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Let's pray, shall we? Father, thank you for the opportunity to come together as a class, to open your Word together, to be reminded of the truths of the Scriptures. And Lord, as we consider today the subject of Reformed Theology, and we look at the difference between what we would refer to as capital R Reformed and lowercase r Reformed, Lord, help us to understand that these titles simply stand as reminders of truths, but they're not the truth themselves.
They point to a greater truth, and that is what does the Bible say. Help us to be submissive to it. Help us to always be reforming Semper Refemanda as the motto of our church. Help us to always be willing to go back to Scripture and to be taught by you.
In Jesus' name we pray, amen. Alright, well, today we're going to begin in our book the subject of Reformed Theology. We have already gone through Roman Catholic Theology, Traditional Roman Catholic Theology, Natural Theology, Lutheran Theology, and Anabaptist Theology.
And as I said from the outset, this book is not in a very rigidly specific order. It sort of gives you, we're sort of going just according to the order of the book, but it's not intended to be rigidly organized.
So if you think, well, wow, this is kind of a weird, to go from Anabaptist to Reformed is kind of a weird shift. Well, it's fine, we're just doing as the book takes us, and each time we come together just looking at the subject at hand.
I imagine Reformed Theology could take us years if we said we're going to go through every single thing. So I don't pretend to go through every single thing of Reformed Theology. I'm going to treat Reformed Theology the same way I treated Anabaptist or Roman Catholic or anything else.
I'm going to give it the time I think it deserves for this level of setting, and then we'll move on to the next thing, which in this is Arminian Theology, which is kind of interesting that it's next is Arminian because we'll be able to compare and contrast the two.
But you'll notice on the first column under Reformed Theology on your paper, it says, Reformed Theology builds around the central theme of the sovereignty of God. The whole of reality falls under the supreme rule of God.
Now, I have heard in conversations with people that Reformed thinking Christians or Reformed theologians put too much emphasis on the sovereignty of God, and they so emphasize the sovereignty of God, they do so to bring down all of his other characteristics.
And so it's an unbalanced system. And this is often the attack which is leveled at the foot of Reformed Theology. I'm willing to at least accept that that's the criticism, is that we have an unbalanced system that we're overly focused on the sovereignty of God.
But before we go further on that, I just want to address something I mentioned in my prayer. When we talk about Reformed Theology, there really has to be at least a tacit understanding that there is Reformed, and then there's Reformed.
And if you're listening to this by audio, I'm writing on the board, Reformed with a capital R and Reformed with a lowercase r. Now, obviously, what I'm saying is there's big Reformed and there's low Reformed.
There's high Reformed and there's low Reformed. Typically, your high Reformed or capital R Reformed churches fall more under the category of your strict Presbyterian style of theology, which would include things which are outside of what we would hold to, such as infant baptism, covenant theology as it is seen as a replacement theology, which is sometimes mistaken view.
And I don't even know that I want to get into all that right now. But there is some differences in what we would say covenant theology versus new covenant theology versus dispensationalism versus 1689 federalism.
There's different views. Yeah, there's differing views on how to understand the relationship between Old Testament Israel and the New Testament church and how those two entities are working themselves out in the economy of God.
And so in the higher Reformed view, that has its own unique understanding of that. Even things like communion in the higher Reformed view, there is a spiritual presence view. High Reformed or capital R Reformed is typically what we would refer to as true Calvinism.
True Calvinism in the sense that what was taught in Geneva and what was brought out of Geneva by men like John Knox and Theodore Beza and others is really referenced in the high big R Reformed. And it's seen today, Orthodox Presbyterian Church, Presbyterian Church of America, and other conservative Presbyterian churches that hold to the Westminster standards.
And that's another thing to think about. Typically, high Reformed will hold to the Westminster confession of faith, and that's what we would call high Reformed or uppercase R Reformed. So what is a lowercase R Reformed church?
Well, we would probably more fall into that category in the sense that we would not hold to things like infant baptism. We would not hold to the Westminster standards in toto, even though we would say that the Westminster confession of faith is an excellent resource for theology.
We wouldn't say that everything in it is without complications as far as how we understand things like the church and theology and particularly the ordinances and things like that. So what is it that marks out a church as still Reformed but not capital R Reformed?
It is what we call the doctrines of grace. Any church that would make as part of its understanding of soteriology, what is soteriology? The doctrine of salvation, soteros or sotos is Greek for salvation.
