December 7, 2018 Show with Martyn McGeown on “Grace & Assurance: The Message of the Canons of Dordt”

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I'm so delighted to have back as a returning guest today, Martin McGeown.

He is author and pastor of Limerick Reform Fellowship in Limerick City, Ireland, and we are going to be addressing the theme of his new book,

Grace and Assurance, The Message of the Canons of Dort, a publication of the

Reform Free Publishing Association, and it's my honor and privilege to welcome you back to Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, Martin McGeown.

Thank you very much, Chris. Now, since the last time we spoke, has my pronunciation of your last name deteriorated, or is it still spot on?

It's still very good. Okay. Oh, I'm glad to hear that.

Before we go into our discussion today on Grace and Assurance, The Message of the

Canons of Dort, tell our listeners again about Limerick Reform Fellowship in Limerick City, Ireland.

Yeah, the Limerick Reform Fellowship is a group of believers who confess the

Reformed faith. We meet on Sunday in the city center of Limerick on Thomas Street at 11 a .m.

and 5 .30 p .m., and our website is limerickreformed .com.

Great. And one of the things that is an important factor of the

Limerick Reform Fellowship is obviously our discussion today, The Canons of Dort.

And of The Canons of Dort, for those of our listeners who are unfamiliar with The Canons of Dort, they are a third of the three forms of unity, the confessional standards of many

Reformed Christians, but perhaps especially those that come from the Dutch branch of the

Reformation. And as some of my Irish listeners may call them, the tree farms of unity.

What kind of trees do they grow on this farm? Boy. Tell our listeners, if you could tell our listeners more about the three forms of unity and specifically

The Canons of Dort. Yes, the three forms of unity are three

Reformed confessions, the Heidelberg Catechism, then the

Belgic Confession, and The Canons of Dort. The Canons of Dort is really a further explanation of some of the doctrines of the first two, the

Heidelberg Catechism and the Belgic Confession, because The Canons of Dort were written in direct response to the attack upon the

Reformed faith by the Romanstrits or the Armenians.

And the Synod of Dort, which wrote The Canons of Dort, met 400 years ago, this year, 2018, so 1618 to 1619.

And that's one of the reasons why we published this book in this particular year for the 400th anniversary of the great

Synod of Dort. Praise God. And how would you say that the three forms of unity, or perhaps more specifically, the

Belgic Confession, would be different from the

Westminster Standards? Well, there are a few differences,

I suppose, between the Westminster Standards and the three forms of unity, but they are really very similar to one another.

Obviously, they're written in different historical periods and so on, but there isn't a lot of theological difference between the

Westminster Confession of Faith and, say, the Belgic Confession. In fact, there were

British people at the Synod of Dort where The Canons of Dort were written, so there was some

British influence, although it wasn't actually the best influence. The British delegates were among the weakest who went to the

Synod of Dort. And, well, let's start with the caveat regarding confessions themselves.

We have brothers in Christ who would agree with us on our opposition to the

Church of Rome, but unfortunately some of them go too far in this by associating anyone who uses extra -biblical creeds and confessions, like we do, and they would say that we are adding to the

Word of God, we are putting another authority equal to the Word of God.

But these charges are absolutely false, aren't they? Oh, absolutely. In fact, in my book

I have a section called The Idea of Creeds, The Importance of Creeds, The Objections to Creeds, and The Characteristic of The Canons.

That's introductory, because if you're writing a book about a creed, as The Canons of Dort are a creed, then you have to explain what a creed is and why creeds are important.

So that's all set forth in the book. Basically, creeds or confessions are a summary of what a church believes the

Bible to teach. So if you go to any given church and ask them, what do you believe here? And they say, we believe the

Bible here. Well, that's all very well and good, but you have to ask more questions to find out what they believe the

Bible teaches, and then you'll find out pretty quickly that they have creeds, just they haven't written them down.

Yes, in fact, any time you explain what you believe the

Bible teaches, you are providing your hearers with a creed or confession, whether you want to call it that or not.

Especially, and most of these churches that are anti -confessional do have track racks, and they give out tracks, and tracks are very often containing a creedal or confessional statement, even though the church might not call it that.

Right. Absolutely. Every church has a creed, just some churches write the creed down and make it binding upon the office bearers.

If you don't have a creed, then really anything can go in a church. A person can say they believe anything at all, a minister can preach whatever he wants, and the creeds really define what is the official teaching of the church, which is derived from the scriptures.

It's not the case that creeds are above the Bible in authority, not even equal to the

Bible in authority. Creeds are simply a summary of what the Bible teaches, and without creeds, the church would never have defined fundamental doctrines throughout our history, such as the

Trinity, and the relationship between the human and divine in Christ, and all the other important doctrines in the

Reformation. For all its cry of solo scriptura, the Reformation produced many, many creeds, because believers have to confess, and when they confess, they want to write down what they believe, and the church wants to make it official and binding.

And the Armenians, actually, at the time of the Synod of Dort, they didn't like the creeds. They wanted to revise the creeds, and the

Synod met to really discuss what the Armenians were teaching, and to demonstrate it was the contrary to the

Word of God, and contrary to the Reformed confessions, which had already been adopted by the Reformed churches at that time.

Yes, and those that say that we do not believe in any creed but Christ, no confession but the

Bible, they would, if they're going to be consistent and logical in their argument, if they have a pastor that ascends into the pulpit, what he should do is just open up the

Bible, read it, and then sit down. Yes, and not do any exegesis.

Right. Well, tell us about some of the reasons, I mean, you've already given a couple, but some more reasons why it is wise for churches to not only have creeds and confessions, but obviously a creed or a confession only has value if it's biblically accurate and faithful.

So that is why many churches in the Reformed community have adopted creeds and confessions that are centuries old, including the three forms of unity.

What further value, other than making sure that you're pastor or the preacher at the congregation where you are a member is faithfully following the word because you're going to be checking as a

Berean to make sure that he is in alignment with what that particular congregation believes are the primary teachings of importance that can be gleaned from the scriptures.

So other than that initial great asset that having a creed or confession that is biblically faithful is to the body of Christ, tell us about some more reasons why a church might use or adopt officially a creed or a confession.

It's interesting that many people will say, oh, creeds are divisive. Well, they're called the three forms of unity for a reason.

Three forms of unity. Because they unify true believers and they also, of course, separate people who are not true believers from the church so that in the

Reformation, for example, it was required of people to subscribe to certain creeds to differentiate them from other groups who didn't believe the same things that that particular church confessed and believed.

And so creeds are unifying. They're the three forms of unity for a reason.

They also are necessary because over history, the church develops in its understanding of the truth.

So, for example, if you read the New Testament, you'll discover that people would say,

I believe that Jesus is Lord. And that's absolutely true. We must believe that Jesus is

Lord. But then later on in church history, they have to define, well, what does it mean that Jesus is

Lord? Is he also God? If he's also God, what does it mean he's also God? And so you have to define the relationship between Jesus and the

Father and the Spirit. You have to use extra biblical language to do that. And then you have to work out, well, if Jesus is

God and also man, what does that mean? And then you have to define that. And as history progressed, the church had to define many, many other doctrines.

