Starting of 2022 on the Right Foot: John 6 and Acts 4

Greetings and welcome to The Dividing Line. It is, believe it or not, 2022, which is the same thing as saying 2022, which scares me because 2020 was really strange.

So let's not do 2020 all over again. It does seem there are some people who want to do that, but we don't want to.

And so here we are on a Monday. Why in the world would we do one on a Monday? Well, I'm planning, trying to respond to things in a manner where you are prioritizing things.

You're trying to make things useful to the widest possible audience. You want to be focused upon going deeply into the text of scripture.

You know, I've wanted to thank all of our supporters over the past year.

It just seems to me that the continuation of the fact that we have so many who are supporting the work tells us that what you want is you want to be going into the text of scripture.

You want to go into church history. You want to go into apologetics. You want to see the application to what's going on in the world today.

That's not everybody's cup of tea, and that's fine. We've never pretended.

We've never been. There are some people that look at their, what is it, Alexis? What is that?

What's the numbers for downloads and blog hits and stuff?

We don't even know. We don't care. Don't bother with that kind of stuff. But we do, so we're not looking for the big, broad spectrum type thing.

People who want consistent theological application and biblical examination and things like that, those are the people that continue to watch the dividing line and continue to make it possible for us to continue to do these things.

So in looking at what's being written, the issues we're dealing with today,

I need tomorrow to respond to two very different presentations, one written, one video.

And I'm going to have to say very strong negative things about both. And I just didn't want to start off the new year with something like that.

They're both directed, they're aimed directly at me. And so I feel it's important to respond to those types of things.

But at the same time, I'd like to start off the year immersed in scripture and immersed in the word of God.

So I'm sitting here going, all right, so what can we do? And I realize that in the longer of the two responses that I'm planning on tomorrow, there are two particular biblical texts that will be looked at.

And they thankfully came up in what is otherwise two hours and 45 minutes of biblically arid discussion.

It's like the Bible's just out there someplace. It's sitting on a desk, but it's not getting much use.

But these two texts did come up. And you know when you're dealing with philosophers, when you literally get excited when they quote a

Bible verse so that you can actually, oh, something to grab hold of, something of objective truth, divine revelation, yay.

Let's talk about it. And so what we'll do today on the program is we're going to go in -depth on two texts.

Over the decades of this program, we have gone into depth on both of these texts before.

But not in this room and not with our wonderful flipboard over here.

I think I mentioned on the amazing

I Was In Here All Alone program on Friday, where I about gave

Rich a heart attack by texting him as I'm on my way down, hey, you think we could do this remotely?

I mean, like, you not here? And I expected to get, are you nuts? I mean, give me a few weeks and maybe, but instead sort of like, yeah, let me see.

Yeah, let's see what you got. And the only thing I had to do manually here was actually play the theme at the beginning and the end.

And I'm sure we'll figure out how to get around that eventually too. And Rich can just retire to his lovely island in the

Caribbean. And we're all set here. We're all good now. Anyway, but I don't think we have had the opportunity of going through these texts here with the big board.

And like I said, I think I mentioned on Friday. Maybe I didn't. But a good friend was watching the program.

And afterwards, I got this text. It had a screenshot of me doing something with the board.

And the only question he had was, where do we get one? Because we want one of them.

And I looked. And I don't think this isn't the Flip 2, is it? I think it is, actually.

Think it is? OK, all right. Well, anyways, that was what came up when I searched for it. And I believe it is

Samsung. OK, Samsung. So if some of you are wondering, this is the

Flip 2 presentation board by Samsung. So yes, we like it as well.

We really, really do. OK, so what two texts am I talking about?

Well, we're talking about John chapter 6. And you say, you've covered

John chapter 6 47 ,000 times before. Yes, we have.

And we have done so within the context of demonstrating that. And I will make this direct statement.

And it's a bold statement. But after all the years we've been doing this,

I think I have a basis for saying this. I do not believe a synergist can walk through John chapter 6 consistently.

I just don't believe it's possible. And especially when someone tries to use

John chapter 6 as a proof text for prevenient grace. So tomorrow in our review of the very lengthy video,

John chapter 6 was referred to as a proof text for prevenient grace. We're going to demonstrate that that was a wonderful example of eisegesis and could never be substantiated from the text itself.

So we will do that first. And then the other text that has been batted around a little bit is

Acts chapter 4, the prayer of the early church after the persecution of the apostles. And they are told, do not speak any longer in the name of Christ.

And of course, they have to do so. It's sort of relevant to us today, certainly relevant to our

Canadian brothers in looking at the establishment within less than a week of an unjust anti -Christian law in Canada, which is based upon an anti -Christian assertion that there is, the law specifically states, and there's a similar law being contemplated in the

United Kingdom in England, that in essence says that there is no, you are not allowed to believe that there are superior viewpoints in regards to human sexuality.

Now, I mean, this is a complete repudiation of the entire history of Western culture. No question about it.

Just the absurdity of it is astonishing. But because of this, coming up on the 16th of January, many churches will be having a special service on the 16th of January, the first Sunday after this law comes into effect in Canada, if you could turn that down a little bit farther, because I get an echo off of it.

And we will be speaking about God's law about human sexuality.

Pastor John MacArthur has jumped in. It's fascinating to me. We had Joe Boudin a couple of weeks ago talk about this.

We've been promoting it. And last week, John MacArthur says, yes, let's do this. And now it's John MacArthur's baby.

It's like, if John MacArthur does it, well, he must have come up with this himself. And it's like, well, no, actually.

Other folks came up with it first, but we're awful glad to have all those folks joining in and participating in the presentation of hopefully very sound and balanced sermons on the subject of God's law and human sexuality.

I will be preaching on the 16th at Apology of Church on this particular subject. And so I would encourage everyone, honestly, to participate in this.

I think it will be very, very helpful to all involved. So anyway, with all of that said, Acts 427 -28 is directly relevant to that in regards to the fact that the apostles made it very clear that they would obey

God rather than man. And that they interpreted, it's fascinating, we'll see here in a moment, they interpreted what was going on around them in light of fulfilled scripture and in light of God's providence.