So soteriology is the study of salvation, and any church that would hold to the standard of the doctrines of grace, which are the five, sometimes called the five points of Calvinism, which is a little unfair because Calvin never wrote them, Calvin never saw them, Calvin wouldn't know why anyone would associate his name with a tulip.
Calvin lived, you know, 16th century, it was Theodore Beza, who was his student, who was ultimately confronted by his student, which was a man by the name of Jacobus Arminius, and Arminius had some followers who took his teachings to an extreme level, they were called the remonstrants or the protestors of Calvin, where Calvin was a protestor of Rome, the remonstrants were the protestors of Calvin, and so they taught something opposing that, and so a synod was convened, it is called the Synod of Dorchec, or sometimes shortened to the Synod of Dort, and out of that came teachings known as the Canons of Dort, or the Canons of Dorchec, now if you've ever read the Canons of Dorchec, they are very beautifully written, they are very pastorally written, they are fantastic explanations of our understanding of God's work in salvation.
In the early 19th century, I'm sorry, 1900s, early 20th century, that was codified, all of this beautiful writings of the Canons of Dort, all of this wonderful pastoral language was codified in five phrases, total depravity, unconditional election, limited atonement, irresistible grace, perseverance of the saints, and I will say this, those five phrases are so unfair, because every one of them can be, based on simple use of language, attacked simply because they don't say enough about what they're saying.
The tulip by itself is refutable if you don't understand what is being said. Do you understand what I'm getting at? If I say the tulip itself is refutable if you don't understand what's being said. If you don't know what it means by irresistible grace, if you've never heard the term effectual calling, if you don't know what we mean by particular redemption in regard to limited atonement, then you're not going to understand the tulip.
And so if all you know is five unique phrases, and that's all you've ever heard, and then you hear somebody tear those phrases apart because they're only using the language of the tulip, they have not demolished Calvinism or the doctrines of grace.
What they have demolished is a straw man, because the tulip provides for our opponents a very flammable straw man. So I'm giving the lowdown today of Reformed Theology. They simply tear down the straw man, and it makes sense.
It does, especially on that side here, they have not had these discussions over the years because you've got to understand what they're saying. You hear the word irresistible grace, then you go to Acts 7, and you see Stephen saying to the Sanhedrin, you guys are always resisting the Holy Spirit.
And you say, how is it irresistible if these guys are resisting it? There it doesn't work. You see the word total depravity, all men are absolutely lost in their sin, then it says the Bible, Job was a righteous man.
Well how can he be righteous if all men are sinners and depraved? That doesn't make any sense. You see, there has to be an understanding of what these things mean. Like I said, they're easily refutable if you don't understand them.
That's why I point people to the Canons of Dort. I say, read what the theologians wrote about these things. Read the deep pastoral literature. Don't just confine yourself to five very simple phrases that eliminate the depth of thought which has gone into this theological paradigm.
But again, getting back to our discussion, this paper identifies more of the Reformed capital R. When I read through this in preparation for the lesson, I noticed there are things in this that identify more with the capital R Reformed than the lowercase or lower Reformed.
But this is the beauty of being lowercase Reformed. I can genuinely fellowship with the capital R Reformed guys, and even though they might see me as a stepchild of the Reformation, ha ha, I can have genuine fellowship with men like David Burke and Steve Jennings and Jesse Pickett, men who are Presbyterian, who are high R, big R Reformed guys.
And we can agree on the essential elements of the gospel and yet still have legitimate disagreement on the things that we would say are non-essentials. And then thus we come back to Augustine's famous quote, in essentials unity and non-essentials liberty and in all things charity or love.
And so that is the beauty of being lowercase Reformed, is we have this unity even in the larger Reformed community. That's why guys like R .C. Sproul and John MacArthur can take the same chancel and preach from the same pulpit.
Because R .C., big R. John MacArthur, small R. Ligon Duncan, big R. Votie Bockham, small R. I mean, I can go through a list, boom, boom, boom, boom, but I'm all R, small R. Sinclair Ferguson, big R. You see, I can take these guys and I can say, every one of them would say about the other one, he is a man of God.
And there's love and unity and respect among them because they're surrounded by the unity of the gospel. And so I think that's valuable to, from the outset, just make that point that even within quote unquote Reformed circles, there is division on certain things.
