predestined.
19:52: And so you follow that to Romans eight, right? Which says that the predestined are the ones who are ultimately glorified in that golden chain.
19:59: There's not an option in that chain.
20:02: The ones who were predestined will be the ones who were glorified.
20:06: So with a solid ordo salutis, you see the fact that it doesn't, it doesn't matter how you view it.
20:13: You are a creature and some creatures have been selected for salvation.
20:18: All right, Mr.
20:20: Matthew, you have a couple of minutes to challenge Mr.
20:25: And again, I do want to say this is not a formal debate, but we do have differing opinions here, and we have different ways that these questions would be answered.
20:33: And that's why we're doing this.
20:34: It would be not pointless, but it wouldn't get us very far if we all just gave the same answers.
20:41: It's good to be able to challenge one another, iron sharpening iron, as it were.
20:46: So Matthew, go ahead.
20:47: Sure.
20:48: So I'll start with the original question.
20:51: You said, what do you do with an objection that someone brings and says, well, that would make God some sort of puppet master or whatever.
20:58: And I think if you're a confessional Calvinist, as Jake would be a 1689, and then there's Westminster that's similar, but not identical to the London Baptist convention.
21:08: You know, and I'll quote it.
21:10: I'll paraphrase it badly from memory.
21:12: You know, God has decreed whatsoever comes to pass, but at the same time, not leaving humans.
21:16: Is it exculpable? Is that the word for it or something? Basically, but that he's decreed whatever's come to pass, but humans are still responsible for their actions.
21:27: I think that's one of the opening statements of the Westminster confession, if I'm correct.
21:32: It says it does not eliminate the participation of secondary causes.
21:38: Okay.
21:39: Secondary causes being that God has decreed all things, but that he himself is not responsible for sin because of secondary cause.
21:49: We're going to get to secondary causation later.
21:51: That's what it refers to.
21:53: Yeah.
21:53: So the idea of where people have a problem in thinking about this is that in the sense, in the objection, okay, well, if God is decreeing all of these things, then he's the divine puppet master and humans don't have any actual free will.
22:10: I think that is a misconception of what Calvinists are saying.
22:13: And I think Jake did a pretty good job at it.
22:15: He's saying that, no, you can, listen, man, you can choose to run in this track, this track, this track, this track, this track.
22:20: But one thing you can't do is repent and believe without a work of the Holy Spirit.
22:27: And so then the question comes down to, right? What is in the order of solidity he was talking about at what phase does that work of the Holy Spirit come? And is that a monergistic work or a synergistic work? And for the listener who may never have heard those terms, mono, single, single act, single work, synergism together or with one another work.
22:53: And so the linchpin question is, is it monergism or synergism? As I've heard Jake explain it before.
23:00: Is this act, which enables you to repent and believe solely the act of the Holy Spirit of God, or is there some sort of cooperation that goes on? And that sort of synergism monergism question is really the linchpin.
23:14: Now, Rome would have an answer that says there's a sacramental system and you got to work the levers and the gears and you got to do all the things.
23:21: And then I guess you would say more classical Arminianism would not have it like that, but there would be some action or some acceptance or some, some kind of initiating factor required on the part of the human.
23:34: And so I guess the, the compatibilism, the, the problem I have with the way compatibilism is stated as, as it sort of solves the problem is to say, okay, so God is decreeing whatever comes to pass over here.
23:51: And yet humans are responsible.
23:55: Most people on, on first blush, see that as a contradiction.
23:57: Now we can say, well, that's what the Bible teaches.
23:59: So we have to accept it.
24:00: And, and perhaps that's true.
24:02: And if it is, that's true.
24:03: Um, but to just say, well, compatibilism solves that because it holds these two things at the same time that to me, that's an insufficient answer.
24:11: Um, it, you know, uh, I'm going to be inside and outside the house at the same time.
24:17: And these two are okay because of compatibilism.
24:21: What, how, how, how is that brought together? I don't understand.
24:24: Um, and, and I have, I have read a book, like I, I have, and, and, and, um, and that's, that's something I think if I can represent the objector saying that that's something I would say would, would probably be what is stated.
24:41: And eventually, and when John MacArthur was asked this, he actually preached it from the pulpit.
24:45: He said, I have no, I have no idea how it works.
24:47: Beats me.
24:48: No clue.
24:49: Well, we accept the Trinity on the same premise, don't we? Like, like I can tell you all day long that God is infinite in his being.
24:56: Therefore he is able to have three persons.
24:59: We as finite beings can only have one person.
25:01: And the orthodox position goes, yeah, absolutely.
25:04: Makes sense.
25:05: Now, now there's a range of determinist thought within Calvinism.
25:09: Yes.
25:10: And we have to, we have to deal with that.
25:11: And that's hard on the internet when you're arguing with people who don't read.
25:15: Sorry.
25:16: Right.
25:16: Because they, they want to like force everybody into one box.
25:19: I tend to lean more toward a hard determinist edge.
25:22: Like R.C.
25:23: Sproul once said something along the lines of there's one rogue molecule in the universe doing its own thing.
25:28: Then God is not in fact sovereign.
25:30: I tend to agree.
25:32: And for me, it comes down to this.
25:34: What if God was a puppet master? What if he was? Yeah.
25:38: Created the universe.
25:40: When you create a universe, you can make the rules, right? You're going to get the answer that Job got, which was, Hey Bubba, where were you? When I laid down the foundations of the earth, right? Like he created all of this for his glory to display the grand drama of the cross to glorify Christ.
25:56: So like, who says you even should get a will? You're the creature.
26:00: You're the, you are the clay.
26:02: Should you look up to the potter and say, Hey, why have you made me such as this? And you know, people don't like that, but that's because we hate sovereignty.
26:10: That's our flesh.
26:11: Our flesh was designed to hate God's sovereignty.
26:13: And people don't like that answer either.
26:14: Cause it says it's also a sin for you to make ask that question.
26:18: I actually have, I have no problem with that.
26:20: I've, so I've said this before too, you know, you hear, you hear about some sort of tragedy or something like that, a natural disaster, whatever.
26:28: And it's like, yeah, that was, that's horrible.
26:30: That's awful.
26:31: I hate that that happened question.
26:33: If God had chosen to just obliterate those people by giant flaming meteor, would he have been just in doing so? Yes.
26:40: Yes, he would have, you know, people, people read the old Testament and they get all bent out of shape.
26:45: Well, God was commanding them to do genocide.
26:48: Okay.
26:48: But again, if this was a Sodom and Gomorrah situation, if God opened up a pit or sent snakes among them or dropped fire from heaven and just burned them all up as sovereign creator of the universe and dealing with, with sinful human beings, would he have been unjust in doing so? No, he would not have been unjust in doing so.
27:07: And that is hard.
27:08: And that took me years to get to that point of being able to say that, but it is, it is the truth.
27:13: And so, um, to your point, Jake, if, if we're just going to say, yeah, he could be the puppet master.
27:19: Fine.
27:19: I will accept your mischaracterization and I, and I will sit in it.
27:23: I would agree that, yeah, that is, I don't think that's what scripture teaches, but I do think that that wouldn't be a, um, that's not out of the realm of possibilities, you know? And on, you know, on the subject of salvation itself, it's like, well, is it a synergistic work? Is it a monogistic work? I think pigeonholing positions can be a bit harmful.
27:40: And here's what I mean.
27:42: Um, you know, when, when you pick out specific cases in scripture, you know, could Judas have done differently? Could Joseph's brothers have done differently in Genesis 50 or leading up to in the events thereof, you know, could, could these people have done differently in a lot of cases? I'm perfectly fine with, with saying, no, they could not have God specifically for his purposes, had it happened in that way.
28:03: But I wouldn't, I would not say that that's the case in all human action of, of all time.
28:10: That's where I would, I would differ a little bit.
28:12: Yeah.
28:12: Keith, what's your stance on determinism? Well, I think that what I'm going to really challenge what Matthew just said, um, because Matthew just said something that I think is, um, demonstrably untrue.
28:30: And I don't mean that to be a challenge that's too harsh.
28:33: No offense, man.
28:34: Um, you just said that God can have this sovereign act where he works out his will in the life of Joseph's brothers or in the life of all of these other things, but you don't think that's the way it has to be all the time.
28:47: I remember years ago, sitting, uh, at a Boston's pizza with a group of men that were having a Bible study.
28:53: And there was a man there who basically said the same thing.
28:56: He said, he said, yeah, I know it happened with Joseph's brothers.
28:59: I know it happened in this, this case or that case.
29:03: Uh, I'm sorry.
29:04: I'm there's this guy who's a, uh, a couple, a couple of people who are, who are, uh, a couple of people are saying some things and it's getting my attention.
29:13: I'm sorry.
29:13: I'll, I'll, I'll, I'll stop.
29:15: We got one guy who wrote a book, so we're gonna have to respond to his very long comment there, uh, in, in CWAC there.
29:22: So, but, um, what I am convinced of is that if there's anything that in what is, is, is outside of the realm of God sovereignty, that could be the one thing that would destroy all the rest.
29:36: And that's what Sproul meant when he said, if there were one rogue molecule in the universe, that could be the one that would take away everything else.
29:44: And here's, here's how that works.
29:45: And you've, you both heard this, but maybe there's a listener who hasn't.
29:49: And it's the, it's the for want of a nail analogy.
29:52: Um, you, you're, you're familiar with this, Matthew? For, uh, I believe so.
29:58: But would you just, just for my own edification, go ahead and, and the, the, the argument that Sproul made was, um, or, or the, or it was, it was all, it was almost like a poem, but it wasn't a poem.
30:09: It was a way he said it.
30:11: He said, um, for one of a nail, the, the shoe was thrown and for one of a shoe, the horse fell in battle.
30:20: And for one of a horse, the, the battle was lost.
30:24: And for, for want of the battle, the nation fell.
30:28: And for want of the nation, uh, the, the people were enslaved.
30:34: So the people were enslaved because of one nail and one shoe and one horse.
30:40: And so the argument there is that when you begin to give away the farm, and that's what I would say we would be doing by saying there are things that God doesn't determine is we are saying that, yeah, there are things that just happen or there are things that are up to us or whatever.
30:59: And in that sense, we have given away the farm because that, that would be the thing that would, um, you know, cause again, think of all the, think of all the moving pieces that brought about the crucifixion of Christ.
31:13: Every single thing that, uh, brought about, uh, oh, I get a little, getting a little, get a little upset in the, in the comments.
31:21: I was just kidding, dude, about the book, man.
31:23: Don't, don't get too upset.
31:24: I was just saying, it's, you know, I need to drop a tag group on this, bro.
31:26: No, no, no, no.
31:27: He just, he, you know, it's just like, you know, Hey, I was invited.
31:30: I'm not on a high horse.
31:32: I was just kind of joking, but you know, that's me anyway.
