Unconditional Election

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I want to invite you to take out your Bibles and turn to Ephesians chapter 1.
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We began last week a series examining the doctrines of grace.
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The doctrines of grace are also known as the five points of Calvinism.
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Many of you came to me after the message and I was grateful that you came and said that what I said last week clarified some things for you and I'm thankful for that and I pray that today's message will add to that clarity.
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Last week we looked at the doctrine of total depravity.
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The natural man is dead in trespasses and sins and because of this he has no natural desire for the things of God.
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Paul clearly teaches in Romans 3 that natural men are known by three things.
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One, there is none good.
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Two, there is none who seeks after God.
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And three, there is none who fears God.
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So we could say that among the natural man, that being the one who has not been born again, there is no good man, there is no God seeker, there is no God fearer.
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All of these things happen after a supernatural work of grace changes the heart.
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Jesus said, unless a man be born again he will not see the kingdom of heaven.
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Righteousness, seeking God, fearing God are all what happen after the heart is changed.
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And if God did not do that work of change in the heart, we would remain dead in trespasses and sins.
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That is the doctrine of total depravity.
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Well today we are going to move to the second petal of the tulip.
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The second petal of the five petaled tulip is unconditional election.
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I want to invite you to stand as we read Paul's explanation of election in Ephesians chapter 1.
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And I want you to notice that he blesses God for this doctrine.
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We begin in verse 3.
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Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, even as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before Him.
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In love He predestined us for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of His will, to the praise of His glorious grace, with which He has blessed us in the Beloved.
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In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of trespasses, according to the riches of His grace, which He lavished upon us in all wisdom and insight, making known to us the mystery of His will, according to His purpose, which He set forth in Christ as a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in Him, things in heaven and things on earth.
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In Him we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to the purpose of Him, who works all things according to the counsel of His will, so that we who were the first to hope in Christ might be to the praise of His glory.
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In Him you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed in Him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, who is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it, to the praise of His glory.
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Father in heaven, I know it has already been prayed, and I pray again, that You would keep me from error as I preach, that You would fill me with Your Spirit, that You would give me boldness, and Lord God, that You would open the hearts of people to believe Your truth.
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Lord, for the believers in this room, those who have already named the name of Christ, who have already bowed the knee, Lord, I pray that You would confirm in them the word of God, the doctrines that are true and holy and right.
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And Lord, for those who do not know You, Lord, that today might be the day.
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You've brought them here for a reason, Father.
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We know not what the reason is.
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But Lord, for those who are here, who are hearing this word, if they do not know You, Lord, that You would, in Your grace, draw them to Yourself.
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Do what only You can do, Lord, and give the gift of repentance.
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In Jesus' name, Amen.
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Last week I wrote two words on the board.
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And I said these two words were offensive to a lot of people.
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So I thought, you know, why not use it again? Not really, but this is just a reminder that this series is on the subject of Calvinism, a word that is often offensive to people, especially those who do not know much about it, hear only what the naysayers would have them hear and who don't really have much history in it.
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You know, a lot of churches, I was taught in seminary, you know, Calvinism kills churches.
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You don't preach Calvinism because that will destroy a church.
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And, you know, that's scary to a 23-year-old seminary student who's told that if you preach these things, people won't come back.
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You don't preach doctrines like predestination because people won't come back.
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You don't preach doctrines like elections because people… It wasn't that it wasn't true, it's that it's not palatable.
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And it's sad that we're more worried about whether or not people are going to accept it than whether or not it's true.
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Same is true with predestination.
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Don't preach predestination.
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People don't want to hear that.
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People are offended by that.
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It's a hard word.
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Well, today we're going to add a word to the offensive list because we've already got two, might as well add a third.
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I'm a man who likes to work in threes.
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So we're going to go with a third word that is often as offensive and it is the word election.
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The title of the sermon today is Unconditional Election and the word election is going to be the subject that we're going to discuss.
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And election simply means to choose.