So it's rather simplistic and naive to say, we believe only the

Bible, because even cults will say, we believe only the

Bible. Right. But Reformed people, having said that, Reformed people, if they are faithful to the scriptures and also faithful to their own

Reformed heritage, we do believe in sola scriptura, but believing that the

Bible is the sole inerrant and infallible authority over the church does not negate the use of creeds and confessions.

Absolutely, it does not. In fact, you might even say it requires it, because the church has to define what the

Bible teaches. Yes, when you say, I believe the

Bible, you have to say, I believe the Bible teaches X, Y, and Z, or Z, if you're an

American. Yes, and we have seen what an opposition to the creeds and confessions, historic ones, has done.

I'm sure that you probably have some familiarity with Harold Camping, who was the founder of Family Radio.

He came from a similar background to the both of us, perhaps even more closely connected to your background.

I know that you're not in the Christian Reformed Church, but obviously the Protestant Reformed Churches have the same heritage initially.

They came out of the Christian Reformed Church, yes. Right, and Harold Camping was an elder in that denomination, and yet,

Harold Camping was anti -confessional, at least he became anti -confessional at some point during his life, and developed all kinds of insane ideas that had no place in the history of the church in recorded history.

Yes, absolutely. By rejecting creeds, he cut himself off from the whole history of the church and became a renegade.

Yes, I wrote a paper about him at seminary. Oh, wow. It's on the

CPRC website, cprc .co .uk, which is the church in Balamina, which is the calling church of the

Limerick Reformed Fellowship. If you search on that website, you'll find the article I wrote about Harold Camping at the time. Great.

Well, I don't know if you're aware of this, but I interviewed the current president, Tom Evans, of Family Radio, and they have repented.

They repented publicly of their defending and declaring

Harold Camping's heresies, and they have purged the airwaves in their network from any presence of Harold Camping.

Oh, well, that's good. Because they were airing recordings of him for a while, even after his death, but they have become, once again, a sound

Reformed source for good preaching and teaching information. Can you tell us some of the characteristics of the canons of Dort?

Yes, the canons of Dort are, first of all, biblical, and I want to read from the book.

There's a quotation in the book where the delegates at Dort made an oath before God, before they began their work, and here's what they said.

I promise before God, in whom I believe and whom I worship, as being present in this place and as being the searcher of all hearts, that during the course of the proceedings of this synod, which will examine and decide not only the five points of the five points of the

Arminians, and all the differences resulting from them, but also any other doctrine, I will use no human writing, but only the word of God, which is an infallible rule of faith.

And during all these discussions, I will aim only at the glory of God, the peace of the Church, and especially the preservation of the purity of doctrine.

So help me, my Savior Jesus Christ. I beseech him to assist me by his Holy Spirit." So the delegates to the great synod of Dort, they came with the

Bible, and if you read through the canons of Dort, you'll find that they quote many, many times from Scripture, and they appeal to the word of God as the final authority for everything that they teach.

So it's not the case that they quote from the Belgian Confession and the Heidelberg Catechism, they actually don't.

They quote from the Bible over and over again, both in the positive articles and especially in the rejections of errors, where they actually reject the teachings of the

Arminians of that day. So they're biblical, and then they're pastoral. As you read through the canons of Dort, you'll discover that they are beautifully warm and comforting, and they appeal to the heart of the child of God, which is why, by the way, the title of the book is

Grace and Assurance, because the fathers of Dort were very concerned about the assurance that God's people should have in the truth, the comfort that they should enjoy, the experience they should have of their salvation, and they are antithetical.

That is to say, they don't simply state the truth positively, but they also explicitly reject the lie, and the lie that they were rejecting, of course, was the lie of Arminianism, which was the reason why they were gathered together in the first place, which was to examine the doctrines of Arminius and his followers, the

Remonstrants. Arminianism. Yes, a lot of people may be unaware of the fact that the

Arminians had their five points before the TULIP acronym was developed, of the five points of Calvinism, although they were believed by the

Reformed Christians since the beginning of the Reformation, and of course, we would say the disciples of Christ, centuries going back to the

New Testament era, believed in these things. But the five points of Calvinism, as you know, are total depravity, unconditional election, limited atonement, which has also been called definite atonement, also has been called particular redemption, and substitutionary atonement, although today many

Arminians are using the phrase substitutionary atonement, but they really don't have any basis to use that term, if they're going to be logically consistent, irresistible grace, and the perseverance and the preservation of the saints.

Now, these doctrines drive us to our knees in humility before God, or at least they should, because we all know some arrogant and proud

Calvinists, but they should drive us to our knees regarding that we are dependent upon God for everything, especially that which involves our own faith, which involves our own regeneration, which involves our own entrance into heaven after we depart this earth, whereas the

Arminians, perhaps some beginning with noble motives, were trying to protect the character of God, they thought, and therefore, in order to put 100 % of the blame on man for sin, they also unfortunately give men far too much credit for their salvation, don't they?

Absolutely, yes, yes. Well, the Arminian heresy, of course,

Roman Catholicism is inherently Arminian as well, Pelagianism and Arminianism are very closely connected, but the

Arminian heresy began, you might say, with Arminius himself, and he was teaching doctrines in his own church in the

Netherlands, which raised the eyebrows of various people, his fellow pastor, for example, and members of the church.

He was saying things that didn't sound quite right. He was teaching, for example, from Romans 7, he was denying total depravity, he was suggesting man has some good in him, that is, unregenerate man has some good in him.

He was denying the doctrine of unconditional election and reprobation, and so there were all kinds of concerns swirling around him at the time, but he had many friends in high places, because in those days, the church and the state were far too closely linked in Europe, and in the

Netherlands in particular, and so he was protected from discipline, and in fact, he ended up becoming a theological professor in Leiden University, where he taught the seminarians, which was the worst possible place to put such a man, and that caused even more consternation, and eventually, after he died in 1610 or 1609, he died, and the year after that, his followers published his teachings in the

Five Points of the Remonstrance, and then eventually, after much wrangling, they finally were able to get a synod allowed to be held in the

Netherlands, and that's when they really got to work to examine what this

Arminianism was, and they condemned it from the Word of God, and then they produced their own

Five Points, and actually, if you look at the Canons of Dort, the order we have of Chew -up is not the same as the order that the synod deals with these doctrines, because the first head of doctrine is actually divine predestination, so that would be the

U, unconditional action, and then the second head of doctrine is the death of Christ, and the redemption of men thereby, that's the

L of limited atonement, the third and fourth heads are put together, doctrine on the corruption of men, his conversion to God, and the manner thereof, that's total depravity and unconditional, or irresistible grace put together as kind of one head, third and fourth together, and the fifth head of doctrine was the perseverance of the saints.

Well, what I'd like to do is I'd like to go to our first break, and then when we return, we will begin examining, in summary form obviously, the first head of doctrine on divine predestination.

This seems to be the most difficult doctrine for our brothers and sisters in Christ who are not sharing, at least yet in their lives, our belief and understanding of the doctrines of sovereign grace.

They very often have a caricature of it that is not only biblical, but it's also not even what the reformers and the great confessions and creeds of the reformed faith teach about predestination.