And so we will take a look at that as well in Acts 4. So with that in mind, let's start with John 6.

As I said, this text will be cited tomorrow in the video presentation as evidence of what

I call the cellophane tape, the cellophane tape of theology known as prevenient grace.

This concept of grace that God extends that does not actually change anyone's nature.

It does not bring about regeneration, but it somehow in unexplained fashion brings people to a position where they are able to make appropriate decisions.

It's almost like it frees the will in a sense without actually giving you a new will.

Who knows what it is? Because there's nothing in the Bible about it. Obviously it is supposed to be a category of God's grace.

But I remember a few years ago, a book came out on it. So I bought it, read it and went, you've got to be kidding me.

It was the most pathetic attempt to try to come up with something just plainly is not there that I had ever read.

And so, like I said, there's just so little biblical content, so little divine content in the criticisms that were offered of me that this was at least one where we can go, okay, you quoted it.

Let's demonstrate that you will not be able to defend your utilization of it. We invite you to try, but once you get into this arena, you can't do what you do in other arenas.

And that is just massage the definitions so that you can maintain your position. This is objective divine truth.

There's error and truth. And we can identify the error by utilizing the, what's interesting is by utilizing the same standards of hermeneutics and interpretation in the

Gospel of John at this point that we use to demonstrate the deity of Christ from the

Gospel of John. And so I would invite everybody, hold me accountable to this.

As I walk through the text, do I use the same standards and methodology to derive my final interpretations of this text that I would in John 1 in regards to, in the beginning was the word was

God, was with God, word was God. John 1 18, there's really no meaningful textual variants here that impact the meaning of the text here.

But if we were to be looking at what would John 1 18, very important text in regards to deity of Christ, but there's a textual variant there.

Will I be consistent in the application of textual critical theory there that I would apply anywhere else?

All of these things, hold me accountable because there are all sorts of places, John 20, 28,

John 1, 1, John 8, looking at the I am sayings of GSA 24, 8, 58, 13, 19, 18, five, six, are we using the same standards?

And if we are, why isn't the other side? That's the question. Now we know the background, hopefully we know the background, the feeding of the 5 ,000.

And before that, in John 5, and one of the things that causes my heart to fall in love more and more with scripture as I get older and older and slower and slower, is, and I've said this many times before, but we have new listeners and new viewers.

The beauty of the consistency of scripture that exists, not in a surface level, shallow fashion, but in the deepest threads that run through the text of scripture, not just from Genesis to Revelation, but in the book of John, it is a glorious thing to see how, in each what we would call chapter, knowing that the chapters are not divinely inspired or anything like that, they were not a part of the original writing.

But I think those who, Stephanos didn't do the chapters, but those who did do the chapter divisions before him, did a fairly decent job with John.

And because you can look at John 3, there's a set of particular concepts there.

John 4, woman at the well, same thing. John 5, very much so.

The dialogue prompted by the healing on the Sabbath and the claim of Jesus to have the same authority as the father to work on the

Sabbath, and then the perfect unity of father and son that is then the essence of what is said through the rest of chapter 5, honoring the son, even as we honor the father.

That is your immediate background to chapter 6, where you then have the feeding of the 5 ,000, and then the sending away, and the confusion of the disciples.

Very important to remember that from the disciples' perspective, this must've been very difficult to be sent away by Jesus.

The reason being, we've got 5 ,000 men.

There's probably at least 5 ,000 women and children. We've got a huge group here, and people are so excited, and you're sending them all away?

Is this what the Messiah would do? You just fed them miraculously, and people are excited, and this is great.

This is awesome. This is wonderful. And then you're sending everybody home, and you're sending us back across the lake, and so there's confusion.

They don't understand why Jesus is doing what Jesus is doing, and there's gonna be confusion at the end of the chapter as well, but for a different reason, a very different reason.

So what happens then is we have men who are seeking

Jesus. It's fascinating. They are literally seeking Jesus, and so they've rowed across the lake, and they have encountered

Jesus in the synagogue at Capernaum, and once again,

I am so thankful that at least once in my life, it may be the only chance

I will ever have to do it, but at least once in my life, I did get to visit this place, and it is burned into my memory standing on the seashore in Capernaum.

With the synagogue, the location of the synagogue, probably not the first century synagogue, but more like a third century synagogue, right behind me, allegedly

Peter's home, right behind me. Again, that's allegedly. No one really knows that for certain, and looking out across toward the other side of the lake, which from anywhere around that lake, you can see the other side.

I grew up, you know, the Sea of Galilee. You don't see anything across the way, but you can.

You can see the shore all the way around. It's distant. It's a big lake, but it is a lake, and so I can just see in my mind's eye these men rowing into that area of Capernaum and beaching their boats and coming in, and, you know, the logical place to look for a preacher would be synagogue, and there's

Jesus, and so this conversation begins, and the focus,

Jesus' focus, is to move these men away from what they saw, which was a physical miracle, to his role as the bread of life, and so in verse 35,

Jesus said to them, now, I do realize we have egoimi here.

I am the bread of life. I think that is significant. However, when you have egoimi with a expressed object afterwards, specifically the bread of life, it doesn't have the same,

I think, application and weight as when it doesn't, when it's just being used as a title, as a name.

I am. Unless you believe that I am, you will die in your sins, and before Abraham was, I am. Who are you seeing?

Jesus. I am. The men fall back upon the ground, but it is there. Egoimi, I am the bread of life.

So these men are seeking bread, and Jesus says, I am the bread of life.

Now, if we were to go through all of John 6 today, and we have done that in the past, and we have done, and this would be another way of testing things, we have walked through all the rest of John 6, and specifically the eat my flesh, drink my blood material, again, demonstrating the consistency of the revelation, and it would be a good test for anyone who wants to say we're wrong about this.

Do you apply the same standards to that material that we do? Who's being consistent in their exegesis?

Always an important thing to ask. But then we have this phrase, the one coming to me, and the reason

I translate the one coming, that's not nice, smooth, the

NASB says he who comes, but the one coming to me is because it is a present tense participle.