31:35: So the point of the matter is when we look at the issue of determinism and the, and the question of compatibilism, I would call myself a compatibilist, um, in that I do believe people's decisions in, in the realm of their own, in the realm of their own consciousness are, are their decisions.
31:54: Like, like if someone, someone came up, put a gun in my face, give me all your money.
32:01: Well, he's taken away my options in one sense.
32:05: I either have to give him my money or die.
32:07: But at that point, I'm going to have to make a decision.
32:10: And it's probably going to, it's probably going to be determined in my mind by several factors.
32:15: How angry am I? How willing am I to give up my life? How willing am I to take a bullet in the chest? All of these things are going to be in my mind, the factors that make this happen, but is my death ordained by God or not? Did God fashion my days before me, before the foundation of the world, or did he not? And so I have to look at that and say, yeah, from my perspective, I'm going to have all these things.
32:38: I woke up on the wrong side of the bed.
32:39: You put a gun in my chest, I'm going to take it away from you and feed it to you.
32:42: That's the attitude I got.
32:43: I'm probably going to die because I'm an idiot.
32:45: But in that moment, in that moment, that's, that's how I see God has still determined the day of my death.
32:55: So, and I, and I think, and the date of our birth and the date of our death, according to scripture, is fixed by God.
33:01: And those two things alone are a part of so many decisions.
33:05: I, you know, I, I, it's often pointed out to me that I can, can lose a few pounds.
33:10: Yes.
33:11: And I do know that that is a reality just in case anybody feels like making that comment tonight.
33:16: Yeah, I understand.
33:17: I could lose a few pounds, but will I die one day from a heart attack or will I die because I get run over by a bus? God knows, and God has determined that.
33:28: And so that's where my determinism comes in.
33:30: Yeah, I want to clarify that compatibilism doesn't mean that a human being is his own chaos agent and can bounce around within a contained space.
33:41: And then God kind of reaches over your will to get the thing that he wants.
33:46: The statement of compatibilism is you were created with your own creaturely will, which runs along a course that happens to be the course that God has also decreed.
33:55: Your will is free to do exactly what you, Matthew, were designed to do.
34:00: You are free to be the most Matthew you could possibly be.
34:04: And that is also God has determined your steps and your final destination, in my opinion.
34:11: So again, you know, like I hate playing the, it's the mystery of the timelessness of eternity card, but, but also kind of like, like God is either omniscient or omnipotent or he isn't.
34:24: If he is omniscient, I hope we're not going down the road of, of molanism and doing math.
34:31: Right.
34:31: I'm not an open theist or anything like that.
34:33: So, so everything that God has decreed to occur will, will occur.
34:38: And so I do also agree with the, with the rogue molecule theory.
34:41: There just is no such thing as a free agent.
34:44: Your will is, is yours to do what a creature will do, which is to play out the drama of God's intention on this universe to glorify Christ, by the way.
34:55: Yeah.
34:55: Like that's the point.
34:57: Okay.
34:59: Keith, you're on mute, buddy.
35:01: Oh, thank you.
35:03: I'm having a little bit of trouble seeing the, all of the, oh, and somebody's going to say this was, I'm doing this on purpose.
35:08: I promise I'm not having a little trouble seeing all of the, all the comments because they have kind of exploded.
35:12: We got a little, little, a little back.
35:14: There's a flame war going on.
35:15: That's a, that's interesting.
35:17: Yeah.
35:17: Yeah.
35:18: Let's leave our questions in like a question form and maybe not like an essay form because I can't read and talk at the same time.
35:24: Yeah.
35:24: Yeah.
35:25: I do have a guy, I mean, this guy, he said, I bet they won't dare answer my comment.
35:29: I can't see it.
35:31: Could you, could you form it? Can you phrase in the form of a question in a, in a, in a way that we could actually address the question? And again, if you're, if you're writing four or five paragraphs, we can't deal with that.
35:43: So not really interact with that.
35:46: Yeah.
35:46: I mean, I, it's not that I don't want to, and I promise it's not that I'm afraid of you just to be clear.
35:52: This is, this is, you know, just to be clear, I'm trying to pull it up.
35:55: I literally can't get it back.
35:57: He could probably debate you under the table and then he would martial arts your face off.
36:01: Please don't do that to me, please.
36:03: I am not anything special, but this, this particular subject is, is an important one to address.
36:09: And I do want to address the question.
36:11: I see Layton Flowers name has been dropped in the, in the comments.
36:14: Oh, I got a tech group for that.
36:15: Hold on.
36:18: We get it.
36:19: You get your theology from Soteriology 101.
36:21: Move along.
36:22: Jake's opening up the, opening up the jacket and pulling out of the shirt pocket.
36:25: Got that one, y'all.
36:26: I got a role in access tech groups.
36:28: That's right.
36:28: Yeah.
36:29: Yeah.
36:29: All right.
36:30: All right.
36:30: So okay.
36:32: All right.
36:32: So let me go.
36:33: All right.
36:34: So again, I don't know if that, I don't know if that satisfies you, Matthew, and I doubt that it would, cause I know that's something that you're struggling with, but that, that is, that is where I come down on the issue of, of determinism.
36:45: I do believe people make decisions and I do believe that from our perspective, those decisions are very real.
36:51: And I think this is what, in talking about reading books, I do think that this is what Jonathan Edwards was arguing in the freedom of the will versus the bondage of the will, which was Luther's argument with Erasmus, trying to prove as opposed to the, to the Roman position, which was that men are bound and unable to do.
37:11: Edwards was coming and saying, yes, men are bound, but they still have this, they still have this understanding of, of, of, of they're making the decision.
37:19: They are, you know, again, the gun in the chest thing, you know, I'm going to decide whether or not I'm going to grab that gun and go to town.
37:25: And, and so that's going to be, that's going to be part of what happens to me.
37:29: And I don't, I don't want to keep talking.
37:30: I'm going to, I'm going to move on to another question.
37:32: Why don't, why don't we do this? Why don't we, while I try to figure this out, why don't you pull something up from, let's, from your tag group? Why don't you pull up a new question? Okay.
37:40: Yeah.
37:41: So looking on, just say, I don't know, now my stuff's freezing too, man.
37:47: I think we broke the internet.
37:50: Wouldn't that be awesome if we had, if, if so, if there was so much interest in this, that folks actually broke our comment section, I'd be, I'd be somewhat pleased with that.
38:01: Well, I can't, I can't get to my list, but, but why don't we talk about, I know you recently did a video on John 3.16.
38:08: It was funny, but let's talk about John 3.16 for a minute.
38:13: And kind of the overall concept of biblical terms, right? So, so did God so love the world and does the world mean the world or not? Or another one would be, you know, 2 Peter 3, you know, the Lord is, what is it? He's not slow to count anyone.
38:33: What is, how's that one going? 2 Peter.
38:35: The operative phrase is not desiring that any should perish, but all should believe.
38:41: Yeah.
38:41: Yeah.
38:41: The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise to some counselors, but is patient towards you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance.
38:49: And people will go, oh, there go Calvinists again.
38:51: And he doesn't mean any and all doesn't mean all right.
38:55: So like, is that, is that a good one for us to get into? Which one? I think we need to pick one.
39:01: Okay.
39:02: Well, let's, let's, let's go with 2 Peter while we're on it.
39:04: Right.
39:05: Because I get that one a lot.
39:06: That's a lot.
39:06: That is one of the biggest, like, oh, I've got my, I've got my Trump card.
39:11: I'm going to play this card and conversation over.
39:14: Right.
39:15: So, so one, anytime, if you're out there and you're like, I bet no Calvinist has ever dealt with this one before.
39:21: Like, bro, you're, first of all, you're talking about 500 years of writing from like people way smarter than me.
39:29: I just want to say you have a tag group for that too.
39:31: I do have a tag.
39:32: I do have a tag.
39:32: You got me.
39:32: I never considered that.
39:33: You caught me.
39:34: I never considered that verse before.
39:35: Exactly.
39:36: Like, like, unless you've read all the things, probably some of these guys who have written commentaries on every book of the Bible have stumbled upon that.
39:46: And they didn't just go, all right, 2 Peter 3, 8, 2 Peter 3, 10, like, like, like it's out there, man.
39:54: And so like, if you want to get involved in these discussions, like just kind of like give yourself the honor of reading the other side of the debate, like read Calvin in his own words, which most Calvinists haven't done, frankly, right.
40:08: Read the, the, the Synod of Dort, read some of these like works that have really addressed this well.
40:16: So, so that bothers me.
40:18: Like, like when I see that in this whole, like, I bet you've never dealt with that or whatever.
40:23: I just want to be like, look, bro, I'm going to send you like a couple of links to some Amazon books.
40:28: Cause I'm not going to sit there on my Samsung Android phone and like type out a full reform dogmatics.
40:36: I'm not going to do it.
40:37: That's why you need a phone with a keyboard on it.
40:39: So yeah, I think, I think both of you are heretics because you don't have an iPhone, but that's okay.
40:44: But like, I have another chat group.
40:47: It's called, I already graduated seminary.
40:49: I will not be taking any homework assignments from you.
40:52: I'm not going to write, I'm not going to write a paper just because you haven't read the book doesn't mean the argument doesn't exist.
40:57: So 2 Peter 3, 9, here's, here's how this, and most of these arguments work, right.
41:03: Is you have to define your terms, right? So when you get to 2 Peter 3, 9, and you see the words, any and all not wishing that any should perish.
41:11: And he wants to save all of everybody in the world.
41:14: Number one, who is that letter written to, to whom is that letter addressed? And it's super easy.
41:23: Here we go.
41:25: 2 Peter 1, 1 to those who have obtained a faith of equal standing with ours by righteousness of our God and savior, Jesus Christ.
41:34: So right after that, this letter is written to Christians.
41:39: This letter is written to Christians.
41:40: So if I write a letter says to the Hinson household, everyone is welcome to come to my birthday party.
41:49: And the mailman opens that letter and reads those words.
41:54: Should he come to my birthday party? No, he is not invited just because it says everyone is invited to my birthday party.
42:02: That letter was written to the Hinson's.
42:05: Okay.
42:05: So when you're looking at 2 Peter 3 and you see he's not willing for any to perish, what the language is actually doing is it's skipping over a reference, right? He's not willing that any, and we fill in people, not willing that any people should perish, but we're filling that in, in our brains, because that's what we just automatically think.
42:27: But frankly, without context, it could say, he's not willing that any Doberman pinchers should perish.
42:34: He's not willing that any jet skis should perish, right? We are filling in the reference of that word any, and because we want to, because we have an agenda, we're putting in any human beings writ large, right? But that letter is written to Christians.
42:49: He is not willing to let any of the elect, any Christians perish.
42:55: All the Christians will be saved period.
42:59: That's the end of that.
42:59: There's actually no more to that.
43:01: That is how that is dealt with.
43:03: People don't like it.
43:05: But if you look at the word structure and check this out, check it out.
43:08: I carry this, keep this on my phone and I share it all the time.
