Radio Free Geneva (Part 2): Scriptural Considerations in Response to Justin Brierley

Because they've chosen to follow John Calvin instead of Jesus Christ. I have a problem with them. They're following men instead of the Word of God.

Over my feet, standing on a stump, and crying out, He died! The two elected were selected!

First of all, James, I'm very ignorant of the reformers. I think I probably know more about Calvinism than most of the people who call themselves Calvinists. Betty Gates is only forgotten son. Betty!

Ladies and gentlemen, James White is a hyper-Calvinist. Now whatever we do in Baptist life, we don't need to be teaming up with hyper-Calvinists. I've said the other day in class that I don't understand the difference between hyper-Calvinism and Calvinism.

It seems to me that Calvin was a hyper-Calvinist. Right, I don't think there is typically any difference between Calvinism and hyper-Calvinism. Read my book.

And now, from our underground bunker, deep beneath Bruton Parker College, where no one would think to look, safe from all those moderate Calvinists, Dave Hunt fans, and those who have read and re-read George Bryson's book, we are Radio Free Geneva!

Broadcasting the truth about God's freedom to say for His own eternal glory.

Response to Justin Brierley’s Article on Free Will

Greetings, welcome to The Dividing Line. It's a little distracting to, right as the program starts, I think my Apple account has been hacked. Yeah, I can't get back into it. That's not a good thing. So what's worse is some of the programs I'm using may, in fact, end up being impacted by that during the course of the program and stop working.

So we will see. So that means I know what I'm doing as soon as the program is over. Unfortunately, I hate stuff like that. Anyway, welcome to Radio Free Geneva. We are continuing the response we began on the last program to Justin Brierley's article in Premier Christianity.

That actually gives a date of November 23rd, but it wasn't created November 10th. So it's been a little while back. But why both atheists and Christians need to believe in free will, you can find that at premierchristianity .com.

We had gotten through a portion of the material, and we were getting down to the important stuff. Important in the sense that, as I mentioned last time, the reason that I am reformed is not because it's cool to be reformed.

As far as the world's body of Christians, it's a small minority view. So it's not quote-unquote cool in that sense. It might be in the United States and maybe some other places, but it's a minority view.

That's not why I'm reformed. I'm reformed because I am convinced that when you use the same hermeneutics that you use to defend the key elements of the faith, which would include the deity of Christ, the Trinity, the crucifixion, the resurrection, the gospel as a whole, that when you consistently utilize the same hermeneutics, the same method of interpretation, and apply it to this subject, and it's a subject that I would suggest, there is a tremendous amount of tradition, and there's a tremendous amount of personal...

Well, it's personal tradition. Mankind wants to have control in the matter of salvation. God is allowed to do everything else. God can cause the sun to rise and keep the moon in its orbit and guide the galaxies, and he can do all of that stuff.

But when it comes to me and my salvation, that has to be totally under my control. There is a very strong personal element of bias and tradition and prejudice that I think has to be examined and recognized when it comes to this subject.

And the Reformed understanding is counterintuitive. It's natural for mankind to reason from himself upward toward God. That's the nature of the religions of men. Reformed theology starts with God and comes downward, and it's destructive, deeply destructive, to man's ego and power and control and everything else.

And so as a result, why would you hold a view like this? Because when I apply the rules of interpretation and exegesis to John 6 and John 10 and John 17 and Romans 8, 9, 10, and 11 and Ephesians chapter 1 and passages, the entire section we looked at last time in Isaiah, I come to the same conclusion.

God is absolutely sovereign. He accomplishes what he wills. We didn't read it last time, but someone at some point, I forget when it was since the last time we talked together, but I almost tweeted to someone, you know, you really do need to read.

Actually, I did. I said to someone, may you obtain Nebuchadnezzar's wisdom. That's what I said to somebody on Twitter. And what I was referring to was in Deuteronomy chapter 4, when Nebuchadnezzar was struck down for his arrogance, for his pride, just like, you know, the king of Assyria was just killed.

Nebuchadnezzar struck down for a period of seven years. And he was driven away from mankind, began eating grass like cattle. His body was drenched due to heaven until his hair had grown like eagles' feathers and his nails like birds' claws.

And here you have, but at the end of that period, I, Nebuchadnezzar raised my eyes toward heaven and my reason returned to me and I blessed the Most High and praised and honored him who lives forever for his dominion is everlasting dominion and his kingdom endures from generation to generation.

All the inhabitants of the earth are accounted as nothing, but he does according to his will in the host of heaven and among the inhabitants of earth and no one can ward off his hand or say to him, what have you done?