Now, there's been a bit of a revolution over the past 20 years, 15 years, in Greek studies in regards to the modes and aspects of Greek syntax, and a deemphasizing of the time element in modes.

My gut feeling is there'll probably be a swing back the other direction eventually, probably not as far, preserving the true elements of this, but then providing counterexamples to, that's how scholarships should work, but most of us don't live long enough to see some of those things.

I'm starting to, which is interesting. But anyway, the point being that in John, in John, we are going to see a very, very important and purposeful emphasis on his part, on the use of the present versus the aorist in regards to faith and coming and things like that.

And so that's why I say the one coming to me will not hunger, and please notice ume, strong form of denial, and the one believing, and again, it's a participle, some type of participle, the one believing in me shall never thirst, shall never thirst.

Now, very important, it's not relevant to the issue of prevenient grace or things like that, but it's very important to put down a marker right here that the first place, the first place in this text where you are going to encounter hungering and thirsting right here and right here, how is this hunger and thirst meant?

I'm sorry, met? How is it dealt with? How is it satiated? It is done by two things, coming to Christ and believing in him.

So it is not satisfied by physical actions, it is satisfied by spiritual actions focused upon Christ.

So this hungering and this thirsting, these men don't understand because they have physical hunger and thirst, but they don't have spiritual hunger and thirst.

And so they're thinking they're going to find in Christ a fulfillment of their physical, and Jesus is saying, the one coming to me will never hunger, the one believing in me will never thirst.

And so the hungering and the thirsting, and hence I would argue, if we're going to walk through the text from beginning end, which is how you're supposed to do it, if you have to jump around in a text and not follow the argument all the way through, it's probably because you have a tradition that goes against what the teaching of the text is.

If you follow the text all the way through, then once you get to Jesus talking about eating his flesh and drinking his blood, you're talking about coming and believing in him.

You're not talking about some future establishment of some Eucharistic sacrifice or something along those lines.

You're going to be letting this establish that context.

So it's important to note then, but I said to you that you have seen me and you are not believing.

You've seen me, but you are not believing.

Please realize these guys rode boats across the lake looking for Jesus.

I've said many times in most of our churches today, they would have been made Sunday school leaders or deacons the first time they showed up.

I mean, it's like they drove through a blizzard to come hear the sermon.

Wow, these people put them in leadership right now, right? Well, Jesus knows the hearts of men.

And he, I said to you that you've seen me, your eyes have seen me, not joined with faith.

He identifies these people who are seeking him as unbelievers.

And what you need to understand, that's verse 36, all right? So everything else below from there on is defined and yet do not believe.

It's all explaining the unbelief.

Why do some believe and some do not? Why do some believe and some do not?

Because all of these disciples who were excited about what Jesus was doing, they've seen it.

They saw the miracle. They saw the miracle, they ate the miracle food. And by the end of the chapter, where are they?

They're walking away, they're walking away. And Jesus explains why. Why? But Jesus' explanation is not a synergistic explanation.

And so we tend to ignore it. We tend to ignore it. So let's, yes, do not save.

Let's scroll this up so we have a little more room to look at some of the key material here.

All right. So the key text.

In the context of having just said, you are not believing, what does

Jesus say? All that the father, here's the father, all that the father, all that the father, which he gives me will come to me.

To me. Now, the key to any fair, honest reading of the text is to follow the argument through.

Follow the phraseology through. Where have we already seen coming to me? Verse 35, where coming to me will not hunger, believing in me will not thirst.

So it's fulfillment of spiritual need. Same language is being used here, okay?

So everyone who the father gives me will come to me.

That's a very straightforward statement. And a lot of people don't like that statement, to be perfectly honest with you.

But they like the next one. And the one coming to me, ume, strong form of denial,

I will never cast out. I will never cast away.

The one coming to me, I will certainly not, the

NASB says, certainly not cast out. Now, like I said, everybody loves that.

I mean, what could be more glorious than Jesus saying that the one who comes to me,

I will never cast that one out. I mean, there's, when you think about it, you think about the necessity of holiness.

Obviously, one who comes to Christ, there must be some means by which they are provided with holiness.

How else could they be in the presence of the son where he is going to be in the presence of the father?

There has to be, this coming to Christ has to be something that results in a fundamental reorientation of one's relationship to God.

And the one coming to me, I will never cast out. What an awesome promise.

But as with parental instructions, teenagers can hear the last part of a sentence and not the first part of a sentence.

This is the last part of the sentence. This is the last part of the sentence. And so the point is that there is a foundation that is provided here.

So who is the one coming? The one given by whom?

By the father. That's divine election. Who comes to Jesus?

The one given by the father. Now, someone might say, oh, but maybe other people can come to Jesus.

We'll find out where the text addresses that. But for right now, what's being said, the one who has said, you will never be cast out is the one who's been given by the father.

All that the father gives me will come to me. And here's something you need to understand.

If you ask the question, how does this will come to me?

All right? That is right here, the one coming. What comes first, the action of giving by the father or coming by the individual?

There is only one answer to that in the language, in logic, in grammar, in syntax, whatever.

The action of the giving by the father precedes and determines the coming of someone to the son.

And that's the problem because this makes salvation something

God does, not man. And that it doesn't matter whether you have a small synergistic system or a big synergistic system.

You require just a few little things, maybe just faith and all sorts of sacramental fulfillments and everything else and everything in between.

All falters right there because the one coming to Christ is the one who's been given by the father to the son.

Now, believe me, again, if you're new to the program or you've not worked through these things before,

I am well aware of the 47 ,000 different ways that man tries to pry these texts open to pour man's abilities and will in to fill things up.

And so some will say, well, but see, the ones that the father gives the son are those that the father has seen will come to the son.

No, that's not what it says, is it? That's not what it says, is it? In fact, that's the opposite of what it says.

But that's the mindset of mankind. I was trying to find a way to get around this particular aspect of things.

Now, upon saying the amazing truth that the one coming to me,

I will never cast out. Why? Why will he never cast out one coming to him?

Because I have come down from heaven. Now, that is a clear indication of Jesus's self -awareness of his divine nature.

