The Doctrine of Justification

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Good morning, gentlemen.
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Good morning.
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We are in week 9 of our overview of theology, principles of theology and doctrine.
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I have a handout, if somebody would like to be so kind as to pass those this way, and if you'll pass them this way.
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Thank you, brother.
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Appreciate it.
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And may I have one too? I like to see what you guys see.
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Sometimes I forget to do that.
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Thank you, Chris.
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So, word is that you crushed your Aaron Bell on the boat during the debate.
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No, who said that? Aaron Bell.
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Aaron Bell? Man, I'm recording this.
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You've got to be careful saying stuff like that.
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Seriously, he's recording.
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Adam.
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Sorry.
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No, Adam said I crushed Aaron? No, Adam was thinking about himself.
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Oh, okay.
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Well, we don't ever debate.
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We agree on most everything.
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That's right.
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I think his verbatim was annihilation or something.
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Well, he's been too nice.
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Him and Aaron are very intelligent men.
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And Aaron used to be at our church.
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He used to work with me.
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He was our worship leader for a while.
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Alright, if you look up on that...
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Excuse me, let me try that again.
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If you will look at the board, you will see a date.
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And you may want to write that date on the top of your notes.
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October 31st, 1517 is what we call Reformation Day.
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We'll be celebrating Reformation Day this Saturday.
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This Saturday, two days from now, is October 31st, 2020.
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Which will be the 503rd anniversary of the nailing of the 95 theses to the church door in Wittenberg, Germany.
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That was the moment that began the Protestant Reformation.
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Now, some would argue that the Protestant Reformation had some earlier figures.
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And I would agree with that, that there were some earlier, what we might call pre-reformers.
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John Wycliffe in the 1300s, and then Jan Hus, not shortly thereafter.
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But the man who made the biggest footprint at that particular time in history was a man by the name of Martin Luther.
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Martin Luther was a German monk.
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He began his life the son of a miner, a man who owned a mining business.
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His name was Hans Luder, the family's name was Luder, L-U-D-E-R.
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But it would later be changed to Luther.
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Luther considered that to be a more scholarly sounding name.
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So when he entered into higher education, he went with Luther rather than Luder.
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But his father, Hans Luder, had made himself a sizable reputation financially by owning a mining business, and so he took his son, Martin, and sent him to school to be a lawyer.
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He figured that Martin was the smartest of his children.
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He had several children, but he considered Martin to be the smartest, and so he was going to invest in his son, Martin, and send him to school to be a lawyer with the hopes that when Hans, his father, became old and unable to take care of himself, he would have a lawyer's son who would be rich and able to take care of him.
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So that's what he did.
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He sent him to school to be a lawyer.
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Well, while Martin was in school to be a lawyer, he was traveling, and he got caught in a terrible rainstorm.
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And the thunder and lightning of the storm was cracking and popping all around him.
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In fact, one particular bolt of lightning hit so close that legend says it lifted him up off the ground, that it was that close and hit that hard.
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And when he was falling back onto his rear, he shouted, Saint Anna, I will become a monk if you save me.
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And Saint Anna was the patron saint of miners.
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Of course, he would have known who she was, having been raised the son of a miner.
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And Martin held true to his vow, because he did not die in the rainstorm, but instead he lived and decided to join the Augustinian Order, which was a very strict order of Catholic monks.
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His father was not happy.
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He had sent his son to law school to be a lawyer, and now his son was going to be a monk.
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And if you know anything about monkery in the 1500s, one of the things that you should realize is that monks took a vow of poverty.
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So the one son who was going to take care of him would now be an impoverished monk.
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So Martin Luther went on to live the life of a monk.
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And he found in his time as a monk many corruptions that had come into the church.
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And one of those corruptions was the sale of indulgences.
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An indulgence was a letter produced by the church that would offer the forgiveness of sins to take time off of purgatory.
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Purgatory was a false teaching that arose in the medieval church that said that when you die, you don't go straight to heaven or straight to hell, but if you are part of the church, you go to a place called purgatory.
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The word purgatory comes from the word meaning to purge, and it means that you have to have your sins purged, therefore you could go and spend 10,000 years, 20,000 years, a million years in purgatory to have your sins purged before you would get to actually go into heaven.
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This is not the teaching of the Bible.
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This was a false medieval teaching that had crept into the Roman church.
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And so they had these letters of indulgence that they would sell that would take time off of purgatory.
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So imagine, I don't know your name, what's your name? Kyle.
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Imagine Kyle, imagine your mother had passed and you thought she was in purgatory, and along comes a man with a letter that says you want to buy your mom out of purgatory.
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If you believed that was true, you'd give everything you had to free your mother from the fires of purgatory, right? And that was the way they sold those letters.
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And the statement that was made is when a coin in the coffer rings, a soul from purgatory springs.
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And so the idea was not only could you buy your own forgiveness, but you could buy the forgiveness of your loved ones.