It's a invention of either their own minds or the minds of those who they have read who have hated and despised these doctrines.

They often equate the understanding of predestination with equal ultimacy, and there are other things that they mix and muddle together that prevents them from embracing this.

In fact, ironically, I have had conversations with many Arminians or those who reject

Calvinism who think that the doctrine of predestination does the opposite of what we are saying.

They believe it is the opposite of God's demonstration of grace, and they say that it robs men of assurance, and that's once again because they have an unbiblical and unhistorical or ahistorical understanding of predestination.

But when we return, we will begin with that. If anybody would like to join us on the air with a question of their own, for Martin McGeown, our email address is chrisarnsen at gmail .com,

c -h -r -i -s -a -r -n -z -e -n gmail .com. Please give us at least your first name, your city and state of residence, and your country of residence if you live outside the

USA. Please only remain anonymous if your question involves a personal or private matter.

So don't go away. God willing, we will be back with Martin McGeown and our discussion on grace and assurance, the message of the

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This is Chris Arnzen. If you just tuned us in, our guest today for the full two hours with a little less than 90 minutes to go is

Martin McGone. He is an author and he's also the pastor at Limerick Reform Fellowship in Limerick City, Ireland.

We are discussing his book, Grace and Assurance, the message of the canons of Dort. Before the break,

Brother McGone, you were going to lead us into the first main topic, which is predestination.

By the way, if anybody is listening and they'd like to join us on the air with a question, our email is chrisarnzen at gmail .com,

C -H -R -I -S -A -R -N -Z -E -N at gmail .com. Give us your first name at least, your city and state of residence, and your country of residence if you live outside the

USA. We do have a number of people already waiting to have their questions asked, but I wanted to get a little bit further into the subject before we took some of those questions.

Let's begin where your book begins under the main heading of predestination. Yes, predestination is

God's eternal decree to choose some particular persons in Jesus Christ before the foundation of the world onto eternal salvation.

And with that decree of election is also the decree of reprobation, which is

God's eternal decree to reject some and not to give them eternal salvation in Jesus Christ.

Now is there any substantive difference between predestination and election?

Well, in the Bible, election and predestination are both used with respect to the elect, so those whom

God has chosen to save. But when theologians speak of predestination, they usually refer both to election and reprobations, to God's decree to choose some and God's decree to reject others.

Now this is where the blood begins to boil in those that are not

Reformed. In fact, I would say that many of us, especially those of us who were not raised in the

Reformed faith, I was raised Roman Catholic, and my first introduction to evangelical

Christianity was Arminian. And when I began to hear about things like predestination,

I was getting upset. And I was immediately, perhaps just because of I think the natural man's tendency, is to use nothing more than what they think is human logic.

And they begin to depart from what the scriptures teach about the nature of man and so on.

And so people, even if they never heard the term equal ultimacy, they may begin to think that that's what you're talking about, where man is morally neutral, perhaps even morally good to begin with, as some teach very wrongly and heretically.

And that when God elects some for eternal life and others for reprobation, he is taking those that would either be mutually moral or good, and he forces upon them wickedness and the deservedness of hell and reprobation.

So therefore, you're going to have some who, through their own free will, embrace

Christ, and some who would otherwise have embraced Christ, but God has imposed upon them reprobation.

But this is totally foreign, obviously, to the scriptures, but it's also totally foreign to historic confessional

Reformed theology, am I right? Yes, it's interesting.

If you read through the canons of Dort, and I would encourage your listeners to do that, to read through the whole of the canons of Dort, it's not a very long document, and to do so without prejudice, you'll discover that when the writers of the canons of Dort discuss predestination, they don't start off in article one with, this is what predestination is.

They don't actually mention the doctrine of election until article one, or head one rather, article six and seven, because they build a case first from the scriptures about man's universal guilt, man's deservedness for punishment,

God's mercy in sending Jesus Christ, God's wrath upon the unbeliever, the cause or guilt of unbelief, and then once they've laid that foundation, then they explain where faith comes from.

The Arminian believes that faith comes from man, that man simply has the power of his own free will to work up faith in himself, but the scriptures teach, and the canons explain this, that faith proceeds from God's eternal decree.

So God decrees to give some faith, to work in them, to cause them to believe, and therefore he receives the glory and all the praise and honor for the fact that some believe and others do not believe, and that's taught, for example, in Acts 13, which is a very striking passage,

Acts 13, 48. So Paul has preached the gospel, he has explained who

Christ is, he has warned those who will not believe of the punishment that will come upon them.

Many of the Jews rejected that word, and then verse 48 of Acts 13 says, and when the

Gentiles heard this, they were glad and glorified the word of the Lord, and as many as were ordained to eternal life believed.

Amen. I've never heard an Arminian adequately explain that passage from Acts.

Pardon? I have never heard an Arminian even remotely come to explaining that adequately from the

Acts, from an Arminian perspective. No, they just try to explain it away, you see. They try to explain it away, but it doesn't fit with their theology at all.

It's, as many as were ordained to eternal life believed. So some believed because they were ordained to eternal life.

So the source of faith is God's eternal decree. And here's what the

Canons say in Article 6 of Head 1, according to which decree he,

God, graciously softens the hearts of the elect, however obstinate, and inclines them to believe, while he leaves the non -elect in his just judgment to their own wickedness and obtrusivity.

And herein is especially displayed the profound, the merciful, at the same time the righteous discrimination between men equally involved in ruin, or that decree of election and reprobation revealed in the

Word of God, which though men of perverse, impure, and unstable minds rest to their own destruction, yet to holy and pious souls affords unspeakable consolation.

So there is the truth that election gives comfort to God's people.

Holy and pious souls receive unspeakable consolation, whereas those of perverse, impure, and unstable minds rest this truth or twist it to their own destruction.

Of course, they're thinking they're of the theologians of the remonstrancy were twisting this truth to their own destruction in 1618, 1619.

Yes, and the other side of the false charges, the slanders made against Calvinists, and of course when

I say this, there are Calvinists that are hyper -Calvinists, and there are Calvinists who are just wrongly taught, and there are many

Calvinists in what many have nicknamed the cage stage of Calvinism, where they run wild attacking everybody who doesn't agree with them, but they do so without wisdom or education.

But the flip side of the attack against reprobation would be the false understanding that if what we say is true, that means

God forces people against their will to believe in Christ, and the old saying they are dragged kicking and screaming to heaven has been used, and some have even dared to call this cosmic rape, which they vehemently oppose, as do you and I, because we don't believe in it, unlike what they may think.

But how do you overcome those objections where the Calvinist understanding is obviously that Christ in his mercy rescues his elect, removes our hearts of stone, and gives us hearts of flesh, and we freely believe when we are regenerate?

We don't believe against our will, but if you could respond to that false understanding of cosmic rape or forcing people against their will to believe.

I'm going to respond by quoting the canons again. This is actually Head 3 -4,

Article 12, and this is the regeneration so highly celebrated in scripture and denominated a new creation, a resurrection from the dead, a making alive, which

God works in us without our aid. But this is in no wise effected merely by the external preaching of the gospel, by moral suasion, or such a mode of operation that after God has performed his part, it still remains in the power of man to be regenerated or not, to be converted or to continue unconverted.