He is just as aware of his divine nature here as he is at his trial in Mark 14, when he combines passages from Daniel and the

Psalter resulting in the high priest tearing his clothes saying you've heard the blasphemy. So this isn't just John.

That's what you'll get in Bible college and seminary, but it's not. I have come down from heaven, not in order to do my will, but rather,

Allah, the adversative, the will of the one who sent me, okay? Not mine, but his.

Ah, lots of things we could wander off into here, nature of the hypostatic union, the errors of neo -Apollinarianism as promoted by William Lane Craig and his acolytes, the accomplishment of the pactum salutis, the eternal covenant of redemption, all things that are touched upon when you have

Jesus specifically referring to him in his incarnate state, that always has to be kept in mind.

He is in the incarnate state at this point. In the incarnate state, he has come down out of heaven not to do his will, but the will of him who sent him.

Now, this is all connected to why won't you cast out this individual?

Well, because I've come to do my father's will and I will not cast out the one who comes to me because, and this is the will of the one who sent me.

So notice the one who sent me here and here, just repeating itself.

Here's the will, in order that of all which he has given me.

Now it's interesting because Panha here is neuter. And the reason for that is the neuter in the

Greek language is often used to sum up an entire group or category.

And so here you have as a group. So up here you have an individual and it's a masculine participle because it's the individual's coming.

Now it's a group that has been given to me in order that of all he has given to me, me apaleso ex autu.

I lose none of it, but raise it.

And you'll notice there's a textual variant here. That's because scribes struggled with the fact that this is, a lot of scribes didn't know the uses of the ancient

Greeks well enough to, so they're concerned this is a neuter and maybe it should be a masculine and so on and so forth.

We won't get into that right now. But I will stay so,

I will raise it up on the last day, on the last day, okay?

As it's extremely important to understand. This is, I think one of the most foundational, beautiful texts in all of scripture regarding our security in Christ.

Am I blowing you out Rich? Cause I was starting to preach a little bit. I'm really fine. You all noticed,

I'm not sure how many of you can see the shadows walking around here, but Rich is very peripatetic today. And so he's moving around a little bit, but he waits till this camera's on.

So cause you go over here, you'll, you'll see him, you know, walking in front. And I decided to do that because he's been very careful and very professional so you wouldn't know.

And so if I tell you, it just makes it all up and it's sort of fun. Anyway, this is all live folks.

And we don't, we don't pretend to be, we ain't, we are not looking to get into Hollywood. Okay. This ain't

Hollywood. The only, the reason we do this is so that you, we can do this. And that's the important part.

This is an incredible text. We have here the revelation of the will of the father.

It's always, it's always a gift of grace when you have one person of the

Trinity telling us, and he's now in the incarnate state. So here's, here's, here is a, a perfectly reliable revelation of the father's will.

And of course the son has always been the ones who revealed the father. So everything we know of the father, we know through the son. But here is the son telling us, and this is his will for me in order that of all he has given me,

I lose none of it, but raise it up on the last day.

Now, the first thing to do, you got it. You just, you've got to do this on the last day.

Okay. We're going to see this over and over again in this section.

And there it is, to be raised up on the last day by the son is to be not cast out by him.

And as we're going to see, that's to have eternal life. That's what it, that's what it means. And we're going to have, we're going to see that in verse 40.

It's going to come up here in just a second, but we're following, and this is the key. We are following all of this straight through from top to bottom, following the flow of the text, following the, again,

I'm repeating myself, but one of the disadvantages of these little things right here,

John 6, 37, John 6, 38, John 6, 39. Verse divisions are wonderful.

We can all get to the same spot so fast, but they are not original.

They are not original. And so they tend to break the text up in our minds when this was one flow of thought, this was one presentation.

And so many of us just chop things up, disconnect things, and we don't follow a flow.

And it bugs us when people do that to us. Didn't you hear what I said before? I define my terms, but we do it to the

Bible all the time. So you follow the flow through, and we'll see in the last day, notice down here at the bottom, and I will raise him up the last day in verse 40.

So it's going to be repeated over and over again. But before we leave verse 39, you must understand what it's saying.

It's saying, how can Jesus say this? How can

Jesus say this? How can he say that the

Father's will for him is that he lose none of what has been given to him?

What does that require Jesus to be? John 6, 39 requires

Jesus to be a perfect and powerful Savior.

And I say to you, if Jesus is a perfect and powerful

Savior, that's monergism. He's going to raise up all those that have been given to him on the last day.

Oh, but they come to him. Yes, they do. As a result of being given, it's already been established in verse 37.

And so he's not going to lose any of it. If you have whatever you want to call human autonomy, if you have human beings with the capacity to do what destroys the will of the

Father for the Son, which is what you must believe. If you believe that a person be given by the

Father to the Son and the Son lose that person, then you believe that that person has more power than Jesus has to keep them.

And that Jesus has to fulfill the will of the Father. And that's what most synergistic systems say.

In fact, all of them really. Well, okay, there are some synergistic systems that in an incoherent way, actually teach some sort of, quote unquote, eternal security or whatever.

So you have free will before you get saved and not afterwards. I've never understood that. It does not make a lick of sense, but there you go.

This means Jesus is a perfect Savior. He has the ability to save all those given to him by the

Father. And that is something for which we should be incredibly thankful.

So you just heard, for this is the will of my Father. And the first use of that phrase, this is the will of my

Father, is in reference to the Son. That of all that he's given me,

I lose none of them, but raise them up on the last day. Now it says so much about mankind and our self -centeredness that what we do, and Norman Geisler did this.

He did. We don't follow 637 and 39 because that's just all sovereignty.

That's just all God doing God stuff. And we don't have any part of it. We come, but we come because we've been enabled to come.

And so what we do is we jump to verse 40. And then we use verse 40 to overturn the flow from 37 to 39.

So you have very clearly laid out for you there. For this is the will of my

Father in order that everyone looking upon the Son, theoreo, to gaze upon, to look upon.

Everyone looking upon the Son and believing, again, to present participles.

And the article from this is borrowed by this.

That's how it functions. The one looking upon the Son and believing in him might have eternal life.

Now, when it's really common for people to say, well, see, might, it's a subjunctive.

