Radio Free Geneva: Reviewing Pastor Eric Hankin's NOBTS Chapel Sermon on Election

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A mighty fortress is our God, a bulwark never failing.

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I don't like Calvinists because they've chosen to follow John Calvin instead of Jesus Christ. I have a problem with them.

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They're following men instead of the Word of God. Our helper he amid the flood of mortal ills prevailing.

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Knocked hands, standing on top of my feet, standing on a stump and crying out,

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He died for all those who elected, were selected. For still our ancient foe doth seek to work us low.

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His craft and power are great and armed with cruel hate.

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Well, first of all, James, I'm very ignorant of the reformers.

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On earth is not his equal. I think

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I probably know more about Calvinism than most of the people who call themselves Calvinists.

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Did we in our own strength confide, our striving would be losing.

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For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever were not the right man on our side, the man of God's own choosing.

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Ladies and gentlemen, James White is a hyper -Calvinist. Now, whatever we do in Baptist life, we don't need to be teaming up with hyper -Calvinists.

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Dost ask who that may be? Christ Jesus, it is he.

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I've said the other day in class that I don't understand the difference between hyper -Calvinism and Calvinism.

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It seems to me that Calvin was a hyper -Calvinist. Right, I don't think there is typically any difference between Calvinism and hyper -Calvinism.

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Lord Sabaoth is name. Read my book. From age to age the same, and he must win the battle.

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And now, from our underground bunker hidden deep beneath Liberty University where no one would think to look, safe from those moderate

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Calvinists, Dave Hunt fans, and those who've read and re -read George Bryson's book, we are

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Radio Free Geneva, broadcasting the truth about God's freedom to save to his own eternal glory.

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And of course, we had to utilize special voice processing to hide the identity of that last voice, because being so close to Liberty University, there was great danger in his maintaining that last outpost of Reformed Theology in that particular area.

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So we masked the voice so that even the NSA does not know who is hidden under Liberty University and why a

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Calvinist would be living under Liberty University. Anyway, welcome to Radio Free Geneva.

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Thanks very much. I learned a while back that because we are trying to, you know, follow the letter of the law, that we would be losing our themes and things like that.

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And it's a great, great encouragement to know that we have friends out there that are helping us to get things back together again.

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That, of course, was the great Clyde Bauman, who is mainly famous for having the in with the even more famous Milo Hotzenbuehler.

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Infamous. Infamous Milo Hotzenbuehler. I'm not sure Milo would know the difference between famous and infamous, personally.

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It's a language thing. But anyway, Clyde helped us to put together that opening for Radio Free Geneva.

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And as I've mentioned on Twitter, I've already heard some of the new material that Gray Level is working on just for this program.

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It's just for us. We're excited about that. And that's that's exciting stuff. So Radio Free Geneva today.

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Let me just mention before we get started that we're going to do this for an hour and then we're going to take a hour break.

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And immediately after that point in time, what is it, eight o 'clock

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Eastern Standard Time, six o 'clock Mountain Standard Time, we will be hosting.

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This is Confessing Baptist. The group got together and they arranged.

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They made the initial contacts to contact Michael Brown and Sam Waldron to debate the issue of the nature of the sign gifts, the miraculous sign gifts, and whether they continue in the church today or whether they had a purpose that was completed in the past.

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And that debate will be taking place for an hour and a half. I will be moderating it.

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You might want to pray for all the technical stuff that is required to have three folks on Skype together and get that to you via YouTube only.

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The audio stream will not be available. We will make it available later.

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I mean, we're going to record it and make that available later. But to make sure that, you know, we're asking one computer to do a lot of stuff here.

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And so it's primarily going to be available on YouTube for you to listen to.

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And then the recording, of course, will be made available to Michael Brown's folks and Sam Waldron's folks and to Confessing Baptist.

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And we're going to post it. And we just want to get it all out there in all the ways we can. And they will be debating.

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I think that'll be excellent. Both of them have written books on this particular subject.

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And I think that will help things out. In fact, let me just explain, for those of you who

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I'm sure will be listening before we get into the material for today. Most of you know Dr.

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Michael Brown. I'm just going to go ahead and give you their bios so you know who's going to be doing the debating. I am not debating. I'm only doing the moderating.

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I know a little something about moderating because I've done a few debates. So hopefully we'll be doing a good job.

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But Dr. Michael Brown is founder and president of FIRE School of Ministry in Concord, North Carolina.

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And serves as a professor at Southern Evangelical Seminary, Gordon -Conwell Theological Seminary in Charlotte, Denver Theological Seminary, and the

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King's University. Holds a PhD in Near Eastern Languages and Literatures from New York University. And is the author of 25 books, including

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Authentic FIRE, a response to John MacArthur's Strange Fire, to be published in December. I wonder why that would be relevant to this particular time.

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Along with scholarly publications in Old Testament, Semitic languages, and Jewish apologetics. He is the host of the nationally syndicated talk radio show,

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The Line of FIRE, which I happened to catch in my car yesterday when I was coming back from South Mountain.

