WWUTT 756 A People for His Own Possession?

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The doctrine of limited atonement is one of the most controversial doctrines out there. There are people who just hate this doctrine.

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But when it comes down to it, unless you're a universalist, you believe in a limited atonement when we understand the text.

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Many of the Bible stories and verses we think we know, we don't. When we understand the text as an online ministry committed to teaching sound doctrine and exposing the faulty, visit our website at www .utt

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.com. Now here's our host, Pastor Gabe Hughes. Thank you, Becky. We come back to our study in Titus chapter 2, returning to this glorious phrase that Paul has written that goes from verses 11 through 14.

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Paul writes, For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people, training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self -controlled, upright, and godly lives in the present age, waiting for our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great

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God and Savior Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us to redeem us from all lawlessness and to purify for himself a people for his own possession, who are zealous for good works.

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This is also the section of scripture that one of our pastors at our church, Pastor Dwight, read at the close of service yesterday as our benediction.

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I love hearing it. It's one that I had memorized a long time ago, for we see the beauty and the grace of God for his people in this passage.

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Some really deep theology too, and that's really what we're going to consider today. Some of the deep theological aspects of what we read in this particular phrase.

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Returning to verse 11, and some of this is going to be a repeat of what it was that we talked about on Wednesday, for the grace of God has appeared.

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It has appeared in Jesus Christ, as we talked about last week. We see the grace of God in the sacrifice of Christ on the cross and his resurrection from the grave, the giving of the son of God to be an atoning sacrifice for our sins.

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That is the grace of God displayed for us in his son. The grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people.

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Now, as I mentioned last week, all always has a context.

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You know, forget that nutty cliche that some of these guys like to use, all means all, and that's all all means.

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No, that's not true, as all has as much of a context as any other word that we would read in the

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Bible. Who is quantified by the all people in verse 11?

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Well, you've got to follow the pronouns. The grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people, training us, us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions.

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Who are trained to renounce those things? The people of God. It's not every single person who is trained to renounce ungodliness.

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It is only those people who have turned from worldliness and desire to live holy, upright and godly lives in the present age, training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions, turning from worldly things, desiring heavenly things, that we would be self -controlled, that we would live upright and godly lives, desiring to be like God in the very way that we live it, be like God, meaning that we desire to be like our savior.

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We we want to be like him. We want to live a life that is worthy of the calling that we have received in Christ Jesus, living godly lives in the present age and the present and evil age is where we have it in other places.

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Philippians two is one of those places where it's mentioned that way, that we would be blameless and pure children of God in a crooked and depraved generation.

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Waiting for our blessed hope. So as we live these godly lives in the present age, we are waiting for our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great

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God and savior, Jesus Christ. So we see the grace of God that has come for us in Christ.

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But then we also await the revealing of his glory. We have very limited views of glory right now.

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It would be like walking up to a wall and on the other side of the wall is glory. And we can't get to that side of glory yet.

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We're still on this side of the wall. But there's small little pinpole sized holes in the wall.

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And the glory on the other side of the wall is shining through those little holes. And so we see some of that glory.

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We get a feeling of a touch of some of that light. But we don't get to to behold

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God in all of his gloriousness. It would kill us now if we were to do that in this corruptible earthly flesh in which we inhabit.

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So we continue to grow in holiness. As long as we inhabit these bodies, we desire to be made like God as we wait for the appearing of the glory of our

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God and savior, Jesus Christ. On that day, as it says in first John three, two, we will see him as he is because we will be made to be like him.

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We can't behold him that way now. But there is going to come a day in which our lowly bodies will be transformed to be like his glorious body by the power that enables him to subject all things to himself.

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That's in Philippians chapter three. And we will behold with our own eyes the appearing of this glory of God, our great savior,

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Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us. So there we return to those pronouns again. Again, this is the all people that have received salvation.

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And why would Paul use that word all people there? Why would he use a word that would be translated that way into all people if he did not mean every single person on the planet?