And so we don't know, look, it's a purpose result clause. It's a Hinnah clause.

And when you have a Hinnah clause, that's how you translate it in English. The context determines whether it's something that is questionable or not questionable or something like that.

It's not just, well, as long as it's a subjunctive. No, it's the purpose. The will of the Father is this, in order that everyone looking upon the

Son and believing in him might have eternal life. And what? And I will raise him up on the last day.

So if we're following the passage through, who does

Jesus raise up on the last day? Those given to him by the Father. And so we get to verse 40.

Does that mean, oh, oh, he forgot something. And actually it's our looking and our believing that determines whether we raised up in the last day.

Well, don't get me wrong. Everyone who's gonna be raised up by Jesus looked and believed, no question about it.

But this text says the reason any one of you has ever looked and believed is because you were given by the

Father to the Son. That is not questionable. I'll debate anyone on that. You cannot defeat this text.

We have responded to John Lennox and everybody else over the years.

And they're just, the only way to get around this stuff is to impose some kind of amazing external, well,

John 6 really doesn't have to do with salvation idea into it. Well, John 3 does, but John 6 doesn't.

And what's the difference? Well, we don't know, but we don't like what John 6 says about salvation. So we're gonna skip all that.

So do not get me wrong. We look, we believe, but why?

Because this is God's will. God's will for us is that we are looking upon the

Son. We're believing in the Son. We're coming to the Son. And how is it that we are able to do this?

Now let's back up a second because something very interesting happens at this point.

What happens at this point is the Jews, Gungusmu, a

Greek term that has become a popular term as part of white family lore.

My grandchildren know what Gungusmu means because my daughter continues to use it because I used it.

We'd be driving in our little old, man, was that an 89 Ford Escort we had for a long time, that white one?

It's like an 89, I think, somewhere around there. And we'd be driving along and they'd have their little whiteboards.

See, there was a precursor to this. They had their little whiteboards in the back of the seat, back seat.

And we're doing Christian worldview stuff while we're driving around. Phoenix is a big city.

And so if you've got to get around Phoenix, you spend a lot of time in a car. And so once in a while I would say, no

Gungusmu -ing back there. No grumbling, no complaining. It is, and Gungusmu sounds like complain.

I don't know how you can say Gungusmu without sounding like you're complaining. So young parents, learn at least that one

Greek term and you will impress your children and grandchildren for years to come. And you can thank me for that later.

So the Jews begin to grumble concerning him because he said, and they're going all, they're behind the,

I am the bread of life, which came down, I am the bread, which came down out of heaven. The point is they see what a lot of people don't see.

This whole text is about Jesus. This whole text is about his centrality, who he is.

The fact that if you experience spiritual longing and desiring, he's the only, he's the only solution.

And when you think about, no Old Testament prophet could have ever said the things that Jesus said here.

You put these words in the mouth of anybody else and it becomes absolute heresy, blasphemy.

Blasphemy is what it becomes. So they start to complain. And so we have the content of their complaint.

And this would be interesting to talk about, but we don't have time to do it, especially we get to Acts chapter four because I've already gone nearly an hour already.

And this was supposed to be the short part. And so they're talking about, is this not

Jesus son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? How does he now say I've come down out of heaven?

And so they're questioning his origin, which is very clearly divine in what is being said here.

So Jesus answered and said to them, do not gungus move. Do not gungus move, do not grumble amongst yourselves.

And here, here we go. Let's dig in, do not grumble amongst yourselves. Udais dunatai, no one is able.

I argue, I would say to you, that is the end of libertarian freedom in the sense of autonomy.

That is original sin. That is fallenness in Adam. That is enslavement.

That is spiritual death. No one is able. Not some are able.

Not some are able if they're put into a particular context. No one is able to do what?

Althine pros me, come to me.

If you function on the foundation that everyone you talk to possesses the innate ability to come to Christ anytime they jolly well want to, you don't believe what

Jesus said here. It may be what you've been taught from the beginning, but you don't believe what

Jesus said here. It's sort of like when you go over John chapter eight and Jesus says, why do you not hear the things

I'm saying to you? People go, well, it's because they've chosen not to believe or the preacher wasn't speaking.

It's because you don't belong to God. It's because you don't belong to God. Jesus says stuff like that that just makes us go, whoa, what, what?

And it runs up against our traditions. No one is able to come to me. If the sentence ended there, if this was the only papyrus manuscript we had of John and it broke off there, hope is gone.

There is no salvation, but thankfully that isn't where it ends. Unless, unless,

Eon, unless, there's your hope. There's your hope.

We having sound problems today, bro? I'm popping, huh?

Do I need to? It's transmitter, huh? Oh, okay.

All right. There's nothing I can do over here. If I just, you know, a little technical adjustment.

Hey, hey, my dad was chief engineer of WHV radio and television in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.

And I will never, ever forget, ever forget these huge transmitting modules in this building because they were like,

I think we had, how many towers do we have out there? Anyways, there were these towers. We'd have to go walk the towers or all this stuff because there was no remote stuff back then.

This was the 19, this is 1972 -ish. And I'll never forget, he was taking readings and he's looking at it and he's looking at it.

And he steps back and he goes, bam, there we go. It's called technical adjustment right there.

Those were the analog. Don't, you don't do that digital. Oh, okay. All right. Well, if you say so. Okay, all right.

Well, anyway, that's how we did it back in my day. My dad remembers that to this day.

It was cause it was really cool. I've told the story before, but there was this, there was this board there that had been disconnected a long time ago and wasn't, didn't do anything anymore.

And so it's, it's got slides and buttons and it wasn't connected anymore.

And I'm watching, this is when Star Trek is first airing. Okay. And I'm into phasers and man,

I flew that board all over the universe. It was, it was awesome. It was, it was great.

And you go, you grew up poor, didn't you? Yeah, we did. But that was, that was, that was great. That was wonderful. So Moses was in the bull rushes.

And so we're back here in John 6, 44. Okay. So no one is able to come to me unless, so Eon May, unless the father, the one who sent me draws him.

Okay, so we've got a subjunctive. Here's your subjunctive indicator here in El Cuso. So unless the father who sent me draws him.

