Calvinists and Eternal Security

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April 24, 2020

Coffee w/a Calvinist Special Edition -- Interview with Richard Rhoden In this episode, Pastor Keith interviews his friend and brother in Christ Richard Rhoden. Together they discuss the important issue of Eternal Security and how they have both deepened in their understanding since becoming Calvinists.

00:07: Welcome back to Coffee with a Calvinist.
00:09: My name is Keith Foskey and I am a Calvinist.
00:13: Today we have another interview for you.
00:16: I'm going to be interviewing a lifelong friend of mine named Richard Roden.
00:22: Richard is from Callahan, Florida.
00:25: He and I grew up together.
00:27: We both went to West Nassau High School, graduated the same year.
00:33: And we have a lot of things in common, but the reason why I wanted to interview Richard is because he was actually very important in a very particular time in my own Christian life.
00:45: I wanted to share the story about how he helped me through a particularly difficult theological time in my life.
00:52: But before I do that, let me just give you a little bit of our history.
00:55: As I said, we grew up together.
00:57: We both grew up in different churches.
01:00: Richard had a Baptist background and I grew up in a different church, not a Baptist church.
01:07: Neither of us got saved until we were both adults and neither of us became Calvinists until much later than when we were saved.
01:19: So both of us were saved outside of the reformed, outside of reformed theology, but both of us have since come to being reformed or Calvinistic in our view of salvation.
01:32: And so today is again another episode of Coffee with Two Calvinists.
01:37: And you can tell by Richard's shirt that he is not only a Calvinist, but he is a prideful man that he would wear five point Calvinist on his shirt.
01:48: I don't even know what kind of a person would make such a shirt like that and try to sell it.
01:54: I'm certain it wasn't me.
01:57: I had to win it.
01:59: If I remember correctly, I gave you that wonderful Martin Luther meme with your karate.
02:06: Yes, you won that shirt fair and square.
02:10: And I'm very proud of that.
02:14: Well, I want to tell the story very quickly.
02:16: And now I want to ask Richard a quick question.
02:19: History brought us together in a very fortuitous and very providential way when we were both young men.
02:27: It was I think we were in our early 20s and I had gotten a job delivering bread.
02:35: And Richard has been a bread man for a long time.
02:38: In fact, now he's a cake man.
02:40: Who do you work for, Richard? You work for McKee Food, which is Little Debbie's Snack Cakes.
02:45: And you sling cake is what you tell everybody, right? That is correct.
02:49: I sling cake.
02:50: Awesome.
02:51: Well, at the time you were slinging bread and you and I were in a bread truck early one morning and the subject got around to our mutual faith in Christ.
03:02: And at the time, I did not understand eternal security, the doctrine, which sometimes is referred to as once saved, always saved.
03:12: Richard, do you remember that conversation? Well, given that it was over almost 20 years ago, almost 20 years ago, not entirely.
03:24: No, you'll have to remind me a little bit.
03:27: I was still a brand new Christian, but I know we had the conversation, but I don't remember the details of the conversation.
03:32: Well, let me ask you this because I don't remember everything about the conversation either.
03:36: But I do know this.
03:37: You were instrumental in helping me as myself, a young believer, you were instrumental in helping me see that that doctrine was a correct doctrine.
03:48: What was it that caused you to be so convinced? How did you have such a robust theology being such a young Christian? Well, it wasn't so much that I had a robust theology.
04:01: It's more of the fact that who I'm related to.
04:06: My brother Hank, you know Hank, and he's been a Christian his whole life.
04:11: He was reformed at this point.
04:14: And when I became a Christian, I had a conversation with him about eternal security and not that I was, I don't even think, I'm not even sure how the conversation started, but I remember him making it very clear to me that in order for someone to lose their salvation, they'd have to have more power than God.
04:35: We are kept by the power of God.
04:37: And if God has saved you in Jesus Christ, you were kept in Jesus Christ and it's by Christ's power that he keeps you.
04:46: And that statement, you have to have more power than God, really stuck with me.
04:52: And that's why it wasn't very hard for me to cling on to understanding, okay, I don't have more power than God.