But there is unity in the gospel and that's what's most precious. So getting back to the first quote here, Reformed theology builds around the central theme of the sovereignty of God. There was a group of pastors who were questioned during seminary.
Some of you have heard me tell this story before. There were questioned during seminary about their comfort. Where do they find their comfort? What attribute of God provides to them the most comfort? And they're to write that down and quietly hold on to it and pass it in to the professor and the professor wanted to read the answers before the class.
Now, I don't know what size of the class. I don't know if it was ten men or a hundred. But I know this, according to the reports, every single man wrote the same thing. That it was the sovereignty of God.
What brings you the most comfort in your Christian walk? What brings you the most peace in your Christian walk? It is knowing that God is the supreme ruler of all. I tell you, I don't know how people live.
I hear people sometimes say, well, you know, God didn't have anything to do with that. Why do they say that? Well, something bad happened. And because something bad happens, they want to divorce God from the proceedings.
Well, God didn't have anything to do with that. Do you realize what you're saying? When you say God didn't have anything to do with that, you're saying that there was something that happened that God did not have anything to do with.
Meaning, he wasn't involved in either causing or allowing however you want to make the language. I remember my professor, and I went to an Arminian school, went to a, I mean, straight up, they did not like Calvinists.
And the more I became one, the more I became less popular. And I remember in class, the professor, he's passed on now, lovely man, I believe he's with the Lord, Dr. Jerry Powers, great friend and great mentor in my life.
He was not Calvinistic, but he was a good man and a good minister. And he would, in every class, say, nothing can happen to you that is outside of God's control. I mean, every class. And because he was very pastoral, and of course he's pastoring to pastors because he's teaching in seminary, and he's trying to get us to help us to understand that in this ministry you will have troubles.
You know, the scripture says, in this life you will have troubles, but you know, in this world you'll have troubles, but behold, I've overcome the world. His sort of thing was bringing it down to our personal level.
In this ministry you will have troubles, and know that I have overcome the ministry. You know, it was kind of his, the heart of Jerry Powers was to remind us, nothing can happen to you that's out of God's control.
And nothing can touch you that God has not ordained. God is the sovereign ruler. And as many times as he said it, I thanked God for inconsistency. Because that's what Brother Powers was. He was a little inconsistent.
And that's what all Arminians are. Arminian theology requires inconsistency. Because you've never heard an Arminian pray an Arminian prayer. No one has ever got down on their knees and said, God, I know you're doing everything you can, I'm praying for Brother Bill to get saved, and I know you really can't make him get saved, and I know you really aren't the one who opens the heart, and you're not the one who does anything.
It's really Brother Bill's absolute free will that's going to do this, so I don't even know why I'm talking to you. I guess I should be talking to Brother Bill. Nobody prays like that. Nobody prays like an Arminian.
They all say, God, open his heart! God, break his heart into the weight of his sin! This is the way Arminians pray. Why? Because they all know. They're closet Calvinists, I think I heard that, that's right!
They pray like Calvinists. They don't even know it. I go to seminary now, I'm auditing a Greek course and getting an opportunity to help teach some, and it's very neat to be able to go back and sit with men who were where I was 10 years ago, 12 years ago, sitting in class, getting to talk to a young man who I've become good friends with, pastor of the Pecan Park Road Baptist Church down the street.
He and I are sort of in a relationship now where we're trying to help each other out and talk. He's young. He's 25, and one day the pastor, or the teacher of the Greek class, he said, who wants a 25-year-old leading the church?
I literally laughed as loud as I just did, because the poor guy sitting next to me, he didn't realize how young he was and how silly of a statement that is, because I was 25 when I took over as pastor of this church, so I hurt for him, but I laughed.
I was like... Spurgeon hadn't hit 25. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. Do not let them despise your youth, said Paul to Timothy, but it was just funny, because when he said it, I don't think he knew the guy sitting beside me, 25 years old, but this is a sweet guy.
So I enjoy getting to go to seminary. I enjoy getting to be with this young man and being with other people and people that are relatively new. Some have been in the ministry for a while, like me, but it's sort of a mixture.
But while I'm there, they pray. I listen to their prayers, and they call out for God to do these things that they would, in their theology, say He doesn't do. God, change his heart. Then you go to them and you say, how does a man say, well, He changes his heart, He changes his mind, He changes his will.
Does God make the change? Well, not really. I mean, the Spirit works on it, but it's ultimately His doing. There's a glorious inconsistency in Arminian theology. Now, are there things about Reformed theology that we are not exactly right on?