Now I want to point something out. In the vast majority of synergistic systems out there in the world, right here after him, there is right there a massive place for the insertion of the autonomous will of man.

Now there isn't anything in the text, but this is where you get to insert all the sacramental system of Rome or everything else.

It all, it all goes in there, but it's not in the text. Because please, please note something.

When Jesus says, unless the father sent me, draws him out on, and I will raise him on the last day.

So here's our last day again. Where have we seen that before? We've already seen it, right? You raised up in the last day by Jesus, you have what?

Eternal life. It's already just in the preceding sentence, but you have two autons.

Now in any meaningful exegetical system, what you would think is, okay, how could say out on on a stay, so out on father draws,

I raise up the two autons are coextensive. There is nothing in the text that distinguishes between the two.

The natural reading, it's consistent with what came before.

The father gives, if you're given, you come to the son. The father gives, the son raises you up on the last day.

The father draws, the son raises you up on the last day. It's consistent all the way through. There is no reason outside of human tradition and a dedication to the quote unquote, free will of man.

Do not recognize that auton and auton are the same auton. But you see all the synergistic systems say, well, he draws everybody, but only those who believe are raised up in the last day.

So you put this big thing right here. Okay, it all goes in there. And that way you can break it up because you don't believe what

Jesus actually said. You don't. Because what Jesus actually said was if the father draws a person, the son raises them up on the last day.

So if everyone's drawn, everyone's raised up, this is universalism, there's no question about that. But if not everyone's raised up the last day, then this is divine election.

And all of this is the father and the son. It's all to his glory.

And it's all based upon the exercise of his autonomous will.

There it is. You can stand on your head. You can say it's under determinative.

It's not. It's way over determinative for you. But there it is.

And I will raise them up on the last day. Now, if you happen to be sitting there going, yeah, but six chapters later, that's six chapters later, in a completely different context, talking about Jews and Greeks.

I know what you're talking about. I know you don't read my books. But when

I've dealt with and written entire books about John six, and we've dealt with John 12 and demonstrated that John 12, when it says, five are lifted up,

I'll draw them into myself. He's talking about in the context of the Greeks coming to seek him, who he does not meet with.

He's talking about Jews and Greeks, all men, all kinds of men.

And that's exactly what has happened ever since then. Don't abandon the text, let the text speak for itself.

If you let John 644 speak for itself, this is not. So here's, well,

I guess this is a faster way. Much faster. This is not prevenient grace.

You try and make that prevenient grace and you have just destroyed the flow of the text.

No one is able to come to me unless the father who sent me gives him prevenient grace and I will raise up the one given prevenient grace on the last day.

You just became a universalist, right? Well, no, but you see, that drawing doesn't actually result in their coming, but I already said that.

All the father gives me will come to me. I already said that, you can't do that. You're breaking the text up and I will raise them up on the last day.

That is the exercise of divine power. That is the exercise of divine power.

This is God -centered salvation. And that's why we're going to see at the end of the chapter, men are going to go, well, thanks.

We like our system better. We continue on.

It is, it stands written in the prophets. They shall all be taught by God.

They shall all be taught by God. But please notice, to be taught by God is to receive truth from God.

So they will all be taught by God. Everyone hearing, hearing what?

From God, from the father and learning what?

Comes to me. You see what, see how the prophetic passage is being fulfilled?

This is, this is a description of the drawing. God reveals to people who the son is and the one hearing from the father and learning comes to me.

Now you want to test to see if you're really a synergist rather than a biblicist. If you read that and went, well, see, we've got to hear and we've got to learn.

Well, that's true, but these are things that God does. He's the one that causes us to hear.

He's the one that causes us to learn because we come to him and what did 637 say at the start?

All that the father gives me will what? Come to me. That's why people just cannot walk through John six.

Because if you start at the beginning and you walk straight through, there really isn't any question.

Anyone who calls this under determinative would find every Bible verse in all of scripture to be under determinative of anything.

Everyone who hears from the father and learns is coming to me.

And then once he emphasizes that focus upon him and then the rest of this comes after this, the one believing has eternal life, so on and so forth.

And then the exclusivity of the son's revelation of the father goes on from there.

Then you end up going into the material about eating his flesh and drinking his blood. And again, that's participation.

It's the one coming to him, the one eating, the one looking to him as spiritual source in all things is the only one that has eternal life.

Now, having said all of that, I do need to, oops.

Sorry about that. There we go. Just got to click on the right thing here. Don't save that because we've got to scroll up.

And so I've got to get control of my screen here again. And so we have, all of this is well worth doing, but we're never going to get to Acts 4 as it is as we go along here.

So here in 650, 660, I'm sorry. Many of his disciples hearing these things said, this is a scleros.

I haven't turned the note thing on, but this is a hard set. You've heard of multiple sclerosis, sclerosis of the arteries, things like that.

Arterial sclerosis. This is a hard saying. I have to draw on the board.

This is a hard saying who is able to hear it.

Who is able to hear it? Don't have time to do it today, but there is a great benefit, great, great benefit in doing a study of hearing and seeing in John.

And who can hear, who can't hear, who can see, who can't see John nine, for example, which is still coming up.

Incredible stuff, but who is able to hear it? Well, that's a good question because we've already had that answer from Jesus.

Those given by the Father, the Son. And so Jesus hears this grumbling amongst his disciples.

Oops, sorry. And so he says, what if you should behold the sound of man ascending to where he was before?

Another text demonstrating that he fully understands his divine nature.

It is a spirit who gives life. The flesh profits nothing. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and are life, not literal flesh, bread, and wine, blood, so on and so forth.

But then notice verse 64, but there are some of you who do not believe. For Jesus knew from the beginning who they were who did not believe and who it was that would betray him.

So this not only is talking about Judas, but this is talking about a plurality. All his disciples except the 12 are about to walk away.

And how did this start 29 verses earlier? Saying to the men who had rode across the lake, you're unbelievers, you're not believing.

But I want you to see in this context, this is often missed, unfortunately.

Verse 65, so he knew who didn't believe. And he was saying elegant, imperfect, over and over again, repetitive, iterative.