04:58: And even though I didn't understand predestination, election or any of that stuff at that time, knowing that God had saved me and it was by his power, he was keeping me, then who am I to say that you could lose your salvation? And I think that's kind of where I took you in the truck was being kept by the power of God.
05:19: And maybe that got your wheels turning.
05:21: I do know I said that to you.
05:24: Sure.
05:24: And having grown up, I know you said earlier before we started the interview, you and I were talking and you mentioned that you had been in a Baptist church, but prior to that, you had been in a Pentecostal church.
05:36: Is that correct? Correct.
05:38: Yes.
05:39: From the time I was born until I was about 10, my parents attended a Pentecostal church here in Callahan and they came out of that belief system.
05:50: And we ended up at the Baptist church, first Callahan, where we ended up after that.
05:55: And so knowing what I know about Pentecostals, Pentecostals would not hold to eternal security.
06:04: Baptists would.
06:05: Is that correct? Is that how you understood it as you were there or did that even come up? Do you remember? I know being 10 years old.
06:12: I don't recall having any conversations about it then, but I do know that having relationships with folks that are still there and knowing them, they still hold to the fact that you could lose your salvation.
06:27: And I'm not putting a flight on them.
06:28: That's just their theological belief.
06:31: I actually had a conversation with a fellow years ago and he happened to see somebody from his church and he said that fellow needed to get saved again, which I thought was a weird statement.
06:44: And he explained that he's been a believer, but some things happen and he needs to get saved and get baptized again.
06:49: And I didn't feel like having the argument.
06:54: But yes, they would hold to that.
06:57: But once saved, always saved is a Baptist mantra.
07:01: They truly believe that once you're saved, you're always saved.
07:05: So yes.
07:06: Well, that leads me to my next question, because as you mentioned, once saved, always saved is very common language.
07:16: Would you say that since you have become a Calvinist, that your position on once saved, always saved has changed or has it evolved at all? Because I think mine has, but I want to hear your thoughts.
07:34: I would say yes, it's evolved in the sense of Baptists tend to be consistently inconsistent when it comes to this.
07:44: In other words, they will hold to God has saved me.
07:50: I cannot lose my salvation.
07:52: I am kept by the power of God.
07:54: But then in the next breath, especially those who aren't Reformed, but I chose God, he didn't choose me or some level of that.
08:03: So it's God's complete sovereign control in keeping them, but not in coming to faith.
08:08: So they're consistently inconsistent in that.
08:10: So in my becoming Reformed and studying the Doctors of Grace, the full understanding of TULIP, as you want to put this acronym, helps me have a fuller understanding of what it really means to be once saved, always saved, because my salvation began in eternity past.
08:32: I had nothing to do with it coming to be, so I definitely ain't going to have anything to do with losing it.
08:37: I don't have the power to get it, so how do I have the power to lose it? So I would evolve in that respect there.
08:44: Amen.
08:45: Amen.
08:46: One of the things that I have noted in my journey of learning and becoming more and more convinced of what I believe the Bible teaches is that the Baptist view, not all, but especially those who I've been in contact with and interacted with, and I went to a Baptist seminary, tends to not really have a very robust understanding of apostasy, whereas the Reformed would have a more robust understanding.
09:30: So can you speak to that? When you were growing up, or whenever you, I don't want to say when you were growing up, but at this point, do you see that Baptists really don't recognize people falling away? How do they usually deal with that? Well, it's kind of a difficult question to answer because I haven't had a lot of conversation with people on it, but there is this idea with some Baptists, not all, and I'm not particularly speaking about anybody in my church, it's just...
10:07: Oh, absolutely.
10:08: Yeah, we're not, this is all general.
10:09: This is all general, correct.
10:12: But there are those that, there is an element in which you would think that someone could fall away, the way they put it, like they've been in the church and they fell away and we just need to kind of go get them, because they didn't really lose their salvation.
10:27: I see where you're going with this now.
10:28: The once saved, always saved, so they could leave the church for 10 years, and all we got to do is just go get them.
10:36: They haven't lost their salvation.
10:38: We just got to go get them and bring them back.
10:40: That's kind of the Baptist thought on that, falling away.
10:44: They're not, they're still Christians.
10:47: They're still saved.