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And the TV program, Answering Your Toughest Questions. Dr. Sam Waldron is the academic dean of MCTS, that's

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Midwest Center for Theological Studies, and professor of systematic theology. He is also one of the pastors of Grace Reformed Baptist Church in Owensboro, Kentucky.

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Dr. Waldron received a BA from Cornerstone University, an MDiv from Trinity Ministerial Academy, a

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THM from Grand Rapids Theological Seminary, and a PhD from Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. From 1977 to 2001, he was a pastor of the

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Reformed Baptist Church of Grand Rapids, Michigan. Dr. Waldron is the author of numerous books, including a modern exposition of the 1689

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Baptist Confession of Faith, The End Times Made Simple, Baptist Roots in America, To Be Continued, which is the book that's directly relevant here, and MacArthur's Millennial Manifesto, A Friendly Response.

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Dr. Waldron is a member of the Evangelical Theological Society. The debate's going to break down into 15 -minute opening statements by both sides.

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Dr. Brown will be going first. 10 -minute rebuttals. 15 minutes cross -examination each, so a total of half an hour of cross -examination, which

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I think will be very good. And closing statements of 5 minutes each individual.

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So that's what's coming up an hour after this program. And so you want to definitely tune in for that, and pray that we don't have any issues as far as that is concerned.

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Next thing, I want to make sure you understand. First of all, those of you watching on YouTube, we've been having people saying that my lava lamp is too dark.

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And I very much appreciate whoever sent me the pretty purple lava lamp. We're trying a different lava lamp today.

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This is truly a 1965 vintage -style lava lamp.

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It's every color in the world. And I'm hoping you can see it a little bit better now.

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Rich says he can't, but maybe you all can. I don't know. So what? Well, now, just for clarification, the lava lamp, we can see the red in the bottom and the blue in the top.

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That's a very nice contrast there. But the circle thing is multicolored, as it's doing all of its electrical.

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It is multicolored. I can only see blue and white on my screen.

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In the Borg cube regenerating thing? In the? The round thing. Yeah.

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Well, it's blue, green, and red. Yeah. So maybe others can see it on the feed, but from what

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I'm looking at on my screens here. There's not a lot of theologians that would know that that was used in a Borg regeneration cube, but there are some.

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There are some, and I'm proud to know that. I just wanted to say that. Anyway, I just wanted you all to see that if you were watching.

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Okay, next. There are certain times when

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Providence catches up with you. Without any doubt here,

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I can at least call one person to witness here. I was directed to the sermon that we're going to be listening to on the program today.

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At least a month ago, maybe right around a month ago, probably. And I listened to it on a ride.

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I remember exactly where I wrote when I listened to it. In fact, I think I've listened to it twice on rides. Come to think of it. And we just haven't done

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Radio Free Geneva, because I just didn't want to have to try to do Radio Free Geneva without the theme. And it took a while for Clyde to find the time to do it.

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And then we had to put it together and all that kind of stuff. So it was the first thing on the list to get to once we did a

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Radio Free Geneva. And I wasn't even thinking about doing a program so much today, because we have the debate this evening.

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But we did it anyways. And Rich put the theme together. And so it just so happens that the sermon that I'm reviewing is by Eric Hankins.

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Now, why is that relevant? Because I just found out literally an hour and a half, maybe less than that, prior to our going on the air today, that maybe they're even still doing it.

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I don't know. It's at 3 p .m., so I doubt it's still going on. Students, join Albert Mohler for a conversation with Eric Hankins tomorrow afternoon at 3 p .m.

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here in Hall. And then they later showed a picture of the two conversing.

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And Al Mohler had a nice bowtie on, which means he obviously was doing better in the conversation. But come join us for a conversation about theology, ministry, and the

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Southern Baptist Convention with Seminary President R. Albert Mohler Jr. and Eric Hankins. Hankins is the pastor of First Baptist Church, Oxford, Mississippi, and recently served with Mohler on the

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Calvinism Advisory Committee. Now, I had no idea of that.

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And I had already taken the time to put the – I wish

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I could show my screen sometimes, but I've got this mass of color in front of me, which is how

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I use the Audio Notetaker program to mark the certain elements of a presentation.

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So I've already taken the time to put it all together. Didn't have time to do something else in time for Radio Free Geneva.

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So I'm not trying to piggyback off of the fact that Pastor Hankins was at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary.

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But at the same time, this isn't what he said there. This was a sermon preached, I believe

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September 26th, at New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary.

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And it's – when you cut out the sermon illustrations and other things, there's only about 12 minutes of material in this particular presentation.

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There was just so much in the way of sermon illustration, introduction, things like that.

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So we might actually be able to get through all of it, even though we're already 15 minutes into the program. There seems to be, as a person on the outside looking in, there seems to be certainly a desire for some level of at least cooperation and dialogue.

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But – and I saw, and I – let me see if I can – I doubt I can find it here. Someone had noted an excellent statement by Dr.

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Moeller, and I'm assuming – okay, and now it has stopped scrolling for me.

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There you go. I am assuming that it came from this particular discussion.

