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- I was sent a link to a tweet yesterday that I found very interesting, and I won't mention who sent it to me, for their own good.
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- And the protection of the innocent, or the not -so -innocent, in this case. But anyway,
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- Dr. David Allen tweeted yesterday, A new book,
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- Anyone Can Be Saved, explains why those who affirm limited atonement cannot affirm this title with consistency.
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- So there's a new book out. A bunch of, well, they call themselves traditionalist
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- Southern Baptists. I do not know why they want that phrase. Because traditionalist is not a positive descriptor for me.
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- And it's not even accurate, historically speaking. But, you know, whatever you want.
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- It's traditionalist authors, and I looked at the endorsers, and they're all traditionalists.
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- It's sort of an echo chamber type thing. Hey, you're good too. That type of thing. Anyway, and it's titled,
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- Anyone Can Be Saved. Now, it's interesting, because I've run into folks in that camp that tended to be
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- Molinist, in their perspective. And a
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- Molinist perspective can't affirm that. Because we've heard William Lane Craig say, there is no possible world in which all free creatures would embrace
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- Christ. And so, you know, God looks at all the possible worlds, and he has his certain criteria.
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- And so, for the maximum good, and the maximum number of people who are saved, for the minimum amount of evil, and the minimum amount of people who aren't saved, then he actualized this particular world type of a thing.
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- You know, he's got to deal with the cards he's been dealt. All that mess that we've talked about in the dividing line many times. So, I don't think a
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- Molinist could affirm that statement. And I know what they're saying. Their argument against a reformed theologian, a reformed theological position, is basically this.
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- If you're not tracking with it, it goes like this. Basically, the argument is, you can't tell people that God loves them, unless you know they're elect.
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- You can't tell them that they can be saved, because if Jesus didn't die for them, then no provision has been made for them.
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- And so, not anyone can be saved. Only the elect can be saved. Now, of course, this assumes that we somehow are given knowledge of who the elect are.
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- And I've pointed out many, many times, a lot of the arguments against reformed theology are based upon the idea that, well, you should know who the elect are.
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- We're not told. We are told to proclaim the message of repentance.
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- Repentance from sin, faith in Jesus Christ, to every creature, man, woman, and child. And nowhere is there any kind of a requirement that we somehow know who the elect are.
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- That's hyper -Calvinism, where you're looking for evidences of election regeneration and things like that.
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- We're not told to do any of that. We proclaim a message to everybody.
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- And we trust it to the Holy Spirit of God to make that message to come alive.
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- And it's a freeing thing to proclaim the gospel openly and allow the
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- Spirit of God to do with that powerful gospel what He will. Which also, by the way, at times,
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- I wasn't going to bring this up, but at times, that also is relevant to the subject of judgment. Because when people reject that gospel, look at Acts chapter 13.
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- When people reject that gospel, that's part of one of the reasons you proclaim it to everyone. In that rejection, there is a hardening and there is a judgment that comes against those who reject it.
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- So, that's part of the biblical teaching. What are we supposed to say to people?
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- Well, if you use the standard, well, you should believe in Jesus because He did a wonderful thing for you by dying for you.
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- Which the apostles never stated. Then you'd have a problem. But if you preach the biblical gospel of repentance and faith in Jesus Christ, that Jesus Christ is
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- Lord and that everyone is to submit to His Lordship, you don't need to know who the elect are or any of those things.
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- But the tweet, notice it says, explains why those who affirm limited atonement cannot affirm this title. Well, what is limited atonement?
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- I can't assume that everyone in the audience is aware of what limited atonement is.
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- Especially because it is pretty much almost always misrepresented. What is limited atonement?
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- Limited atonement is simply the recognition of the perfect unity that exists between the
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- Father, the Son, and the Spirit in the redemption of God's people. That is those whom the
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- Father elects freely in eternity past, not based upon any foreseen merits in them or anything else.
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- Solely on the basis of His will, Ephesians chapter 1, the praise of His glorious grace. It's all in Him.
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- Those whom the Father elects, He unites to His Son. And so the
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- Son dies for them. Their union with Him is personal and perfect.
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- And so His death becomes our death. His resurrection, our resurrection.
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- Union with Christ. 10 times in the first 13 verses in Ephesians. Ephesians chapter 1. And then the
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- Spirit then comes and makes those same individuals alive at the exact time that God chooses to draw
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- His people unto Himself in their life, in their experience, in some of us, in my life, very early on in life, in others later in life.
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- But it's that perfect harmony that exists between the
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- Father, the Son, and the Spirit in the self -glorification of the Trinity and in bringing about God's glory.
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- It's all about God. That is the difference between monergism and synergism. One's about man, one's about God.
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- So limited atonement is simply the recognition that the Son acts in perfect harmony with the
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- Father and the Spirit in bringing about the redemption of God's people. And so when they are saying, well, you can't affirm that anyone can be saved, what they're saying is there are people who can't be saved because Christ didn't die for them.
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- If the Father had chosen to save them, then the Son would have died for them. There is no one that God could not have saved had
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- He chosen to do so. See, the problem here is this perspective is very time -bound.
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- Because it's very man -centered, it's very time -bound. It's looking from below, trying to look up, and it's very based upon time categories and things like that.
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- It doesn't take into account the overall biblical perspective of the eternal purpose of God and things like that.
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- Very common in synergistic systems, sub -biblical synergistic systems. And so the assertion that's being made is, well, there are people who can't be saved because provision hasn't been made.
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- Not recognizing that the provision was made on the basis of God's perfect plan in eternity past.
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- But I was thinking about it, and I thought, you know, can they really affirm this?
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- Only by really lowering the level of what saved means.
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- Because see, from their perspective, what Jesus did on the cross just makes men savable. It doesn't save anybody.
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- And God can't save anybody without their cooperation. So really, when you think about it from their perspective, anyone can be saved if they cooperate and allow
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- God to do it. But the biblical perspective is,
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- God is the one that has the power and ability to save anyone. There's no question about that.
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- Their argument is, well, yeah, but he didn't choose to do that. So in time, there are those who cannot now be saved that could have been back in eternity or something along those lines.
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- Don't you think it's far more relevant that one system is saying, well,
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- God the Father tries to save as best he can. And the Son tries to save as best he can. The Spirit tries to save as best he can.
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- But it's all up to man. Don't you think that's a much more amazing statement than to state that God in eternity past chose to save his elect people out of pure grace, pure love.
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- It was undeserved and therefore made perfect provision for them.
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- And then to go into time and say, ah, but now that means someone can't get saved. Which one is biblically relevant?
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- Well, it struck me as an odd tweet and an odd perspective to take.
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- But once again, it just so clearly demonstrates the vast difference between a man -centeredness and a biblical
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- God -centeredness. All brought out in a single tweet. Well, I hope you found that to be helpful.