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Every four years we sort of choose a president.
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I say sort of because the way we do it is a little odd, but we sort of choose.
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And, you know, every few years we choose our congressmen, we choose our senators.
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We call that the election.
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In fact, the sad thing is, and Brian Bortman reminded me this week as I was preparing for my messages, I often listen to Brian and he's such a good teacher and one of the things he said, he reminded me, he said, you know, the old way that the old southern preachers used to try to explain election was this, God voted for you, the devil voted against you, and you get to cast the deciding vote.
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That was the way that was often understood.
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Election was simply God votes for you, the devil votes against you, and you cast the deciding vote.
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He said, here's the problem with that.
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The devil is a convicted felon.
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He doesn't get to vote.
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And you were chosen before the foundation of the world, so you were too young to vote.
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So the only vote that matters is God's.
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That's the thing.
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And when we talk about election, that's really the key to all of this, is understanding who chooses whom.
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Who is the active chooser? And who is the one being chosen? Because I will tell you this, in the minds of most people, if you go, I mean, you throw a stick and you'll hit 10 churches.
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And in the vast majority of those churches, the thing that is taught from the pulpit Sunday after Sunday, it's you are the one who makes the choice.
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You are the one who casts the deciding vote.
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In fact, what was the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association, what was the name of their magazine? Decision.
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Decades of magazines put out, all with the same name, Decision magazine.
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Because it was all about your choice.
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It's all about your decision.
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And here's the sad thing about that.
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I'm not going to tell you today that you don't make a choice, and I'm not going to tell you today that your choices don't matter.
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But what I have learned in many years of preaching this doctrine is the problem is not that we believe that we make a choice, the problem is people don't think God makes a choice.
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People think that God treats grace like peanut butter.
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He sort of spears it on everything, and it just sort of goes everywhere, and it sticks to whoever wants it to stick.
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And rather than God being particular in His grace, rather than God having purpose in His grace, rather than God actually making a choice with His grace, God becomes this sort of celestial Santa Claus who sits on His throne hoping that somebody might make the choice to come sit on His knee and tell Him what they want for Christmas.
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And we end up with a God who is not powerful, but a God who is impotent, a God who does not save, but a God who hopes people will get saved.
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Election, from a biblical perspective, is the active choice of God of a person to be saved.
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That's the simplest definition.
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I tried to, in my mind, write a definition.
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Election is the active choice of God of a person to be saved.
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Many people do not like that word.
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In fact, many people would say the Bible doesn't teach it.
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They'll say the Bible doesn't teach election.
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And you know what I say when I hear somebody say that? Can you read? I don't mean to be ugly.
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But if somebody says the Bible doesn't teach election, I say, can you read? Because here's the thing.
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I don't care what you think about how God elects, but if you don't think God chooses, then what do the passages mean that call you the elect? I'll give you a bunch, but you want to take them.
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Matthew 24, 22.
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This is Jesus.
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And in those days, if they had not been cut short, no human being would be saved, but for the sake of the elect, those days will be cut short.
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Same chapter, two verses later.
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Verse 24.
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For false christs and false prophets will arise and perform great signs and wonders so as to lead astray, if possible, even the elect.
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Matthew 24, 31.
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Same chapter, a few verses later.
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And he will send out his angels with a loud trumpet call, and they will gather his elect from the four winds and from one end of heaven to the other.
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You know what Jesus liked to call his people according to this chapter? The elect.
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And it's not just in the Gospel of Matthew.
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We see this in the Gospel of Luke.
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And will not God give justice to his elect who cry out to him day and night? And of course, Paul uses the word elect.
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Romans 8, 33.
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Who shall bring any charge against God's what? Elect.
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Romans 9, 11.
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Though they were not yet born.
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Speaking of Jacob and Esau.
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Though they were not yet born and had done nothing good or bad in order that God's purpose of election might stand.
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He said, the greater, or the lesser will serve the younger.
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The older will serve the younger.