At that time, my reason returned to me. So we are most reasonable when we recognize how small and brief and ignorant we are and how big and powerful and omnipotent and omniscient God is. And so here you have a pagan and he recognizes all the inhabitants of the earth are accounted as nothing.

He does not have this idea of the powerful libertarian will of man. All the inhabitants of the earth are accounted as nothing. He does according to his will in the host of heaven and among the inhabitants of earth.

It's not just out there. Even amongst the inhabitants of earth, he accomplishes his will. And if you don't like the fact that that is said by a pagan, how about we consider the 33rd Psalm, which says, let all the earth fear Yahweh, let all the inhabitants of the world stand in awe of him, for he spoke and it was done, he commanded and it stood fast.

Yahweh nullifies the counsel of the nations. He frustrates the plans of the peoples. The counsel of Yahweh stands forever, his plans, the plans of his heart from generation to generation. So notice the parallel in verses 10 and 11.

Counsel of the nations, Yahweh frustrates that, but the counsel of Yahweh stands forever. Plans of the peoples, frustrates that, the plans of his heart from generation to generation. The psalmist contrasts these things.

And yet very, very often I hear the quote unquote, freewill theists, who interestingly enough, are only concerned about the freewill of the creature, not the freewill of the creator. The freewill theists emphasizing very strongly that, well, God wants to do this and he wants to do that, but you know, hey, he's given us all our freewill.

And so he can only do what we allow him to do. And I just go, yeah, you know, I don't seem to, I don't seem to see that in the Psalter. I don't see to see it. You know, I did mention last time very briefly, Psalm 135, six, it's one of those nice short ones.

You can memorize it very easily. Whatever Yahweh pleases, he does. In heaven and in earth, in the seas and in all deeps. Some might say, oh yeah, yeah, see? In the heavens, the earth, seas, all deeps, just all that impersonal stuff.

It's just not when it comes to man, but that's not, that's what we saw in Psalm 33. That's Daniel four, that's not actually how that works at all. And so we come to, you know, the discussion with certain biblical foundations.

And I recognize that those biblical foundations require a very high view of scripture. And I honestly believe that one of the reasons that Reformed theology is a minority report amongst many is that it does require an extremely high view of scripture.

And there are many people who do not hold an extremely high view of scripture today. There are many people who have bought into very modernistic, rationalistic, anti-supernatural criticisms. And even amongst Christian academics, there is quite honestly a desire to look good in the eyes of the world, and therefore, there are certain things you just really can't believe.

Or even if you do believe, you can't say it out loud, because that's going to end up causing you problems. And so, as we had said last time, we have these foundational starting points. And so we were moving toward, we were looking at the assertion, losing love and justice.

And we had already pointed out that love is something that is commanded, it's grace commanded. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength. It is not a feeling, it is not an emotion.

Feelings and emotions may flow from it, especially in the changed heart, but it is not, thou shalt have a feeling. There is so much more to that, as I think most Christians do understand that. The idea is that you have, the objection is you have two people on equal level, and there has to be give and take in this type of relationship, but we're talking about the creator and the creature.

And that part is very often missed in an understanding of what it means to love God. But we had also mentioned, likewise, any meaningful sense of justice is also lost under the deterministic view of God.

So if God has a sovereign decree, if God is accomplishing what he wills in the heaven and the earth, if God is the one who works all things after the counsel of his will, Ephesians chapter 1, then there can be no justice, because it's all just a play.

Again, it's the flattening out, it's the taking of the three-dimensional beauty of scriptural revelation, and flattening it out to a two-dimensional puppet play. Very common perspective that many people, unfortunately, have.

But we already looked at counter examples of this in scripture last time. We looked at the fact that in Acts chapter 4, Herod and Pontius Pilate and the Jews and the Romans are all held accountable by God on different levels, because they have different motivations, they have different intentions in what it is that they, and how they engaged in the actions relevant to the death of Christ, but it does not change the fact that what took place in the death of Christ, which is the most evil act ever, because it was the one absolutely innocent victim, what took place is at the very predestining hand of God.

God predestined that it take place. You either have to say the early church was wrong, the early church was deluded, the early church was just simplistic. That's how you do this. That's how, as people turn to the left and move farther and farther away from a commitment to Sola Scriptura and Tota Scriptura, that's what you do.