43:12: It is the full sentence structure showing you that the nearest antecedent to those words, right? It's not the whole world in this case.
43:24: Now, now listen, I don't want to make this an argument by elitism.
43:29: I am not an elite theologian.
43:30: I'm not.
43:31: Okay.
43:31: But I have taken five semesters of Greek.
43:35: I used to be a Greek TA and tutor.
43:37: I still translate from the Greek when I do my sermons because that's, that's my job.
43:42: That's what I do.
43:43: Okay.
43:43: So like Greek matters, it matters.
43:47: And in a lot of these things, the nuance or some of the baggage that we place from the English onto a Hebrew or Greek word, those things matter.
43:56: And people spend their whole lives learning and studying and trying as best as they can to get back to the original language, put it back into its original context.
44:04: Read it back to the original audience, right? And then come at it.
44:08: So when, when a random internet bro is coming at me because he watched a YouTube video with late flowers, right? Like I'm not saying that I'm better than you.
44:17: I am for the love of the Lord.
44:18: I am not better than any of you.
44:19: I'm just saying on this topic, could we at least have like walked along the same amount of road together to have the same conversation? Because this is going to sound elitist, but I'm going to do it.
44:29: People who don't do that part.
44:31: They are children playing on the sand saying I have mastered the ocean, right? Meanwhile, I have a snorkel and I'm just like looking out there.
44:39: I'm like, no, man, there's like a lot, there's like a continental shelf and sea monsters out there.
44:44: I have not mastered this ocean.
44:46: There's a lot that like I'm not even capable of.
44:49: I'm not Dan Wallace, right? But you're sitting on the seashore saying, right? Like, well, you know, that, that seawater, I got it.
44:57: I got it covered.
44:58: Right.
44:58: You guys always saying the moon is made out of cheese.
45:00: You've never been to the moon.
45:01: Okay.
45:02: I'm done ranting.
45:02: All right, Matthew thoughts.
45:04: Well, I, I'm sorry.
45:07: I was watching some of the comments coming in.
45:10: You, you did, you, your answer was just called idiotic Jake.
45:13: So there you go.
45:14: I hope that's sorry.
45:15: It's the truth.
45:16: I don't know.
45:17: Here I get inside with me.
45:18: We have 10 new comments that came in while you were talking.
45:22: Just, just rapid fire.
45:23: It's great.
45:24: Um, all right.
45:25: So, uh, the, the one part I, the one part of your answer, I kind of scrunched my nose up at is, are any of the new Testament epistles written to anyone other than the church or the believing ones at their intended destination? I mean, I can't, I can't seem to think they are.
45:41: And I mean, the address of, of Luke acts, even as theophilus, who may be a person or it may be just friend of God, you know, we don't really know who he's specifically addressing it to.
45:52: It seems to me the new Testament is written to is, is almost exclusively written to and for God's people.
45:58: I don't, would we, I mean, we want to use it and demonstrate it and show it to the unbeliever.
46:03: Of course, I'm pretty sure you two are presuppositional list.
46:07: Um, and so that would be something important to do, but, um, then it would be difficult then to discuss, um, unless you have like an Ephesians two, one through three moment, it would be difficult to discuss a pre-Christian state or, or I guess a way to say it would be the assumption is that all statements in all of the letters are referring to current believers unless explicitly stated.
46:33: Otherwise, is that your, is that your hermeneutic? Yeah.
46:36: I mean, essentially, I mean, I, I'd have to probably break down every instance, but essentially, yeah.
46:41: The addressees of the letters matter.
46:43: Correct.
46:44: Okay.
46:45: But, but then, and then it would exclusively be the church or the believers, wherever it is that it happens to be written to.
46:50: But I mean, you look at a book like Romans and it'll, it'll tell you how you went from being an unbeliever to a believer, thus showing a systematic of how salvation occurs.
46:59: Or like Ephesians one, you know, you were this, and then God did this.
47:03: Yeah.
47:03: Okay.
47:03: All right.
47:05: Um, so when, when, because I'm a dork, um, and German, I'll mute myself.
47:14: I'm sorry.
47:14: Yeah.
47:16: Um, so, you know, I, I, in terms of being able to read original languages, I'm not, I'm not there.
47:22: I haven't taken, I haven't taken Greek classes and I appreciate the, the, uh, the jettisoning of the elitism, uh, label.
47:30: And I don't think I've ever felt that from you.
47:32: Um, on an, on an area of expertise.
47:34: Yes.
47:35: We need to, what did Paul say? Or in this case, Peter, um, what did Luke say? What did John say? Those are important questions.
47:42: Um, I, I do check it out in a couple of different English translations.
47:47: And then, and again, this is the part where I said I'm a dork.
47:49: I go grab the German because it does have a genitive case, which is super helpful in trying to figure out like what is, what connections is the author trying to make? Um, and the, what he's saying that, but he's saying that not desiring that any should perish, but all should, what's the, I'm sorry, what's the English you were using? All should reach repentance is the ESV.
48:19: Yeah.
48:19: Not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance.
48:23: Yeah.
48:23: I don't know.
48:24: Um, not, I don't think this is a, I don't think this is a terribly strong one against Calvinism, to be honest with you.
48:32: Um, I don't, it comes up a lot, but yeah, there are good objections to Calvinism and there are bad objections to Calvinism.
48:40: And I'm not playing the referee or something here, but as someone who doesn't, who's already gone on for 51 minutes about not being the Calvinist in the group, I don't, I don't think this is a terribly difficult one.
48:50: If, if the address of the letter is to Christians, um, then, I mean, look a couple of verses earlier, he's talking about, um, three onwards, last days, mockers will come with their mocking following after their own lusts, basically mocking the idea of Christ returning.
49:06: And then verse eight, he says, don't let this fact escape your notice.
49:09: Beloved the Lord a thousand days or a thousand days, like a thousand years, a thousand years, like a day.
49:15: The Lord's not slow in his promise as some count slowness, but as patient towards you, not willing any to perish, but for all to come to repentance.
49:23: It seems the context straight through.
49:26: If you just read the passage from top to bottom, it seems like it's talking about God's people there.
49:30: I don't have, I don't have an issue with that.
49:31: Yeah.
49:32: Yeah, man.
49:32: To my, to my bro over on CWAC, who's, who's arguing about this, my man, like you can't argue the context of, of the words away.
49:41: I mean, you just can't, I'm sorry.
49:42: I know you want to, but you're arguing with the Bible.
49:45: So it would be, I think, I think John three 16s.
49:50: So love the world cosmos.
49:52: I think that would, I think that would be stronger than this.
49:55: I'm not saying it's a ha ha.
49:57: You've never considered John three 16 before Calvinists.
49:59: Like, I'm not saying that, but I think that's a stronger case than this.
50:03: Yeah.
50:04: Let me jump in for just a second because we did start on John three 16.
50:09: I know at some point the all doesn't always mean all thing was said.
50:12: I think Jake said that.
50:14: And then, and then we jumped, we jumped to second Peter three nine.
50:16: And there is a, um, there's an important thing to remember.
50:21: And I, and again, I, I, I like, I always liked Roy Hargrave.
50:25: He, he was a, he was a, he was a man who knew how to say things that was just right on and simple.
50:33: And he said, uh, they got two or three verses.
50:35: We have whole chapters that address this.
50:38: And, and, and that was just his answer.
50:40: He said, yeah, okay.
50:41: There's second Peter three nine.
50:42: There's Matthew 23, 24, which I think that's it.
50:45: Where Jesus, uh, says, uh, oh, Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who stole the prophets and killed those who were sent among you.
50:51: How often I would have gathered you together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, but yet you were not willing.
50:56: That's, that's another one that's often cited.
50:58: And John three 16, he said, he said, they got like three or four verses.
51:01: We're dealing with, um, you know, Romans eight, Romans nine.
51:05: We're dealing with Ephesians one, Ephesians two.
51:07: We're dealing with, we're dealing with whole chapters here.
51:09: It's not just one or two verses.
51:11: And so the deck is stacked in our favor.
51:14: If you want to start going tit for tat with passages, uh, that, and that's, that was again, you argue that if you want, that was his thing.
51:21: I want to jump over to the questions on the, on the thing, because Shannon Herring is, is, is a, is a nice young man.
51:30: I don't know how young he is actually.
51:31: We've never met, but he's, he's been, he's been sending me messages for, for actually a couple of years, ever since I started the program.
51:37: First of all, Shannon, thank you for being a long time listener and, and, and being on the, on the channel tonight.
51:43: And he asked a very good question.
51:46: And, um, he, he asked the question, did the early church fathers teach Calvinism? Now, I, I, I would, I would be happy to address that, but I want to see, is that something that you want to, I, I'm sorry, go ahead, go ahead, Jake.
52:01: Um, so one, um, the, the, the early church fathers is, is not a monolithic group.
52:09: Okay.
52:10: So anybody who wants to argue that the early church all taught this, it's, it's not a fair representation of history.
52:18: Um, you have to be more specific in, in like, you have to like, even, even like in specific like epochs of, of the church fathers.
52:27: So yes, the, let's, if we just break down the tulip into its individual pieces, yes, they come up in early church father quotes, but the context of how they're quoting it and what exactly they mean does seem to vary a little bit, but like, it's not like people say, well, uh, uh, St.
52:45: Augustine came up with the idea of seed and then John Calvin turned it into a flower.
52:49: As I've heard that that is false.
52:51: So, so yes, the early church fathers did in different pieces and places pick up on, on tulip.
52:58: You'll, you'll see it throughout the writings.
53:00: Okay.
53:00: What is your thought, Matthew? I see you have a, a, a loving grin.
53:04: Please be gracious to our, uh, to our brother here.
53:08: Absolutely.
53:08: Uh, and thank you for the caution.
53:10: I think it's just the question kind of amuses me.
53:13: It's like saying was Paul Calvinist.
53:15: Paul had no idea who John Calvin was.
53:17: Paul was not omniscient.
53:18: Paul was an apostle and he spoke from God as he was carried along by the Holy spirit and he wrote scripture.
53:24: Um, but, but it's, it's a, to, to the person who asked the question, this is not meant as an insult.
53:30: It's sort of an anachronistic and amusing question because John Calvin did not exist until the 1500s.
53:35: Um, so I guess another, another way I would say it, and this is not to be pedantic, um, would the early church fathers having a chance to read Calvin's institutes agree? Um, would that, would they, was Calvin's theology consistent with the early church fathers might be a better way to say it.
53:54: And to Jake's point, yeah.
53:56: Um, you know, this came up with Francis Chan recently saying very silly things about communion.
54:02: Um, he's, he's, he said things like, did you know that for the first, and then he said, and these are, if you've ever studied any church history, these are wildly different spans of time.
54:12: He said, did you know that for like the first 500,000, I don't know, 1500 years, the church universally believed I'm like, stop there.
54:21: Listen, I have read maybe three books on church history.
54:24: It's the four volume set from Nick Needham and a couple of others.