I'm sure. No one has perfect theology this side of heaven. So I'm not up here trying to bash anyone over the head or to be spiritually arrogant or theologically prideful, but I do thank God for the inconsistency of my Arminian friends because it's what causes them to pray the way they do, so it causes them to preach the way they do.
Because oftentimes, Arminians can be good preachers, but you know what happens, though? They still are bound by that feeling of this need for this understanding of manipulating the will, and even the best of preachers often end with some type of emotional appeal that's a bending of the will, so this inconsistency can be frustrating as well.
Look at the next form. This is as far as we'll go today, just for time's sake. It says, under theology, it says we focus on the sovereignty of God. Yes, we do, but beside God, what does it say? God is sovereign.
He is perfect in every respect and holds all righteousness and power. He created all things and sustains them. As the Creator, He is in no way limited by His creation. I remember hearing on television one night, and it was back when I had TiVo.
Do you know what TiVo is, where you can pause live TV and go back? I don't have that anymore. I use Netflix now for television, but back then, that was the neatest thing, because you could pause television, and I actually have this recording on my computer.
Somewhere in the vowels of my computer somewhere is a recording, vowels, that was an odd choice. Somewhere in the database of my computer is a recording of me shouting to Jennifer, Jennifer, come here, you gotta hear this, because I just hit, I paused it, hit record on my phone.
I said, Jennifer, come here, you gotta hear this, and I rewinded it a minute and played it. And this is a guy, he said, God cannot intervene in the affairs of men unless He be invited. Say what? That's exactly right.
Say what? Is the answer. What do you mean, God cannot? You think Nebuchadnezzar invited God to cause him to eat grass? You think Nebuchadnezzar invited God to cause him to lose his mind and to be sent out in a field?
How foolish. And yet, very popular teaching, that God's bound by us. Heard one guy say, God sits up and takes notice when I put a demand on His will. I got that recording as well. He said, he said, you've heard it, haven't you?
I taught a lesson, a series on worship, and I brought in some recordings of some bad preaching because I wanted to let people, during the series on worship, I wanted to say, this is the stuff I'm talking about.
This is some of the dangerous stuff that's out there. And the guy said, God, he said, I hear people say, if it's your will be done, but I don't say that because God listens to my will and He sits up and takes notice when I put a demand on His will.
That theology is heresy. It's dangerous. What's that now? Yeah, if he hadn't already. That's true. I've never heard that, but I'm not surprised. I'm not surprised. It's so amazing to me how we can all read the same Bible, but come to such drastically different conclusions.
But then again, it's not amazing because when a man wants to find something, if he's so desperate to force his view, his dogma into Scripture, he can find whatever it is he needs at the expense of other things.
I mean, I'll bring something down very simple, and this is going to sound like it's coming out of left field, but something as simple as ladies pastoring churches, which I don't think is biblical. I think it's very clear it's not biblical.
But those who want to support such a thing are quick to run to places wherein they can find something that would help them support their case, whether it's Deborah and the judges or whether it's the prophets, the daughters of, who's it in Acts, I can't, was it Philip?
Daughters? I can't, in my mind I just lost it, but there you've got the daughters who were prophetesses. You know, these things that you see and they say, oh, here it is, here's the answer, and that's proof that ladies should be pastors.
Totally throwing out the pastoral epistles, which are written by Paul, two pastors, four pastors on the purpose of pastorates, and saying, you know, we don't need to obey that. That was just for the first century.
But these scriptures are relevant, those are not. And that's the same thing we do with so much of the Bible. But because we do need to look at a scripture, I want us to look at a verse there as we kind of begin to draw to a close.
I do want to go to Romans 9, because we've talked about sovereignty, and even though I won't have time to give a strong exposition of this text, if someone asked me, Pastor Keith, what passage made you become, lowercase r, reformed, what made you believe the doctrines of grace?
I'll tell you what, I'm going to be honest with you, it wasn't Romans 9, it was John 6. We'll get there in the weeks to come. Because I truly believe that if you understand total depravity, that everything else is a no-brainer.
And I believe that Jesus taught total depravity in John 6. So for me, the linchpin of coming to a right understanding of the doctrines of grace was what Jesus Christ said in John chapter 6, about my inability and the necessity of God to grant me the ability to come.