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Who created the teaching of purgatory? I don't know exactly who, the individual particularly, but it is not a biblical doctrine.
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It comes from a misunderstanding of justification.
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Because the Bible says we are justified once and for all.
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Purgatory says we have to be justified over time, over a series of penance and purging.
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And so it's a misunderstanding of biblical principles.
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And as I said, it did arise in the Middle Ages, but I'm not sure exactly of who or the date.
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Alright, so here we are, Martin Luther, he's seen these indulgence letters get sold throughout Germany.
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He's seen the poor German people be fleeced, seen the flock of God be fleeced and essentially extorted.
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So Martin Luther took his pen and in 1517 he wrote 95 arguments against the sale of indulgences.
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95 arguments opposing the sale of indulgences.
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And he went to the church in Wittenberg.
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And a lot of people make a big deal about the fact that he nailed these 95 things to the door.
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But that's not, a lot of people think that's protesting, right? I'm going to go to the church and I'm going to nail something to the door.
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That's not exactly the issue.
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Because the church door was the place where scholarly debate would be announced.
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So there were probably other things on the door as well.
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It was almost like the bulletin board of a church today.
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It wasn't exactly, his nailing it to the door was not the big deal.
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What was the big deal was that the 95 arguments included arguments against the Pope.
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His arguments said essentially that the Pope was extorting the people of God and was ultimately himself in tremendous and dangerous error.
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And if you're not familiar with Catholic theology, the Pope is seen as the vicar of Christ, which means the one who stands in the place of Christ.
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What does vicar mean? It's where we get the word vicarious, to be in the place of.
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Vicar means vicarious.
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So he's the vicar of Christ.
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And that again is an unbiblical teaching.
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But that was what was taught.
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And so Luther opposed the Pope.
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So the Pope sent a letter.
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Well, actually, not at first.
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This story is longer than I'm making it.
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I'm condensing the story for time.
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Because the first thing the Pope did when he heard about Luther was he laughed.
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He said, ah, that German monk, he's just drunk.
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When he sobers up, he'll get back in line.
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That was the attitude.
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He'll sober up.
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But Luther didn't sober up.
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Luther became a force within the church.
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And finally the Pope excommunicated him.
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He sent a papal bull, which was a letter from the Pope to Luther saying he would be excommunicated.
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Luther tore the letter up and burned it in the middle of the city.
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This is a letter from the Pope.
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This is the most powerful man in the world.
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More powerful than kings or princes.
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Who has the ability to consign the soul to hell.
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Did we know the name of the Pope at that time? Pope Leo.
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Does vicar stand for the number of the beast? No, vicar is just short for vicarious.
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One who stands in the place of.
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I've got a question.
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So are you saying that the Pope, he was thought to be, from what we believe now, I'm trying to...
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They still consider him to be in the place of Christ.
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No, not us.
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Roman Catholicism and the Protestants, which we are from the Protestant tradition, the split occurred in the 16th century.
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That's what I'm talking about.
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This was what started the divide.
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This moment was...
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This was the signpost.
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We're not going to continue doing this.
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We're protesting.
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The word Protestant means to protest or protesting.
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So they protested against the Pope.
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Luther was condemned.
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He tore up the condemnation letter.
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He burned it in the middle of the city.
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Basically to say, I reject the Pope.
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Well, a few years later, he was demanded to come to a, what was called an imperial diet or an imperial diet, which was essentially a hearing.
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And he was called before the emperor to make his case.
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And he was demanded to recant.
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And basically that means to take it back.
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Take back all the stuff that you've said.
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Recant.
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And when Luther was called to recant, he was called before the people, before the emperor and before the bishops and the leaders.
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The Pope was not there, but the leaders were.
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When he was called before them to recant, Luther said, I need 24 hours to think it over.
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We watched that movie.
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You've seen it? Okay.
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Am I telling it right? Yes.
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Okay.
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Luther is one of my, one of the figures of history I have studied the most.
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Anyway, he asked for 24 hours to think it over.
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And the reason why was because he knew that the potential of staying the course was he was going to be executed.
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That's right.
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Less than 100 years before, a man by the name of Jan Hus had believed and taught basically the same thing Luther taught.
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And he was called to a council to state his case.
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It was the Council of Constance.
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And when Jan Hus was called to the Council of Constance, he was promised, if you come and make your case, you will have safe quarter and you will not be persecuted.
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Just come and make your case.
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He came and made his case.
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After he made his case, they rejected his safe conduct, what they called safe quarter or safe conduct, took him outside and burned him.
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Yeah.
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So Luther knew, even though he had certain men who were protecting him, Frederick the Wise and a few others who were on his side, he knew that at any moment he could be drug outside and burned.
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He knew that that was possible.
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So when he was asked to recant, he said, give me 24 hours to reconsider.
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He went to his room.
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He prayed.
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I imagine he probably stayed up all night praying.
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I know I would have.
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And the next day he came forward.
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They asked him, will you recant? He tried to be a good lawyer.
