May 1, 2018 Show with Dr. Tony Costa & Dr. Kirk MacGregor on “Calvinism vs. Molinism: A Discussion Between Two Brothers in Christ Who Disagree Over How Scripture Explains God’s Sovereignty & Man’s Freedom”

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Live from the historic parsonage of 19th century Gospel Minister George Norcross in downtown

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Carlisle, Pennsylvania, it's Iron Sharpens Iron, a radio platform on which pastors,

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Christian scholars and theologians address the burning issues facing the church and the world today.

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Proverbs 27, verse 17 tells us, Iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another.

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Matthew Henry said that in this passage, quote, we are cautioned to take heed whom we converse with and directed to have in view in conversation to make one another wiser and better.

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It is our hope that this goal will be accomplished over the next hour, and we hope to hear from you, the listener, with your own questions.

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Now here's our host, Chris Arnson. Good afternoon,

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Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, Lake City, Florida and the rest of humanity living on the planet Earth who are listening via live streaming at ironsharpensironradio .com.

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This is Chris Arnson, your host of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, wishing you all a happy Tuesday on this first day of May 2018, and I'm delighted to have not only a first -time guest but also returning guests on the program today.

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We're going to have a fascinating discussion, I'm sure, on a subject that we have never addressed in all the years that we've been broadcasting

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Iron Sharpens Iron Radio going all the way back to 2005, and part of that is because I've just become familiar with the theme that we are going to be discussing today in recent months, perhaps actually maybe a little bit longer ago than that, maybe two years ago,

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I began to hear about Molinism. I had no idea that this theological perspective existed, and we are going to have today as our theme,

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Calvinism versus Molinism, a discussion between two brothers in Christ who disagree over how scripture explains

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God's sovereignty and man's freedom. We have, first of all, a very first -time guest to Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, Dr.

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Kirk MacGregor. He is a Molinist, and he is the Assistant Professor of Philosophy and Religion at MacPherson College.

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He's also the author of Luis de Molina, The Life and Theology of the Founder of Middle Knowledge, and it's my honor and privilege to welcome you for the very first time to Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, Dr.

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Kirk MacGregor. Thank you so much for having me on the show today. I really appreciate the invitation, and I'd like to thank

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Eli Ayala for all his hard work in making today's show a reality. Great, and we have, representing

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Calvinism on the program today, my friend Dr. Tony Costa, who's been a guest on this program a number of times and has also been a participant in Iron Sharpens Iron Radio events, including a debate we orchestrated between Dr.

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Tony Costa and the Roman Catholic apologist Robert St. Genes. We've also had Dr. Tony Costa as our featured speaker at one of the

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Iron Sharpens Iron Radio pastors' luncheons not long ago, but it's my honor and privilege to welcome you back to Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, Dr.

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Tony Costa. Well, thank you, Chris. It's always a pleasure to be with you, and I look forward to an enjoyable discussion today.

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And I do as well. And then another dear friend of mine who is returning today, he is going to be co -hosting this program with me.

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His name is Anthony Uvinio, and he is co -founder of New York Apologetics. He's also a member of Hope Reform Baptist Church of Long Island, located in Medford, New York, where my very dear friend,

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Pastor Richard Jensen, serves as the undershepherd over that flock. And it's my honor and privilege to welcome you back to Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, Anthony Uvinio.

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Thanks, Chris. I'm looking forward to this new co -hosting gig I have. I hope

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I don't blow it. Well, you know what I'd like for each of our participants to do before we go into their opening presentations?

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They're going to each give a 10 -minute opening presentation to define what they believe in regard to God's sovereignty and man's freedom.

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And then they will each have 10 minutes to rebut those opening statements. And then we are going to go to listener questions and also questions that I may have and that Anthony Uvinio may have.

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And keep in mind, Anthony, since I cannot see you, I cannot see you frowning or waving your arms violently.

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So if you want to ask a question and you see a lull or an opening, just move right in there and ask a question.

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Don't wait for me to ask you to ask a question. And so first of all,

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Dr. Kirk McGregor, tell us something about McPherson College briefly and something about your role there as assistant professor of philosophy and religion.

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McPherson College is one of the institutions, part of the

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Church of the Brethren. The Church of the Brethren is an Anabaptist denomination.

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I am a strong Anabaptist myself. I have Anabaptist roots going all the way back to Anabaptists who first came over to this country back in the 1700s.

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And my role in philosophy and religion is to teach courses in biblical studies, in systematic theology, contemporary theology, science and religion, philosophy of law, and I'm also chair of the

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Department of Philosophy and Religion. So I always want to put out a plug to anyone who is interested in doing undergraduate work in philosophy and religion.

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I would love to have you here and take you on as one of my students. And the website for our listeners interested in that is mcpherson .edu.