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Well, because you got to understand that in the full context of scripture, I'm talking reading from Genesis all the way to Revelation.

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When we're in the Old Testament, there is a particular people of God through whom God is bringing about this sovereign plan of salvation for the whole world.

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And he's doing this only through the Jews, the Jews, the nation of Israel. Is that people which

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God had called out from slavery in Egypt? He set apart as holy.

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He called them out of slavery. He gave his promises to them, the descendants of Abraham, because this is to whom

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God had first made that covenant promise with. I will make you the father of many nations.

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And it is from the children of Abraham that all people would be named because what was going to end up happening through the line of Judah in particular is the

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Messiah was going to come. And whoever believed on the name of the Messiah, whether they are Jew or Gentile, they would be received into the glorious kingdom of God and they would wear the name of God.

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We would be adopted into his family. We would know him as our heavenly father, as we would be his sons and daughters.

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And so it is it is through this promise that God gave to Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Judah, David on down the line, you get to Jesus Christ.

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And this is the people that God has called out to bring about this plan of salvation. So it's always been about a particular people.

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There is always a specific group of people that God has selected and called unto himself, starting with the

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Old Testament all the way through to the end of all things which we read about in the book of Revelation.

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And we see in Ephesians, chapter one, the apostle Paul talking about that God had elected from before the foundation of the world those who would be holy and blameless before him in love.

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He predestined us for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ.

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Verse four, he chose us in him. We have been predestined for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ.

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God has done all of these things through his son. And it is in Christ that we receive these promises of God, which he predestined for his elect from before the foundation of the world.

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It's always been about a particular specific people. So when you're reading in the

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Old Testament and you're reading about the people of God, you're talking about Israel. When you get to New Testament and you're reading about the people of God, you might be talking about Israel, depending upon the context.

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But more than likely, you're talking about those people who have come to faith in Jesus Christ, whether they are

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Jew or Gentile. And that would include every nation of men. It's not just about Israel anymore.

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It's about every nation on earth. Anyone who would call upon the name of the Lord, they are the people of God.

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So when we come to Titus, chapter two, verse eleven, in light of everything that you've read in the

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Bible from Genesis all the way up to this point, when we read that the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people, this means every nation of men on earth from whom are called to himself those who would be believers in Jesus Christ, as opposed to just the nation of Israel.

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For God's promises are not just for an ethnic people group that is descended from Abraham.

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His promises are now for people that come from all tribes and tongues and nations on earth, those whom he elected for salvation in Jesus Christ.

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The grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all of them, all people, not just Jews anymore and not just Gentiles, but all people,

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Jews and Gentiles whom God has elected for salvation, training us, those who have received that salvation in Christ to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions and to live self -controlled, upright and godly lives in the present age.

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No one else can do that but a follower of Jesus. Your heart is oriented against God.

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You desire to sin and you want to rebel and go your own way. That is who you are before you come to the saving knowledge of your savior,

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Jesus Christ. And so in you, as you are in that rebellious state, that's all you want to do.

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You don't desire to live in godliness. You want to live in ungodliness. You don't desire to put away those worldly passions.

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You want all of those worldly passions. Everything that your flesh desires that you want, that's what you go for if you are not in Christ.

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So this is specifically for only those who have been trained by the

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Holy Spirit of God and according to the word of God to renounce these things that are displeasing to God.

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And instead, we would be self -controlled. We would not give in to those fleshly appetites that we have, but we have put that sin to death.

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We've mortified the sin, as John Owen put it. And we live self -controlled. We live upright and godly lives in the present age.

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We're not pursuing ungodliness. We're pursuing godliness in our Lord and savior,

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Jesus Christ, as we wait for the appearing of Christ. No one who is not of Christ Jesus is waiting for his coming.

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They love the world. They want to continue in the stuff of the world. They're not looking forward to the day that Christ comes for.

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Not only does that mean that they have to let go of all these things in the world that they love so much, but it also means that the judgment of God has come upon them.

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And they fear that day because they have not renounced their ungodliness and clung to Christ and his grace for the forgiveness of sins.