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He said, well, I have written many things.
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Many of them are accepted Christian truths.
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Which ones do you want me to recant of? And they said, no more.
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Just say it.
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Will you or will you not recant? Give us a simple answer.
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And he said, you've asked for a simple answer.
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Here it is.
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Unless I am convinced by Scripture and reason and not by popes or councils who have often contradicted one another, my conscience is captive to the Bible, the Word of God.
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And therefore, I will not recant.
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God help me.
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Here I stand.
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Amen.
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Now that's a shortened version.
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It's a little bit longer speech.
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But ultimately, that was where he took his stand.
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This was in April of, I think, 1521.
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So several years after this day.
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Well, the whole scene erupted and he thought he was done for.
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Well, his friend kidnapped him.
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Took him to Wartburg Castle and hid him there for ten months so that he would be hidden from anyone trying to capture him and kill him.
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While he was at Wartburg Castle, he translated the Bible into German so that the people of Germany would have a Bible in their own language.
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It is still the Bible that many German people use today.
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Luther's translation is 500 years old.
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It's still used by many people today, similar to how the King James is used by many English speakers today, which was also 400 years old.
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So the point of it is, Luther stood against the false teachings of Rome.
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God protected him through it and he became one of the great leaders of the Reformation.
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He went back to Wittenberg.
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He ended up marrying a nun, Katharina von Bora.
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And he and his wife now had a...
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well, they had a...
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I hate to call it a mansion, but it really was.
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It had many rooms.
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It was like a hotel, I guess more so than a mansion.
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And they had a table big enough to seat 30 students at a time.
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And he would take students in, 30 at a time, and he would teach the Reformation teachings and then he would send them out as ministers and he would bring others in.
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And it was constantly producing...
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And he ended up dying natural causes.
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He did not end up being burned.
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He did not end up being killed.
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He was able to live out his life teaching what God had put in his life.
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Yes, sir? So, what's the difference between Luther and the Romans? I don't believe in anything of Purgatory.
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I don't believe anything about the tunnels.
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I just respect the tunnels.
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I don't believe in any of that stuff.
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Like a lot.
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Okay.
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Like a lot of other Latin religions.
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I don't believe in any of that.
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Okay.
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Well, let's look at it from the perspective of Rome.
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Somebody might call themselves a Roman Catholic and say, well, I'm a Roman Catholic, but I don't believe in...
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But that's what a Catholic is.
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It's Roman Catholic.
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Sure.
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Sure.
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Let me make this point.
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The Church, the Roman Church, would say they don't have the right to do that.
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They would say as Catholics, they have a responsibility to venerate the Pope and obey the teachings of the Church.
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In fact, Pope John Paul II, you remember him? He was three Popes back.
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Pope John Paul II was the Pope when I was a kid.
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Then there was Cardinal Ratzinger who became Pope Benedict, and now it's the liberal Pope.
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I forget his name.
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Francis? Yeah.
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But Pope John Paul II, who was in the 80s, he called those people cafeteria Catholics.
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He said they think they can take what they want and leave what they want.
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He said you can't do that.
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To be a Catholic, you have to take it all or nothing.
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So I would say that even their own Church would reject it.
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Well, I'm not a Lutheran, just so you understand.
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The Lutheran Church was what came out of Luther's teachings.
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And though I do respect a lot of Luther's teachings, I don't agree with Luther on everything.
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I'm what you would call a Baptist.
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Because the Baptist...
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We still haven't gotten to our lesson.
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This is an important thing that a lot of people don't know.
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Because...
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I'm going to give you a quick overview of this.
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Christ.
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33 A.D.
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Death, burial, resurrection.
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This is the time period.
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The early church up until 325.
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Well, up until the early 300s.
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Let's just say 300s.
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The church was persecuted up until the early 300s.
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It was called religio elicita.
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It was illegal religion.
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After the 300s, Christianity became legal to practice, along with the other religions.
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After the conversion of Constantine, which I don't really think he was a true convert, but after the supposed conversion of Constantine, Christianity became the official religion of the empire.
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The empire of Constantine.
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Constantine was a leader in the 4th century.
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He was a very important leader.
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And he believed that Christ had saved him in battle.
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I think it was the Battle of Molvian Bridge.
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And he believed that Christ had saved him.
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He saw a vision of a Cairo symbol, which was a Christian symbol.
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And he thought that was God's way of saying follow this person.
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And so he became a Christian.
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Now, later in his life, whether or not he was truly a Christian, there's a lot of questions about that.
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But because of his conversion, the Christian faith became now part of tradition.
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What's that? Well, there's a lot of history here that we have to be careful.
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But understand that before Constantine ever came along, the foundational Christian teachings and the doctrines were already in place.
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When Constantine comes along, he allows for what was called the first ecumenical council of the church, 325.
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That was the first time all the leaders of the church were able to gather together safely and convene.
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Because before that, they were being fed to lions.