For this reason, I said to you that no one is able to come to me.

Where is that? 644. So he didn't just say it once, he's repeating it.

And this is why I said to you that no one is able to come to me eon may unless, now what's 644 say here?

The father who sent me draws him. And there are those people who identify that as prevenient grace by destroying context.

But here's the same text. Here's the same words. What does Jesus say? Unless it has been given to him from the father.

So the drawing of the father is the giving to him, the giving to that person by the father of that relationship with Christ.

It's consistent all the way through. You can't break it. It's like trying to break the golden chain of redemption.

Can't do it. Can't do it. No prevenient grace, true saving grace.

That's what you have in John six. That's what you have in John six. And I'm going to try to do

Acts four. What was I thinking? I should have known that there was just going to be no way.

But let me see here. That is a tiny little thing.

But it worked pretty well. Once you find it. All right,

I will try to be brief. I could barely say it without laughing.

This is where you, this is where some people take commercial breaks and things like that, you know?

But, oh, I've only been going an hour and 15 minutes. That's nothing much. My phone's going crazy over here.

There's someone at my door. Oh, I missed that one. I'm just, if you would, since we're live, we have a woman in our congregation who is not doing well.

And we're doing everything we can to minister to that family and the husband and the children and do what we can to try to get her in a situation where she can actually heal.

I can't say much more, given that we're on YouTube right now. But just pray.

Her first name starts with J, okay? Just pray for a believing woman that the

Lord would lift her up. And so that's one of the reasons I was looking at what was there. So anyway,

Acts chapter four. Okay, stretch out the back. Rich is, see,

Rich is sitting down. So, but he's been getting up a lot. You've gotten more steps today in running this program than you normally get in running any program at all.

So you're just sitting there staring at me. I can barely see between those two lights. I feel a little bit like Picard with the

Cardassians. There are two lights and they're right in my face. Some people have no idea why

I just said that, but it's okay. Acts chapter four. The apostles have been instructed that they are not to continue preaching in the name of Christ.

When they had been released, 423, they went to their own companions and reported all the chief priests and the elders had said to them.

And when they heard this, they lifted their voices to God with one accord. So here is the prayer of the early church.

I love this prayer because when they heard this, they immediately demonstrate, they know they are living the reality of fulfilled prophecy because they quote from, and really, just make the heaven, the earth, the sea and all is in them is repeated like three different times in the

Old Testament. So we're not even sure exactly which one it's being drawn from. But please notice, they lifted their voice to God.

Kaipon despotah, despotah, despotah, despot.

Now that's a negative term in our language, but it means sovereign Lord. And it would have sort of less of a covenantal thrust than kurios would given its use in the

Tanakh, but the sovereign Lord over all the nations. And you have then who by the

Holy Spirit through the mouth of our father, David, thy servant did say, this is an NASB 1977.

So it uses the older English forms, but don't miss that.

By the Holy Spirit, by the mouth of David, here is a key text.

We don't have time to develop it today, but here is a key text in regards to a proper understanding of the early church's view of scripture.

This is a view of scripture within scripture. And all of those are extremely important and vital to us.

So then you have fascinatingly enough, the early church sees

Psalm 2 being fulfilled. Psalm 2, why did the

Gentiles or nations rage, ethne, and the peoples devise futile things.

The kings of the earth took their stand. The rulers were gathered together against the Lord. And kata to kuriu, kai kata to Christu autu.

And against his, now it's Christu, it's Christ. But if you go back to Psalm 2, it's the

Mashiach. It's the anointed one. It's the anointed one. And that's important to see because that's how they make applications.

So here, this tells me anyway, anytime I see, especially in the first sections of,

I'm not sure where, oh, there I am. The first sections of Acts. Remember that the first thing

Jesus does in Luke after resurrection is he starts teaching his disciples about how all of the scriptures from Moses onward prophesied of him.

And while we wish we could have been walking on the road to Emmaus, while we wish we could be hearing

Jesus teaching in that way, we get some of it by listening to the preaching of the early church.

And here's part of it. Psalm 2, messianic. Of course it is. But the point is the church sees it in their own experience.

And now the power's coming against them. And that could only become more and more the reality as Rome then joined in, in the persecution of the church.

And so they see Psalm 2, Lord laughs from heaven. Lord laughs from heaven.

Wonder how many of us really believe the same thing today when the Canadian government is now doing exactly what

Rome did and what the Jewish leaders did. So with that fulfillment in mind, for truly in this city, we're gathered together.

We can go ahead and, oh yeah, definitely. We can definitely fire this up now.

I didn't know that was still on. How'd that, I didn't know how that worked. For truly there were gathered together in this city.

I'm not sure why there aren't more colors. I'll be honest with you. I wish there were some more colors.

I'll be honest. Against, so gathered together in this city,

Jerusalem, against your

Hagion Pidasu, your holy servant

Jesus, whom you anointed using the same term that was just used up above in Psalm 2 in regards to the

Mashiach, the Messiah, Christos, the anointed one. So they're seeing, it's just the fulfillment is right there in front of them.

They're going, wow, this was written hundreds of years ago. And here we're seeing it fulfilled in our day. For truly there were gathered together against your holy servant,

Jesus, who, well, we have

Tekei, is a form that means both.

So both Pontius Pilate, Herod. So it's

Herod and both Pontius Pilate. So by name gathered against him,

Herod, a king, Pontius Pilate representing the authority of Caesar, the

Romans, together with Ethnosynchai Laois Israel, the

Gentiles and the people of Israel. And so there you have, in general, the

Roman soldiers and the people of Israel.

So the people bring the false accusations, the scribes, the Pharisees. And so the early church sees the conflict brought against the son, read

Psalm 2, it's amazing. Let us throw their chains off and better kiss the son lest he be wrathful with you.

They see in Herod, Pontius Pilate, the

Romans and the Jews. They've all been gathered together against Jesus.

They experienced it, they saw it, they knew the reality of this, it was a historical thing that they themselves had seen. Okay? Now, let's think for a moment.

What was Herod's role in all of this?

What was Herod's role in all this? I doubt there's any way that you can take a break.