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As it is written, Jacob I have loved, Esau I have hated.
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Romans 11, 7.
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What then? Israel failed to obtain what it was seeking.
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The elect obtained it, but the rest were hardened.
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That by itself, that verse could have been today's sermon.
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It's not just what he's saying.
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The elect obtained, but the rest were hardened.
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That's speaking about Israel.
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Speaking about those who in Israel are elect.
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Chosen.
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2 Timothy 2, 10.
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Therefore, I endure everything for the sake of the elect that they may obtain the salvation that is in Christ Jesus.
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Titus 1, 1.
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Paul, a servant of God, an apostle of Jesus Christ, for the sake of the faith of God's elect.
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1 Peter 1, 1.
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Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, those who are elect, exiles in the dispersion and Pontius.
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2 Peter 1, 10.
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Therefore, brothers, be all the more diligent to confirm your calling and election.
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I mean, honestly, it goes on and on and on.
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This is why I'm not being ugly when I say can you read.
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You say the Bible doesn't teach election.
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It's there.
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Now, you may disagree with me about what it means, but you cannot say it ain't there.
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And it doesn't show up once or twice.
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It's all over.
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You may not like what it means.
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You may not like what it's saying, but you can't say that it ain't there.
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I don't mean to get all, you know, warm under the collar here, but I've been doing this a long time.
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I've had so many people look me right in the face and say the Bible doesn't teach that.
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You're a false teacher.
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You go to our YouTube page.
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Have fun.
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Go to our YouTube page, but be calm.
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Because if you're not, if you're hot when you get there, you're going to be hotter when you're done.
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Because if people just post things, especially on my podcast, you know, my podcast, Conversations with a Calvinist, why would you be proud of teaching a false system? These are comments people leave on our page.
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So if someone says to you, Bible doesn't teach election, they are simply, or the Bible doesn't speak about election, they are simply wrong.
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And by the way, they'll also say this.
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Well, the elect doesn't refer to people who are saved.
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It simply refers to people who are chosen for some kind of purpose.
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God chooses nations.
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God chooses people for, you know, like David was elected as king because God had a purpose for him.
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Go back through the context of every verse I just read and tell me that isn't talking about people who are saved.
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In fact, you can take the word elect and change it with the word saved, and it wouldn't change the meaning one iota.
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I mean, just think about the first one.
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And if those days had not been cut short, no human being would be saved, but for the sake of the saved, the days were cut short, for the sake of the elect.
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Again, it's referring to those who are saved.
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The elect are those who are saved.
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The elect means to be chosen.
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And what are they chosen for? We're going to talk later.
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It's more than just salvation, but it's certainly not less.
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God elects people to be saved.
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The question becomes, upon what basis does God choose? The fact that God chooses should not be up for debate.
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And for any reasonable scholar, that's not the debate.
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It's not if God chooses.
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It's upon what basis does He choose.
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If you don't believe God chooses, again, you can't read.
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But if you want to debate how He chooses, here's the two options.
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He either chooses based upon something He sees in you.
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We call that conditional election.
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Or He chooses based upon the counsel of His own will.
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Then we call that unconditional.
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And it's either or.
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It's either God chooses you based on something you do.
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Either you believe, you respond, you make the decision, you do this, you do that, you're baptized, whatever.
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I don't care what you put in this category.
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I don't care how many lines you draw over here.
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How many think you make it conditional upon what you do.
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And therefore election is not a choice that God makes independent of you.
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It's a choice that God makes absolutely dependent on what you do.
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Notice the difference right away.
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Election becomes conditional.
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And then you start having to figure out what the conditions are.
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Or election is unconditional.
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And unconditional means God chooses based upon the counsel of His own will.
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Not because of you.
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So which is it? Does God choose based on what He sees in me? Or does God choose based upon His own will? This should take us back to last week.
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If you were not here last week, I'm sorry that you weren't here to hear it.
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But I will say this.