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That's m -c -p -h -e -r -s -o -n dot e -d -u. Tell us a little bit about your book that you've written.

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If I'm not mistaken, I think it may be the only modern biography on Molina.

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I may be wrong about that, but tell us about Luis de Molina, The Life and Theology of the Founder of Middle Knowledge.

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When I was doing my master's work at Biola University, I heard a presentation from William Lane Craig on aspects of Molinism, and I became intrigued by it, because given my own

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Anabaptist tradition, which is highly biblical in orientation,

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I believed that there were passages in scripture that taught things like God's individual predestination, human freedom,

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God's universal salvific will, and the question for me was how exactly to reconcile.

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And when I heard Bill Craig speak on this, I began to look into Molina in more depth.

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I was stunned to find that only one -seventh, the middle volume of Molina's seven -volume masterwork, the

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Concordia, had been translated into English, and that most of the scholarship, if not all, that had been done on Molinism was simply based on the information in Book Four, and Book Four presents basically the philosophy of Middle Knowledge.

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What most people don't know is that if you read the entire Concordia and you read all of Molina's other works,

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Book One of the Concordia is actually devoted to the scriptural foundations of the philosophy that he's later going to give.

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And so one misconception I'd see is that both some

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Molinists and some Calvinists think that Molinism is a purely philosophical position with no biblical foundation.

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And so once I began over the years to read through Molina's writings,

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I thought, gosh, there are probably maybe three to four people who have read everything that Molina has written, and there's never been a critical modern biography of him.

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And so I thought that Sondervan might be interested in the idea, and they were, and the rest is history.

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Well, I know that you would be very, you would feel very much at home in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, because there are

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Church of the Brethren and Brethren in Christ congregations all over the place. I think that is the dominant denomination around here next to the

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United Methodists with a close runner -up, the Church of God, Findlay, Ohio denomination.

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They far outnumber the Calvinists around here. But Dr.

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Tony Costa, now if you could tell us something about your role as Professor of Apologetics and Islam at Toronto Baptist Seminary.

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Yeah, sure. Toronto Baptist Seminary is a Reformed Baptist Church in Toronto. A Reformed Baptist Seminary, you mean.

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I'm sorry? A Reformed Baptist Seminary, you said a Reformed Baptist Church. Well, we're connected to Driver Street Baptist Church, so I guess you're probably right.

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Yeah, let me rephrase that. We are a Reformed Baptist Seminary, and my role there as Professor of Apologetics, I deal with a wide range of topics from biblical theology to systematic theology.

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I also teach on comparative world religions with a specialization in Islam in particular.

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I also teach in the area of cults, biblical reliability, and social ethics, and also in the area of Islam in particular.

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I think I already mentioned that. I also teach philosophy as well, so we do engage with very philosophical thinkers, patristic writers, the fathers of the

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Church, and so forth. So it is, again, a very conservative seminary in the

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City of Toronto, and we do have a growing number of students internationally who do come to our seminary.

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And I know that the website is tbs .edu.

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That's tbs for torontobaptistseminary .edu, and I would strongly recommend my dear friend

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Dr. Tony Costa for a guest speaker at your church. He has truly delighted and edified the audiences or the congregations wherever I have arranged him to speak, including at my my pastor's luncheon.

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In fact, you'll be, I think, pleased to know, Tony, that a local

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Church of Christ minister, Chris Croats, who was at the pastor's luncheon where you were the speaker, the

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Iron Sherpa and Zion Radio pastor's luncheon, he was so profoundly blessed and edified by your presentation that he organized his own conference with Brad Harab that involved some similar themes that you spoke on, but we would delve more heavily into the creation versus evolution debate.

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But every single person that I know who attended that that luncheon was just profoundly blessed, and I look forward to you returning to this area.

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Well, thank you very much, Chris. I'm delighted to hear that. Thank you very much. And you have also written a book that is in print.

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I believe it is published by Peter Lang Publishing. Could you tell us about that? Yes, it's

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Worship and the Risen Jesus in the Pauline Letters. So in that book, which is basically the publication of my doctoral dissertation,

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I looked at the subject of worship in the early Church, and so I went to the

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Pauline Epistles, which most scholars believe are the earliest writings of the New Testament, and what

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I did was I went back and looked at the topic of worship, what exactly is worship, and how does that early

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Christian form of worship, how does that factor into the person of the Risen Jesus? And so some of my book, what

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I deal with, is also the early high Christology that we find in early Christianity, and it's very similar to the work that Larry Hurtado, Richard Bauckham, and many others have put out there, but it particularly looks at the

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Pauline Letters and looks at the dynamics of worship, what exactly is worship, what are the words that Paul employs in the original

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Greek for worship, and various expressions such as baptism, the Lord's Supper, and invocation, prayer, hymns, and so forth.