But it is evidently a supernatural work, most powerful, and at the same time most delightful, astonishing, mysterious, and ineffable, not inferior in efficacy to creation or the resurrection from the dead, as the scripture inspired by the author of this work declares, so that all in whose heart

God works in this marvelous manner are certainly, infallibly, and effectually regenerated and do actually believe.

So it's described here as a delightful, astonishing, mysterious, and ineffable work of God, which is not rape.

Right. And it's failing to understand that we believe all of humanity comes from the same lump of clay, and we are all sharing in a damnable state morally and spiritually.

And some of us, for purposes only known to God, the only thing that we know about God's purposes when he elects is that he is not choosing someone because they are more lovely or lovable or good or because of anything innately good and wonderful about them.

We know that that's not the reason, but there are reasons that God alone has for those whom he chooses to save.

Am I right? Yes, that's why we speak of unconditional election. The Arminians taught and still teach conditional election, which means that God foresees that certain individuals will fulfill the conditions of salvation, namely that they will believe and persevere in true faith until the end of time.

And based on that foreknowledge, then God supposedly chooses some, which would then mean that God chooses those whom he sees will be worthy, because to believe in Jesus Christ would, according to Arminianism, be a worthy act, even a good work, because it's a good thing to believe in Jesus Christ.

The problem is that man doesn't have the power to do that. Man does not have the power to believe in Jesus Christ of his own will, because man by nature detests

Jesus Christ. And the very last thing in the world he wants to do is to repent of his sin, believe in Jesus Christ, and thus receive salvation.

Man would do anything apart from believe in Jesus Christ. And so that opposition to Christ must be overcome.

And it's not overcome by, you know, nice music and dimming the lights and trying to get people to accept

Jesus by some power that they have. It's overcome by the power of the Holy Spirit.

And the power of the Holy Spirit is such that he can overcome all opposition to Jesus Christ without even having to force man to believe against his will, but rather by giving him a new heart, creating in him a new will, so that he has new desires, and according to those new desires, he then believes in Jesus Christ.

Amen. And the term unconditional that you used, and that is in our historic confessions in regard to election, that is something that the enemies of the

Reformed faith will pounce on as well, because they say unconditional election requires one to believe in arbitrary election.

I don't know if they use this phrase in Ireland, but there is a phrase in children's games here in the

United States that's probably centuries old called eeny, meeny, miny, moe, where if you're like picking somebody to be on your baseball team, or in your case,

I guess it would be UK football, not in your case, you're in Limerick, Ireland, but football or soccer.

Or something, I don't know. We have a game called hurling here.

Okay, there you go. But if you're choosing a teammate out of a crowd, and your efforts to be unbiased when you're picking them, you use the eeny, meeny, miny, moe, catch a tiger by the toe if he hollers, let him go, eeny, meeny, miny, moe, and whoever you're pointing at is the one that you bring onto your team, or whatever reason you're doing it.

Uh, this is not the way God operates, is there? Doesn't God always have a purpose and a plan, even if we don't know what that purpose and plan is?

Absolutely, God has a purpose and a plan. God has a purpose and a plan for all things, but God doesn't choose to tell us what his purpose or plan is, except that his plan is to glorify his own name through Jesus Christ in the election of an elect church, which is his body and bride, which he gives to Jesus Christ, and through which he displays his grace and glory.

Who the individual members of that church are, those are chosen by God. Why he chooses some as opposed to others, that's something he knows, he doesn't tell us.

All we know is that the reason is not found in us. It's not as if God said, oh, this person is more worthy, therefore

I will choose him, and this person is less worthy, therefore I will reject him. And that's what

Arminians actually do, because if they say election is based upon God foreseeing our faith, that is what they are saying

God does. Yes. Absolutely, they're saying that. And the

Arminians at Dort were very clear on that. They talked about all kinds of conditions that you had to meet in order to be elected onto salvation.

The modern Arminians are a little bit less supple than the ones that the men of Dort had to deal with in 1618, 1619.

Yes, well, a lot of this also, I'm sure you would agree, has to do with men defining the terms for who receives or who is rejected for receiving eternal life based on either an individual's understanding of what is fair or what a group or what society may deem at any particular time as what is fair.

And what they fail to realize, first of all, of course, Arminians are in many different categories.

You have Arminians who agree with us that there is eternal conscious damnation for those who are lost or forever damned, but you do have those that are full -blown universalists who believe that everyone will be in heaven.

But for those of our brothers and sisters in error who believe, like we do, in eternal conscious punishment,

I don't know how they could believe it is fair for God to say for anyone to come to heaven, they must believe that they are sinners, that they must believe that Jesus Christ has paid the penalty for all their sin on Calvary, and that Jesus rose again and ascended into heaven and is seated at the right hand of the

Father. If they believe that they will be in heaven, and if not, they will be in hell.

And how could that be fair when you have places in the world where to believe upon Christ might even guarantee you a death sentence, where children are raised in homes that they never hear of Jesus Christ or the

Word of God or the Gospel ever uttered, and then you have people in the Bible Belt of the

United States who are nurtured by Christian parents in loving homes and are hearing the

Gospel and hearing the Word of God taught to them since infancy, and then of course, the larger picture, for centuries there were countries all over the globe that had never heard the

Gospel. So how could you say this is a fair treatment of humans by God, or any fairer, using a fair understanding of logic, using a logical understanding of human fairness,

I mean, they really can't use the fair argument very well, can they? No, but you have to remember that God is just, and if God were to give every man what he justly deserves, then

God would condemn every single human being who has ever lived. And so salvation is not about justice, salvation is about mercy and grace.

God's justice was satisfied on the cross, that's head two, of course, of the

Canons of Dort, but God's justice was satisfied on the cross with respect to the sins of his elect people. If people are concerned about justice,

I would advise them not to be so concerned about justice and to throw themselves upon the mercy of God, and instead of quibbling about, oh, they didn't get to hear the

Gospel, that's not fair, they ought to say, well, I am hearing the Gospel, and my responsibility now is to believe the

Gospel that I'm hearing, otherwise God will have even more reason to condemn me on the last day.

Not only have I committed all of these sins, but I've also added to my sin conscious, willful unbelief against the

Gospel of Jesus Christ. Well, we have to go to our midway break right now, and we'll pick up where you left off, and then we'll enter also into the second main head of our discussion, and hopefully we'll get to all five of these points from the

Canons of Dort before the end of the program. If not, we'll just go on to another interview at some point in the future, if you are willing.

So, God willing, we'll be back with the second head of doctrine after these messages.

If you'd like to join us on the air with a question of your own, our email address is chrisarnsen at gmail .com, C -H -R -I -S -A -R -N -Z -E -N at gmail .com.

Please give us your first name, your city and state, and your country of residence. If you live outside the USA, only remain anonymous.

If your question involves a personal or private matter. And I haven't forgotten about you who are waiting to have your questions asked.

Please be patient with us. This is an elongated break, because Grace Life Radio, 90 .1

FM in Lake City, Florida, requires of us a longer break in the middle of the show, because they localize

Iron Sharpens Iron Radio to Lake City, Florida, with their own commercials and public service announcements from local ministries and businesses and so on.