Is there? Yes, I'm sorry.

Just a moment. Hi. Thanks, folks.

We all live in the real world. And when you get certain phone calls from certain phone numbers, you got to take them.

Because there's life and death situations that sometimes you have to deal with. So I appreciate taking that.

We'll just probably just cut that out and we'll take care of it later on. But everything was okay for now.

But anyhow, okay. Moses is in the bulrushes again for seriously here. Okay. Now, Herod.

Herod's role in all of this, we know that Herod was not a well man.

He was a crazy man. He wants to see Jesus because he's heard that he does miracles.

Think about the motivations of these two people, Pontius Pilate and Herod.

Pontius Pilate is a politician who has been put in an almost impossible place to try to keep peace in a place that's a powder keg.

He has ambitions in Rome. And Herod has no such ambitions and clearly is not a well person.

And so very, very, very, very different individuals coming into this place from completely different backgrounds.

Think about the Roman soldiers. They're just sick and tired of being stuck in this backwater of the

Mediterranean. And the people of Israel, the leaders of Israel, they're just filled with jealousy and hatred.

And Jesus has exposed them over and over again. They have been ridiculed.

The people of the land have been calling for, they've been calling

Jesus the Messiah. And they are just sick of the whole thing.

Very different motivations, very different motivations.

These are, and notice the people of Israel, that's plural. Gentiles, that's plural.

So you're not talking about just one person and their desires. You're talking about entire groups of people acting as groups of people.

They're all gathered together. May I point something out to you? If it is true that the crucifixion takes place at the fullness of time, do we believe that Christ died exactly when the father intended that to take place?

When the triune majesty in eternity past had determined this would take place?

That all those prophecies, including those of Judas, lifting up his heel, betrayal, was there any other time this could take place?

God in his sovereignty, in his free sovereignty, this wasn't, well, given the cards

I've been dealt, the best time I can have this happen is at this time.

Are we really comfortable with believing that there could have been times that God wanted to bring redemption into fulfillment, but couldn't because there was no feasible world wherein it would have taken place at that time.

Was this the second choice, third choice, fourth choice? Would anyone who reads these words come to those conclusions because notice what then is said in the text.

To do, who? Herod, Pontius Pilate, Gentiles, people of Israel.

What they did, they were gathered together to do whatever your hand and your will, your bullae, your decree predestined to take place.

Now, most of the time when we look at this, we look at the bullae, his decree, his intention, predestined to take place.

This includes the personal actions of Herod and Pontius Pilate and all these people and all these people.

And what this tells us is that the early church as a whole believed that it was the bullae of God, the hand of God that brought all this to take place.

And the idea that they also went, yes, but we know that he could only do this because this was a feasible world is absolutely absurd.

There is nothing in scripture to suggest that they actually believed that there was a constitutive body of data that delimited

God's freedom as to when and how he was going to accomplish this. If you believe in middle knowledge, you do believe that.

You can try to dodge it all you want, but if you believe and really, but that was the only logical time it could happen.

The early church believes this and there was something that had never really struck me, your hand, your hand.

Let me pop something up here and just scroll through a few of them here.

Oh, well, that's all right. I'm close enough to read it. Here are just some of the places where you have hand of Yahweh is

Yad Yahweh, Yad Yahweh. And so there are so many references to the hand of Yahweh.

It's an accepted phrase and it's what stands behind its use in Acts chapter four.

But frequently it is, for example,

Deuteronomy 2 .15, where over the hand of Yahweh was against them to destroy them from within the camp until they all perished.

So the hand of Yahweh is mighty as soon as you may fear Yahweh your God forever. And so very often the hand of Yahweh is destructive in the sense of judgment.

But there are other places in the prophets where the hand of Yahweh is upon someone and as they prophesy and as they're able to do special things as a result of this.

And then you have it in salvation, for example, in Isaiah 59 .1, behold, the

Lord's hand, hand of Yahweh is not so short that it cannot save, neither is his ear so dull that it cannot hear.

So there's all of the hand of Yahweh shall be made known to his servants, but he shall be indignant toward his enemies.

The point is that all through the Old Testament, all through the text, the hand of Yahweh is his providential activity in his world, accomplishing his purpose, either in bringing judgment, in bringing blessing, pretty much a fulfillment of Deuteronomy 28 and 29.

But the point is that there's never anything that indicates that what

God does in these places in bringing judgment, bringing blessing, providentially entering into the accomplishment of his purposes in time.

There's nothing anywhere that suggests that this is anything other than what is absolutely free on his part.

This is the eudaicheia. This is his goodwill, his kind intention of his will that he is accomplishing.

And according to Acts 4, the early church understood that the central redemptive activity of all of eternity was predestined by the hand of God freely.

Not that he is operating on the basis of a knowledge of human actions that does not flow from his will.

There is nothing in that text about anything that does not come from his will. Middle knowledge does not come from his will.

That is the issue. That is why it was developed the way it was developed. That's the only way that it functions.

And people can try to say, well, no, as long as God's omniscient and God is omnipotent, then he must have middle knowledge.

That's ridiculous. I don't know how anyone can believe that that is actually a meaningful argument.

There is an assertion being made. You can hide it behind all sorts of cheap tricks if you want to, but you're making an assertion.

And I'm honestly concerned about anyone who could read Acts 4 and go, yeah, yeah, they probably believe what

I believe about that. Or it's even worse if you say, no, they didn't believe what I believe about it, but they should have.

They would have been wiser if they had. Those are some of the questions that we have to raise up and think about.

Well, anyway, first program of the year, and we spend all the time doodling on the board.

There we go. That's the way it should be, I suppose. I hope that is of assistance tomorrow so that we will not have to go quite as long.

Because I was just thinking, if I tried to roll all of that into a response, we would be here all day long.

And it just wouldn't do anything. So tomorrow, we'll provide those responses.

I believe that there are some learnable, some teachable moments in that.

And in the other response, we're going to be doing in regards to a ostensible book review of the

Forgotten Trinity, which was nothing more than one of the clearest acts of woke penance

I've ever seen. We'll be looking at that as well. Thanks for watching the program today.