54:27: That does not make me like, Oh, look at all the books I've read, but I've read a couple of books to just interchangeably throw out those three different time periods.
54:35: That's a bit anyway, but he's like, did you know that for the first 500,000, 1500 years, the church universally believed this? No, they probably didn't.
54:47: You could probably find a guy who wrote up, um, you know, a papyrus letter to so-and-so that didn't believe that thing.
54:54: And in the, especially in the early church, um, the one thing that everybody agreed on was probably monotheism and that's about it.
55:03: I mean, you know, the area and controversy was not extending into the fourth century because we had it all wrapped up neat and tidy.
55:10: I mean, you know, like core doctrines of the faith, what we would call definitional aspects of the faith, the deity of Christ was under attack and was the minority view in the fourth century.
55:22: I don't think it was up till then.
55:23: I think there was a diminishment of it in church history and the area and controversy and Athanasius standing against that and et cetera, et cetera.
55:30: But the point is, um, no, I, I don't think, I think you could find, I think you could find, uh, the positions that John Calvin espoused in the early church.
55:39: I think you could find other ones.
55:41: I think Clement has a couple of quotes where it's like, oh, well, you know, that seems to support more of a libertarian free will kind of thing.
55:47: But guess what? That doesn't make it correct.
55:50: None of those guys are, are apostles.
55:53: Um, if it is an apostle, we have it written down.
55:55: We call that scripture.
55:56: That's infallible.
55:57: We can go back to that.
55:59: Certainly if you have an idea that no early church father held, you should perhaps hold that idea with some suspicion.
56:06: It should put the brakes on it.
56:08: Um, but they are not, they are not found in sauce.
56:11: They are not infallible.
56:12: So yes, I find strong evidence of the all five doctrines of grace all the way back into the very earliest aspects of the church.
56:20: And you gentlemen would say in scripture itself, which is the earliest church documents that we have.
56:24: Um, but I find a variety of other ideas and I don't think that's necessarily the best way to like, okay, this is the thing we should, you know, we should believe.
56:33: Yeah.
56:34: Again, like we are the reformed tradition.
56:38: So like if you're making the argument that Rome was making in the 16th century, like maybe you should ask why you're a Protestant.
56:47: Like, like they also believe some other crazy stuff, but we're really going back to soul scriptura.
56:53: That is kind of the point.
56:55: So like, like, it's good to see that, that it's not going to be monolithic.
56:59: You're going to see, sometimes they're saying things that do lean toward predestination.
57:04: And sometimes they're saying things that don't just like we are today because we, in our writings are just as fallible as they, in their writing.
57:11: So to me, it's just not compelling.
57:13: To respond to the chatter in the group a little bit.
57:16: Am I going to let him off that easily? You forget you are not dealing with a Calvinist and an, a two Calvinist and an anti-Calvinist on this discussion.
57:24: You're dealing with two Calvinists and someone who has a high amount of respect for reformed theology, but doesn't personally hold it.
57:31: So I'm not going to, I'm just not going to go and cherry pick quotes from Clement and Irenaeus.
57:35: I'm just not going to do it.
57:36: You can do that yourself.
57:37: If you did that with any amount of like intellectual honesty, you will see that what I'm saying is true.
57:43: You'll get both from both sides, from some people, Clement on both sides, Irenaeus from both sides.
57:48: You just will.
57:49: So I'm not going to go cherry pick any more than I want to cherry pick the Bible.
57:52: I think this person was saying that I let you off the hook on the second Peter verse, but I, again, again, if my job is to get on here and, and to fire back and find a way to negate everything you gentlemen are saying, then yes, I'm not doing a very good job, but that's not why I got on here.
58:07: Plus there's no letting me off the hook on that.
58:08: I'm 1000% correct.
58:10: Well, I just, I'm just saying I'm not going to, I'm not going to browbeat you on that.
58:14: If I don't think it's a good point, I can't, here's something I'm absolutely committed to.
58:18: I'm absolutely committed to the, the, and the antithesis of the tag group title.
58:24: And that is that I will understand reform theology.
58:27: I will represent it accurately and where I disagree.
58:29: I will disagree with honesty and with kindness.
58:33: And so if there's, here's the thing, here's the thing about what I was saying at the very start of the show, five points of Calvinism.
58:39: There are aspects of all five that I would be okay with, but it's the application phase that I would not go that far with.
58:45: So if you were to ask me on the, on as, as your wife did Keith on the subject of total depravity.
58:49: So do you deny total depravity? No.
58:52: Well, do you accept it? As Calvin defined it and applied it? No.
58:57: To the extent that the Bible says that there is a sin nature that exists.
59:02: And what does that mean? And what do we do about that? Of course it's scripture.
59:05: We have to deal with the words that are on the page.
59:07: It can't mean what it doesn't say, say, and so we, we have to, we have to allow a little bit of nuance here, guys, and not, not you too.
59:16: I mean, the, the people, you know, we have to allow a little bit of nuance here and I, doesn't make me a 4.3.5.3 point Calvinism.
59:24: It could be 60% T 20% you 80% L.
59:28: I don't know.
59:29: I don't know what your specific systematic is.
59:31: And I imagine if we really drilled into it, the two other gentlemen on this podcast may have some, some minor tweaks between themselves on this.
59:40: And that's okay.
59:41: That's an okay thing to do.
59:42: And we have to remember this, the, the, the systematic acrostic of Tulip did not come out of nowhere, did not come from John Calvin, just thinking, Hey, I want to invent a systematic today.
59:53: Right.
59:53: He was, or not even, Hey, right.
59:55: People who were of the same school as John Calvin were answering arguments from the other side of the conversation.
01:00:01: And, and theology always happens in dialogue.
01:00:05: Always happens in dialogue.
01:00:07: When you want to argue about some of the silly things and he writes, as he says, some things that seem silly, he's not talking to you.
01:00:13: He's, he's talking to the far, far left of progressive Christianity, trying to bring some sense to them.
01:00:19: He's in that conversation.
01:00:21: You know what I mean? And so, so the same would be said of how Tulip is structured.
01:00:25: And I don't actually think the concept of Tulip is structured.
01:00:28: As I said at the beginning, I'm, I'm, I'm more into biblical theology than systematic theology.
01:00:34: So can I ask one Keith, or do you have one? No, I got to say something.
01:00:37: I got to cut you.
01:00:38: I want to want, first of all, I want to give a shout out to Shannon.
01:00:41: He did say, thanks, Matthew.
01:00:42: That would be a better way to ask the question.
01:00:44: And that's a good lad, Shannon.
01:00:46: Yep.
01:00:46: I hope I was not condescending.
01:00:47: It's a good question.
01:00:48: And before we jump away from his question, I want to say this.
01:00:52: He asked, his original question was, did the early church fathers teach Calvinism? And in a succinct answer, my answer would be, let me pose this question.
01:01:02: Did the early church fathers teach Trinitarianism? Yeah, right.
01:01:05: Because the question is based on, as you said, an anachronism as, as saying, this is something that they were not using the language that would be later codified.
01:01:17: And while I know with Trinitarianism, we're looking at a fourth century versus a 16th century codification, we're still dealing with the idea of how would these do? But I think he understands the answer.
01:01:27: I think he gave a gracious response.
01:01:28: And thank you, Shannon, for that.
01:01:30: Absolutely.
01:01:31: All right, your turn.
01:01:33: So I got one loaded from just say, this is from David Zimmerman.
01:01:37: And so this kind of goes off of what Matthew's talking about, about application.
01:01:40: And what I hear all the time, if Calvinism is true, why evangelize? What is the purpose of prayer, right? So you hear that a lot.
01:01:49: If everyone is just predestined, then if nobody evangelized, then all of those people would still be saved.
01:01:56: That's when you hear a lot as kind of a, as a good gotcha.
01:02:01: So Matthew, first, do you hear that one? And do you think there's any validity to it on its face before I talk about it? Yeah, before you proceed to steamroll it.
01:02:09: No, Jesus commanded it.
01:02:11: Next question.
01:02:13: Yeah.
01:02:13: I mean, like, that's good enough for me.
01:02:16: Here's the thing.
01:02:17: Okay, here's the thing.
01:02:20: That is a second or third order conclusion.
01:02:23: If this is true, then this is true, then this is true.
01:02:26: Therefore, I shouldn't do this.
01:02:28: Okay, but Jesus said, go make disciples.
01:02:31: And there is the book of Acts is the record of that occurring.
01:02:34: And so like, do you really want to take a conclusion about determinism and then read it back into the gospels about a command that you were given from Jesus so that you can kick your feet up and not do that? No, you shouldn't do that.
01:02:52: And if I can say to take the hyper Calvinist behind the woodshed, which neither of you gentlemen are, and I'm not, I'm not pinning that on you, but to take them behind the woodshed to say, I'm just going to drink my craft beer and smoke my pipe and read my Spurgeon, though he's probably not reformed enough for them.
01:03:09: Like you, brother, that is disobedience.
01:03:14: Like Christ said, go make disciples.
01:03:18: If okay, Paul was shipwrecked and arrested and beaten and tortured and all of these things trying to get the gospel, you read the book of Acts, he stays in an area as long as he can.
01:03:30: There's a Jewish mob tries to kill him.
01:03:31: He goes to the next city, rinse, lather, repeat.
01:03:34: If the assertion by the Calvinist is that Paul had the same understanding of sovereignty, election, predestination, and all that.
01:03:42: Paul did not buy your method.
01:03:45: Paul was the first and best evangelist.
01:03:48: I guess you could say Jesus, but that's Jesus juking the question.
01:03:51: But anyway so for me, I don't actually care what your soteriological framework is because the Calvinist and the non-Calvinist both say that the gospel must be proclaimed.
01:04:01: And that's simple enough for me.
01:04:03: Yeah.
01:04:03: So I completely agree with you.
01:04:05: But to get more into the theology of it, well, one, before I get to the theology, I will say it's completely ahistorical to say that Calvinists don't evangelize.
01:04:15: I mean, if you look at the 19th century, like the stories of the Scottish Presbyterian missions, I mean, completely rocked the world.
01:04:22: So there's a rich history of the reformed tradition being very involved in missions work.
01:04:29: Maybe it doesn't look like how missions is done today, but I would say that's probably a good thing.
01:04:34: Secondly, theologically, it's as simple as this.
01:04:38: God justifies the means as well as the ends.
01:04:41: And so if the end is that God is going to save this person, he also has planned and determined the means by that person's salvation, which could be Pastor Jim's sermon.
01:04:51: It could be you speaking with him over coffee about how the gospel has changed your life.
01:04:57: And the Bible also does prove, right, that if no man speaks and the rocks will cry out, God can speak through a donkey if he needs to.
01:05:06: Jesus can heal through the hem of his robe.
01:05:08: So the means by which people are saved don't depend on us.
01:05:14: That's what's important about that.
01:05:16: Like, if God wanted to, he could save people in any way that he wanted to.