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At least, I hope it came from this particular discussion. That in essence was, we have to have freedom.

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Here we go. There it is. Adam Greenway tweeted this. As a denomination, if you can't talk about theology, you can't talk about that which matters most.

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Now, whether that came from the Hankins thing or what, I don't know, but it was also retweeted by Albert Moeller, so I guess he agrees with it.

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I am, of course, concerned that when it comes to this issue, that the conversation be a two -sided conversation, and that the real issues not be swept under the rug for the purposes of a piece that really does not exist.

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I've been – for example, I just listened to a lecture on Ephesians chapter 1 from a class at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, allegedly in a class on the

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Trinity. Doesn't seem like they're learning much about the Trinity, but they sure are hearing a lot about why election isn't true, which seems very odd.

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Or not why election isn't true, why the Reformed understanding of election is not true, and why you need to have a much smaller, redefined definition of election.

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It seems that even though the two sides are talking, and they appeared together at the convention and stuff like that, there are certain seminaries where you're going to get one side, and certain seminaries where you get the other, and it just seems to me that at least one of those, you're going to get to learn about both sides, but at the others, you only hear about one side.

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And not really an overly accurate view of it either. Some people in the article where this was posted, this sermon was posted, called this a sermon for the ages.

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It's a sermon for the ages. Now, he never claimed that for himself, Pastor Hankins certainly didn't, and I think he'd probably be embarrassed if he ever heard somebody describe anything he did that way.

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But it was described that way. So I want to listen to certain portions of it here. Like I said, if you break it all down, actually

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I'm looking at it now, it might be ten minutes worth of stuff. But this is the kind of material that was being presented in the chapel at New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary in regards to the subject of election.

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Let me just break the whole thing down for you. It's fairly easy to do. The summary thesis of Dr.

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Hankins' presentation is that election is for ministry. It's not determining who is in and who is out.

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It's for ministry. It's for calling, and that's it. That's it.

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Nothing more. Nothing more. There is no personal election of a particular people.

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There is clearly in the sermon the assertion of synergism. There is surface -level reference to certain texts.

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But the whole idea is you need to redefine your understanding of election as not a matter of who is in and who is out, which of course would be a very shallow way of looking at it anyways.

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But what he has in the back of his mind is a Reformed understanding. You need to understand it as calling to service, which of course every

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Reformed person believes. If you understand Ephesians chapter 2, it's by grace you've been saved.

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And why have you been saved? To do those good works which God has afforded, and you should walk in them. So clearly election includes sanctification.

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It includes ministry. It includes all those things, because those things all flow out of the sovereign grace of God.

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But none of that actually addresses the real issue. And the real issue is monergism versus synergism.

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Does God save, or does God make men savable? And until that simple, clear issue is addressed, you haven't addressed anything.

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And what I'm concerned about is what I'm hearing among Southern Baptists is a willingness to go, well, you know what?

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Let's not worry about that part. Let's agree on this part. But this part isn't even part of the controversy.

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So let's agree on what we can agree on. Yeah, but if you're not actually talking about the issue, you're not solving anything.

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It's a peace that is not peace. It's not true shalom from a biblical perspective.

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So anyway, let's take a listen. We're listening again. September 26, 2013,

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New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary, Pastor Eric Hankins. As you well know, the issue of election tends to increase the tension in any room when it's discussed in theological circles.

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But I believe what we have in this passage of Scripture is the script for the whole Bible, and it's the script that we should use to understand what it means to be elect of God and chosen of God.

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I think the great mistake of theology is that we have created the categories and have created distinction between the categories of the chosen and the unchosen, as though God picks some and not others, and that is fixed, and that's the way things really are.

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I believe the mistake is that it's shrunken down the idea of election into a focus on conversion and a focus on the individual, when from the very beginning the picture of God's choosing an individual has a global, missional, world -changing purpose.

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Okay, so there you go. You present the idea that election is personal, that election has to do with conversion, that election has to do with individuals.

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You present that as a shrunken -down version of election, and you present your idea that it's much bigger than that, it has to do with mission, it has to do with calling and going out to the world and all the rest of these things.

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And, of course, what you're doing is you're not dealing with the reality that it is both and.

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No unregenerate sinner is going to be going out to the world with this message and laying down their lives unless a radical transformation has taken place in their hearts, unless there has been regeneration.

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And so the question is, can the unregenerate heart desire to be changed, can the heart of stone desire to be exchanged for a heart of flesh, can the valley of dead bones put itself together and ask for the wind to blow across it and all the rest of that kind of stuff?

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Basic fundamental issues, but what you've got is a very purposeful presentation of what is actually a cutting down of the range of election and also a shifting of it.

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Because, yes, God chooses us to do things, but the proper theological terminology for the things that He's chosen us to do, that's sanctification, that's calling, that's the mission of the church, and so on and so forth.

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Election brings us into that sphere, but it's not appropriate to cut out the key elements of election to then emphasize these other things as if somehow you're then doing justice to election, because you're really not.

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And he's in Genesis chapter 12, by the way, so when you hear him make reference to that, that's what he's referring to.