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If you didn't hear last week, I would say go back and listen to it.
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Because here's the thing.
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If you think this is the answer, then you don't believe what I said last week.
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Because what I proved, and I will say proved, what I proved last week is that no man on his own will come to God apart from the work of the Holy Spirit to change his heart.
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No man will do.
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And if that's the case, then how can it be conditioned on something that you do? Does that make sense? You can't be conditioned on something that you do if you won't do it.
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No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him and I will raise him up on the last day.
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Jesus said those words.
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I don't want to get too much into that because that's what Brother Andy is going to preach in two weeks.
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That's his passage.
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But it is there.
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No man can come, Jesus says.
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Dr.
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R.C.
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Sproul tells a great story.
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And I never can tell his stories as good as he can, but this is his story.
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He said one time he was asked to come and teach at a seminary that was not reformed.
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But they wanted him to teach a series of courses.
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He said so in the first course, the first day, he taught total depravity.
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And he asked at the end of the lecture, how many of you would agree with everything that I have said on this total depravity? And he said I want you to come up and I want you to write your names on the board.
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Every one of them, 26 students I think he said he had.
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All of them came up and wrote their names.
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We all affirm total depravity.
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One after the other after the other, 26 names.
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Then he came in the next week and he started teaching unconditional election.
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And immediately there was rebuttal and rejection and denial.
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And Dr.
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Sproul says, but wait a minute.
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You told me last week you affirm total depravity.
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Do you still affirm it? And as they began to think about the connection between the T and the U, one by one they came up and erased their names.
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Because they said they can't affirm the T.
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And you can't affirm the T fully unless you affirm the U.
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So one by one they erased their names.
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Again, that's not my, that's his story.
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I imagine it went just as he said.
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Understand this, if a person is chosen by God based on God foreseeing in them some ability to meet some condition, then total depravity is not true.
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Because that means they have the ability to meet some condition.
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Total depravity says they don't.
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Total depravity says that man is incapable of meeting any condition unless he is exercised outside from the work of God.
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And I believe I proved last week that man is dead and trespasses in sin and unable to go to God in his natural state.
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You may disagree my, I guess my hubris there as I proved it.
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But I think I made a conclusive case.
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So if you agreed with last week, there should be nothing I say today that should not also be affirmed.
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And if you can't affirm what I say today, then you really didn't affirm what I said last week.
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Now I want to make a note about something.
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We haven't even gotten to the text yet.
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I'm sorry, I have a lot to say.
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By the way, last week's sermon was really long.
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I'm not going to try to go as long this week.
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But I want you to understand the recognition of man's inability is not something that was conceived or proposed by John Calvin.
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One of the greatest controversies in church history actually happened a thousand years before Calvin through the teacher named Augustine.
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Now you probably want to say Augustine because of where we live and the connection.
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So if it makes you happy, we'll say St.
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Augustine.
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Aurelius Augustine lived from 354 to 430.
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So fourth and fifth centuries.
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That is a thousand years before John Calvin was ever born.
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And he had a famous prayer.
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His prayer went like this, Grant what thou commandest and command what thou dost desire.
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Now that's the fancy way of saying it.
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Here's the simple version.
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Here's the NIV version.
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God, tell us what you want us to do and give us the ability to do it.
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That was Augustine's prayer.
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God, command what you will and give us the ability to do what you command.
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Well there was a man who heard that and was absolutely offended by it.
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His name was Pelagius.
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Now you may have heard me talk about Pelagius before.
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Pelagius was a man who did not believe that we were depraved.
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He did not believe that we were dead in trespasses and sins.
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He did not believe that we were so affected by the sin of Adam that we come into this world opposed to God and unwilling to submit.
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Augustine and Pelagius had an exchange.
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And the church, based upon the testimony of Scripture, sided with Augustine.
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And at the Council of Orange in 529, they proclaimed the total depravity of the human soul by saying clearly that if anyone says that he can come to God or even pray without God first prompting him by the work of the Spirit, let him be accursed.