01:05:23: But he has ordained that there will be people speaking the gospel as his, I think, primary means of how people are saved.
01:05:32: Now, there are also people who just read the Bible themselves, and the Holy Spirit regenerates them through the reading.
01:05:39: Some people take a much more dogmatic, how can they be saved if they haven't heard? And it becomes an auditory thing, and deaf people definitely get saved.
01:05:48: So I don't necessarily think it's that, right? But the point is that God has ordained the means, which is people proclaiming the gospel.
01:05:58: And so if you think that, again, and here's the alternate problem in Arminianism.
01:06:03: If you think someone's salvation depends on you, one, you've given yourself a ton of power, right? I have got to get out there because somebody needs me.
01:06:15: I think you've kind of misplaced where the power lies.
01:06:20: And two, that's going to put you in a position of desperation.
01:06:26: We discussed on a previous podcast the idea of how Arminian preaching, I have seen become very manipulative, emotionally manipulative, because it becomes the sense of, I got to do whatever I got to do to convince these people.
01:06:39: And so whatever I got to do to show them and scare them into heaven, I'm going to do it, which, again, it just misplaces the power.
01:06:49: The desperation of salvation is not on you.
01:06:51: It is to the glory of God.
01:06:53: But ultimately, I am satisfied with Matthew's answer, which is because that's what I was told to do.
01:07:00: Yeah.
01:07:03: Keith, did you want to say, I was going to just do one little thing in there, I guess but I'm going to say one other thing.
01:07:11: So marriage is a sanctifying experience.
01:07:14: And if you don't believe that you either haven't been married or you have been married for 15 seconds and not 30 seconds.
01:07:22: Let's say God wanted me to be a more, and I think based on what my wife has told me, I think I've gotten better about this since we've been married.
01:07:33: Let's say God wanted me to be a more patient person and a better listener.
01:07:39: And forgive the lack of holy terminology here.
01:07:46: Could God just do this and zap my heart into a condition where I am that? Yes, he could.
01:07:50: He absolutely has the power to do so.
01:07:52: But what if God instead said for the sake of her life and for the sake of his life and for the sake of others who are going to watch them and for the sake of all they're going to interact with, I am going to use marriage as the tool by which I grind off those rough edges and I have greater purposes.
01:08:07: Yes, I absolutely have the power to just do it in his heart, but instead I'm going to do it in this other way because I'm God.
01:08:14: He's fully capable and sovereign if he chooses to do it that way.
01:08:20: I have no problem with that at all.
01:08:23: When somebody asks me about the evangelism question, if God is sovereign, why do we evangelize? I say, well, if God ordained the day of your birth, why did your parents have to have sex? I mean, if the question is, why does one thing lead to the other so we don't need the first thing to lead to the second thing if God has ordained the second thing? This is again what we talk about when we address secondary causes.
01:08:56: We address God working through things.
01:08:58: My birth was ordained.
01:09:00: I have to believe that not only my birth, but my death is ordained by God.
01:09:04: Therefore, my new birth is ordained by God, and those things are brought about by him in his time and under his power.
01:09:13: And again, there was something that brought about my birth.
01:09:16: It was the action of my parents, and there was something that brought about, I know, a weird thing to think about.
01:09:24: And I've said that from the pulpit.
01:09:26: People say, oh, it's such a weird thing to think about.
01:09:28: Yeah, but I'm trying to drive home a point.
01:09:31: There is something that is required for my birth.
01:09:34: It had to happen nine months before I was born.
01:09:37: It is the necessary antecedent to my birth.
01:09:41: The preaching of the gospel is the necessary antecedent to someone hearing the gospel and believing and being saved.
01:09:47: The other necessary antecedent is regeneration.
01:09:49: I'm going to answer Mike's question real quick, because he says, does God give eternal life? And then he says in parentheses, regeneration to an unbeliever.
01:09:57: Calvinists twist it.
01:09:58: Jesus taught how sinners can believe, and then he goes on and puts some scripture.
01:10:01: Excuse me.
01:10:02: You cannot equate regeneration and eternal life.
01:10:04: That is destroying the order salutis.
01:10:07: Regeneration is the cause of our salvation, but it is not the only part of our salvation.
01:10:13: In fact, that is the problem that people have, is they begin to look at salvation as a flattened out thing rather than, as was stated earlier by Jake, that there are these things that are logically ordered by God, even though some of them happen at the exact same time.
01:10:28: I believe regeneration logically precedes faith, but I believe they both happen at the same time.
01:10:33: I don't think someone's regenerated on a Saturday, and they believe on a Sunday.
01:10:36: I think the two happen in time at the same time.
01:10:40: But regeneration causes faith.
01:10:42: And so I know we're going to start the comments again, but I do believe that is the part that people are missing.
01:10:51: And again, I'm going to throw out a shameless plug.
01:10:53: I did a podcast last week with Will Dobby, his book, From Everlasting to Everlasting, Every Believer's Biography.
01:11:01: It's a 30-day devotional on the ordo salutis.
01:11:03: Dude, get that book, because if you've not read a whole lot on this subject, it is a very well-articulated, reformed exposition of what happens in eternity past into eternity future.
01:11:18: And you have to examine the biblical data.
01:11:20: So a lot of times people say things like, you know, I just believe that there's like a tension, and there's both.
01:11:25: It's both free and determined.
01:11:27: And I said, that sounds really nice.
01:11:30: The biblical data, however, doesn't leave us with that opportunity.
01:11:33: The biblical data on predestination is that it happens before the laying of the foundation of the earth.
01:11:38: I don't know what you want to do with that data point, but I can't undo that data point.
01:11:44: The predestined ones, who are the called ones, who are the justified ones, who will be the glorified ones, those ones, when did their predestination happen? Before the laying of the foundation of the earth.
01:11:56: Now, that struggles with people because it's also before Adam.
01:11:59: We want to talk about this idea that, oh, well, Adam was also truly free.
01:12:03: No, I don't think that he was.
01:12:05: Adam was going to fall because he was also a creature who was going to fall.
01:12:11: Why? Because God wanted to show the superiority and the supremacy of Christ.
01:12:15: He wanted to show the necessity of Christ because all of the universe, read Revelation 5, the whole of the universe is sitting around looking to answer the question, who is worthy to open the scroll? It is the Lamb who was slain.
01:12:29: This whole drama to whomever is the audience, whether God himself is the audience, whether the spiritual council is the audience, I don't know.
01:12:37: But the whole drama of human and earthly history is to demonstrate one thing, the supremacy of Christ, not the value of humans, how great we are, how necessary we are, how free we are.
01:12:51: We are simply here to demonstrate as creation the supremacy of Christ, period.
01:12:58: You look like you got a thought there, Matthew.
01:13:00: Did you have something you wanted to add to that? No, I don't think so.
01:13:05: I think we can move on.
01:13:06: I don't have any problem with what Jake said about why God created and why we exist and all that.
01:13:12: Nope.
01:13:13: Sounds good to me.
01:13:14: All right.
01:13:15: All right.
01:13:15: So I'm going to turn to you, Jake.
01:13:17: Do you have anything from Let's Ask? Yeah.
01:13:20: Yeah.
01:13:20: Just say.
01:13:21: Just say.
01:13:21: I'm sorry.
01:13:22: So I'm going to read from Maddy Rose.
01:13:24: She's a good friend of the tag group World, and she brings up 2 Chronicles 7, 14, which proves that it's up to people to choose.
01:13:33: So if my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and will heal their land.
01:13:42: And I'll put that in a greater framework of, well, look at all the places in the Old Testament where it says, choose, choose life, choose this day whom you will serve, right? There's all this choosing that happens in the Bible.
01:13:54: So that demonstrates that we are being told to choose.
01:13:58: And so let me start by saying, yes, we are told to choose.
01:14:03: And the Old Testament will show you we did not choose well.
01:14:07: When left to our own devices, we might choose well once or twice, I suppose.
01:14:13: But the wisest man chose poorly.
01:14:16: The man after God's own heart chose poorly.
01:14:18: The strongest man chose poorly, right? So yes, we are being told to choose.
01:14:24: And what the Bible teaches is we won't and we can't choose well.
01:14:28: So yeah, the Bible says to choose.
01:14:29: The Bible also says to repent.
01:14:31: And we're not going to do that without the Holy Spirit first freeing us, regenerating us in the heart that is able to repent.
01:14:40: All right, Matt, go ahead, buddy.
01:14:42: I don't know.
01:14:44: 2 Chronicles 7.14 doesn't seem like...
01:14:50: Yeah, but the heart of the question is God tells people to make choices.
01:14:54: And what passage you choose is really, I think, inconsequential.
01:14:56: Not to say that it doesn't matter, but I do think you could say any passage where it says, choose this day whom you will serve, any of that.
01:15:03: Yeah, well, so let's...
01:15:09: Again, I'm committed to accurately representing reformed theology.
01:15:12: So let me state it and you guys can knock it down if it's not true.
01:15:17: There are...
01:15:18: Okay, so God commands...
01:15:20: God sets before them, I choose life this day or Moses, actually, I guess does.
01:15:24: So this day choose life or...
01:15:26: Okay, so God commands...
01:15:28: Ah, what that was.
01:15:30: Sorry.
01:15:31: Okay.
01:15:33: So God commands, you know, make a choice, choose life, choose death via Moses, who's acting as prophet there.
01:15:40: We Calvinists, the reformed perspective would be that the unregenerate person would choose poorly and the regenerate person may not always choose rightly, but has the capacity to choose rightly.
01:15:54: Is that accurate? In terms of salvation, the regenerated person will always choose Christ because you are freed to see Christ and his offer and its truth, and you will then repent.
01:16:09: Okay, so this is only in a soteriological context that we're talking about there.
01:16:14: I would...
01:16:15: Because that becomes a separate question, is sanctification monergistic or synergistic, which is...
01:16:19: Oh, no.
01:16:19: Okay, so I guess what I'm saying is like, all right, so if the gothic is presented to someone and that person does not have any sort of faith or repentance or belief, and then another person does, your assertion would be the only thing that is different between those two is the regenerating act of the Holy Spirit, which has taken place in person B, but not person A.
01:16:42: Is that right? Yeah, essentially.
01:16:44: All right.
01:16:46: Well, what about most of the Old Testament passages, because a New Testament soteriology really isn't in view yet.
01:16:53: There's not a Christ.
01:16:55: I mean, there's the Old Testament points to Christ.
01:16:57: It's all of those things, but those kinds of questions don't seem to get at the heart of the matter to me because what Moses is telling them is, here is God's law.
01:17:10: You can choose God's law or you can choose not God's law, and there will be blessings if you choose God's law, and there'll be curses if you do not.
01:17:18: I'm sure that there were some regenerate and some unregenerate among that group who mostly kept the law, and many regenerate who were terrible about keeping the law.
01:17:26: I don't think that those examples really get to the heart of soteriology.
01:17:31: Completely agree.