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The chosen people are not chosen for their own sake, certainly not for their own honor or pleasure, but for the sake of the unchosen.

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Now catch that. This is the key assertion. I want to play it for you again.

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The chosen people are not chosen for their own sake, certainly not for their own honor or pleasure, but for the sake of the unchosen.

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So the chosen are chosen for the sake of the unchosen. That's going to be his theme, which he's going to draw from C .S.

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Lewis. Well, there is an element of truth to that in the sense that, once again, it is

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God's purpose in the salvation of His elect people that they then become the instrument by which the

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Word of God is preached, and so the Word of God and the Spirit of God causes the salvation of the rest of God's elect people, and it's the process that goes on.

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There is an element of truth there. But what's missing here? And what was missing, sadly, in the entire sermon was the fundamental reason for election, which comes out so clearly in Ephesians 1.

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To the praise of His glorious grace, it is to the glory of God. That is the first and foremost thing.

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So to say, well, the election is for those outside, chosen for the non -chosen, is to, again, immediately introduce an imbalance that is nowhere to be found biblically at all.

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Abraham is told that in his seed, the chosen nation, all the nations of the earth will be blessed.

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The chosen are chosen for the sake of the unchosen. The chosen are chosen for the sake of the unchosen.

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The question of this text is, what is the relationship between Israel and the nations? What is the relationship between the chosen one,

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Abraham, and the rest of the world? And it's not, I've chosen one and I've excluded others, but I've chosen one for the purpose of reaching those who are not yet reached.

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And I believe Lewis' insight is fundamental to understanding election in the Bible and to understanding your own chosenness today.

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Okay, so there you have the idea. The relationship of Israel to the world,

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Abraham's to be a blessing, but none of that has anything to do with the fact that Abraham is still chosen by God and others were not.

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Was God choosing everyone else? Was every person in Ur of the Chaldees the recipient of the same calling as Abraham?

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If there's something special about Abraham's calling, what was its basis?

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Could Abraham have refused God's calling so that God had to look for someone else?

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These questions, as I'm experiencing this, in Southern Baptist life, and I frequently speak at Southern Baptist churches so I get to talk to people, that kind of stuff doesn't get asked or get discussed.

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There's sort of a party line that's being presented in particular denominational seminaries, and the rest of that stuff just isn't sort of really being talked about, and this is the new party line that needs to be adopted.

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Often those who want to emphasize election want to emphasize God's sovereignty, and to that I say amen. And of course you have to say that.

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In fact, I'm going to go ahead and take it down to 1 .0 so that I think we've got enough time to get through it. I was playing at 1 .2.

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But do you? You know, whenever I hear a synergist saying,

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I say amen to the sovereignty of God, I want to go, what do you really mean by that?

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And are you simply saying that God sovereignly chose to make salvation a possibility, or are you saying that God sovereignly saves?

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There is a vast chasm between those two statements. And until there is an honest examination of that vast chasm, you cannot build a bridge over a chasm when you deny that the chasm is as big as it is.

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If you decide that a chasm is much smaller than it is, you try to build a bridge over it, and it ends up being a lot larger, and you try to go across the bridge, you're going to fall into the chasm.

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That's just sort of the nature of physics. And I am very concerned that there is this idea that we can somehow sort of, you know, if we push the monergist as close to synergism as we can and push the synergist as close to monergism, we can sort of jump across the, you know, you can't do it.

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You can't do it. These, monergism and synergism cannot both be right at the same time.

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It's just not possible. It's not possible. If God had not moved, and from the very beginning, you see the first person singular of God here,

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I will, I will, I will, I will accomplish these things. It's what I'm going to do. And if God has not made the decision to find this idol -worshipping, wandering

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Aramean in the middle of the desert, Abraham never would have come into covenant with God. It's the sovereign work of God.

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In fact, the prologue here leading up to this text, Genesis 1 to 11, it's the story of God's covenant pursuit and man's covenant rejection and the reality that God never gives up.

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He just never quits pursuing. He is the hound of heaven. And so election speaks of God's unstoppable plan to save.

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That sounds pretty good. Until you realize what he's saying is God never gives up.

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He may not be successful. It is his intention to save, but he may not accomplish that because the missing element is what introduces synergism.

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He's going to try. He's made salvation possible. But it's not a matter of determining powerfully and effectively the salvation of any one individual.

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And so, again, this is the issue. The more clearly you lay out the issue, then the more clearly you understand the answers that are given.

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Election is God's unstoppable plan to save, not his unstoppable plan to damn.

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Now, what does that mean? I'd really like to know.

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What do you mean by that? Who says that God's...

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Who in the Reformed camp says that God's electing grace is his purpose to damn?

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That would require, again, the error of equal ultimacy. It would require that we are making the extension of grace that saves the elect people of God equal to the extension of justice which rightly condemns the sinner who remains outside of Christ and remains in love with their sin, which is everyone who is not...

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does not experience the grace of God in regeneration, obviously. So who is that about?

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Is that not a misrepresentation of Reformed theology? Is that a misunderstanding on his part, a misrepresentation?