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A thousand years before Calvin, the church recognized this.
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Why? Because it's in the Bible.
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Augustine didn't invent it.
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Calvin didn't invent it.
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And you want to know something about Calvin? He didn't even really address it all that often.
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Calvin didn't go around preaching predestination every day.
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In fact, Calvin said that when it came to the subject of predestination, it was such a subject that was difficult and had to be handled very carefully when taught to the church because it is a doctrine that can be misunderstood, misused, and misapplied.
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You know who taught more about predestination than Calvin did? Martin Luther.
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Martin Luther wrote an entire treatise called The Bondage of the Will.
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And Luther taught in The Bondage of the Will absolutely what Paul taught about our sinful condition.
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And he was debating Desiderius Erasmus, who was one of the smartest men of his generation, and Luther nailed him to the wall.
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If you've never read Bondage of the Will, I would encourage you to read it.
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Read Erasmus' and Luther's exchange because Erasmus is no dummy, but Luther nails him to the wall on the subject of man's inability.
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And again, you come back to this question of conditional-unconditional because if this is your position, not only are you going against what I would say is clear biblical teaching, but you're going against the vast majority of scholarship in the history of the church.
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You might say, well, my pastor never taught me this growing up.
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Yeah, I will say in the last hundred years, the level of theology in most churches has been about that deep.
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And if that offends you, I'm sorry.
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Praise God.
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The vast majority of theology in the last hundred years has been abysmal.
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This is why we know Bible stories, but we don't know Bible doctrine.
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We know all about Noah and the ark, but we don't know how the ark represents Christ.
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We know all about Adam and Eve, but we don't know anything about original sin or how that sin affects us.
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Theology matters, as I say all the time.
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So where did the doctrine of unconditional election begin? Well, if you want to be honest, I would say it began in the Old Testament.
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It didn't begin with Augustine.
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It didn't begin with Calvin.
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It didn't begin with Luther.
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Why did God choose Israel? Because He loved them for no other reason.
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In fact, turn in your Bibles real quick before we get to Ephesians because apparently we're never going to get there, but I promise we will.
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But go to Deuteronomy chapter 7.
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See, because here's the thing that kills me.
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I get to talk, especially dispensationalists.
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Dispensationalists love to talk about Israel.
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And we start talking about election.
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They get all offended, and I say, but wait a minute.
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Why did God choose Israel? They don't have a reason other than His own purpose and choice.
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They weren't better.
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They weren't bigger.
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They weren't more righteous.
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In fact, they were scoundrels through and through, and yet God still chose them.
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And it was unconditional.
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He chose Abram.
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He chose Isaac.
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He chose Jacob.
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That's the whole point of Romans 9.
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God chooses whom He wills.
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Deuteronomy 7, verse 6, look at it.
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For you are a people holy to the Lord your God.
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The Lord your God has chosen you to be a people for His treasured possession out of all the peoples who are on the face of the earth.
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By the way, that tells us God does not elect everyone.
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He chose Israel out of the world, not along with the world.
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Verse 7, it was not because you were more in number than any of the other people that the Lord set His love on you and chose you.
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For you were the fewest of all peoples, but it was because the Lord loves you and is keeping the oath that He swore to your fathers that the Lord has brought you out with a mighty hand and redeemed you from the house of slavery from the hand of Pharaoh, king of Egypt.
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God made a choice of Israel.
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Does that offend us? No, never does.
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But when I say God chose you, God chose me, oh no, that's offensive.
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How in the world is God not the same yesterday, today and forever? So God can choose in the Old Testament but not in the New Testament.
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Do you think God gave the same amount of grace to Aaron, the high priest of Israel as He did to the high priest of Molech who was there destroying babies? Do you think God gave the same amount of grace? Yes or no? If you do, you are absolutely not reading your Bible.
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God gave the same amount of grace to the Amorite high priest.
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I am sorry.