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So salvation has not come for every person in the sense that when Jesus died on the cross, his blood atoned for the sins of every person.

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That cannot be what that phrase means in verse 11. The grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people.

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The only way that you believe that Jesus has indeed covered over the sins of every single person is if you are a universalist, a universalist believes that no matter what happens, no matter what choices a person makes in their life, they are going to go to heaven.

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Everybody gets to go to heaven. Christianity is just simply the best way to live. So if you if you want to have the best, most fulfilling life, well, you need to do what

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Jesus did and you need to obey the things that he said. That's how you have the most fulfilling life.

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But otherwise, don't worry about it, because on the other side, when everybody dies, we all get to go to heaven. That's that's what a universalist believes.

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And this is one of those verses that they will use to try to justify that belief. The grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people.

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It says right there, salvation has come for all people. You're taking that out of context because it's very clear when you look at the context that the people

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Paul is talking about is all of those people. And it is indeed a great number of people.

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It's just not every single person, all of those people for whom specifically Christ died.

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When Jesus died, he as an atoning sacrifice died for a specific group of people.

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And it even says that here he gave himself to redeem us, his people from all lawlessness and to purify for himself a people for his own possession who are zealous for good works.

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Again, you go all the way back to the Old Testament with a sacrificial system. And when sacrifices were made, they were for a particular person or a particular sin.

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You go back to the law, you go back to Leviticus. There were certain sacrifices that were made for certain sins.

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And then there were other atoning sacrifices and things like that that were made. And whenever a sacrifice was brought in, a person brought that sacrifice to the priest.

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They had to lay their hand on the sacrifice to represent the transference of sins from the person to the animal that was being sacrificed.

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And then the priest would cut the throat of the animal while that person was standing there with their hand on the head of the animal being slaughtered for their sins.

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So sacrifices were not just being done willy nilly in the tabernacle or in the temple and then going,

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OK, here's a bunch of blood that spilled. So whoever wants this blood to cover over your sins here, come and get it.

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That's not the way sacrifices were being done. It was for a particular cause or a particular person or a particular group of people.

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Even when you're talking about like the Day of Atonement, Yom Kippur, which was the one day a year in on which a sacrifice was offered for the sins of all the people in Israel.

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And that blood would be sprinkled across the Ark of the Covenant there on the Day of Atonement, Yom Kippur.

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Even that day, that offering and that bloodshed was for a specific people for a particular purpose.

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It was all the people of Israel. Not every single person on Earth was atoned for by that blood that was sprinkled by the high priest over the

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Ark of the Covenant. It was only those people of God who were there on that Day of Atonement that the priest was offering a sacrifice for.

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This is all the way through the Bible. Suddenly, we get to Jesus, who is dying on a cross for our sins.

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And we want to be able to say that Jesus died for every single person, that he offered up a blood sacrifice that every single person can have if they want it.

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But that's not what happened. That's not the pattern of the sacrificial system from the

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Old Testament to the to the new. And nor is it what we read about that blood covering, even when we come to passages like this, that Jesus gave himself to redeem us, his people from all lawlessness, to purify for himself a people for his own possession.

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And they were chosen before the world began. That's even talked about in Revelation. Revelation 13, 8, there is a book called the

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Lamb's Book of Life. And from the foundation of the world, God had written the names of everyone whom he would save in that book.

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And everyone whose name was not written in that book would worship the beast.

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Those whose names were in the Lamb's Book of Life would worship the lamb, would worship Jesus Christ, would have their sins atoned for by the sacrifice of Christ.

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God had chosen for himself a people whom he would call out from the world of men to himself, and he would purify them for himself by giving his son

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Jesus as a sacrifice for their sins. This particular people and those who were not part of that group whom

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God did not write down in that book from before the foundation of the world, they would not worship Jesus.

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Instead, they would worship Satan. They would follow after the beast. They would listen to the beast instead of listening to the voice of the lamb.