You say, well, yeah, I know it says that in Daniel, but we all know Nebuchadnezzar never said that. This was just simply a Jewish writer many, many centuries later. It wasn't Daniel, and he just puts these things in Nebuchadnezzar's mouth, and it's just poetry, and all the stuff in Psalms and in Isaiah, it's all just poetry.

You can't really take it literally. And the early church, they were just interpreting their little bit of persecution at that time in an apocalyptic sense. Look, I went to Fuller. I know. I know how it's done.

I know how you get away with this kind of stuff, and how you explain stuff away while continuing your religiosity. I know how it's done. But like I said, it requires a fundamental shift in your view of the authority of Scripture.

If you allow Scripture to be Scripture, then we've already provided counter-examples where God holds men accountable justly for doing what He decreed they do. That's where you have to understand certain things, such as the difference between what's called the decretive will of God and the revealed will of God.

God has a will that is expressed in His decrees. He does not tell us what that is. We do not have access to that information. We only have access to that information as history plays out. But He has a prescriptive will, and that's found in His law.

And if you don't see the distinction between those two, you'll never understand the biblical narrative. God says, Thou shalt not kill. And then He has Israel act as His means of judgment upon deeply idolatrous nations, which included killing.

So, you've got the prescriptive will, and then you've got the decretive will, or sometimes called the secret will. I prefer decretive will of God. And they are not in conflict. You just need to understand what each one is addressing.

And in the same way, you have men acting on the basis of their desires, and yet, God at times restrains men's sin, does not allow them to sin. The brothers of Joseph wanted to kill Him. God would not allow that to happen.

There are a number of instances like this found in Scripture. And so, God can justly use those who are guilty before Him of sin in any way as to glorify Himself. I mean, I suppose there are some today, but for centuries there wouldn't have been many Christians who would have been found to raise an objection to God using Pharaoh to glorify Himself.

I mean, the plagues were clearly a destruction of the gods of Egypt, and yet people died. And people today will say, that's not fair. That's not right. That can't be. But God... You know, our natural response is if God wanted to bring His judgment to bear upon us for our sins at any point in time, He could do so.

We'll say that, but then when it really happens, we won't follow through with that. Can God do that? It destroyed the firstborn of Egypt. How can He do that justly? Because they fell on Adam and they were guilty of sin.

And so, we have become very accustomed to demanding grace and mercy because God is so gracious and merciful, but sometimes God brings judgment, and that's very important. So, we provided counter examples the king of Assyria, the brothers of Joseph, etc., etc., to this idea that justice is destroyed in a deterministic view of God, because obviously the justice of which we speak has to be defined as to, what category are we talking about?

We're not talking about justice between men. We're talking about cosmic justice. And in the end, everyone will either get justice or mercy. One of the two. If a person is condemned, that's just simply the just condemnation of their sin.

If they receive mercy, that transcends categories of justice. And so, one of the lines here, equally, how can those God has predestined to hell? Now, of course, this engages in the error of equal ultimacy, and there are people who teach equal ultimacy, but I think it's an error.

Very plainly, there is a vast difference between the exercise of God's sovereign power in saving the elect, because that's an exercise of grace. That's power expressed through grace over against leaving someone in their sin, which is reprobation, which leaves them subject to the justice of God and the wrath of God.

There's no need for the extension of the power of grace outside of a common grace or a sustaining grace, but there is no extension of the power of redeeming grace, which requires the entire redemptive act of the triune God in Christ to be effective and just in bringing about the reprobation of any individual.

So, they're not the same thing. So, when you say predestined to heaven, predestined to hell, when you make it equal ultimacy, it's the same thing, either direction. That's not accurate. That's not an accurate understanding.

But equally, how can those—God has predestined to hell—be considered guilty of rejecting him if they had no option to choose him? Now, notice, I think, the fundamental misunderstanding of what is being said here.

When it says they had no option to choose him, what is that a statement of? That is a statement of saying that for fairness to exist, grace must be extended to the fallen sons and daughters of Adam equally.

And as soon as you start saying that grace can be demanded, that grace has to be given in a particular fashion, now you're getting into some serious problems with the very nature of grace and the freedom of God in the extension of that grace.

And so, the idea is, well, people deserve a chance as if salvation is some kind of chance thing. Again, very much focused upon man, not focused upon what God is accomplishing, the fact that God has a particular people, that he saves them in his mercy and grace, the praise of his glorious grace, and so on and so forth.

No, it's just everybody has to have, quote-unquote, an equal chance. But as an equal chance, that's basically like saying, I've used this illustration for many years, hardly ever happens anymore, it does every once in a while I hear about it.