And if God has that necessity to grant it to me, and he grants it to whom he wills, then I know the rest of it must be true, because that's true. So why am I reformed? I always say, because of Jesus. But, what was it that first got my attention, regarding Reformed Theology?
It was Romans 9. Because it said something about God that I never really thought of. So I just want to read to you, starting at verse 6. Paul is talking here about the relationship between God and Israel, and he's saying, you know, God did make promises to Israel, and it's not as if those promises haven't come to pass, because God didn't promise to save every single child of Abraham.
God chose one of Abraham's children. How many children did Abraham have? Well, he had an adopted son, Eleazar of Damascus. He had a son through his handmaiden, who was Ishmael. He had Isaac, and then he had many sons and daughters through Keturah, his wife, after Sarah died.
How many sons did Abraham have? We don't know. How many sons were chosen by God? One, the son of the promise, Isaac. And from Isaac, who had two children, how many sons were chosen by God? One, Jacob I have loved, Esau I have hated.
So that's where we get, verse 6 begins, he says,. But it is not as though the word of God has failed, for not all who have descended from Israel belong to Israel, and not all are children of Abraham because they are his offspring, but through Isaac shall your offspring be named.
This means that it is not the children of the flesh who are the children of God, but the children of the promise are counted as offspring. But this is what the promise said about this time, Next year I will return, and Sarah shall have a son.
And not only so, but also, when Rebekah had conceived children by one man, our forefather Isaac, though they had not yet been born, and had not done either good nor bad, in order that God's purpose of election might continue, not because of works, but because of his call, she was told the older will serve the younger, as it is written, Jacob I have loved, but Esau I hated.
So right there, God's showing that throughout all of history, he's made choices. Why? To show his elective purpose, that God is sovereign in this. He chose Isaac out of all of other Abraham's children.
You say, well he chose him because he was Sarah's child. Well, he gave him to Sarah by choice, because he came in her 90's. It wasn't just, well hey, I like Sarah better. He chose that child before he was even born.
He chose Jacob, before he was born, for what purpose? To show that it was choosing not based on works. You can't choose somebody based on works if they haven't done any works yet. And finally, it says, what shall we say then?
Is there injustice on God's part? You see verse 14 there, is asking the question that every person, when they hear about the doctrine of grace, the first question everybody asks, well does that mean God is unfair?
By no means. Meganoita is the Greek. May it never be, may it not exist in your mind that you think that God would be unfair. For he says to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.
So that it depends not on human will or exertion, but on God who has mercy. For the scripture says to Pharaoh, for this very purpose I raised you up, that I might show my power in you, and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth.
So then he has mercy on whomever he wills, and he hardens whomever he wills. I don't know how a person can read that and walk away and say, ah, but it's all our choice. God is sovereign. Yes, that's a big part of our theology.
It's not the only part. You read systematic theology books written by solid reformed theologians. Will there be things about sovereignty? Yes, but there will be things about several other very important topics as well.
But you will notice that the sovereignty of God does undergird what we believe, because it adds support. As R .C. Sproul said, if there be one rogue molecule in all the universe, then God is not God. If there's one molecule in the universe that God is not in control of, that could be the one molecule that unravels everything.
It's one nail that releases one shoe from one horse, and it was the nail that caused the horse shoe to fall, that caused the horse to fall, that caused the battle to be lost, that caused the war to be lost, that caused the nation to be lost.
One nail and one shoe and one horse and one battle and one war and one nation is gone. One molecule out of God's sovereignty, and he's not God. So yes, reformed theology does find its foundation in an understanding of the nature of the sovereignty of God.
He has a final rebuke in verse 20. But who are you, O man, to answer back to God? And in the Greek, it says, O man, who are you? It starts with the word man, because in Greek, word order puts emphasis.
It's emphasizing your being a creature. O man, who do you think you are? To answer back to God.
It's sort of like Christ when we rebuke Peter. Put away your sword. Don't you know? All I've got to do is speak a word to twelve legions of angels? Absolutely. And what did he say to Pilate?
You would have no authority over me were it not given to you from above. Or like when bad things happen, Christians feel like we have to answer for God. We have to make excuses for God. We're apologizing to the God of the universe that created it.
Who are we to inflate ourselves to that type of position? Exactly. Well, let's pray a final prayer. Father, thank you for your word. Thank you for giving us an opportunity to study it. I pray in the weeks to come that we'll have an even better understanding of what we mean when we say Reformed theology.
In Christ's name, amen.