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They were being drugged and drawn and quartered.
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I mean, they were being killed.
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Christians were being killed.
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No, this would have been previous.
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The conquistadors would have been after the Middle Ages, I would say.
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Yeah.
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Now that, yeah.
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A conqueror.
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Yeah, a conqueror.
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Yeah, not a conquistador.
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No, yeah.
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Yeah, yeah.
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Yes, certainly.
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And so, like I said, I don't want to get stuck here because that's not the important date.
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That just shows you that the church in the first 300 years was being persecuted.
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After that, though, the church becomes part of the tradition of the state.
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And therein arises what was known as the Holy Roman Empire.
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The Holy Roman Empire would go on through the Middle Ages.
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So Constantine was Roman.
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Well, sort of.
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That's a harder thing to explain because we're looking at he was the ruler of the Western world.
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So we're not just Rome.
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Yeah.
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So the point is, when you get to 1056, so 700 years later, in 1056, you have the divide between the Eastern and the Western church.
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How many of you have ever heard of Eastern Orthodox? Eastern Orthodox.
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Okay.
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And Roman Catholic.
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Well, Roman Catholic is simply Western church.
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That's the Western church.
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And the Eastern church.
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And they divided over who had the authority.
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The Western church said the Pope has the authority.
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Okay.
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The Eastern church rejected the authority of the Pope.
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So it wasn't just the Reformers who rejected the Pope.
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It was the whole Eastern church rejected the authority of the Pope.
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So the first major divide is in 1056.
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You have the Western church and you have the Eastern church.
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Here you have the Pope.
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Over here you have what are known as the Orthodox.
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And they had several leaders within the Orthodox church.
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1517.
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We already said what happens in 1517.
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Right? Martin Luther.
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So let's say the 1500s.
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The 1500s, we have the beginning of the Protestant Reformation.
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Out of the Protestant Reformation came all of the denominations that you are all familiar with today.
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Prior to the 1500s, there were no Lutherans.
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Prior to the 1500s, there were no Methodists.
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Prior to the 1500s, there were no Baptists.
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Prior to the 1500s, there were no Pentecostals.
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Prior to the...
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I mean...
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Not enough.
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Yeah.
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Thank you.
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Keep going.
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Alright? And you asked about Lutherans.
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Right? Out of this...
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Out of the Protestant movement, you could say you have the Lutheran movement and then you could say you had what was known as the Reformed movement.
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Those are also called Calvinistic.
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Calvinist.
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Based on the teachings of John Calvihope.
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I am a Calvinist.
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More so than I am a Lutheran.
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Right? I would agree more with Calvin than I would with Luther on doctrine.
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So...
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But see...
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Don't get caught up in the predestination thing.
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That's important.
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But that's not all that Calvinism is.
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Calvinism is an understanding of how to understand things like salvation and justification and all those things.
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So it's not just predestination.
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Predestination is a small part.
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Don't ever get too caught up in just that part.
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The point is there were two major streams.
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Right? You had the Lutherans.
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You had the Reformed, which were the Calvinistic.
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Right? There were also others.
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There was the Zwinglians.
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There was Anabaptists.
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There were these different movements.
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But out of the Calvinistic stream came what were known as the English Baptists.
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Presbyterians also came out of the Calvinistic movement.
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So you have the Presbyterians.
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And the reason why I distinguish between the Presbyterians and the English Baptists was they were very similar in theology where they divided was on the subject of baptism.
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Presbyterians believe that you should baptize infants when they're born.
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Baptists say you don't baptize someone until they make a profession of faith.
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Paedo-baptism, baptism of infants.
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Credo-baptism, baptism of those who profess faith or make a creed.
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Right? Credo-baptism.
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So Lutherans also hold to infant baptism, but they hold to some other very distinct views as well.
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Go ahead.
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I know the Anglican, but the sprinkling and not full conversion.
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Yeah, and that's pretty common even within...
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Well, the Presbyterians pour.
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The Methodists sprinkle.
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You know, depending on how...
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We've done.
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Oh, yeah.
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Well, a little dab won't do you here.
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That's what they said.
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Because they'll say a little dab will do you.
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We say a little dab won't do you here.
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So that just gives you...
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I mean, that's such an anemic breakdown.
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But the idea, though, is prior to the 1500s, we didn't have all these denominations.
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And so what was the one thing that all the Protestants agreed on? This is really the lesson for today.
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Resurrection? No, because even the Catholics believed that.
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Jesus came and died on the cross for all of us.
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Salvation is through faith alone.
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JP's the closest, but you left out one word.
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Salvation is by grace alone.
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Through faith alone.
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You see, the Roman Catholic Church don't deny grace and they don't deny faith.
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But they do deny that it is by grace alone, through faith alone.
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And so it was the Latin word sola that really distinguished...
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the word sola distinguished the Reformers.
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There were five solas.
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Sola gratia, by grace alone.
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Sola fide, through faith alone.
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Solus Christus, in Christ alone.