But, in the United States anyways, and I'm sure the royals could do this, I'm sure there's somebody with the power to do this in the United Kingdom, but you can, the governor of a state, or obviously the president of the United States, can pardon someone and can remove all legal ramifications of whatever acts they may or may not have committed.

And so, the governor of a state, for example, can pardon a man on death row, whatever few states are left that have the death penalty, can pardon someone on death row. Now, does it follow that if that governor is going to be just, he has to pardon everybody on death row?

That's how man wants to think. That's not how we used to think. That's back when people fought rather than emoted. People recognize this illustration a little bit better. But, no, there is no necessity for that governor to pardon everybody on death row when he pardons one particular person on death row.

And so, with that in mind, we see that the underlying presupposition and objections like this is an errant presupposition. It's an assumption that for God to be, quote unquote, fair, he has to treat everyone the same way, and that makes grace something that can be demanded of God.

And that is not what we see in Scripture. I don't know how anybody looks at the history of Israel. And even looking at Jacob and Esau or anything like that, but then looking at Israel and Egypt, Israel and Babylon, Israel and Assyria, how can anyone look at any of that and come to the conclusion that in reality, God has to treat everybody equally?

Who were all the prophets that were sent to the Amorites before they were wiped out by the Israelites? Well, there weren't any. And yet, there were prophets sent day and night to the people of Israel over centuries as God's long-suffering stayed with them in his patience and his mercy and so on and so forth.

So, the idea that God just has to treat everybody the same, if you've come up with that conclusion, you didn't get it from reading Scripture. You did not get it from making your parameters, scriptural parameters.

So, anyway, da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da. Okay. Ah. Meanwhile, Christian determinists are faced with the problem of how to rescue the concept of love and justice from being rendered meaningless by a God who controls every thought and desire.

Well, we've already addressed that. Calvinists may have a logically consistent view of God, but is he worthy of our worship? Well, and what does worship even mean when it isn't freely given to begin with?

Well, again, notice the flattening out. You can't have a full orb. You can't have meaning in eternity and meaning in time. One has to crush the other. We've pointed out that the Incarnation is a standing refutation of such a thought.

Jesus didn't become a puppet. He entered into time. His actions were meaningful. That means our actions are meaningful. And yet, Jesus himself affirmed, it is absolutely necessary that I go to Jerusalem, fulfill these prophecies.

These things were written beforehand of me. They're being fulfilled now, etc., etc. And so, we see that the Bible doesn't allow for this flattening out. If you accept this flattening out, you've pretty much hollowed out the entire story and really are on your road to either open theism or even worse, something like process theology down the road.

But Calvinists may have a logically consistent view of God, but is he worthy of our worship? Well, Romans 1 says that the very element of general revelation in the creation around us shows us that we should be thankful to God and to acknowledge him as God.

It's not up to us to determine that God is worthy of worship. That's again, starting down here, setting up parameters to say, well, do you fit what I think should be worthy of worship? This is not biblical.

And of course, the child of God recognizes that I have been raised to spiritual life. I was spiritually dead. There was nothing in me that could attract the grace of God. It was completely his work, completely his spirit, and therefore my heart has been changed, and when it's drawn out to him, that's the work of the Spirit of God and it's the nature of the new creature in Christ Jesus, and that's all his work.

So where do I get any boasting in any of this? I don't. And so what does worship even mean when it isn't freely given to begin with? Well, it is freely given. I want to worship God, but when you say freely, you're saying as an autonomous creature outside of the resurrecting power of God and the role of the Holy Spirit, you're not even saying that it's freely given.

If you confess the necessity of the renewing work of the Holy Spirit and convicting work of the Holy Spirit, enlightening the mind, you're not even saying freely. So, you know, there were a few lines in here.

It's just like, hmm, losing free will is too high a price to pay for the God of determinism. Surely the Christian view of a God of love only makes sense if he has given us the ability to freely choose or reject him, just as he freely chose to give himself for us.

That's interesting when Jesus specifically talks about the specific people for whom he gives himself and uses specificity in that language. But what I wanted to really get to is sorting through scriptures.

It's not a long section, unfortunately, and of course we've spent over the years many, many hours working through key texts and there is almost nothing here. There's only one brief text or scripture to look at, but I do want to work through it.

Well, there's two. One's a very, very clear that we'll see here in a moment, but there are, you know, it would be very, very worthwhile, Justin, if you would take the time to look at the strong Reformed exegesis that has been presented from John 6 and John 10 and John 17 and Ephesians 1 and so on and so forth.