10:47: They just left the church, where my response to that would be, well, one, Christ made it very clear, if you're connected to the divine, there's going to be fruit, and part of that fruit is regular attendance, wanting to worship with the saints, wanting to be with brothers and sisters in Christ.
11:05: And then you got what John says in 1 John, that they went out from among us because they never were really of us.
11:12: So this idea of falling away, if someone just abandons the church and leaves the church and, you know, just there's no fruit of repentance in their life, then they're obviously not truly believers in the first place.
11:27: They are apostate, and they need to be dealt with in that way.
11:30: They need to hear the gospel, and they need to come to true faith and repentance.
11:36: Amen.
11:36: Did that answer your question? It does, because this is where I find myself at times.
11:43: You know, I do a lot of funerals, and one of the things that I tend to run into a lot is people who will say, well, this person got saved when they were 12, but there's been no fruit of repentance in their life, and maybe they died at 30 or 40 years old or even older.
12:06: And I say, well, how do you feel about this person spiritually? And they would say, well, he came to Christ when he was 12 years old, and even though he never had a desire to be a part of the church, he never had a desire to do anything to follow after Christ, but we believe he's saved, because once you're saved, you're always saved.
12:29: And I would say that's the difference between the Baptist and the Reformed, is the Reformed would say this person was never saved, most likely, because they never had the fruit of repentance.
12:43: Would you line up with that kind of understanding? Absolutely.
12:50: And I would be an example of that.
12:52: I made some kind of conversion when I was nine.
12:56: There was a revivalist.
12:58: He did the altar call, bow your head, say this prayer.
13:02: If you said that prayer, come down forward.
13:04: And you come down and you've made a profession of faith.
13:07: I got baptized a week later.
13:08: I was nine.
13:10: And I was in the church from nine to 16.
13:13: Now, in the Baptist and even in the Pentecostal, to some degree, you got saved when you were nine, so you're saved.
13:23: Now, the Pentecostal would say you could lose your salvation if you sinned enough, obviously, but the Baptist would say you're still in the faith.
13:31: But when I was 16, I walked away from the church, and I went into doing a whole lot of sinning.
13:39: And again, John says in 1 John, those who make a practice of sinning are not born of God.
13:46: And I was doing a habitual practice of sinning.
13:49: So that conversion at nine was not a true conversion.
13:52: It wasn't until later when I came to a—and that's the beauty of the power of God in salvation, is that I'd heard the gospel all my life.
14:00: I'd been exposed to it, but it took me hitting the bottom of the barrel at 21 years of age for the light to come on.
14:10: I'm a definite sinner.
14:12: I'm a wretch in Christ's sake, and place my faith and repentance—faith in Him and His finished work and repent and believe.
14:19: That's when it all came to a head.
14:22: So, you know, that would be my answer to that.
14:25: I'm an example of someone who saved early and then walking away.
14:30: I never was saved in the first place.
14:33: Amen.
14:34: It's so funny how similar our stories are, because I was eight years old the first time I was baptized.
14:40: I was baptized again at 12, and neither one of those times was because I was truly repentant or truly of faith, but I was following the dictates of those around me and the consciences of those who were encouraging me.
14:57: And I appreciate those people caring about my soul, wanting me to be saved, but they couldn't do what only God could do.
15:07: And there's a danger in that, when baptizing someone too soon.
15:12: That's just a belief of mine.
15:13: You know, I've got children, and they tell me they understand the gospel and they believe the gospel, but I want to make sure there's true fruit of repentance before they go through the waters.
15:24: I don't want them to have this false sense of security because, you know, who knows what down the road they'd be exposed to once they're out of my house.
15:32: Well, you made this conversion when you were 16, so you're in.
15:37: So what are you worried about? And I don't want this false sense of eternal security.
15:42: I want them to truly know that they know that they're saved.
15:45: So anyway.
15:46: Hey, that might be a great discussion for a follow-up interview.
15:51: When should little Johnny be baptized is actually something I've thought about writing because that is such an important question.
15:59: You know, Presbyterians don't have to answer that question because little Johnny gets baptized before he knows it.
16:05: But it isn't for us, for us who have a baptistic view of the sacraments or the ordinances, we have to answer that question.
16:13: And that is a very, very important question.
16:16: All right.
16:16: Well, I want to have some fun.