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Sola scriptura, according to Scripture alone.
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Soli Deo Gloria, for God's glory alone.
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It was alone, alone, alone, alone.
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And the point was, the Roman Catholic Church had added these false teachings and the Protestants were removing that.
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It's not by works and faith.
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It's by faith alone.
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It's not by grace and the church.
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It's by grace alone.
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It's not through Christ and the Pope and the magisterium.
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It's in Christ alone.
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It's not Scripture and tradition, but it's Scripture alone.
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It's not glory to the Pope and to the magistrates and to God, but it's to God be the glory alone.
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And so it was all about that statement of alone.
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Alone, alone, alone.
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And the five solas were the battle cries of the Protestant Reformation.
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And so that is why on your sheet, today is the doctrine of justification.
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And on your sheet, the first thing says define sola fide.
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Justification by faith alone.
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That's what sola fide is.
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And it is theological shorthand.
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And what I mean by that is justification by faith alone in Christ alone.
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So even though it's sola fide, faith has to have an object.
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You can't just say you're saved by faith.
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You have to say you're saved by faith in something.
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Faith by itself without an object is nothing.
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If you say to somebody, do you believe? And they say, yeah, I believe.
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And you say, what do you believe? I don't know.
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That's a problem, right? You've got to believe in something.
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You can't just believe.
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It's got to have an object.
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You know, if I go sit in this chair, I've got to believe that chair will hold me.
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So this chair becomes the object of my faith.
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I'm trusting it.
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I told you guys the story of the parachute.
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If you go to step out of an airplane, you have to have complete faith that that parachute is going to catch you.
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I don't.
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So I ain't stepping out of no airplane.
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Now, I believe it will work because I've seen it before.
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But I don't trust it enough to throw my big behind out of an airplane.
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I ain't going to do it because I don't have that kind of faith.
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The object of my faith, which would be that backpack, does not have enough of my allegiance to cause me to step out of that plane.
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It would if that plane was going down.
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Well, brother, that would change things.
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I agree.
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Have y'all ever seen...
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Okay, now that reminds me.
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Have y'all ever seen the movie...
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This movie came out in the 90s.
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Some of y'all weren't even born.
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But there was a movie called Congo.
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Yeah.
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And they're on a plane, and the plane's going down, and they're, all right, put the backpacks on, put the parachutes on, and they get the guy, it's Tim Curry is the actor's name, and they get him up to the door, and he puts his hands on the door, and they're like, jump! And he goes, push me! And he goes, harder! That'd be me.
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I'd have to be pushed really hard, because I ain't jumping out of no airplane.
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But that's what we mean when we say faith has to have an object, right? When you jump out of an airplane, your faith's in the parachute.
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All your faith is.
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You're saying all my life is resting on 20 foot of tarp.
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That's why it don't make no sense.
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But, when we say justification is sola fide, by faith alone, what we're saying is justification is by faith alone, in Christ alone.
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That's why I say theological shorthand.
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It's in Christ alone.
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So if you are taking notes, I would say that.
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Justification by faith alone is in Christ alone.
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And Martin Luther was convinced of this by studying Romans and Galatians.
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And I don't know how many of you were here.
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Some of you I know, but not many of you.
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Last year I taught all the way through Galatians from verse 1 all the way to the end.
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I did a verse-by-verse teaching.
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It took me, I think I did, it was a year.
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It took a year to teach all the way through it.
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But the reason why I did that was because I wanted to help implant in those who were here, this particular teaching.
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Because it is in Galatians that it says very clearly that we are justified not by works of the law, but through faith in Christ.
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We are justified.
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And to be justified means to be declared righteous before God.
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It is a legal declaration.
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Go ahead, brother.
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Through the blood of Christ.
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Yes, yes.
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We are justified.
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We are declared righteous by the work of Christ.
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And it is our faith in His finished work that we stand upon.
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Not our work.
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And that's letter C.
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The key to sola fide is the rejection of our works as a cause of justification.
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I cannot tell you how many people I have talked to throughout my years of ministry, and I'll ask this question.
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If you died today and you faced God and God said, why should I let you into heaven? What would you say? And almost every person I talk to will say, because I am a good person.
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God will let me into heaven because I am a good person.
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Well, he is a liar.
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That's true.
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But they don't understand why.
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A lot of people really think that they're good persons.
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And you know how I know that's true? Because in the last 15 years, I've done about 150 funerals.
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I work for a funeral home part-time.
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I'm a chaplain, per se, with the funeral home.
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They call me at least once or twice a month to come and do funerals for people who don't have pastors.
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And I've never sat down with a person who said, yeah, Jimmy's in hell.
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No.
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They always say, Jimmy is with the angels.
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Jimmy is with Jesus.
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Well, good point.
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But that's always the...
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See, I call that justification by death.
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See, the Bible says we're justified by faith.
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But a lot of people think they're justified by death.
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Because they figure, when I die, I'm going to heaven.