01:17:32: I completely agree with you because you're dealing with how the Old Covenant worked, which was not a salvific to eternity system.
01:17:40: It was a living with God physically as his presence inhabits the tabernacle of the temple.
01:17:46: Yeah, I completely agree.
01:17:48: While we're back there, let me ask you this about Abraham because Abraham is...
01:17:52: Before you do that, can I just jump in? It is your show.
01:17:56: How it will.
01:17:57: I know I'm supposed to be quiet, but this is really hard.
01:18:00: I've been sitting on my hands for a while.
01:18:03: What the lady asks about God giving the command to choose, and again, I often answer a question with a question, not to be argumentative, but to try to get them to think through the question that they're asking.
01:18:18: The question she's asking is, how can God ask you to make a choice if you don't have the legitimate ability to make that choice? I would say, does God command us to repent? She would say, yes, I'm certain, because the Bible in many places does command us to repent.
01:18:33: Then I would read in 2 Timothy 2 where it says, the Lord's servant must not be quarrelsome, but kind to everyone, able to teach, patiently enduring evil, correcting his opponents with gentleness, because God may perhaps grant them repentance, leading to the knowledge of the truth.
01:18:52: Repentance, I believe, is a gift, and God commands something we can't do to show our dependence on Him.
01:19:00: That's how I would answer that question.
01:19:01: Yes, God commands things we can't do.
01:19:03: He gave 10 commandments that we have not been able to do, and yet, where do we go to find the strength to Him? That is the only place that it can come from.
01:19:16: So that would be the way I would answer that.
01:19:17: Matty is a Calvinist, by the way.
01:19:19: Matthew, you look like you don't like my answer, and that's okay, but I think that's the heart of the question, so maybe I'm wrong.
01:19:30: No, I think you're right.
01:19:38: On the subject of God's law and God's commandments, when God defines good and evil, and He says, these things are good, these things are evil.
01:19:50: I think I know where you're going, because maybe I overstated what I just said.
01:19:54: We can't keep the commandments.
01:19:55: Well, yes, I can not murder, so that's where you're going.
01:19:58: Yeah, so I guess I'm not a Pelagian, before we go there, or even a semi-Pelagian, but I don't think it is outside the capacity of humans to choose life or death, good or evil, those kinds of things, in specific circumstances.
01:20:17: I would not affirm that someone can do that their entire life, or that I'm not a Baptist age of accountability type person or anything like that, but there are times that I have known people who we can't see inside hearts, but I know when they came to Christ 10 years later, and so I knew them 10 years before they knew Christ, and they had the option to make a poor choice, a God-hating choice, or a God-honoring choice, specifically in the context of marriage and family, and I won't go any more specific than that, and they chose to make the God-honoring choice, even though from my perspective, from your perspective, from anyone else's perspective, regeneration had not yet taken place.
01:20:58: Maybe it had, maybe it was a 10-year slow burn.
01:21:00: We don't know.
01:21:01: I'm not claiming to have a stethoscope.
01:21:03: I don't know, but all I'm saying is that I wouldn't agree with that.
01:21:07: I wouldn't say that, well, God commands things that we can't do to show us our dependence on Him, because people that don't have Him occasionally make the right call, so I don't think that necessarily holds.
01:21:24: But I would ask you, and I'm going to challenge you back.
01:21:26: Sure, yeah.
01:21:27: Okay, so do you think that whoever this person is who made this good decision, do you think they made that decision independent of God's providence, sovereignty, and decree? Well, from a deterministic perspective, you couldn't say that.
01:21:41: No one has made any choice outside of God's deterministic, or outside of a deterministic understanding of God's decree.
01:21:47: So that's how it fits in with my argument, though, if the argument is that they have to have God to make good decisions.
01:21:52: I would say outside of the common grace of God, no man would make a decision that is pleasing to God in any way.
01:21:58: I know that sounds kind of harsh, but the Bible says, that which is not of faith is sin, therefore you could make the argument.
01:22:04: I wouldn't object to that.
01:22:06: No, I think Romans 1 is pretty clear about that.
01:22:09: If a bad person...
01:22:11: We're going to get a little wishy-washy here.
01:22:13: Yeah, if an unbeliever makes a good choice, then did they...
01:22:17: Paul tells us that creation itself testifies of God, general revelation.
01:22:21: We have nice words for that.
01:22:23: And so if they choose to do so, then I don't have any problem saying that that was because of the grace of God, but I'm not denying their agency.
01:22:31: And I don't think you are either.
01:22:32: I don't think you are.
01:22:33: I'm not.
01:22:34: The opposite of that is the unbeliever.
01:22:37: Even their good works are counted as filthy rags.
01:22:42: And whether that's because their good works were done with the intention of satisfying, glorifying, justifying the self, God can use those in his providence toward good ends.
01:22:52: But the non-believer can do things that glorify God and are representative of godly choices, but not do such in a way that recognizes the sovereign Lord of the universe to whom all glory is due.
01:23:06: Okay, so yes, those are filthy rags, which is a very polished translation.
01:23:12: That's a nice way.
01:23:14: Yeah, but that is in...
01:23:17: I've always heard that preached in the context of doing enough good things to earn your ticket to heaven kind of thing.
01:23:23: I think that if you have an unregenerate, a pagan king or something, when Cyrus permitted the people of Israel to return back and rebuild their city, unless we're arguing that Cyrus was regenerate, Cyrus did something that pleased God.
01:23:41: That was a good thing that Cyrus did.
01:23:43: But didn't do it to please God.
01:23:45: But okay, so it doesn't earn Cyrus.
01:23:49: Cyrus can't do 500 of those and get his ticket punched to heaven.
01:23:52: I'm not saying that.
01:23:54: But I think God was pleased with that choice, right? He was...
01:23:59: Was God upset with that choice or am I screwing the categories up? I just think that the intentionality of the choice matters, right? So he did it probably for his own good, his own purposes, his own...
01:24:14: As a rebel king living in God's territory, he did it for his own kingdom.
01:24:20: Now that doesn't mean that me as a regenerate believer, I make every choice to honor God for the essential purpose of recognizing him as sovereign.
01:24:28: I don't.
01:24:28: And that's the whole point, right? As human beings, our thoughts and intentions are corrupt.
01:24:35: And so even when we do things that God approves of, we often do them to justify ourselves, to make ourselves look good or feel good or protect our stuff.
01:24:44: So that helps...
01:24:45: That pushes me to Romans 2, where you have these Gentiles that are keeping the law.
01:24:52: Like, what's that about? Those who don't have the law do what the law requires.
01:24:55: They show that there are a lot of themselves and the law of God is written on their hearts.
01:24:58: Yes.
01:24:58: Yeah, yeah.
01:24:59: So to me, it's a little bit of an escape hatch to say, well, those must have been regenerate people.
01:25:06: There's no evidence in the text of that.
01:25:07: We can read it from other parts of the Bible and say, well, if they're doing things that please God and they're keeping the law and all that, that must have meant...
01:25:15: Like we can reason backwards, but would it be your assertion that the Romans 2 Gentiles are regenerate when they're doing these things? No.
01:25:23: So then why were they keeping the law? Because in a lot of cases, the natural order, which is God's order, shows us that God's law is just right, perfect, and the example for how everyone should live.
01:25:35: But no, hold on a minute.
01:25:37: Hold on a minute.
01:25:37: General revelation and special revelation are two different categories.
01:25:41: This is special revelation we're talking about here.
01:25:44: They're keeping the law.
01:25:45: Not the law that's written in their heart.
01:25:47: That is the...
01:25:47: In fact, I would say it's not the law written in their heart.
01:25:49: This is where I'm going to maybe differ a little bit from Jake, because I would say the phrase is the work of the law is written on their heart, which I believe...
01:25:56: It says for Gentiles by nature do what the law requires.
01:26:00: It doesn't say that they're keeping the Torah by their nature.
01:26:03: They're doing the things, the ends that the law wanted, which was a just society, an equitable society, a society that takes care of the poor.
01:26:11: They're not reinventing the Torah and saying, hey, I kept all these laws, right? They kept...
01:26:16: They are doing by their nature what the law of God said should be done, which was treat each other fairly, so on and so forth.
01:26:22: If I'm reading Romans 2 correctly.
01:26:25: I'm skimming it now again.
01:26:26: I think the term works of the law is an important distinction, because often people say, well, the law of God is written on the heart, and that's not what it says.
01:26:33: It says the works of the law is written on the heart.
01:26:34: And you say, well, what's the difference? I do think that there is a distinction to be made there, because having the law written in our heart is the promise of a regenerate heart in the new covenant, according to Hebrews chapter 8, that having the law in our hearts in that sense is a new covenant promise to regenerate people.
01:26:51: But what the work of the law is, the work of the law brings conviction when we do evil, and therefore what they have is they have a conscience that God has placed there by God, and it shows forth when they reject those things which God would reject.
01:27:05: There is a conscience in them, and it's not as if they have the Torah as it has been described by Jake, but they do have a conscience which God has placed there so that they are able, when they face God, to not say, I didn't have any idea what was right or wrong.
01:27:21: They had the shame and guilt that comes along with error, and so they will be unapologetus.
01:27:27: They will be without excuse when they face God, and I think that's part of why.
01:27:33: I'm looking at 2.14 specifically, Matthew.
01:27:36: Yeah, so for when Gentiles who do not have the law instinctively perform the requirements of the law, these, though not having the law, are a law to themselves.
01:27:44: And it goes on to say, and the work of the law is written.
01:27:48: In that they show the work of the law is written.
01:27:49: That's the point you were- That's the point I'm making, yeah.
01:27:52: Their conscience testifying in their thoughts, alternately accusing or else defending them on the day when according to my gospel, Christ would judge the secrets.
01:27:59: Yeah, I don't, I'm comfortable with the distinction between special and general revelation, and that the Torah and then the New Testament being another form of special revelation was only given to a particular people, first the Jew, then the Greek, and it goes to all the nations.
01:28:12: But I don't mind that distinction, but you're saying that law here though is only referring to general revelation for these Gentile believers.
01:28:26: I think so.
01:28:28: Yeah, yeah.
01:28:29: By their nature, what the law requires, which is the things that God wants to happen as a result of the law.
01:28:34: What should the world look like if the law is popping? It is a world that is just where the poor are taken care of, right? Just general, it's not general like revelation, like general grace, like, oh, it rains sometimes and it's good.
01:28:47: It's more specific than that.
01:28:49: It is something that is unique to humanity, human beings.
01:28:52: I mean, there's a law before the law of Moses, right? The law of the Noahic covenant.
01:28:58: Whoever takes the life of man, his life will be required of him.
01:29:02: That's given to all of humanity.
01:29:03: That is a specific law given to all of humanity.
01:29:06: You know what right and wrong are because God gives it to you.
01:29:09: So are these Gentile, sorry, Keith, go ahead.
01:29:11: No, go ahead.