16:18: I thank you for very thoughtful answers.
16:20: And by the way, for those of you who don't know, Richard is also a Sunday school teacher.
16:25: He's a great one.
16:26: My wife and I have enjoyed getting to see him teach through social media videos and stuff.
16:33: So grateful for your teaching of the word.
16:36: And so because you are such a great Bible teacher, I feel like it's pretty fair that you and I have a contest of who can remember the most Bible verses in the shortest amount of time.
16:47: So I'm going to click this clicker.
16:51: And when I click the clicker, I'm going to have about 15 seconds to give a memory verse.
16:57: And once I give my memory verse, I'm going to click it again.
17:00: And then you have 15 seconds to give a memory verse.
17:02: And we're going to go back and forth.
17:05: And the person who gets the ringing and it'll make a car horn sound, the person who gets the ringing of the car horn sound, that person is the loser.
17:18: And well, we'll just say the person who doesn't win.
17:21: Such a negative thing to call someone a loser.
17:25: But I enjoy this little game.
17:27: I did this with my last interview.
17:29: We had a lot of fun.
17:30: And I lost.
17:31: And I'm here to redeem myself.
17:34: So we're going to see.
17:35: We're going to see.
17:37: Yeah.
17:38: Okay.
17:40: All right.
17:41: So I'm going to hit the button and then I'm going to I'm going to go with my first Bible verse.
17:52: The Lord is my shepherd.
17:54: I shall not want.
17:55: Psalm 23 verse 1.
18:00: Proverbs 25 11.
18:02: A word fitly spoken is like apples of gold and pictures of silver, like an earring of gold and an ornament of fine gold.
18:08: So as a wise reprover upon an obedient ear.
18:11: There's no way I'm going to win.
18:16: John 8 and 58.
18:18: Jesus said before Abraham was, I am.
18:24: Galatians 5 22.
18:26: The fruit of the spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness, self-control against such things.
18:32: There is no law or by grace.
18:37: Are you saved through faith and that not of yourself? It is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast.
18:43: Ephesians 2 verse 8.
18:47: I'm going to give you an easy one.
18:49: John 1 1.
18:50: In the beginning was the word and the word was with God and the word was God.
18:56: John 11 35.
18:58: Jesus wept.
19:02: Romans 12 1.
19:04: I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God to present your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and acceptable unto God, which is a reasonable act of worship.
19:13: Okay.
19:15: Romans 1 18.
19:17: For the righteousness of God is being revealed from heaven against all unrighteousness and ungodliness of men who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth.
19:29: Ephesians 5 18.
19:31: Do not get drunk with wine for that is dissipation, but be you filled with the spirit.
19:36: I want to pause and say that's a Baptist.
19:42: Okay.
19:44: Ephesians 5 23.
19:46: Husbands love your wives as Christ loved the church and gave himself for her.
19:51: Okay.
19:52: James 1 27.
19:54: Pure and undefiled religion in the sight of our God and father is this.
19:58: To visit orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself unstained by the world.
20:06: James 2 and 24.
20:09: You see that you're justified by works and not by faith alone.
20:16: Um, well, I'm gonna hit you my favorite one.
20:19: It's gonna take longer than 15 seconds.
20:20: Philippians 2 6 through 11.
20:23: He, though he was in the form of God and not a quality of a God, a thing to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant and being born in the likeness of men and being found in human form.
20:33: He humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on the cross.
20:37: Therefore, God has highly exalted him by bestowing on him the name that is above every name so that in the name of Jesus, every knee shall bow in heaven on earth and under the earth and every tongue shall confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the father.
20:52: Okay.
20:52: I hit it twice just to give you time and I think you should win by virtue of how great that was.
21:00: That was awesome.
21:02: Okay.
21:03: Uh, oh man, I don't even think I should even, I give up.
21:10: Boy, that was, that was awesome.
21:12: Uh, you need to do your own reading of the New Testament.
21:15: That'd be great.
21:16: You have such a great voice.
21:18: I figured, uh, we were going back and forth too easy with the one with the simple ones.
21:23: I figured if I'm gonna lose, I'll just go out by one, two, that's too long.
21:28: Well, yeah, you, you, you deserve the win brother.