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My death is my justification.
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But that's not true.
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Justification by death is known as universalism.
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People who believe that no matter what, everybody dies and goes to heaven.
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The Bible doesn't teach that.
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In fact, there are some in this room today who will go to hell.
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That's just a fact.
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I mean, I don't know who you are.
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And I'm not going to walk around.
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I would never walk around and assume to know your heart.
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But every Sunday, I preach to my people at my church and we have about 80 to 100 people.
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And just about every week, I make the point that some of you in this room have not bowed the knee to Jesus Christ.
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Some of you in this room are still standing in opposition to the Lord of glory.
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And one day, you will bow the knee whether you want to or not.
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The Bible says every knee will bow and every tongue will confess.
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Well, let me say it like this.
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We don't naturally willingly bend the knee.
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Our heart is opposed to God.
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So my prayer is that God would open your heart and that you would bend the knee.
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Yes, but again, you want to talk about predestination real bad.
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Next week, we are going to do the doctrine of election.
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Just so you know, I am going to teach on it.
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Judas.
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Yes.
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So is the question did Judas have a choice? He did not have a choice.
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He was prophesied to do what Jesus said.
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So he was prophesied to go to hell, so he was predetermined to go to hell.
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Well, that's for a moment.
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I want to put a pin in that because I am going to deal with the doctrine of election next week.
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The doctrine of election, but I will give you a quick answer if you don't mind.
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The doctrine of election does not remove our own individual responsibility because Judas didn't do anything that he didn't want to do.
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He had free will.
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Well, before we even talk about free will, let's just talk about what we would call moral agency.
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And I will explain the difference later.
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But when we talk about what did Judas want to do? Judas wanted to betray Christ.
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He chose to do that.
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Now was it predetermined that he would do that? Yes, but there is a tension there that we have to maintain that he was not coerced or forced.
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He did what he wanted to do.
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But if he didn't do it, he would have made God and Jesus a liar because that Scripture wouldn't have added up.
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Yes, but are you saying then that in some way, shape, or form, he did something he didn't want to do? That's my point.
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That's my point.
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He wanted to do it.
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But it's still predestined in the laws of the Scripture.
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Sure, absolutely.
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But it also says...
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But again, if you want to get into the nuts and bolts of this, I want to caution you.
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The Bible never uses the word predestination in regard to someone going to hell.
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Predestination is always in regard to someone going to heaven because predestination is an act of God whereby He actually does a work of grace in the life of an individual whereby reprobation, which is the word you're actually trying to describe when you say predestination, reprobation is God allowing a person to remain in their sin.
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And there is a distinction between active predestination and passive reprobation.
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So we have to be able to distinguish categories if we're going to have a theological conversation.
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We can't simply say, well, this is this because I think so.
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No, we have to consider that these things are laid out in Scripture for us very clearly.
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Does that make sense? There's a difference between God actively extending grace and passively passing over and allowing someone to do what they want to do.
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And my point is simply to say this, what He did, He wanted to do.
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For instance, have you ever done something that was opposed to God? Me too.
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I'm not pointing fingers.
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Did you want to do that? Yes.
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Did you fulfill your own fleshly desires in doing it? Do you blame God? Okay.
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But yet God was still sovereign over your life when you did it.
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It's not easy, brother.
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I'm not saying it's easy.
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Well, I'm glad you do because that means you're actually thinking through it.
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And when I say I'm glad, I have a hard time thinking through everything too.
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Yeah, and I'm not chastising you for asking the question.
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I'm just trying to give you there's more to this than just the simple answer.
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We have to look further into it.
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Let me say this.
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I'm going to use some terms real quick.
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I hope this makes sense.
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There's something called Arminianism and then there's Calvinism.
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I'm a Calvinist.
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But then there's something called Hyper-Calvinism.
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Arminianism says, because man is free, God must not be fully sovereign.
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Hyper-Calvinism says, because God is sovereign, man must not be really free.
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Calvinism says that God is sovereign and man is still able to make choices according to his desires.
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The problem is our desires are wrong.
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We desire the flesh.
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Now that's true, but you're going to take me down a road that's going to get me into a conversation I just don't have time to give.
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If you want to ask the question, does God love everyone? I will say this.
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God does not love everyone the same.
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And if somebody gets mad at me saying that, I'll take you to Amos 3 and verse 2 when He says to Israel, You I have loved above all the nations of the world.
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So there is a difference in how God loved Israel than how God loved the Amalekites.
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There's a difference between how God loved Israel and how God...
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What's that? Jacob I loved, Esau I hated, right? What did God say to Saul? He said I regret making you king, but I better admit more towards being a sovereign fool.
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No, not that.
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JP studied 1 Samuel a lot.
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When he refused to do what he was told to do with the people of Agab, God said go destroy everything.
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Lay everything to destruction.
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And He brought back the spoils.
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And what did Samuel say? What is the bleeding I hear in my ears? Because he did not destroy what God commanded him to destroy.