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Can't ask questions, unfortunately, in this context. But to save. It's not a question of who is out and who is in, but it's a question of how those who are called in by the power of the good news then go out to those who are not yet reached.

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We are chosen in sovereignty. If God had not moved, we would not be saved.

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If God had not pursued us, we would not be saved. So if God had not pursued us, we would not be saved.

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Again, hopefully many of you are already aware of what the issue here is.

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Because what was the key soteriological issue of the Reformation?

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What have I said over and over again now for coming up on 30 some odd years of ministry?

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The issue of the Reformation was not the necessity of grace. It was the sufficiency of grace. It was not the necessity of grace.

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Rome said grace is necessary. The Mormons say grace is necessary. Almost everybody except the full -blown

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Pelagians say grace is necessary. But the dividing line, the hill to die on, the difference between Biblical monergism and all of man's religions is whether God's grace is sufficient to save without the addition of the autonomous cooperation of mankind in and then fill in the blanks.

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Make it as short a list as you want or as long a list as you want. That's where man's religions come in. And that's the question.

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Does God's grace make us savable? Or does God's grace save? And as long as we're able to put the issue that clearly, all the smoke and mirrors about other issues, is not going to keep people from continuing to ask the direct questions that need to be asked at this particular point in time.

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1 Peter 2, verse 9 says, But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, these are

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Old Testament quotes from Exodus, a people for God's own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who has called you out of the darkness and into his marvelous light.

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For you who were not a people, now you are the people of God. And you who had not received mercy, now receive mercy.

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Beloved, I urge you as aliens and strangers to abstain fleshly lust which wage war against the soul. Keep your behavior excellent among the

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Gentiles so that in the thing in which they slander you as evil doers they may because of your good deeds as they observe them glorify

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God in the day of visitation. It's not the elect of God set over against the Gentiles and the nations, it's the elect of God living in such a way that it calls the nations.

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Again, it's a dichotomy that has no substance.

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You, low on me, on me and low on me. People who were not a people now are a people.

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What's that referring to? It's Jews and Gentiles. It's the gospel going out to the whole world. But again, when that is explained, is that not part of that explanation?

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The fulfillment of God's own purpose in the giving of the promise? Look at Romans 9. You had the promise given and the promise means it goes a particular direction and so you've got the hardening of Pharaoh and you've got the choosing of Jacob over Esau and you've got

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Moses being given special privileges. Again, this is all right there.

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You can't cut this out of election just simply by being very passionate about how you say well, election has to do with what we do and how we go witness to people.

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Well, okay, it's connected. All of it's connected. And God's electing purpose includes our sanctification and our service in ministry.

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And there is a calling. A calling to minister the word of God to other people.

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No question about that. But none of that has anything to do with the fact that we still have to deal with the reality that man is a rebel sinner against God, dead in his trespasses and sins, in love with his sins, incapable of coming to Christ, unless drawn by the

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Father. So, it's right there. You can't read that out.

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...into fellowship in the covenant with the one true God. This is the story, by the way, of Romans 9 -11.

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A text that's often used to lay out this argument that God chooses some and not others is really opposite of the point.

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The point of Romans 9 -11 is God never gives up on anyone. No matter how the

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Jews resist, God keeps working and finds a way. So, that's the point of Romans 9 -11 is that God never gives up on anyone.

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Somehow, Paul missed that when he then raises the imaginary voice of the objector and says,

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Who will find fault? Who resists God's will? Who are you, O man, who answers back to God? Will a thing molded say to the one who molded it?

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Why'd you make me like this? What if God willing to do these things? It's right there, but it gets passed over in the sort of...

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Well, this is the Southern Baptist way of preaching. You get people going one direction, one direction, and you make statements, but you don't necessarily back up those statements.

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That's unfortunately a very common Southern Baptist style of preaching. It really is.

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That's not... I'm sure it's going to be, Look! Listen! Sit down and listen to 20 average

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Southern Baptist sermons from around the United States and see how many times assertions are made without any biblical, exegetical foundation whatsoever.

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But because they're made with passion and because they're made in a certain tone...

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Look! I went to a Southern Baptist school. I took homiletics there. I know what we were told to do, how we were supposed to start getting people ready for the invitation and all the rest of that kind of stuff.

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I've been there, done that, got the t -shirt. So there wasn't any argumentation provided there.

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And the sad thing is, what he just basically said was, the meaningful exegesis of Romans 9 is opposite of the truth.

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The truth is that it's all about how God will never give up. And the problem is, he then runs to the end of chapter 11, which

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I would argue there is a rather fundamental shift in the topic between 10 and 11 that he's missing here.

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And once again, our synergistic friends find themselves, and this is part of the criticism that I offered of the

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John 3 .16 materials too, what they present is utterly incapable of defending itself against universalism.

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Listen, think about someone who's a universalist, think about someone who believes everyone's going to be saved, and then listen to the next words that Pastor Hankins utters.

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...treating seriously their unfaithfulness but still bringing about an end of the story that says all Israel will be saved, so that he might have mercy on all.