21:31: So that's why I'm, so I'm O for two, right? Is that, I'm not a sports guy.
21:38: That means I lost twice, right? Yes, you're O for two.
21:40: You got two in the L column.
21:43: Okay.
21:43: Well, whoever I've got to go up against next, I'm going to have to, I'm going to have to pick up my game a little bit, but I did do better this time.
21:50: I calmed down.
21:51: I got a little chill.
21:53: I figured it out.
21:54: As we, in the interview, I want to ask you one final question and then I'm going to pray.
22:02: My final question is something I want to make this part of each interview because it really interests me and it's an opportunity for you to share with people, uh, something that benefits you.
22:15: Who is your favorite Bible teacher, both living and dead? I'd like to know who your favorite living Bible teacher is that you could share.
22:25: Maybe somebody can look him up and learn from him.
22:28: And, uh, and your favorite dead guy.
22:32: Dead guy.
22:33: Well, um, living, um, would have to be Stephen Lawson.
22:38: And the reason I like Steve Lawson much because he just preaches with such power and conviction.
22:43: I mean, he's just like thunderous in your face kind of preaching, which I like.
22:48: And, uh, he exposes the scripture very well.
22:52: Um, dead preacher.
22:55: Hmm.
22:57: I'd have to go with, uh, I guess I'd have to go with R.C.
23:00: Sproul, honestly, because I mean, even though he's only been gone for a short period of time, he does qualify for that category now.
23:08: And he was also a powerful preacher of the word and exposes it very well.
23:12: And I just, the way he preaches, just the ease in which it came, I just, I thoroughly enjoyed him and I learned a lot from him and still do.
23:22: I have, uh, several of his DVD sets.
23:25: I still need to go through it.
23:27: It takes so long to do.
23:29: So anyhow, that was my answers.
23:33: Well, that brings something up.
23:34: I'll mention for those who don't know, during this, uh, coronavirus crisis that we're going through right now, Ligonier has offered all of their series for free.
23:44: So if anybody's interested in learning, they can, they can go and learn from, from the great Dr.
23:49: Sproul, uh, for free from their website.
23:52: Well, Richard, I appreciate your participation today.
23:55: I had a lot of fun.
23:56: I think this is going to interest people because the subject of eternal security is certainly one that causes a lot of questions and, and, and, uh, I would, I want to ask for you to, would you pray for us? Uh, pray for, pray for two things.
24:09: One, pray that God will use this to help someone and also that God will get the churches open just as soon as he is ready.
24:17: I can do that.
24:18: You ready? Yep.
24:19: Let's pray.
24:20: Heavenly Father, Lord, we thank you again for this opportunity to come and to, uh, have a discussion centered around your word.
24:28: And Father, I'm thanking you for, uh, for Keith and his ministry.
24:32: And Father, I just pray that you will watch over him and strengthen him as he continues to be an under shepherd to the flock that you have given him.
24:40: And Father, I pray and ask that you would, uh, work in this nation and father to release us from this, this COVID-19 and father, let your people come back together to worship you in person.
24:54: We thank you that we have the media of social media, the form of social media to where we can still meet each other and, and, and do it that way.
25:01: But that's just not, uh, Hebrews 1025 for gathering ourselves together.
25:06: So father, just pray and ask you to work in our midst and bring us back together.
25:11: And father, I just pray that you'll be with, uh, both me and Keith as we continue to, uh, to work out our salvation with fear and trembling.
25:19: And father, I pray and ask that you will grow us and sanctify us in your truth.
25:23: And I thank you father for the many blessings you give us.
25:27: And, uh, well, that'll be about it.
25:31: So thank you father.
25:32: I pray in Jesus name.
25:33: Amen.
25:34: Amen.
25:35: And if everybody notices, he did two more Bible verses in there just to throw it in that he's the winner of today's Bible verse challenge.
25:43: I brother Richard, thank you so much.
25:45: And I appreciate you being on coffee with the Calvinist again.
25:49: Thank you for watching.
25:50: I'm Keith Foskey and I've been your Calvinist today.
25:53: God bless.
25:55: Thank you for tuning in to coffee with the Calvinist.
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26:18: My name is Keith and I've been your Calvinist.