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See, that's the problem.
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We think God is obligated to give everybody the same.
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And God is under obligation to no man to give anyone anything.
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And if God is giving you any grace at all, you need to fall down on your knees and thank God that He chose to give it to you because He didn't have to.
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That's the point.
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So you are making God unloving.
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No, I am making God free.
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Because with the system that says God has to give everybody the same amount of grace, God is not free to love how and whom He chooses.
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We want to express our free will but we want to deny free will to the only one who truly has a free will.
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God.
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We have made an idol out of free will and she is not worthy to be worshipped.
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If you want to express someone's free will, express the free will of your God who had the choice to save you or not and chose to.
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Who didn't have to but did.
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Amos chapter 3 verse 2.
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You don't have to go there but write it down if you want to take notes.
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Amos 3 verse 2.
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He looks at Israel and he says this through the prophet.
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He says, you only have I known of all the families of the earth.
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And the word know there means loved.
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Because when the Bible says God knows someone, it's referring to His electing, saving love.
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You say, how can you prove that? Well, go to Matthew chapter 7.
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Jesus said, depart from me, I never knew you.
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The word know refers to relationship.
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Adam knew Eve and they conceived and bore a son.
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Know refers to relationship.
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God says to Israel and Amos, you only have I known of all the nations of the world.
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Now we go to Ephesians 1.
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And we go back there because I want to show you two verses.
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Unfortunately, I will not get to exegete verses 3 to 14.
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Not just for the sake of time but because there's so much in it, it would take me months to go through it all.
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But I want to show you verses 4 and 11 and really stress two things to you.
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Number 1 in verse 4.
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Well, let me just erase this.
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Read with me verse 4 again.
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Even as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before Him, in love He predestined us.
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Now, for the sake of it, I just want to stick with verse 4.
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I could go into verse 5.
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But notice what it says.
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In the English ESV, He chose us.
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And then it says in Him.
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We're going to deal with that too.
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But I want to deal with just this part from a language perspective.
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Okay, all you homeschool students, listen up.
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Here we go.
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We have here, we have here a subject.
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Who is who? God is the subject.
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And we have a what? A what? A verb.
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So, who is doing the action? The subject is doing the action.
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And upon what is the action being done? The direct object, right? So, we have the direct object of the verb.
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So, what is this saying? It's saying, this one did this for them.
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Now, you might say, why are you being so pedantic? Because we miss it every time? That's why? Because we see it and it's there.
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And it's so clear that we don't want to deal with it.
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He chose us.
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That's it.
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Those who want to argue that it's us who chose Him.
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Notice too that this, according to the Apostle Paul, is the blessing.
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God has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places.
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He chose us.
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We are the object of His work.
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By the way, you might hear me or the other elders through the course of this series talk about synergism and monergism.
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Synergism means two things working together.
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If you work in corporate America at all, you've heard of synergy.
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We've all got to work together.
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We've got to have synergy.
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I know, Dale, you know what I'm talking about.
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Synergy, right? Working together.
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Monergism, the root word there is ergos, it's a Greek word for work.
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Mono means one.
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Monergism means there's one worker.
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And really the difference between Calvinism and Arminianism is in Calvinism we believe there's one who works for salvation, God.
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And we are the beneficiary.
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He chose us.
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One worker.
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But you see, Arminian puts it on the other side.
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Those who oppose this, they say, no, we chose God, then He chose us.
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God looked down the corridor of time.
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He saw my choice.
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And based upon my choice, He chose me.
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Who's sovereign in that exchange? Who's in charge of that exchange? Me.
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I get to make the choice and God is subservient to my choice.
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Paul never teaches that.
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Yeah, I think it is.
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And again, it's so clearly a part of so many people's understanding.
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Notice He chose us, and there's a prepositional phrase at the end.
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In Him.
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God does not choose us independent of the Son.
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Because people say, well, does that mean God chooses anybody and they don't have to believe? No.
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God chooses us in Christ.