01:29:12: But what we do got to bring, we're at the 90 minute mark and we got a couple more questions I want to try to get through before we close out.
01:29:17: So go ahead.
01:29:17: So these Gentiles are regenerate, unregenerate, or indeterminate from, they're unregenerate.
01:29:25: Well, no, it's not in view.
01:29:26: It's all Gentiles who never had the law.
01:29:30: They're in the same position as you Jews are who had the law.
01:29:33: They're ultimately going to need the Christ, which is going to be revealed later, right? That's how Paul's building his argument.
01:29:38: Having the law is of some benefit, but not all benefit.
01:29:41: Not having the law is some curse, but not all curse, right? Ultimately what you need is Christ.
01:29:47: Okay.
01:29:48: I got more to go on that, but we're straying from soteriology.
01:29:51: It was good, but Keith wants to, yeah.
01:29:54: I've just got to get us back.
01:29:55: And it's not that this is not a useful conversation, but if we stop on this one question, we'll be here for another hour.
01:30:01: And we didn't say from the beginning how long we were going to go, but I do think we've lost some of the audience.
01:30:05: So I do want to address the questions that two people have asked.
01:30:10: One specifically is Chukwudu Uzumba, or I don't think I said that right, Uzumba.
01:30:17: And he asked a very reasonable question about the issue of multiple possibilities.
01:30:23: He said, is there multiple possibilities for how our lives will play out, whereas nothing but what your life ends up being the only thing that was possible? I want to ask Jake, I'm sorry, I want to ask Matthew first.
01:30:39: What is your, do you tell people that, yeah, things could have been different? Do you have the text of the question somewhere? I got a little mixed up there.
01:30:49: Okay, let me read it to you again.
01:30:51: Call me Chuck.
01:30:53: He says, call me Chuck.
01:30:54: Okay.
01:30:55: I'll call him Chuck.
01:30:55: Hey, Chuck.
01:30:56: He says, is there multiple possibilities for how our lives play out, or is nothing but what your life ends up being the only thing that was possible? Good question.
01:31:07: And I do think that that tips into Molinism a little bit, but I'm curious as to where you're at on that.
01:31:14: Matthew, do you think, do you tell people, yeah, well, it could have been different? Well, on Molinism, I think Molinism sounds really nice, except I just can't find it in the Bible.
01:31:25: So that's an issue.
01:31:27: It solves a lot of philosophical problems, but I just don't see the biblical data for it.
01:31:32: It creates more philosophical problems if you peel that onion, because it, I'm sorry, assumes that there's a force higher than God's knowledge.
01:31:40: Yeah, I don't, I'm not a Molinist.
01:31:42: I wouldn't advocate for that.
01:31:44: Could it have been differently? Well, that's how God describes it to us.
01:31:49: He says, very often in scripture, if you had done this, then this would have happened for you.
01:31:55: Like I would have brought you here and I would have brought you into a land flowing with milk and honey, but instead you did this.
01:32:01: I mean, what are the prophets saying constantly? You have rejected this and you have done this.
01:32:06: And Jeremiah says, if you had done this, then it would have been different because you couldn't, you know, Jeremiah seven, especially like, oh my gosh, if you had not done the Molech thing, then I would not have allowed you to be, you know, taken by these other Kings.
01:32:24: I guess I would say, I don't have a problem with saying that.
01:32:27: Yeah, it could have been differently.
01:32:28: You could have chosen differently.
01:32:29: Things could have worked out differently.
01:32:32: Does God see it that way? I don't know.
01:32:35: I mean, you have, I think Isaiah 42 or 40, something like that.
01:32:40: It says he declares the end from the beginning.
01:32:42: Like, I don't know.
01:32:46: I'm not sure.
01:32:48: I'm willing to sit in a little bit of ambiguity on that one, only to say that there's a difference between how we would perceive it and how God would perceive it.
01:33:00: And also God affirms the possibility that you could have done something differently.
01:33:05: But you didn't.
01:33:06: And so now here we are, so.
01:33:09: Yeah.
01:33:09: What do you think, OJ? Peter and Paul does that too.
01:33:11: Like if you, you crucified the author of life, the Prince of Life, and guess what? Now here, now here you are and they're cut to the heart.
01:33:18: So does God offer options that, that he says there would be this result if you chose an option? Yes.
01:33:28: Did history play out exactly how it was intended to play out? Correct.
01:33:32: So are there multiple possibilities? No.
01:33:39: There are not.
01:33:40: You've been waiting all evening for that one.
01:33:41: There are not.
01:33:43: There are not.
01:33:44: Remember the Old Testament exists to point us to and prepare for Christ who came at the appointed time.
01:33:51: And so all of the things, especially in the Old Testament data that led us down the road.
01:33:56: So you could have chosen to listen to the prophets, but you didn't.
01:34:00: Why didn't they? To lead us to the appointed time whereupon Christ was going to come and reveal God to us in his totality.
01:34:06: So, so no, I don't believe that at all.
01:34:08: Well, we're back to what Keith was saying, where he said, and I don't take offense by it, but it was the strongest language you've used on one of my positions so far.
01:34:16: You said, I think what you said is demonstrably wrong.
01:34:18: And again, that is not offensive to me.
01:34:20: We're talking about ideas, not people.
01:34:21: You're not insulting me.
01:34:23: I love you.
01:34:25: I'm going to use a down home analogy, right? I'll take that in the way I'm sure it was intended.
01:34:30: Somebody said the other day, we should tell our friends we love them and make it weird.
01:34:33: Well, I just did.
01:34:34: So you told me on an earlier show, you have 100% unblemished record of heterosexuality.
01:34:39: So absolutely.
01:34:41: So to use a down home analogy, right? Like I can offer my daughter a chocolate popsicle and a broccoli stick, right? She's, she will choose the chocolate popsicle.
01:34:52: She will, because I know her and I know what she will choose.
01:34:56: God's knowledge of us is way more in, you know, intimate than that.
01:35:01: And he created us for a purpose.
01:35:04: So yeah, I just don't, I just don't buy it.
01:35:06: Hey, can we do a Michael Payton's question? He had a good question.
01:35:09: Let me just quickly add one scripture verse.
01:35:11: For truly in this city, there were gathered together against your holy servant, Jesus, whom you anointed both Herod and Pontius Pilate, along with the Gentiles and the people of Israel to do whatever your hand and your plan had predestined to take place.
01:35:22: All of those men had their own plans and their own ideas, but God's plan ultimately prevailed.
01:35:27: And that's what I tell people when they ask me, could it have been different? I say, ultimately God's plan did prevail.
01:35:33: And that's my answer.
01:35:35: A hundred percent.
01:35:36: I don't have a problem with that.
01:35:38: I mean, you did just read the Bible, so I can't really have a problem with that.
01:35:42: So Michael Payton asks, I hear this a lot.
01:35:45: Calvinists believe God just doesn't love some people.
01:35:47: Is his patience and provision for the unbeliever as they draw breath and live, not him showing love and mercy.
01:35:54: So, so Matthew, does God love everyone or does he love some people and hate some people? I think creation itself is an act of love.
01:36:03: I mean, like, and I mean, the Old Testament talks about this.
01:36:07: I don't know if it uses the term love, maybe not Chesed, but it would, you know, like the idea of the rain falling on the righteous and the wicked, you know, I guess in a sense, the fact that God doesn't obliterate us the moment that we sin, though he would be just in doing so.
01:36:23: Is that, that's, that's mercy.
01:36:25: That's grace.
01:36:27: So does he show mercy and grace to the unbeliever? And from the Calvinist perspective to the unregenerate predestined to damnation, does he still show a measure of love and grace? Yes, absolutely.
01:36:38: He does.
01:36:39: I think where we would differ is that perhaps has he shown sufficient grace and, and love for them to be capable of repentance.
01:36:47: You would say apart from the Holy Spirit of God performing a work on the heart called regeneration and a higher measure of love and grace.
01:36:55: No, that can't happen unless those things happen.
01:36:58: Is that, would that be accurate? Yeah, yeah, definitely.
01:37:00: I think what you say, he, in his justice, in giving creatures who have sinned against him and owe an eternal debt, as he sends them to their point of justice and receiving his wrath, he is still loving them in that capacity.
01:37:16: Those creatures are receiving his justice, which is also his love.
01:37:20: I completely disagree with the dude on American gospel too, who's, who's, you know, says, oh, you can't say that God is all justice and all love.
01:37:28: I think he's just love.
01:37:30: No, his justice is his love.
01:37:32: He cannot be less just.
01:37:34: He cannot be less loving.
01:37:36: He is those things.
01:37:37: God's chesed love, his loving kindness, which is keeping of the covenant.
01:37:42: How does he display his love and kindness to us? By keeping his covenant.
01:37:46: And we are all covenant breakers.
01:37:48: So when we get what we deserve as being covenant breakers, he is loving us by being faithful, by being who he is.
01:37:55: Now, is that awful for the people who get what they deserve? Yes, it's terrible.
01:38:03: So at the same time, that should send me into like unbelievable wonder and awe at the mercy that I don't deserve.
01:38:11: Because what I do deserve is that.
01:38:14: And really what it comes down to for me when I get into these arguments and debates online is people fundamentally think that human beings deserve heaven.
01:38:22: They just do.
01:38:23: People fundamentally believe that human beings deserve a chance to go to heaven.
01:38:30: Human beings from the biblical data do not deserve heaven.
01:38:35: Do not.
01:38:36: We deserve what we have earned, which is eternal damnation.
01:38:41: We have sinned against a righteous and holy God.
01:38:44: The smallest of sin is an infinite sin because it was against an infinite God.
01:38:48: And so all humans deserve death.
01:38:51: We never should have been born, right? God could have taken Adam and said, on that day, you shall surely die, slain Adam, and thus none of us would be here.
01:39:00: So none of us deserve to go to heaven.
01:39:03: But people fundamentally think that we do.
01:39:06: And so R.C.
01:39:08: Sproul said, Tulip really rises and falls on tea.
01:39:12: Do you actually believe that? Total depravity doesn't mean, oh yeah, we all do bad stuff.
01:39:17: No, total depravity means we all deserve hell, period, period.
01:39:21: We all deserve hell.
01:39:22: But God, right, has chosen, I will give mercy on whom I will give mercy.
01:39:28: And I'm not going to demand an answer from him.
01:39:31: I just want to point out, someone commented, but God, about 10 seconds before you said it.
01:39:34: So that was a little bit, because I'm watching this live.
01:39:36: They're seeing it delayed a little bit, I guess, because just how it takes to get through the internet.
01:39:40: So yeah, but God.
01:39:42: So, so tell me why humans deserve heaven.
01:39:44: Why, why do you think that? If it rankles your heart to go, well, God told those people that they're absolutely going to hell with no chance.
01:39:52: Why do you think they deserve otherwise? I, I know, I think you're saying that to a generic objector, but I'll answer.
01:39:58: Yeah, not you.
01:39:59: Yeah, I don't, I don't think humans do deserve heaven.