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And Samuel took a sword and he hacked Agab to pieces.
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Yeah, Agab was the king of the people.
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So the point I'm saying is did God have the same affection for the Israelites as He did for the people of Agab? I would say no.
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Now some people would say no, He loved them all the same.
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And I would say just don't watch.
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Just don't watch.
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Now, if you want to...
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Okay, you look like you really want to say something.
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I'm converting the Israelites.
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But see the thing is if you're in Christ, you're already there.
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No, no, no, but think of what you just said though.
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You said something that really makes a good point.
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This is why the Bible says that those who believe in Christ are the true sons of Abraham.
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We enter into a relationship with God by faith in Christ and thereby become spiritual Israel.
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In fact, at the end of Galatians, Paul says, blessings be on the Israel of God.
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Who is the Israel of God? It is all God's people who have come through faith in Christ.
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Didn't any of y'all go to church as a kid and sing Father Abraham? Father Abraham had many sons.
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Many sons had Father Abraham.
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I am one of them and so are you.
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So let's all praise the Lord.
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The song was trying to teach a lesson.
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You see, Abraham was the chosen vessel to bring about the seed who was Christ, the chosen Messiah, and everyone who is in Christ is by faith a son of Abraham.
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So yeah, you weren't wrong when you said I want to be in Israel.
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Yeah, I want to be in that chosen race.
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I want to be in that chosen kingdom.
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He was one and didn't realize it.
45:35
Alright, so...
45:37
No, I'm glad.
45:38
Hey, brother, don't ever be sorry to ask me questions.
45:41
As long as you understand that if I answer you quickly, I'm not trying to be rude.
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I just have a lot to get to.
45:46
I'm not ever trying to argue or be argumentative.
45:49
I just in my mind, sometimes when you're asking questions, I'm like...
45:52
Like I come back.
45:53
Sometimes people are like, oh, he's shooting me down.
45:56
No, I'm just responding.
45:57
These are all questions I've dealt with.
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I've been a Calvinist for 15 years.
46:03
And what changed me from being, I guess, what you call an Arminian or didn't even really understand was the Scripture.
46:12
I was forced to the passages of Scripture that were so clear, but I had the same questions you had.
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Does this make man a robot? Does this make man a puppet? Simply just on the end of the strings.
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And it doesn't because we are still doing what we want to do even in the midst of God's sovereignty.
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And it's hard to understand, but I've never done anything I didn't want to do.
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I heard a term from knowledge like the Lord permits some things to happen.
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That's a whole other conversation.
46:56
Again, we could go into what we would call God's decretive will, God's permissive will, and all those things.
47:01
And that's a little further again than I'd want to go.
47:04
But I'll say this.
47:05
There's a book that was written by Jonathan Edwards, considered to be one of the greatest theologians in the history of America.
47:11
He was, I would say, one of the greatest theologians in the history of the church.
47:17
Jonathan Edwards wrote a book called On the Freedom of the Will.
47:20
And he really did help to define some of these terms.
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That's why I don't use the word free will.
47:25
I use moral agency because he describes the difference.
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Our will is not free because it's bound in sin.
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So Jesus said you're either a slave to sin or you're a slave to righteousness, but He never says you're free.
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You're bound to your desires.
47:40
So to say free means without that.
47:43
But we are.
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We're bound.
47:45
You know, before coming to Christ, we are slaves to sin.
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And slaves to the devil.
47:52
And so that's the argument, right? We do have these fleshly desires.
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And when we come to Christ, what does He do? He sets us free.
47:59
And you say, but yeah, I still have the fleshly desires though.
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That's because you're still in the flesh.
48:04
But you're now battling those desires.
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The difference between being a Christian and being a non-Christian is the non-Christian loves the sin and revels in the sin and wants the sin.
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The Christian sees his sin and rejects it and hates it and fights it.
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It's like the picture of the fish.
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You know, if a stream is going and all the fish die, the fish will go with the stream.
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But if one of those fish came to life and he tried to swim upstream, now it's a fight.
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And he's going to run into the other fish.
48:39
Well, that's another conversation for another...
48:42
What's your name? Remind me of your name.
48:44
Richie.
48:45
Richie.
48:46
That's a good question too.
48:47
That's the problem I have.
48:48
That's why I ask these questions because I still want to do stuff.
48:52
You still want to do stuff.
48:53
I've been talking up until I'm 27 and it just sucks.
48:56
And I can't get past them.
48:58
And I have such a hard time.
48:59
People are like, stop asking that question.
49:01
But I'm waiting for somebody to somehow break it down toward my little ones.
49:06
Well, as far as you're dealing with sin, I would say Galatians 5 is very helpful in that regard.
49:15
Particularly verse 16 because it talks about the works of the Spirit being at war with the flesh.
49:22
And I think that's the battle that we all face.
49:25
I've never had a day in my life that I didn't sin.
49:28
Sometimes I know God is there and I'm like, let's just see what happens.