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And by the way, if you follow through, go home this week and with your family during family worship.
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Spend this week with Ephesians 1, 4-11.
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And you will see the phrase, in Him, in Him, in Him.
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I think it's five different times the phrase in Him comes up.
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Because every blessing that we have from the Father is brought to us through the conduit of Jesus Christ.
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It is all in Him.
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We are chosen in Him.
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In Him we have redemption.
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In Him we have forgiveness.
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In Him, it's all about Him.
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So, and some people will say, well, what God really did was God chose Jesus and then we chose to be in Jesus.
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And that's why God chose us.
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I say, find it in the text.
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I'll wait.
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Again, I'm not trying to be a jerk.
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Maybe I am coming across that way.
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Maybe I should say again that it's not my intention.
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But this is to me such a beautiful truth that has been so maligned that He chose me.
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And notice when He chose me.
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It says it.
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It says, He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world.
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God chose me before Adam sinned.
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That tells us something about the providence of God right there.
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And about the foreknowledge and perfect decree of God.
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God chose me before He laid one stone on this earth to create it.
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God chose us in Him when? Before the foundation of the world.
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Why? Why did God choose me? So that I could enjoy the benefits of heaven? No, no, no.
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That's a byproduct.
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Heaven is a byproduct.
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Notice what it says.
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The why? That we should be holy and blameless before Him.
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That's the purpose that God chose you.
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God chose you to be holy and blameless before Him.
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See, holiness.
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You see, people say, oh, we shouldn't preach holiness because it offends people.
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The call to holiness is the call to the Christian life.
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Is it a perfect life? No.
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Because we are still dealing with the sin that we have in this body.
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But we are called to forsake it, to flee from it, to turn from it, to hate it.
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You cannot love Christ and love your sin.
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And by the way, it's not what you were chosen to do anyway.
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You were chosen for what reason? You were chosen, it says here, that you should be holy and blameless before Him.
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And then the last thing I want you to see.
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And honestly, in the ESV, it connects this to verse 5.
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And in the Greek, it is connected to verse 5.
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I'm not disagreeing.
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But notice that the last two words in the ESV, if you have one, in love.
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Predestination is an act of love.
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People say, I don't like predestination.
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I'm offended by predestination.
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I don't like election.
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I don't like that God chooses.
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I say, but why did He choose? He chose because He made a choice to love you.
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Predestination and election is an act of love.
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By the way, that surprises people when I tell them that.
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Because a lot of times people, I don't want to talk about, or predestination is offensive.
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I say, well, can we just read what the Bible says? It says here, He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before Him.
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In love, He predestined us.
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And they say, wow.
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I mean, I've actually seen people's eyes open when they see the phrase, Again, this is not the doctrine of Keith.
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This is Paul who wrote this.
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And he said, in love, He predestined us.
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By the way, it doesn't say He did it arbitrarily or capriciously.
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It says He did it in love.
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You say, well, what do you mean by that? Some people believe that if we believe in election, we believe God just sort of rolled the celestial dice, and He was hoping, maybe get snake eyes, maybe get you and not get you, maybe get you and not get you.
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No, God made a choice.
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And how did He make the choice? Go to verse 14, because this is how He made the choice.
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Look at verse, I'm sorry, verse 11.
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Notice what verse 11 says.
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Having been predestined according to the purpose of Him who works all things, according to the counsel of His will.
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God chose you based upon the counsel of His will.
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Not capriciously, not arbitrarily.
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He didn't roll some celestial dice or go around playing whack-a-mole, hitting this one, not hitting this one.
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No, God made a choice based upon the counsel of His will.
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Going back to the conditional and unconditional thing.
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It was conditioned on something, just not you.
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It was conditioned on His choice to love you.
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That's the key.
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You say, I don't like that because I can't control it.
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Well, now who wants to be God? God is a perfect and absolute being.
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And therefore, He cannot do anything capriciously or arbitrarily.