01:40:02: But I think that's, I think it's, I think there's a bit, it's dichotomous there.
01:40:07: If humans deserve heaven and God doesn't give us to it, give it to us, then he's unjust, right? Like if, if we deserve heaven, he doesn't give it to us, then we're unjust.
01:40:15: If we all deserve hell and he gives it to, and he doesn't give us hell, he gives us something else.
01:40:20: He's also unjust.
01:40:22: This problem gets solved with the cross, of course.
01:40:24: Like I'm not, is God unjust? May it never be, you know, like I'm not, I'm not suggesting that, but there is perhaps, you know, a middle ground there, which is what I was sort of leading off with.
01:40:36: And I guess it would have to get into a discussion of the, you know, what is the capacity of turning to God? What must happen first for that to occur? And I think that, that you said, you said humans, people believe they have, they deserve heaven or they deserve a chance at heaven.
01:40:52: I don't think either of those is true.
01:40:54: I think that if you are given a chance at heaven, that that is an act of grace.
01:40:58: And I don't have a, I don't have a problem saying that.
01:41:01: I don't think you do either, but you wouldn't call it a chance.
01:41:03: You would say that it is.
01:41:04: Yeah, God, it is, or it's going to happen or it's not in your heart.
01:41:07: Right.
01:41:08: So, so my favorite argument in Calvinism, my favorite is James White-ism, right? Which is God will save absolutely everyone whom he intends to save, period.
01:41:18: My God is able to save all of those.
01:41:20: There is not a single person that God looks at and goes, I wish I could save you, but I was unable to convince you.
01:41:27: All of my followers were unable to convince you.
01:41:30: My word, which has been kept through the ages, my revelation in the stars, I wish that I could save you.
01:41:37: But I just, you know what? I value your freedom more.
01:41:40: God is able to save and will save everyone whom he intends to save.
01:41:45: And none of those people deserve it.
01:41:47: All of those people should look up and go, God, why, why, why me? I don't, I don't.
01:41:52: And he says, no, you don't.
01:41:54: It is for my glory, is to the praise of his glorious grace.
01:41:58: I have to throw a quick illustration in here.
01:42:01: And I know you both have probably heard this, but maybe there's a listener who hasn't.
01:42:05: If you have two men who visit a church, never having gone to church before, they're both standing in the same pew.
01:42:15: They're hearing the same music.
01:42:17: They're hearing the same message.
01:42:20: And come the time of the invitation, because apparently this isn't a reformed church.
01:42:26: Bazinga.
01:42:28: Pastor Jim's Bible church.
01:42:31: But Pastor Jim has given a good gospel presentation.
01:42:36: And one of those men chooses to walk the aisle, and it is a legitimate conversion, and he receives Christ.
01:42:43: And the other man remains obstinate in his sin.
01:42:48: And I remember this being, this was not the nail that cinched it for me, but this was a good illustration, because the question was, was it something in that man that caused him, that he could look back to and say, somehow I was better.
01:43:05: Somehow I was more spiritually sensitive.
01:43:07: Somehow I was more able to be molded by the Spirit of God.
01:43:15: Or was it God who chose? And that's really the heart of Chosen by God, the heart of the idea of Calvinism, is that what made the one go and the other not is the work of the Spirit of God.
01:43:28: Now, people don't always agree with that, but I have to ask them, okay, so do you believe it was something in the man that was different, that there was something in him that was more spiritually sensitive, something that was more malleable, something that was better? And I can't go there.
01:43:46: I can't go there.
01:43:48: And Chuck just said, yep, that's James White's question.
01:43:50: I know where my stuff comes from.
01:43:53: I cut my teeth on Potter's Freedom, Chosen by God, and I'm very thankful for James White.
01:43:59: I'm very thankful for all those men who were mentoring me from afar 16 years ago when I entered the pastorate and who didn't even know my name.
01:44:12: Keith and I are friends because we were James White groupies.
01:44:18: That's how we met.
01:44:19: Yeah.
01:44:20: And to the listener who thinks that I haven't read, and I hope no one thinks this at this point, thinks that I haven't read a book, I can probably guarantee you I've listened to more dividing lines than you have.
01:44:29: Probably.
01:44:29: Yeah.
01:44:31: Yeah.
01:44:33: If you actually looked at my podcast history, because like I said, I am not allergic to reform theology.
01:44:38: And James White is one of the most fervent defenders and advocates of reform theology in modern American Christianity.
01:44:46: I am not afraid of listening to what he has to say.
01:44:49: I don't always agree with him.
01:44:51: And that's an okay thing.
01:44:52: It really is.
01:44:54: Yeah.
01:44:55: Yeah.
01:44:56: Well, gentlemen, we are getting close to the two hour mark.
01:44:59: We're at one hour and 47 minutes.
01:45:02: I did not get all the questions.
01:45:04: We did not.
01:45:05: But I have a question for the audience.
01:45:07: If you're out there, if you want us to do this again, put it in the comments.
01:45:11: Say, hey, guys, plan another one of these.
01:45:14: And if you want us to participate, because I know Jake is in a situation where his weeknights are a little open right now.
01:45:22: And I don't know about Matthew.
01:45:23: The only thing I know is within the next four weeks, I'm going to have a little one.
01:45:27: So if we did it again, and this is going to be baby number six for me.
01:45:31: So if we do it again, we're probably to do it pretty soon.
01:45:33: But if you want us to plan another one, let us know, we will plan it.
01:45:37: But I do have an email I have to share, because I said I was going to do it from the beginning.
01:45:40: This was directed directly at Matthew.
01:45:42: This is from Richard Roden.
01:45:45: Oh, Uncle Rich.
01:45:47: And he said, what I'd like to know is why Matthew thinks he's better than me.
01:45:51: Oh, shoot.
01:45:52: Actually, same question.
01:45:54: I agree.
01:45:55: Why do you think you're better than me that you can be on the show more than me? Oh, why did I think I'm better? I mean, you know, we talk, I know we got to close out, but a little bit of echo chamber is like, Keith, the very first episode you and I did was questions about Calvinism is what it was entitled.
01:46:10: And what you told me is, and this is nothing against your congregation.
01:46:13: It just means you've been consistent in your preaching that a non-Calvinist is like seeing an albino tiger for some people like, yeah, like those exist.
01:46:22: They don't, well, then we must learn more about the species of Christian that we are unfamiliar with.
01:46:27: And, you know, I'm not saying your church is simpletons or anything like that, but I'm saying there does tend to be an unfortunate echo chambering that goes on.
01:46:37: And I've just committed to reading as much as I possibly can, especially from people who disagree with me.
01:46:45: We just disagreed tonight and I still love you guys just the same heterosexually.
01:46:52: That has to be clarified, Keith.
01:46:54: Yes, I said, we said, make it weird.
01:46:57: Well, there you go.
01:46:59: And again, I brought this as a prop, but like, this isn't something I'm afraid of.
01:47:05: I mean, at a time, most of my friends, I was the token, still am in a lot of ways.
01:47:10: I'm the token non-reform guy in the group threads.
01:47:13: And I'm okay with that.
01:47:16: And, you know, if it's still a yet, if you think, you know, well, then this is going to happen someday.
01:47:20: Maybe, you know what, maybe.
01:47:22: And if study of scripture and study of various works of reformed theology and hanging out with people leads me to that place, then okay.
01:47:30: Because even now not being reformed, I don't fear becoming that someday.
01:47:34: I don't think it's going to happen, but I didn't either.
01:47:38: Yeah.
01:47:39: Chris profile just said, that's gay.
01:47:42: No, you.
01:47:43: Yeah, yeah, okay.
01:47:45: All right, Jake, I'm gonna let you finish this out, brother.
01:47:46: You have something you want to say or answer? Make a few remarks before we close out.
01:47:50: I just want to close out on this.
01:47:51: One, I love talking theology.
01:47:54: I love when we can do it in a friendly manner.
01:47:56: I'm not in my cage stage anymore.
01:47:58: So if you try to come at me on the internet, I'm just not.
01:48:01: You're going to get a tag group and I'm going to be done.
01:48:03: Okay, but I will say this.
01:48:05: Please do not take your understanding of an other theological framework from the opponents of that framework.
01:48:15: Read these people in their context.
01:48:18: Read Calvin in context.
01:48:20: Yeah, that's me right now.
01:48:21: Read Calvin in context, read Sproul, read James White.
01:48:27: Read the material in their context first, and then really ask yourself before you want to go at it with somebody, has this ground been trod? What are the best arguments against this? The best arguments against this that have already been out there.
01:48:45: And then if you still want to go at it, then we can get down to the pronoun usage and the genitive and the Greek, because that's really where this stuff lies.
01:48:55: I'm not saying that there aren't any good arguments against reformed theology.
01:48:59: I'm just saying I don't ever get to see them on the internet.
01:49:03: And definitely, this will be my final thought, no good arguments come from Layton Flowers, zero.
01:49:10: He is not a good opponent of reformed theology.
01:49:13: So find a good one and we'll have that conversation.
01:49:16: But it's not him.
01:49:16: Please join us at Just Say You Don't Understand Reformed Theology and move along.
01:49:21: And this has been a really great night.
01:49:23: Thanks for having me.
01:49:23: Thank you, Jake.
01:49:24: And thank you, Matthew.
01:49:26: And yours is the papacy one.
01:49:30: Go ahead and check it out.
01:49:30: Yeah, we should talk about Rome sometime, even though we'd all be on the same side of those issues.
01:49:35: Absolutely.
01:49:36: Well, I want to again thank you all for being with us tonight for this live edition, which went up to almost two hours.
01:49:42: And I want to put out a plea.
01:49:43: If you are enjoying this program, please come on to the group and join the group.
01:49:49: It's an open group.
01:49:50: Anyone can join.
01:49:52: And we just went over 400 members today.
01:49:54: And I was really excited to see that.
01:49:56: I put a little post out about it.
01:49:57: Also, if you're interested and you wouldn't mind helping me out, go over to the YouTube page.
01:50:02: It's now youtube.com slash conversations with a Calvinist.
01:50:06: I know that's a long thing to type, but if you go youtube.com slash conversations with a Calvinist, you can go there and see the shorts videos that I've been making.
01:50:14: Some of them are rather humorous and they are, that's a way for me to reach a larger audience and larger community on YouTube.
01:50:21: And every time somebody goes there and likes and subscribes to that channel, it just helps put me in this program in front of a larger audience.
01:50:29: So if you don't mind helping me out, please do that.
01:50:31: If you have a question that you'd like for us to address on the next, I've had enough people say they want us to do it again.
01:50:35: We're definitely going to do it again.
01:50:36: If you have a question that you would like for us to address, you can drop it to either one of these men or you can send it to me directly at Calvinist podcast at gmail.com.
01:50:45: Thank you for listening and participating with conversations with a Calvinist.
01:50:50: My name is Keith Foskey and I've been your Calvinist may God bless you.