So, please be patient with us as we take this elongated break. Use this time to write down questions for Martin McGowan on the

Canons of Dort. Our email address, as I said, is chrisarnsen at gmail .com. But also use this time to write down information provided by our advertisers so that you could successfully and more frequently patronize them, because we depend on our advertisers to exist.

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Don't go away, God willing. We're going to be back after these messages from our sponsors with more of Martin McGowan and our topic of Grace and Assurance, the message of the

Canons of Dort. My name is Steve Lawson, founder and president of One Passion Ministries, as well as teaching fellow for Ligonier Ministries.

I serve as professor of preaching and oversee the doctor of ministry program at the Master's Seminary in Los Angeles.

I would like to recommend the church where one of my preaching students, Andy Woodard, serves as the pastor.

It's called New Covenant Church, NYC. They are a Reformed Baptist church that meets in Midtown Manhattan.

You can find their service times and location on their website, which is www .ncc .nyc.

They believe in a sovereign God who commands all men everywhere to repent and believe the gospel.

If you're looking for a church that believes in expository preaching, which is simply biblical preaching in New York City, I'd like to recommend that you visit

New Covenant Church, NYC. Again, their information can be found at www .ncc

.nyc. Have a great day. Really matter.

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Kerry Kimbrell, senior pastor at Bethlehem Baptist Church in Laurel, Mississippi. And I'm hoping that many of you who listen to Chris Arnson's Iron Sharpens Iron radio program will join

Chris and me at the Deep South Founders Conference, Thursday, January 24th through Saturday, January 26th here in Laurel.

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Our speakers at the Deep South Founders Conference this year include Rusty Reed, Gerald Henderson, Jason Goodwin, Bobby Crenshaw, and our keynote speaker all the way from Zambia, Dr.

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two S's in the middle. I hope to hear from you soon. God bless you. Chris Sorensen, host of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio here.

I want to tell you about a man I have personally known for many years. His name is Dan Buttafuoco.

Dan is a personal injury and medical malpractice lawyer, but not the type that typically comes to mind.

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Dan Buttafuoco's number is 1 -800 -669 -4878, 1 -800 -669 -4878, or email me for Dan's contact information at chrisarnson at gmail .com.

That's chrisarnson at gmail .com. Charles Haddon Spurgeon once said,

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So make sure you mention Chris Arnzen of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio. And I just have a few exciting announcements about upcoming events that we want you to be aware of that we hope that you attend, that I will be attending myself,

God willing, and Manning and Iron Sharpens Iron exhibitors booth at all of these events.

First of all, an event of my own, the Iron Sharpens Iron Pastor's Luncheon is coming up sooner than you think,

Thursday, January 3rd from 11 a .m. to 2 p .m. at the Carlisle Fire and Rescue Banquet Hall in Carlisle, Pennsylvania.

Our featured speaker, once again, is Dr. Tony Costa, who is

Professor of Apologetics and Islam at Toronto Baptist Seminary, which is a historic

Reformed Baptist seminary in Canada. And Dr. Costa is always a fascinating and enlightening and powerful speaker.

So I hope that you join us for the Iron Sharpens Iron Radio Pastor's Luncheon. You have to be a man in ministry leadership.

This is a luncheon for men only. And you could be a pastor, an elder, a deacon, a leader of a parachurch organization, and you will be admitted absolutely free of charge.

Not only will you be fed physically through a delicious lunch, compliments of our friends at Firehouse Subs, but you will also be fed spiritually by a message from Dr.

Tony Costa. And you're going to be leaving there with perhaps two or more heavy sacks of brand new books donated by major Christian publishers, the majority of major Christian publishers, all over the

United States and the United Kingdom, who have been doing this every year going back to the 1990s when my dear late wife,

Julie, actually launched these annual pastor's luncheons. And they grew into a much larger event than either of us could handle financially.

So we had to have corporate sponsors help us with this event. And I hope that you join us

Thursday, January 3rd, 11 a .m. to 2 p .m. at the Carlisle Fire and Rescue Banquet Hall, Carlisle, Pennsylvania.

Again, it's absolutely free of charge. There is no ulterior motive that is behind me inviting you to this luncheon.

There's not going to be any Amway salesman. There's not going to be anything for sale at all at the event.

Not that there's anything wrong with that at other events, but at my event, the pastor's luncheon, we never have anything for sale.

That was something that my late wife insisted upon because she didn't want people to think that the luncheon was a gimmick to sell

Men in the Ministry anything. This was purely to treat men in the ministry to a relaxing and informative and fun and delicious time of lunch with other brethren in Christ and with an excellent gifted speaker.

So please attend if you can and send me an email if you need more questions answered to chrisarnson at gmail .com,

chrisarnson at gmail .com and put pastor's luncheon in the subject line. Then immediately following the luncheon from Friday, January 4th through Sunday, January 6th,

Dr. Tony Costa, who I just mentioned from Toronto Baptist Seminary, he is also going to be speaking at a three -day

Bible conference that I have orchestrated with my friend Pastor George Jensen at the

Enola First Church of God in Enola, Pennsylvania. And Dr.

Costa is going to be speaking on a fascinating subject that I hope that you all will come to hear.

And this, by the way, is open to all people, men, women, and children, and even non -Christians.

You are welcome whether you are a Christian, a Jew, a Muslim, a Buddhist, a Hindu, an atheist.

We would love to see you at this event which is on the theme The Meaninglessness of Life and Morality Without God.

The Meaninglessness of Life and Morality Without God is the theme of the three -day conference. If you'd like more information, you can email me at chrisarnson at gmail .com

and put Tony Costa Conference in the subject line. This is also free of charge. Tony Costa Conference in the subject line at chrisarnson at gmail .com.

You can also call the Enola First Church of God in Enola, Pennsylvania at 717 -732 -4253.

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That's e -n -o -l -a -c -o -g .com forward slash bible dash conference.

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Then coming up later in the month of January, the G3 Conference returns to Atlanta, Georgia, more specifically

College Park, Georgia, at the Georgia International Convention Center. I will be there manning an

Iron Sharpens Iron radio booth for the third year in a row. They're expecting 4 ,000 to 5 ,000 people to be there.

So I hope you join me there at the G3 Conference, which stands for Gospel, Grace, and Glory, in case you're wondering.

That is from Thursday, January 17th through Saturday, January 19th. The very large roster of speakers includes

Dr. James R. White, John Piper, Stephen J. Lawson, Vody Baucom, Mark Dever, Conrad M.

Bayway, Tim Challies, Phil Johnson, Stephen J. Nichols, the founder of Reformation Bible College, the college founded by the late

R .C. Sproul and Ligonier Ministries, Todd Friel of Wretched TV and Wretched Radio, and many more are on that roster.

If you'd like to attend, go to G3conference .com. If you have a church, parachurch ministry, business, professional practice, or special event that you want to promote in that crowd of between 4 ,000 and 5 ,000 people,

I would strongly urge you to register for an exhibitor's booth, just like I will be manning. I can tell you that my experiences at the

G3 Conference have been extremely beneficial to Orange Shrub and Zion Radio, manning a booth in a crowd of that size.