There's no response to those things here. It's just an article, I understand that, but that's where we're coming from. That's our source, and when you don't take that apart, you're really not providing much for us in the way of a reason to take seriously what you're saying because you're not interacting with the primary argumentation that we're putting forward.

It says, but what about those scriptures that seem to affirm that God controls everything and only chooses some for salvation? The fact is, we all read scripture through an interpretive lens. Yes, Justin, but that's why we do exegesis, and that's why having the consistent rules of exegesis for everyone in every culture and language and everything else is meant to help filter those lenses out.

So, I hope you haven't bought into the idea that we are all hopelessly enslaved to our lenses and that there isn't any way of really knowing any kind of objective truth, or if that objective truth is just a very, very basic outline and that the rest of it is all up for grabs.

The fact is, we all read scripture through an interpretive lens guided by our intuitions and theology. Well, I would hope, Justin, as an apologist, that what you really wanted to say was guided by the sound, consistent rules of hermeneutics that allow us to get to the original meaning of the author and his intended audience that then becomes the foundation for the development of our theology.

Because if you're using your theology to interpret scripture, then where'd you get your theology at? You now have an external source that is determining what you're going to see in scripture. And while we see people doing that all the time, I hope we recognize that that's backwards.

And if we don't challenge that, it ends our ability to really communicate to anyone the truth of the gospel of Christ. Where others see predestination, I tend to see God granting genuine freedom to his creation.

Well, okay, then how do you deal with Psalm 33? Where do you see? Because when you use the term genuine freedom, you're actually referring to some concept of autonomy, libertarian freedom. So, where do you find this?

Did Cyrus have libertarian freedom? Could all the prophecies in Isaiah, could they have all been invalidated? I mean, I've said it before, I think the only consistent Arminian is an open theist. And so, I don't know if you did say that there were other views and you included a concept of open theism seemingly as part of the possible viewpoints, so maybe you have some predilection toward that.

I don't know. I don't see how anyone can hold to the inspiration of the Old Testament text and actually believe in open theism, because certainly nobody who wrote the Old Testament or New Testament had any concept even close to that as being their view of God by any stretch of the imagination.

But that doesn't change the direct statements of predestination and hardening of hearts and it's all there and just simply saying, well, I tend to see God granting genuine freedom to his creation. Okay, but that doesn't explain how you see it, it doesn't explain how that text actually teaches that and that's what we need in a meaningful dialogue and debate.

So, there were two references, two references in the four paragraphs under Sorting Through Scriptures. In 1 Timothy 2 -4, Paul states that God wants all people to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth.

God's heart is for all to know him, that's clear enough. But it's less clear in Romans 8 that Paul is talking about individual salvation when he speaks of those whom God has predestined. That's it. Now, on one level, it's a little bit unfair because you did not invest much there and some of us have invested a lot there and written entire chapters and books dedicated to those particular texts, so it's a little bit unfair.

But you did put it out there. So, let's take a look at 1 Timothy once again. Now, Justin, I would assume you at least have access to The Potter's Freedom. A lot of people over there do. It has made the trip across the pond.

There is a chapter called The Big Three and it deals with 1 Timothy 2 -4, Matthew 23, 34 and following and 2 Peter 3 -9 because they are the most commonly cited texts and they are just thrown out there saying, hey, this is perfectly clear.

But I'd really like to ask you, Justin, do you really think it's that clear? Let's take a look at it in its context starting in 1 Timothy 2 -1. First of all then, I urge that in treaties and prayers, petitions and thanksgivings be made on behalf cupere ponton anthropon, in behalf of all men.

Now, if we're going to take that literally and not contextually, then it sounds like Paul is saying that there needs to be prayer for every... He's writing to Timothy. Let's say Timothy is in Ephesus right now.

He's saying that we should be praying by name for every person in the city of Ephesus, which would mean very, very, very long prayer meetings. But you'll notice that Paul defines his own language. When he says cupere ponton anthropon, he then says cupere basileon kai ponton tun enhuparke anton.

In other words, for kings and all who are in authority. So what are kings and all who are in authority? They are kinds of men. They are types of men. He's speaking in categories. Categorically, that is, breaking people down into categories.

And what he's doing specifically when he says all men, is he's not speaking extensively. He's speaking extensively of categories. The reason being that there would be a temptation since Christians are under persecution, to not pray for those who are persecuting them.

To not pray for those who are kings and all who are in authority. That remains a temptation even to this day. But he says no, you are to have prayers and petitions and thanksgivings for all kinds of men.