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Great. And if anybody wants to learn more about that book, you can go to PeterLang .com,

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PeterLang .com, and just to let you know ahead of time that Peter Lang Publishing is not exclusively a

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Christian publisher. It's an academic publisher that really runs a very broad spectrum and happens to include some conservative

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Christian books, but that is probably a minority of what they publish. It's a very highly academic -based publishing house.

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In fact, that's where I first discovered Dr. Joel Beakey's doctoral dissertation on assurance before it became republished in a more popular form.

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But we are going to now have our representatives today, our participants, give a 10 -minute explanation of their theological position, and we are going to start by our

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Molinist guest today, Dr. Kirk MacGregor, if you could. Let me begin by thanking

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Dr. Costa for his willingness to participate in what I anticipate will be a very fruitful discussion.

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Having read Dr. Costa's book, Worship and the Risen Jesus, in Pauline letters, I can testify that he is a first -rate scholar.

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It's an honor to have him as a conversation partner. Today I'll be arguing that Molinism is a biblical tool for ensuring

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God's perfection, particularly his cognitive perfection, that God knows all truths at any given moment that are logically possible to know, and his moral perfection, that God is not the author of evil.

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I'll also argue that a five -point Calvinist can be a Molinist, as is

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Alvin Plantinga, today the world's foremost philosopher of religion. Molinism is named for its founder,

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Luis de Molina, a 16th -century Spanish theologian who disagreed with much of the

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Catholicism of his day as he tried to reform the Catholic Church from within. It is important to stress that Molinism is not a doctrine of salvation, as many in popular circles make it out to be.

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They confuse the soteriological applications of Molinism by Arminian Molinists, especially

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William and Craig, with Molinism itself. Unlike Calvinism, which

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I take to be a complete systematic, Molinism is a view that makes only two claims.

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Claim one, before his decision to create the world, God knew everything that would happen in any possible scenario he might create.

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God knew the truth value of all statements of the form. In such and possible scenario, so -and -so would happen.

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Molina called this would -knowledge God's middle knowledge. Claim two, as beings created in the image of God, humans, like God, possess libertarian free will.

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Libertarian free will is the ability to choose between various options consistent with one's nature.

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It must be emphasized that libertarian free will does not specify the range of options from which a person can choose.

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One's nature fixes the range. Thus, a totally depraved individual can only choose between spiritually evil options.

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A criminal can choose between robbing a bank, robbing a liquor store, raping, shooting someone in the head, or so forth.

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A regenerate believer can choose between the options of various spiritually good actions or succumbing to temptation.

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God can only choose between spiritually good options. God can choose to create any world he wants or to create no world at all, surely based on his sovereign good pleasure.

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But whether we're discussing a totally depraved person, a regenerate person, or God, all possess libertarian free will.

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So let's turn to the first claim, that God possesses middle knowledge. Middle knowledge is so called because it falls logically between two other types of knowledge that all

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Reformation theologians agreed God possessed. God's knowledge of everything that could happen in any possible scenario he might create, called natural knowledge, and God's knowledge of everything that follows from his freely issued decree to create our world, called free knowledge.

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It is relatively easy to show from Scripture that God knows the truth value of all statements of the form, in such and such possible scenario, so -and -so would happen.

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In 1 Samuel 23, 10 -13, David inquires of God whether or not, if he were to stay in the city of Kilah, Saul would besiege the city.

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God answers yes. David then inquires of God whether or not, if Saul besieged the city, the people of Kilah would surrender him and his men into Saul's hand.

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Again, God answers yes. Accordingly, David and his men escaped from Kilah, and when

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Saul learned this fact, he never came to the city. Notice that God's knowledge here is not knowledge of the future, because Saul never besieged the city, and the people of Kilah never delivered

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David and his men into Saul's hand. It is knowledge of what would happen in various possible scenarios, regardless of whether those scenarios ever become actual.

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Likewise, in John 18 -36, Jesus told Kilah, My kingdom is not of this world.

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If it were, my servants would fight to prevent my arrest by the

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Jewish leaders. Finally, in 1 Corinthians 2 -8, Paul comments, None of the rulers of this age understood

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God's wisdom, for if they had, they would not have crucified the

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Lord of glory. Now, there are only two possible options for when God possessed this good knowledge, either before his decree to create the world, or as part of his free knowledge.

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If God possessed this good knowledge as part of his free knowledge, the knowledge that follows from his decree,

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God must have decreed not only what world to create, but also what would happen in every possible scenario, including those that will never actually happen.

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But this position suffers from a fatal logical weakness. It violates God's or God's knowledge of all truths at any given moment that are logically possible to know.

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Now, it is true that for God to know what will happen in this world, God must first decide to create this world.