So we hope to see you this January 17th through the 19th at the Georgia International Convention Center at the

G3 Conference. By the way, there is a Spanish -speaking edition of the conference, so tell your Spanish -speaking and bilingual friends that on Wednesday, January 16th, there will be that Spanish -speaking edition of the conference.

Then, later on, towards the end of the month, the

Deep South Founders Conference, January 24th through the 26th, is going to be held at the

Bethlehem Baptist Church of Laurel, Mississippi. I will be there, God willing, manning my first exhibitor's booth at the

Deep South Founders Conference. I've never been to the state of Mississippi before, so I'm looking forward to this first -time visit.

The theme is sanctification, and the speakers include Rusty Reid, Gerald Henderson, Jason Goodwin, Bobby Crenshaw, and the keynote speaker is

Dr. Conrad Mbewe, pastor of Coboata Baptist Church in Lusaka, Zambia, Africa, and chancellor of the

African Christian University. I think he is the most powerful preacher alive on the planet Earth today. Conrad Mbewe, a dear friend of mine since 1995,

I hope that you attend this conference and see me there. For more details, go to deepsouthfounders .com,

deepsouthfounders .com. Last but not least, if you love Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, you do not want our show to disappear from the airwaves, you value the guests and the topics that we feature that very often are never heard anywhere else, you love sharing the free

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And if you do not have a church home and you're not prayerfully looking for one, you are living in rebellion against God, I have lists of faithful churches all over the world,

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And also, that's the same email address you can use to send a question in to Martin McGown, the author of Grace and Assurance, the message of the

Canons of Dort, that's chrisarnsen at gmail .com, chrisarnsen at gmail .com.

And as always, please give us your first name, your city and state, and your country of residence. If you live outside the

USA, please only remain anonymous if your question involves personal and private matter. So as we said before the break, we wanted to enter now into the second head of doctrine, the death of Christ and the redemption of men thereby.

Unless you wanted to wrap something up with predestination, we can move on to the second head. That's fine with me.

Did you have questions you wanted me to answer? We do have questions waiting, but I'd rather just at least take this one additional heading first, because the questions are more general in nature about Reformed theology, so I want to at least get through the second head before we move on to the listener questions.

Perfect. I think what's important about the second head is how it's phrased.

The second head of doctrine on the death of Christ and the redemption of men thereby.

In other words, the Bible teaches, and the canons of Dort follow what the Bible teaches, that Christ actually redeems certain men by his death on the cross.

And that's something the Arminians denied, and that's something the Arminians today would also have to deny if they are being consistent, because Arminianism teaches that Christ did something on the cross for everyone, not simply for the elect.

And if Christ died for every single human being who ever lives and doesn't actually accomplish their salvation, then what he did was not to redeem them, but was to do something else.

His death was, in their minds, even if they would never phrase it this way, if Christ died for every single human that ever lived or ever will live, his atoning death was merely hypothetically atoning and redemptive.

It didn't actually atone or redeem anybody, did it? Correct. And that's exactly what the

Arminians were saying at Dort, and that's exactly what the men of Dort were responding to when they wrote the second head of doctrine.

I want to read from Head 2, Article 8, because this is the main article really of the second head.

For this was the sovereign counsel and most gracious will and purpose of God the Father, that the quickening and saving efficacy of the most precious death of his

Son should extend to all the elect, for bestowing upon them alone the gift of justifying faith, thereby to bring them infallibly to salvation.

That is, it was the will of God that Christ, by the blood of the cross whereby he confirmed the new covenant, should effectually redeem, notice those words, effectually redeem, out of every people, tribe, nation, and language, all those, and here's where the canons are actually more precise than Westminster, because all those and those only, and those only, who were from eternity chosen to salvation, and so on.

So it was God's will that Christ should effectually redeem all those and those only who were chosen to salvation.

So the question is, did Christ actually accomplish salvation by his death on the cross, or did he merely make it possible?

That's the issue, not how many people did he die for, but what did he actually accomplish by his death.

Right, and I don't have the exact wording that our dearly departed brother now in glory for eternity with Christ, Charles Haddon Spurgeon, once uttered in opposition to Arminianism, but the gist of what brother

Spurgeon said was that when it comes to limited atonement, he said, even though we as Calvinists use that phrase, we are only talking about the scope of the scope of humanity for whom the atonement was intended.

And according to Spurgeon, the Arminians truly have a much more limited atonement than Calvinists do, because they limit the power of the atonement, because they believe that Christ's death in and of itself did not atone for anyone, as we just mentioned earlier, it just made a hypothetical atonement possible.

And Spurgeon also said that he found it abhorrent and monstrous and something equivalent to the

God of the pagans, that humans would be tormented in eternity for sins that they claim, the

Arminians claim, were already atoned for on the cross by Christ. So it doesn't even make sense that if Christ died to atone for the sins of all humanity, that anyone would be cast into hell anyway and be tormented for those sins.

Absolutely, yeah. That would deny the justice of God. Now, I've heard some people say,

I don't know if you agree, and of course some of it might involve mind reading, but people have said, reformed people have said on occasion, that the true objection to limited atonement or particular redemption or definite atonement or substitutionary atonement is not really that doctrine, it really goes back to what we were initially talking about, unconditional election.

People may claim that they find limited atonement abhorrent, but it really goes back to the topic that really hinges, inseparably hinges on this, that God has chosen a certain number of people before the foundation of the world to receive the benefits of his death.

These things are inseparable, aren't they? Yes, the five points of Calvinism stand or fall together.

God chooses a certain people, Christ atones for that certain people, and the

Holy Spirit then regenerates that people because that people with all other people are totally depraved, and the

Holy Spirit preserves that people. So you can't really be a one -point or a two -point or a three -point

Calvinist, you have to be a five -point Calvinist to be consistent and to be biblical. Right, and although there have been some

Amaraldians who have tried to possess that balanced view, or they would think is balanced, that's just really inconsistent and illogical.

J .C. Ryle, a great hero from church history, claimed to be in that camp of Amaraldian who believed in the four points of Calvinism but not in the limited atonement doctrine, but I don't think that he was being consistent on that, as great a man of God as he was.

So what has the great harm done? Because some people might say, well you're really talking about very academic issues that should be confined to the libraries and studies of scholars, theologians, and seminary professors.

What great harm could this do? Can you really explain why this would in any way be a harmful doctrine if one were to teach, as many do, as many

Christians, if not most who profess to be Christians today and for a long time, have used as their main theme of evangelism, walking up to strangers or even those that they know but who reject

Christ and telling them, God loves you and sent his son

Christ Jesus to die for you in your place on the cross and he has paid the penalty for all your sins.

They will tell this to people without discrimination, without any knowledge of where this person's heart is, or they might even know for certain that the person is an enemy of Christ.

And they will say this, but this cannot be true that Christ died for all of their sins if they never repent and wind up in an eternal hell.

Those two things don't jive together, do they? No, if you go up to a person who is living in rebellion to God and you say to that person,

I have good news, God loves you and Christ died for you, then that person could legitimately say, well, that's wonderful, that means

I can go on in my sin. There's no reason for me to repent of my sin. If God loves me, then God would hardly send me to hell, now would he?