Even those you might not want to pray for, such as kings and those who are in authority. So the important thing to see is, in the immediate context, Paul uses categorical language. His hearers would have had to have used categorical language.

They would have understood him to be speaking of categories of peoples. Kings, all those possessing authority. That's not everybody, but it's talking about categories. So that we may lead a tranquil and quiet life in all godliness and dignity.

This is good and acceptable in the sight of God, our Savior. And then we get to your text, but notice it's God, our Savior, who Pontos Anthropos Thelisotheni. Now, if we just stop right here, connect this with the preceding sentence, what's he saying?

That it's God's desire that all kinds of men be saved. That is, Paul is affirming the reality that even rich people, powerful people, even kings are going to be the recipients of his grace. God desires all men to be saved.

Now, if you want to take the, as you did, and you said it's very clear, but you assumed it, you didn't prove it. You didn't drive it from the context. If you want to assume that this is all men individually, then A, you have to explain why he would use categorical thinking in one sentence and the next sentence switch to something else without even any indication whatsoever.

And then you need to be consistent in applying this in what comes afterwards. And that's something, to just be honest with you, Justin, I've never seen anybody do. Potter's Freedom has been out for coming up on, well, it's 18 years, coming up on two decades.

It's had a lot of impact on a lot of people. I know entire churches that exist because of the Potter's Freedom, and you would think that if there was a problem with this argumentation, that it was somehow self-contradictory or that it was impossible or something.

Somebody, by now, would have demonstrated that, but I can be perfectly honest with you. I've never seen anything that even comes close to providing that kind of counter-exegesis. So, let's follow it along.

Who desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth? So, two possible ways of understanding this. Universally, God desires the salvation of every single individual, but he can't accomplish it without their assistance.

Or, God desires the salvation of every kind of men, and of course, we can then go to John chapter 11. We can go to Revelation chapter 5. Men from every tribe, tongue, people, and nation. It's asserted over and over again in Scripture that that is where you're going to get God's elect people, or men from every tribe, tongue, people, and nation.

That's why Paul endures all things for what? For the sake of the elect. That, I think, is Paul's understanding. But, let's press on. There is one God and one mediator also between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, who gave himself as a ransom for all the testimony given at the proper time.

Now, if you look at the Nessie-Aland text, the editors have placed verses 5 and 6 in a poetic form, indicating this could be a fragment of a poem, early hymn, creedal form, something along those lines, an early confessional form.

But, what's interesting is there is one God, and, having used hais with theos, you then have hais kai mesites theou, there is also one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus. So, there's all sorts of stuff here that's really important in regards to incarnational theology and soteriology in regards to mediation and the work of Christ and the acceptance of his sacrifices, all sorts of stuff here.

But, here's the question that I will ask you to seriously consider, Justin, because I think it's very fair that given, assuming, this doesn't determine the ex-Jesus one way or the other, but it is relevant, assuming that this is a fragment of an early confession or something along those lines, then Paul is assuming that it's the common possession of both he and Timothy.

And so, that there's going to be an understanding between the two. And, when it says there is one mediator between God and men, do you understand, Justin, that Jesus intercedes before the Father in behalf of every human being who has ever lived or ever will live?

Now, I suppose you could raise questions about the nature of heavenly intercession, which is not just a Pauline doctrine, but it's clearly seen in Hebrews as well. And I suppose you could raise questions about temporality in regards to the nature of that intercession, Jesus is the God-man.

I suppose you could raise some issues like that. But, when we talk about intercession, does Jesus intercede before the Father for every person who has already died in their sins? And, what would be the nature of this intercession?

And, what would be the effect of this intercession? If he's not, then is he only interceding for those who have not yet died? And yet, God, the Father, and the Son know what each one of these is going to do, unless you're an open theist, I suppose.

I mean, open theism just ends all meaningful categories, especially satirologically speaking. And, again, because none of the biblical writers had it as a category, therefore to insert it messes everything up.

But, I believe, based especially upon Hebrews chapter 7, where we are told that Jesus is able to save completely those who draw nigh unto God by him, seeing he ever lives to make intercession for them.

So, Jesus possesses the capacity to save completely because of his intercessory standing. There's something about his intercession that actually saves, which fits perfectly with John 6 39. All the Father gives me have come to me, the one who comes to me I know.

This is the will of the Father, of all he's given me. I lose nothing, raise it up on the last day. Jesus has to have the capacity, power, and ability to fulfill the Father's will. Now, again, this is taking the biblical revelation as a whole, interpreting it consistently.