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See, when you don't make distinctions, when you don't allow all, he's actually going to say a little bit later on, all means all, and that's all all means, one of the most obviously untrue statements that anyone could ever make about the

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Bible. I mean, there's just so many obvious exclusions and exceptions to that statement, but he's going to say it, when you don't make the proper definitions, and you don't recognize that if in Romans 11, you're talking universalism here, you're talking that he might have mercy on all, you are left either with mercy it does not save, or universalism, one of the two.

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One of the two. It's all you've got left. You're either left with the synergistic, well, he's had mercy on all, but that doesn't mean they're all going to be saved, because, well, we know you know,

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God's mercy isn't really what saves, it's God's mercy plus, and then the list is either short or long.

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So God chooses Abraham, and he chooses Isaac, and he chooses Jacob, and he chooses Israel, so that he might win the nations.

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He might call forth... What about the fact that he chose

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Israel to glorify himself? In fact, he chose Israel in the context there, so he could demonstrate his power in the destruction of the

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Egyptians. How about that? How about that he chose

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Israel so he might demonstrate what happens when people are given tremendous privileges, and yet their hearts aren't changed?

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And what the hardness of heart is, and when God even dwells amongst a people, and they're exposed to his truth, and yet if there's not a change of heart, you see the

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Jewish kings, and you see the Manassas, and you see the syncretistic worship, and you learn all these...

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What about all that stuff? Again, when you try to cut it down, and say, oh, but this was the real purpose!

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I think I've found the blueprint! If we'll just take this one part of election, and just run over everything else in the

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Bible with it, then we won't have any problems anymore! And them there Calvinists will have nothing to say.

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It doesn't work! It just doesn't work! "...the Gentiles, and Ishmael, and Esau, and the

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Pharaoh, are rejected in Romans 9 through 11? Why?" Why? Did God have a purpose?

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Remember what Paul himself said? Before we get to the...

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I'll leave you hanging here. I'll leave you waiting to hear what he's going to hear.

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What did Paul say? What did Paul say in Romans 9 .17? "...For the

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Scripture says to Pharaoh, for this very purpose I raised you up, to demonstrate my power in you, and that my name might be proclaimed throughout the whole earth."

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That's what he said! And you might say, see! That's just evangelism!

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It has nothing more to do with that! Why is the next verse then, "...so then he has mercy on whom he desires, and he hardens whom he desires." We were just told election has nothing to do with who's in and who's out.

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But the apostolic interpretation of the

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Old Testament text of Pharaoh is, so then he mercies whom he desires, and he hardens whom he desires.

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Direct parallel. It's right there. It's right there. So, what were the next words?

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"...so that the nations might be reached." There you go. Not so that my power might be demonstrated.

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But so that the nations might be reached. That's his understanding. "...so that the nations might be reached." Even in their resistance and rebellion against God, God continues to work in his sovereignty to bring about a great salvation.

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So the ending of the book of Genesis, the arc that flows to the end of this book, is the life of Joseph. And you remember what is exclaimed at the end of Joseph's life?

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What men meant for evil, you meant for good, to bring about a great salvation! Actually, Genesis 50 -20 says what you meant for evil,

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God meant for good, to save many people alive to this day. He's talking about the people of Israel.

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He's talking about the family in light of the famine. That's the text!

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I mean, again, you can say it with passion, and with that cadence, the

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Southern Baptist cadence and all the rest, it doesn't make it true. It doesn't make it true.

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What Joseph said was, I understand. It's a great text on compatibilism, right there.

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It's one of the key texts, direct parallel. It's true. But it's not making the point that Hankins just made.

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That's stretching it way out of its context. What you meant for evil has ended up, brother, saving you in the end.

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We are chosen in sovereignty for the sake of the rebellious, and this is seen most fully in the supremacy of the chosen one.

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King Jesus sets his face resolutely towards the cross in Jerusalem, and he is going there.

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It's his goal in Luke chapter 13. Nothing's going to stop him. He is going to go to the cross.

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In sovereignty, he's going to bring about and win for us that salvation and give us the victory. Now, okay.

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Here's the question. Sounds great, but what are you saying when you say that?

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I've told the story many times of my conversion to five -point Calvinism, was in reading a book,

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Spencer's book on the five points, where he simply came to a point and said, did

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Jesus actually propitiate sin or not? Was it a true atonement or not?

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That's when I realized saying that Jesus made us savable is not the same thing as saying that Jesus saved.

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They're not the same thing. There are many, many people who are more than happy to say,

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Jesus makes us savable. Jesus makes it possible for us to be saved. Isn't that wonderful? Praise his name.

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But that is a very different thing than saying Jesus actually saves his people perfectly.

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That's the very language of Hebrews 7. That's what the high priest does. That slams the door in all of the merit of man.

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That slams the door in all the possibilities of man's religions.

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That's why it's a dividing line. And an appropriate dividing line. But it's not to say he won the victory.

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What was the victory? Making us savable? Or actually saving us? That's really the question, isn't it?