If God really loves me, and if Christ died for me, then surely my sins have been paid for and therefore

I can go free. So why would I need to repent of my sin and believe since God loves me and Christ died for me?

That message does not have the effect upon the sinner that you'd want and besides that, of course, to say that God loves everyone and that Christ died for everyone is to make

God's love ineffectual and to make Christ's death ineffectual and really dependent upon what man does, which is to really take away the glory of what

God did in Christ by sending his Son. I read what the Canons say about this in their second head,

Rejection of Errors 3. The Synod rejects the teachings of those who teach that Christ, by his satisfaction, merited neither salvation itself for anyone nor faith, whereby this satisfaction of Christ unto salvation is effectually appropriated, but that he merited for the

Father only the authority or the perfect will to deal again with man and to prescribe new conditions as he might desire, obedience to which, however, depended on the free will of man, so that it therefore might have come to pass that either none or all should fulfill these conditions.

In other words, Christ died for all men and it could be the result of that that no one believes and therefore no one is saved, or everyone believes and therefore everyone is saved.

In answer to that, the Canons write, For these are judged too contemptuously of the death of Christ, do in no wise acknowledge the most important fruit or benefit thereby gained, and bring again out of hell the

Pelagian error. So the Canons of Dort were very strongly opposed to the teachings of Arminius and his followers with respect to the death of Christ.

They were saying that Christ's death accomplished nothing. Nothing. In and of itself, nothing.

Now, if you add something to it, then perhaps it will accomplish something, but in and of itself, Christ's death accomplished nothing, according to Arminius.

Right. In fact, I heard, or perhaps I read it, there was a professor for a

Nazarene seminary, Church of the Nazarene, and I don't want to say anything disparaging about them as a whole group.

I have friends in the denomination that I love that I think are very faithful Christians in many respects.

But this professor of the Nazarene seminary, which is a Wesleyan -Arminian denomination, he was chiding, he was rebuking his fellow

Nazarenes for using the phrase substitutionary atonement. And he was actually more consistent and logical about it because he said, if Christ did indeed die as the substitute for every human that has ever lived or ever will live, then all of humanity will be in heaven.

How could it be otherwise? So he told his own fellow Nazarenes to stop using that phrase because, in fact, logically and consistently, he was correct according to their theology, wasn't he?

Absolutely. So what phrase did he suggest he should use instead? Well, he believed that Christ died for all.

I don't remember if he actually chose a phrase other than that. In what sense did Christ die for all, then?

You're asking me to defend Arminianism. Christ did not die for all in the sense that he actually was the substitute for, for being in the place of, in that he actually satisfied

God's justice for the sins of all, or in that he actually redeemed all or delivered all.

So in what sense does he mean Christ died for all? I mean, this is the question that has to be asked.

Well, see, he actually admitted that the death of Christ was hypothetical in regard to the atonement.

He saw the logical and consistent conclusion that one must draw if Christ died for everybody.

He was admitting that the death of Christ in and of itself alone did not purchase anyone from the gates of hell.

Of course, that's what they would teach, and then they would say that faith is the condition that you must add to the cross in order to make the cross effectual, whereas the

Calvinist, following scripture, teaches that faith is the gift of God, that God works faith in his elect people so that they appropriate unto themselves the benefits of the cross of Christ.

Faith is that which unites us to Jesus Christ. It's not something we work up of our own so -called free will, or something that God works in us by the power of the

Spirit. And of course, most... Arminianism doesn't believe that, so they have to have a different theory of the cross.

Right, and most folks that I know that are opposed to Reformed theology, well, first of all, most of them don't actually use the phrase

Arminian to describe themselves, even if they really are that, or at least evangelical

Arminians. But most would never be as bold and as honest and as consistent and as logical to say the same words as that Nazarene seminary professor did.

They would typically say that Jesus Christ died for your sins, and there's nothing you can do other than believe, and they would really be very inconsistent.

And as I said earlier in the beginning of the program, there are many Arminians who use the terms substitutionary atonement or that Christ died as a substitute, but they're really wrongly using that phrase.

Yes, they are. The phrase substitutionary atonement or even

Christ died for your sins, those phrases, while they're biblical, are not

Arminian. Right, and the sense in which that Christ died for all men is true in that he died for all kinds of men.

He died for kings and peasants. He died for people of all skin colors, ethnic groups, and nations of origin.

He died for those who are brilliant, and he died for those who are mentally retarded or brain damaged.

He died for all kinds of people, prostitutes and pastors and everyone in between.

And of course, those for whom he died, he not only rescues them from the penalty of sin, but he rescues them from the bondage of sin.

So those that are amongst the most perverse, the prostitutes and the murderers, as well as those that are guilty of the sin of pride, who may be living outwardly moral lives, but are really still dead in their sins because they take pride in their own deeds and their own abilities and their own minds and hearts, everyone who is purchased by the blood of the

Lamb will be given a new life. And although we'll never be perfect on this earth, we will be living lives marked out by obedience and repentance, correct?

Absolutely, yes. That's what the Bible means by universal.

All kinds of every nation, tribe, and tongue, Jews and Gentiles alike.

The Bible does not use the term world or all man in the sense of without exception, but rather without distinction.

Yeah, we have to go to our final break. It's a much more brief break than the last one. If you'd like to join us on the air, and we will get to our listeners' questions when we return.

But if you want to join them, do so now or forever hold your peace. The email address is chrisarnson at gmail .com.

chrisarnson at gmail .com. Don't go away. God willing, we are going to be right back after these messages from our sponsors.

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It's a great conference. I love it. And Chris Arnson was there last year. He's been there, I think, every year.

It's great to see him there. You and I actually did some recordings in the lobby at that place, which is a highlight.

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G3conference .com. G3conference .com. Paul wrote to the church at Galatia, For am

I now seeking the approval of man or of God, or am I trying to please man? If I were still trying to please man,

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That's not the best recipe for popularity, but since that wasn't the apostles' priority, it must not be ours either.

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If you live near Norfolk, Massachusetts, or plan to visit our area, please come and join us for worship and fellowship.

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Iron Sharpens Iron Radio. I'm Dr. Gary Kimbrough, pastor at Bethlehem Baptist Church in Laurel, Mississippi. God tells us in James 127 that pure and undefiled religion is a visit to fatherless and widows and their affliction.

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Bethlehem Baptist Church, 838 Reed Road, Laurel, Mississippi, 39443.

Or bbclaurel .com. Thank you. Lindbrook Baptist Church on 225

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-Ground -Books .com Okay, we are now back, as I said, with Martin McGowan. And we have a listener in Annapolis, North Carolina named

Casey. And Casey asks, How can we best introduce the doctrines of grace to family members who don't understand them and may even be hostile when you bring them up?

It seems that if they have a commitment to scripture, that when you properly interpret the scripture to teach them, they should be challenged to change their minds.

Well, if only life could be that easy. But, Martin, if you could. That's a difficult question.

I would advise you to, again, look at the Calendars of Dort and see how the Calendars of Dort bring up these issues.