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He does everything according to the counsel of His divine will.
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And I've often said this, and I hope you listen.
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Everybody, please, if you're not listening, if you've tuned me out, tune back in for just a second.
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Because I want to say this.
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I don't know why God chose me.
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But this I know for sure.
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He did not choose me because I deserved it.
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His choice had to be conditioned on something other than me.
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Because had it been conditioned upon me, I would not be saved.
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It was conditioned on His choice to love me.
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God chose me because He loved me.
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And He didn't have to.
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So if it makes you feel better in your heart of hearts, if you don't like the term unconditional election, here's one you will like.
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Unconditional love.
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Because for those whom God has elected, He has lavished on them a love that is unconditional.
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Beloved, if you are saved today, I want you to ask yourself why.
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And then I want to tell you what the Bible says.
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If you are saved today, it is because from the foundation of the world, God in eternity past set His holy affection upon you.
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And in time, He opened your heart to believe.
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You did not deserve it.
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You did not merit it.
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And you did not receive it because you were smarter or more spiritually sensitive than a person who did not receive it.
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And it was not because God foresaw that you would meet certain conditions.
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He chose you based upon the counsel of His own free will.
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He chose to love you even when you were unlovable.
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Turn in your Bibles to the last passage we'll look at.
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And we're just going to read it.
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We're not going to exegete it.
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But you're in Ephesians 1.
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Turn over to chapter 2.
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I want you to hear this again with fresh ears.
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Focusing most specifically on verse 4.
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And you were dead in trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work and the sons of disobedience, among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath like the rest of mankind.
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But God, the two most beautiful words in the Bible.
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But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which He loved us even when we were dead in trespasses and sins made us alive together with Christ.
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By grace you have been saved.
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If you want to know how you were saved, that's how.
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You were dead in trespasses and sins.
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God loved you in your sin.
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And He came into your life and changed your heart.
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And if you are here today and you are not yet a follower of Jesus Christ.
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You are not yet His.
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I want to say something that may sound radically strange, but listen.
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If you are here today and you have not yet bowed the knee to Jesus Christ, that does not mean that you are not one of the elect.
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It may simply mean that God has not yet opened your heart to believe.
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So my prayer for you is that He would.
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And understand this.
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The Bible does not command you to sit and wonder if you're elect.
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The Bible commands you to repent and believe.
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So if I say to you today, if you are outside of Christ, you are to repent and trust Christ.
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I'm not denying election.
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What I am saying is that if you do that from a sincere heart, it is because God has opened your heart to believe.
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It is because God has given you the gift of regeneration and repentance.
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And from the foundation of the world, God chose you to be His.
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And today is the day of salvation for you.
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If you come to repentance today, let me tell you what life's going to be like.
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It's going to be like the life of the men in Acts 13.
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Acts 13, 48, Paul preached.
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And the Gentiles believed.
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And you know what Luke, who wrote Acts, you know what he wrote? He says, as many as were ordained to eternal life believed.
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As many as were ordained to eternal life believed.
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So I say this to you today.
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Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ.
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And if you do, it will be because it has been ordained for you.
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Let us pray.
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Father, I'm so grateful for the opportunity to preach your word.
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And I do pray, Lord, that it has fallen on ears that have been opened by your spirit and willing to hear.
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Lord, I know that a lot of what I said today was hard.
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And I know that maybe it was received with barbs instead of with an embrace.
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But Lord, I pray that even though it may not have been smoothed and polished, perhaps, Lord, those barbs would strike our heart.
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And would cause us to really reflect on what we truly know and believe.
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Your word is so clear on this, and yet we don't want to believe it.
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Because it denies our natural tendencies and our natural desires.
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So I pray, Lord, that for the believers in this room, Lord, that you would conform us to a better understanding of your word.
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And for those who do not yet know Christ, Lord, that today might be the day that you have ordained from the foundation of the world to draw them to yourself.
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I pray this in Jesus' name.
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Amen.