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It would seem to be, and until that's addressed, we're not really addressing the issue at all.

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Then he goes on, a couple minutes later, we pick up with the comments.

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Now, did you catch that? So here you have the distinctions. Here, listen to it again.

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Let's hear it again. ...is the call to service. Another mistake in election theology, I believe, is to create a difference between salvation, or election to salvation, and election to service.

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Now, I'm not sure what election theology is. I assume he's referring to reform theology, and he's saying that there's an error in reform theology, and that is a distinction between election to salvation and election to service.

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Well, there's a difference between the two. One has to be distinguished from the other because the grounds are different, and in the

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Ordo Salutis, one comes before the other. So what we're getting in this new

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Southern Baptist paradigm that is being presented is we need to step back from where Christian theology has gone.

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It went too far. We need to be less specific. You see, if we'd just be less specific, then these questions wouldn't be coming up.

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Folks, this is not the way forward. This is not the way forward. There were great

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Southern Baptist theologians that had this stuff figured out a long time ago, and we've seen what's happened historically when you step that back and say, well, maybe not with that clarity.

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Let's rethink this. This is not the way forward. There is a distinction between election to salvation and election to service.

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One comes after the other and is based upon what God does in the other, and none of that is addressing the real issue, and that is, does

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God save freely by His grace, or does He try to save but leaves it up to man and hence tries and fails?

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You can preach all the sermons you want until you face the issues directly.

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You're not really facing the issues at all, and you're not helping the people who are listening to you.

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So I back up just a little bit to get the whole context here. It's the call to service. Another mistake in election theology,

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I believe, is to create a difference between salvation or election to salvation and election to service.

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I don't think you can see one without the other. A great insight of James Leo Garrett and his theology is that election doesn't belong at the beginning of the discussion of salvation.

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It belongs at the end of the discussion of salvation. Well, that's just wrong. Call it a great insight if you want, but that's just wrong.

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If what you're saying is you cannot limit election to only the freedom of God in selecting a particular people into salvation, but you must see that God then has a continuing purpose in the sanctification of His people and the use of His people in the ministry of God's Word, great!

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But that's not what's being said here. That's not what's being said here. What's fundamentally being said here is that you're wrong to see it at the beginning.

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It is first and foremost at the beginning because it's God's free action. It's the foundation of everything else.

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And so, if he's accurately representing it, then I simply say, wrong.

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Inappropriate. And illogical. Doesn't make sense. Why can't it be both?

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In fact, if you try to figure out why we're being sent out without knowing why we're in the first place, you're going to have no foundation for missions at all.

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Especially when you end up going to places where Islam is predominant. You're going to have no foundation there at all.

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That's why Reformed men and women have been the ones who have gutted out in those places knowing it might take 10 years before they see one of God's elect come to salvation.

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You see, the one becomes the foundation for the other. What we're being told here is, forget about the foundation part, let's just get on with this other part.

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How does that work? How does that work? That does not make a lick of sense to me whatsoever.

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Well, we don't have too much more to cover. Looks like we're going to have just about the right amount of time. For those of you just tuning in, a certain person and channel

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I just noticed, maybe he wasn't following me on Twitter today or something, I don't know. I'm going to try not to be hurt.

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Maybe he was busy, I don't know. A little late? Yeah, you know, this time thing, it's messing everybody up. We're listening to a sermon by Eric Hankins that was preached at New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary on September 26th of this year on the subject of election from Genesis 12.

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We're almost done with the theological portions of the sermon. To bless Abraham, and essentially the construct in the

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Greek there is many will say, God bless me like you blessed Abraham. Whatever Abraham's got, that's what

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I want, and the expectation there will be many of those, it's plural. There's a singular for those who will curse.

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There will be those who hear the gospel and reject it, but it's God's desire to save many.

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To bring the gospel to all. And once again, that's the purpose of the conclusion of Romans chapter 11.

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I've shut up all in disobedience. Verse 32 of chapter 11 says. So that he might have mercy on all.

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Now see, I argue, and I've not had anyone respond to this, I argue that if you attempt to destroy the proper biblical distinction in regards to the use of the word all, if you do not see that we're talking about all kinds of men, if you're trying to make this all men individually, which

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I would argue is not an eastern way of thinking, it's not a biblical way of thinking, it's not a contextual way of thinking, but if you're doing what he just did, he has no grounds for fighting against universalism.

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He doesn't. Because he's just made a universal application and unless you're going to say the mercy of God does not bring about salvation, the mercy of God is insufficient to bring about salvation, then you're stuck with universalism.

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Obviously universalism is not the big challenge that these folks are facing and therefore they don't seem to see that they've become imbalanced in their fight against Reformed theology and in becoming imbalanced have left themselves open to the attack of universalism.

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For the sake of all, and we know those passages of Scripture that speak against the idea that the atonement is limited just to the elect, 1

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John 2 says that... This was right afterwards, so his purpose here is clear.

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He may not, you know, quote any Reformed writers, he may not represent

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Reformed theology in an appropriate fashion, but he's definitely arguing against it.