49:33
And I'm going to still go through it and I feel bad.
49:35
But then I feel like God is like, come on, dude.
49:37
You knew what was wrong and you still did it.
49:40
Maybe I never knew you.
49:42
Depart from me.
49:43
You don't want to be that guy, right? I don't, but I can't help it sometimes.
49:47
No, you don't want to be the guy in Matthew 7.
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Many will come to me in that day and say, Lord, Lord, did we not do this? Did we not do that? And I will say, depart from me.
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Maybe I never knew you.
49:57
That's the one that you just quoted.
49:58
And that's what I'm saying that I have a hard time because sometimes I think about it and I'm like, no, I shouldn't do this.
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And then I'm just like, definitely.
50:04
I'm doing it.
50:06
I'm having fun.
50:06
I can see Richie at the gate talking about, hey, Lord, it's me.
50:10
Over here.
50:12
I put a lot of hours under the Bible, man.
50:14
I know you remember those nights.
50:17
I want to remind you of something because it is the heart of the lesson today.
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By what are we saved? By our works or by faith? Faith.
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Well, I have complete and utter faith in God.
50:29
That's why I'm scared because I know sometimes I'm just not strong enough.
50:32
You know what? What's so interesting, you know, and I do got to finish up here.
50:41
Luther spent so many hours going to the confessional.
50:46
This is before 1517.
50:49
He would go to the confessional every day because of his guilt.
50:54
And he was trying so hard.
50:56
He would beat himself.
50:58
He would fast, starve himself.
51:03
He would pray on his knees for hours.
51:08
He would go into the confessional so often that his leaders would say, Brother Martin, do not return until you have something serious to confess.
51:17
And he would say, but all of my sins are serious.
51:21
So he was so convicted over his sin and it was when he finally understood that his justification was by faith alone that he was able to have peace.
51:39
And that's all I can give to you, Richie, is that we have to figure out that it's not.
51:45
It's not our ability to do good or bad, but what Christ has done for us.
51:53
Now that doesn't mean what we do bad is we shouldn't not try.
51:57
You should.
51:58
Yeah, exactly.
51:59
Because that's what Romans 6, right? We shouldn't continue in sin saying grace will abound.
52:04
We shouldn't do that because that's not what we're called to do.
52:07
But at the same time, we cannot rely on ourselves for our salvation.
52:11
I think that that battle slowly, once you keep on persisting, it slows, you know, that battle slows, you know what I'm saying, against doing what you don't want to do against what you want to do.
52:25
I do think you have more victory over time.
52:27
I think that's what you're saying, yeah.
52:29
Eventually, right.
52:30
It'll get easier.
52:32
I'll give you, well, I don't know if it gets easier, but let me tell you this story.
52:37
I think I may have mentioned this in here before, so if you've heard it before, forgive me.
52:40
If I'm repetitive, just remember this.
52:42
Repetition is the key to learning.
52:44
And the key to learning is repetition.
52:46
So if you hear me say the same story twice, just remember this.
52:48
The only things I remember from seminary are the things my professor said over and over and over.
52:54
That's it.
52:54
That's all I remember.
52:56
Dr.
52:56
Jerry Powers was my favorite teacher and he used to say the same things over and over.
52:59
And every once in a while, I'll quote Dr.
53:00
Jerry Powers because he said those things over and over and over.
53:03
Let me say this.
53:05
There was a man who was going to a party.
53:09
A man was going to a party.
53:11
While he was on the way to the party, a car went by and splashed mud on his clothing.
53:18
It was too dark for him to see how bad covered he was.
53:23
So he's like, well, it's probably okay.
53:26
I'll just keep going to the party.
53:28
Well, as he walked in the dark, he got closer and closer to the light of the house that he was going to.
53:35
And the closer and closer he got to the house, the more he could see how dirty he was.
53:40
And when he finally got to the front door of the house, he could see his whole self and he saw that he was covered in dirt.
53:48
And so that picture for me is a picture of what it's like as we draw closer to Christ.
53:56
Oftentimes, as we get closer to the light, we see in ourselves more sin.
54:03
We see how dirty we really are.
54:05
And even though I do agree that we have victory over time, there are certain things that do get easier.
54:11
I think that we recognize our sin even more clearly the closer we get to Christ.
54:17
And therefore, it becomes even more evident why we need grace.
54:24
The evidence of needing grace is the closer we get to Him.
54:31
Yes, absolutely.
54:33
Now, I didn't get to the second half of your sheet and we're out of time.
54:36
So just understand that basically I was going to defend Sola Fide.
54:41
I think I've done that.
54:42
I think I've made the argument.
54:45
So hopefully this was helpful to you.
54:47
And let's pray.
54:48
Father, thank You for this time of study.
54:50
I pray that it's been encouraging.
54:51
And I pray that in the days to come as we celebrate the Reformation, Lord, we'll be reminded of why all this was important.
54:58
In Christ's name, Amen.