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So this is talked about all throughout scripture from the very beginning to the very end that God has called out for himself a people for his own possession who are zealous for good works.

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Now, there's a doctrine out there. It's a very hated doctrine. But I think one of the reasons why people hate this doctrine is because they simply don't understand it.

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And it is the doctrine of limited atonement. I think one of the reasons people don't like the doctrine is because of the name.

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It's a doctrine that is tied in with Calvinistic theology. But the reality is that unless you're a universalist, you believe in limited atonement.

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Do you believe that Christ's blood on the cross has indeed atoned for the sins of every single person on Earth?

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That's what a universalist believes. If your answer to that question is no, then you believe in a limited atonement.

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Now, I really don't think that doctrine is properly named. R .C. Sproul didn't think so either.

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And he would refer to it as the doctrine of particular atonement. And that really is a much better name because Jesus died for a particular group of people.

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When it comes down to it, the Calvinist or the person who believes in God's sovereign election that God had decided from before the foundation of the world whom he would save and whom he would not save.

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The person who believes in that kind of doctrine does not believe in a limited atonement. They believe in a particular atonement.

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But it is ironically the person who hates the doctrine of limited atonement that actually limits the atonement.

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They limit it to a mere possibility or an opportunity to be saved since Jesus didn't actually die for a particular group of people.

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And how how ungracious is that? How unloving is that that God did not actually have in mind a particular group of people when he gave his son to be an atoning sacrifice for their sins?

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It was just simply the opportunity or the possibility of being saved instead of showing his love and his affection for this group whom he had called out from the world to be united with him and be adopted as his sons and daughters.

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By grace, through faith in Jesus Christ, you know, it comes down to studying these kinds of things and a doctrine of particular atonement.

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We never should respond to this with, oh, well, if God has decided from before the foundation of the world whom he's going to save, then there's not any reason for us to go out and evangelize.

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That should never be our response to doctrines like this. That wasn't Paul's response right from the very beginning of this letter.

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Titus one one, Paul, a servant of God and an apostle of Jesus Christ for the sake of the faith of God's elect and their knowledge of the truth which accords with godliness.

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Look, folks, we don't know who the elect are. God does. But we don't know who they are.

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So we must obey the command that Christ gave to his disciples when he said, go into all nations baptizing in the name of the father and the son and of the

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Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And, lo, I am with you always, even to the very end of the age.

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Jesus said to go into all the world and preach the gospel. And so we must do it. But those people who actually turn from sin and come to faith in Christ will be those whom

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God had predestined from before the foundation of the world. And gave his son to atone for their sins.

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Let's conclude with prayer. Our wonderful God and Savior, we thank you for the salvation that we have been given in Jesus Christ, our

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Lord, training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions that we may live self -controlled, upright and godly lives in the present age.

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And God, we know that you know that there is nothing that shocks you or surprises you.

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For all things have been decreed from before the world began. And so, you know how bad this world is and how depraved it is and all the awful, terrible things that are going on around us.

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We would ask that in the midst of such a crooked and twisted generation, that you would give us hearts that yearn for you, that desire to please you, that desire to live lives of holiness that you have called us to, and that we would remain steadfast in this calling by the gospel of Jesus Christ, pursuing holiness and godliness as we wait for our blessed hope.

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The fulfilling of a promise that you have given us in your son, and that is the appearing of the glory of our great

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God and Savior, Jesus Christ, upon his return to this earth to judge the living and the dead.

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Jesus gave himself for us to redeem us, to redeem for himself a people whom he would forgive of all of their lawlessness.

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And he would purify us as a people for his own possession, and that we would be zealous for him and for his good work.

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Teach us these things as we continue to reflect upon the goodness and the loving kindness of God our

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Savior. In Jesus name we pray, amen. Pastor Gabe keeps a regular blog, sharing personal thoughts, alerting readers to false teachers, and offering commentary on the church and social issues.

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You can find a link to the blog through our website, www .utt .com. Thank you for listening and join us again tomorrow as we continue our study in God's word, when we understand the text.