They don't start with reprobation. I think many Calvinists, when they try to witness about these things, start with reprobation.

The Canons don't address reprobation until Head 1, Article 15. Instead, they lay the groundwork about man's sin,

God's justice, the need for atonement, and these important issues before they get to the issue of God's decrees and election, reprobation, limited atonement, and so on.

And even with limited atonement, probably the better thing to do would be to talk about the atonement as such first, because what the atonement is, and then prove that it must be limited, otherwise it's not really an atonement.

And you also need to explain to such a person what the fall was, how man was originally created, and what happened to him when he fell into sin, because a lot of people seem to think that man after the fall is the same as he was before the fall, and don't understand the doctrine of sin at all.

So those are the kind of things I would probably start with if I was going to bring these things up with someone, and of course bring them to the

Scriptures, Ephesians 1, Romans 9, and other places. Yeah, and I think that Casey, since he appears to be a believer in the doctrines of grace, he needs to be reminded that he should not be overly dismayed and discouraged if those whom he is evangelizing don't immediately repent of their false theology and embrace the doctrines of grace, because that too is in the hands of God himself.

No matter how articulate you may be, or brilliant you may be, if God intends to show those deep and beautiful truths to those to whom you're talking, he will do so at his own time.

Shouldn't that be an encouragement to us when we may feel very frustrated? It seems that our words are falling on deaf ears.

Yes, well, if we're talking to unbelievers, our words are falling on deaf ears. That's right. We have deaf ears.

But we speak the Word of God, and we believe that God is able to open deaf ears, and open heartened hearts, and so on.

We don't rely upon our eloquence or our ability to argue. We rely upon the

Holy Spirit's work. Amen. We have a listener in Balamina, Northern Ireland, Julian, who says,

Concerning unconditional election and reprobation, in the book you say Calvinists are accused of teaching

God hates people and condemns them to hell. But is this not biblical truth?

Thou hatest all workers of iniquity. Esau I have hated, and the false teachers in Peter's epistle anointed to outer darkness.

And he's asking, I guess, for you to affirm that those are biblical teachings.

I'm not sure what his question is. I don't say in the book that God does not hate the reprobate.

No, I think he's basically spelling out biblical truths and asking you to affirm them, it seems.

Concerning unconditional election and reprobation, in the book you say Calvinists are accused of teaching

God hates people and condemns them to hell. But is this not biblical truth?

In other words, he's saying that it is biblical truth. And he wants you. Yes, it is biblical truth that God hates the reprobate and condemns them to hell.

The point I was making in the book was that when the Synod of Dort addresses that question, it doesn't just blurt out clumsily, oh,

God hates certain people and condemns them to hell. It builds an argument before it gets to that important point.

But it doesn't deny that God hates the reprobate and condemns them to hell. Yeah, but those that have a sentimental understanding, a greeting card understanding of God, who say that he is not a

God that hates anyone, well then they would have to be a universalist who believes that even the devil will be in heaven with us one day, as some people are, heretically.

But you really cannot believe in hell at all. Even if you're an annihilationist, you're believing that people are being punished and evaporated.

I'm sorry, I'm not condoning annihilationism. I'm saying that even those people believe that there is a punishment that is eternal.

So therefore, you cannot believe in the kind of love that most non -reformed people claim about God, can you?

No, I mean, obviously, God does not love those people whom he condemns to hell.

To condemn someone to hell for eternity is the very opposite of love. And of course, the Bible teaches that God does not love everyone, but only loves the elect, and detests the reprobate and condemns them for their sins.

Yes. Yes. Let's see here. We have an anonymous listener, and the anonymous listener says,

I have found it disturbing that more and more people, pastors, churches, and denominations that claim to be reformed are borrowing from the

Arminians in regard to seeker -sensitive approaches to worship and evangelism.

They seem to be declaring on one hand faithfulness to the confessions of faith that we share in reformed history, but when it comes to the practice of it, they seem to be acting as Arminians.

Do you have a word of loving rebuke to our brethren who are doing this? Something that they can point out again and again is that God uses means.

So God has determined to save his elect people, and God uses means. The means that God uses is the preaching of the gospel, and the gospel is the message, and the preaching is the method.

Any other means is not one that God is pleased to bless, and a means that would seek to appeal to man's will, to maybe manipulate man's emotions, which is what a lot of the seeker -sensitive

Arminian stuff is, is not something that honors God. God uses the proclamation of his truth, and God is pleased then to send his

Holy Spirit, and to take that truth and apply that to the hearts of his elect people, and also to use that same truth to harden the reprobate under the same preaching.

And whenever we preach Christ crucified, we rely upon God for the fruit of that preaching.

We have CJ in Lindenhurst, Long Island, New York, who says, what steps can

Calvinists take as to not fall down the slippery slope of hyper -Calvinism, where they are denying the whole counsel of God, just as the

Arminians are? He doesn't define what hyper -Calvinism is, but hyper -Calvinism is the idea that the unbeliever to whom you bring the gospel is not commanded by God in the preaching to repent and believe.

So -called duty -faith and duty -repentance. Hyper -Calvinists will say that since man is unable to believe, and doesn't have a free will to believe, therefore he's not commanded to believe, which is really a similar error to the

Arminian who says, well, since man is commanded to believe, he must be able to believe. Both the

Arminian and the hyper -Calvinist are wrong on that point. Man is unable to believe, and yet he is still commanded to believe, because he's still a rational, moral creature who is accountable to God for his actions and his responses to God's word.

And so God still commands all men everywhere to repent and believe in Jesus Christ, despite the fact that they aren't able to.

But that's a moral inability caused by the fact that they have become corrupted in the fall and are totally depraved by nature.

But they're still commanded to do what God made man originally able to do, which is to believe and to live a godly life and to keep

God's commandments. Man is still commanded to do that. Well, C .J.,

you have won a free copy of the book, Grace and Assurance, the message of the Canons of Dort.

Make sure we have your full mailing address. So CVBBS .com can ship that out to you.

That goes for our anonymous listener as well. Please give us your full name, your address, so that can be shipped out to you.

For those of our listeners who say that God would never command anyone to do anything they could not do, might

I remind you of two different instances where Jesus Christ said, pick up your bed and walk, and also

Lazarus, come forth. Those are instances when those people were totally incapable in and of themselves to obey those commands, and yet Christ commanded them to do so, and he enabled them to obey as he does with his elect.

Paul, I want to thank you so much, Martin Miguel, for being our guest today. And I obviously want you to come back to continue our theme on your book, because we're only not even halfway through it.

So if you could come back and bless us with additional information about Grace and Assurance.

I'd certainly be willing to do that, if you can schedule me in. I will. And well,

I know that your website for the church where you pastor, there in Limerick, Ireland, limerickreformed .com,

limerickreformed .com. You can also email me for more information if you're listening and you want those details.

chrisarnson at gmail .com, chrisarnson at gmail .com. You can also find out more about the

Reform Free Publishing Association at rfpa .org,

rfpa, that's publishing association, rfpa .org. I want to thank everybody who listened.

I hope you all have a safe, blessed, and happy weekend and Lord's Day. And I want you all to always remember for the rest of your lives that Jesus Christ is a far greater