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And here's the entire argument and once again, I guess

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I should just give up ever expecting it, but I would love to see some of these synergists and some of these universal atonement advocates actually represent what we believe in one of their sermons.

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They may do it in a blog article someplace, but let's have them come straight out and say,

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You think that Jesus as High Priest actually saves all those for whom

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He dies? No, He doesn't! He only makes them savable!

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The High Priest cannot save the uttermost anyone except those who enable

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Him to save. Why not just come out and say it? Just be...

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I'm so tired of the... I'm going to trot out my three texts that have been refuted 47 ,000 times before, but I'm not even going to make reference to the refutations,

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I'm just going to repeat them, because I know the people I'm trying to reach are going to be convinced by what I'm saying anyways. It just is very, very troubling.

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And we know those passages of Scripture that speak against the idea that the atonement is limited just to the elect.

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1 John 2 says the propitiation of Christ is not for our sins only, but for the sins of the whole world.

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1 Timothy 2, verse 4 speaks of God's desire for everyone to come to a knowledge of Him. John 3, 16 speaks of the whole world.

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All means all, and that's all all means. Now, that is...

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That's just the red meat for the base. I mean, let's use a nice political term there.

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That was just red meat for the base. That's all it was. That's not actually exegeting any of these texts, that's not dealing with the context, and again, all

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Jerusalem went out to be baptized with Jesus. Every dog, cat, I mean, the place was empty, right? There's just so many of those that it's really hard, honestly, to take seriously anybody who repeats that.

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Because, and I saw Armenians, by the way, commenting on this blog post where this was posted, and even they said, oh man,

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I wish he hadn't said that, it is just so easy to refute that, and they're right, because it's just an utterly bogus point.

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And this is what it means for those of you who are chosen in Christ, is that every single person you encounter, you can look at them in the face and say to them,

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God loves you, He died for you, He wants you to come into fellowship with Him, and if you'll say yes, if you'll respond, if you'll surrender, you will be saved.

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Again, that's what Southern Baptists are used to hearing. But Southern Baptists get a little bit uncomfortable when you say, where did an apostle of Jesus Christ ever preach that way?

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They get really uncomfortable, because I was there, folks! I was there, been there, done that! Someone finally said, where did the apostles ever preach like that?

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Where did the apostles make the basis of their exhortation? You need to do something for Jesus, because Jesus did something for you.

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It's not there. You can look all you want, it's not there. It may be what your tradition has taught you.

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Just ask yourself the question, is it what the Bible teaches? But that still happens by faith.

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The submission of the chosen one makes possible our response to faith to the gospel, but that response is still necessary.

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That's basically his statement of, God's done it all, but now it's up to you. Now it's up to you.

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It's not an issue of faith being gift of God, it's not regeneration, it's just, you know, it's just up to you.

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It's time for us to stop splitting hairs over theological Rubik's cubes.

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I think that's his way of referring to reform theology. Over theological Rubik's cubes and recognize that the trajectory of election is not inward, but it's outward.

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It's not us and not them, but it's us for them. For anyone, anywhere, anytime, no matter how lost or broken.

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So there you go, there's the summary. Election isn't about isn't about God's freedom in powerfully saving to his honor and his glory.

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Election is about once you allow God's grace to be effective by your faith, what you're to do as an evangelist.

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And you're gonna, again, you're gonna find lots of folks, that's exactly what they want to hear, and they're gonna believe it.

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And I say, well, nothing I can do about that.

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I can challenge, and I can ask you to think through, but my concern is this paradigm, this model that seemingly is being promoted by some of the major seminaries now, is not a model that actually answers the questions that must be addressed in the controversy.

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And every generation has to deal with these issues. You cannot sweep them under the rug.

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You cannot ignore them. You cannot say, well, that's divisive. Yes, truth is divisive. The gospel's divisive.

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But people who love the Word of God will not be afraid to deal with the difficult teachings of the

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Word of God because they'll have confidence that the Spirit of God who inspired it would only put in the

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Word of God what is necessary for the health of the people of God. So you're not gonna put it off to the side, and you're not gonna try to shrink election down or change its emphasis so it does not deal with the fundamental issue, and that is the sufficiency of God's grace versus merely the necessity of God's grace.

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Unfortunately, Pastor Hankins did not address that issue in this sermon at the

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New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary. My hope is that there will be some folks at NOBTS that will hear this and maybe record this and maybe let some other people hear this because unfortunately, we can't get much in the way of dialogue going.

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I would love to go down to New Orleans. I know some weird people in New Orleans. Very odd, strange people in New Orleans.

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And I won't mention any names because then I'll never get invited down there. But I'd be happy to come down and address this very issue.

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I think it'd be great at a seminary to have this kind of conversation. That's what seminary education's all about, isn't it?

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At least it should be. Well hey, thanks for listening to The Dividing Line today. Don't forget, one hour from now, be back here for the debate between Michael Brown and Sam Waldron on the continuation of the miraculous gifts or the cessation thereof.

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Right here, you'll be able to listen in. I'll be doing the moderation. It should be a great debate. Join us one hour from now.