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Or if God had chosen to create some other world, then different future tense statements would be true than those that are.

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But no logical constraint prohibits God from knowing what would happen in all possible situations prior to his decree, as there's no necessary connection between this hypothetical knowledge and the decree.

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So if God is truly omniscient, he must possess middle knowledge. I believe

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Calvinists, who are vitally concerned with God's cognitive perfection, should embrace middle knowledge, even if they reject libertarian freedom.

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This is precisely the position taken by prominent Calvinist theologian and Evangelical Theological Society past president

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Bruce Ware of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, who just contributed to a forthcoming book

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I'm co -editing, a chapter entitled Middle Knowledge Calvinism. Luke Van Horn argues for the same position in an article of the

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Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society, volume 55, edition 4, in the year 2012.

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So let's turn to the second claim, that humans possess libertarian free will. This is plainly taught in Scripture.

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1 Corinthians 10 .13 says regarding believers, no temptation has overtaken you but such as is common to man.

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And God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will provide the way of escape also, so that you will be able to endure it.

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So the regenerate can choose between the right God provides, the way of escape, and the wrong.

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But if humans lack libertarian free will and are locked into one option, then

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God is directly morally responsible for all the evil they cause. If when the believer falls prey to temptation, the believer could not have done otherwise by resisting the temptation, then

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God, by putting the believer in that scenario, compels the believer to sin. In that case, biblical inerrancy goes out the window, not to mention the moral perfection of God.

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But if the believer could do otherwise and take the way of escape God provides, then

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God is in no way morally responsible for any evil that they cause. Finally, is

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Five -Point Calvinism compatible with Molinism? It seems the answer is obviously yes, just as it is compatible with Arminianism and other positions, like my own

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Anabaptist convictions. The Calvinist, Arminian, Anabaptist, and so forth will simply do different things soteriologically with Molinism.

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In particular, there's nothing in Five -Point Calvinism or in any of Calvin's writings that compels a totally depraved individual to commit the precise sin she or he commits, and thus nothing that rules out libertarian freedom.

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Regarding total depravity, a Molinist can feel free to agree or disagree, depending on their presuppositions.

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Regarding unconditional election, this is a doctrine Molina himself taught, so the Molinist can clearly feel free to agree.

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Regarding limited atonement, a Molinist can feel free to agree or disagree. Regarding irresistible grace, since Molinism isn't a doctrine of salvation, a

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Molinist could say, but doesn't have to say, that God gives the elect irresistible grace. Molinism only requires that sometimes humans can choose between alternatives.

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Regarding perseverance of the saints, a Molinist can feel free to agree and even assert that God uses his middle knowledge to accomplish this.

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In conclusion, we've seen that the doctrines of middle knowledge and libertarian free will are plainly taught in scripture, from which it follows that Molinism is true.

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This can only be avoided by denying biblical inerrancy. Middle knowledge safeguards the perfection of God, ensuring that God knows everything that is logically possible to know, and that God is not the author of evil.

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Accordingly, Molinism redounds to the glory of God. Well, thank you,

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Kirk McGregor, and we are going to go to a very brief station break before Dr.

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Tony Costa gives his opening statements. If anybody would like to join us with a question of your own, which we will be taking during the second hour, our email address is chrisarnsen at gmail .com,

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c -h -r -i -s -a -r -n -z -e -n at gmail .com. Please give us your first name, at least your city and state, and your country of residence if you live outside the

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USA. Please only remain anonymous if your question involves a personal and private matter.

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So don't go away, we'll be right back with Dr. Tony Costa's opening statements explaining

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Calvinism. Charles Haddon Spurgeon once said,

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Iron Sharpens today. Hi, I'm Pastor Bill Shishko, inviting you to tune in to A Visit to the

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.com. We bring biblically faithful pastoral ministry to you, and we invite you to visit the pastor's study by calling in with your questions.

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Our time will be lively, useful, and I assure you, never dull. Join us this Saturday at 12 noon

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Eastern Time for A Visit to the Pastor's Study, because everyone needs a pastor. Welcome back.

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This is Chris Orenson. If you just tuned us in, we are having a discussion today between a Calvinist and a

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Molinist. Representing Calvinism today is Dr. Tony Costa, professor of apologetics and in Islam at Toronto Baptist Seminary.

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And representing Molinism is Dr. Kirk McGregor, assistant professor of philosophy and religion at McPherson College and author of Luis de

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Molina, the Life and Theology of the Founder of Middle Knowledge. And now we are reaching, or have reached, the point when

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Dr. Tony Costa is going to give his 10 -minute opening presentation. Well, thank you so much,

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Chris, and I also want to echo Dr. McGregor's earlier statement. I'm also honored to be on this show with Dr.

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McGregor, whom I consider a dear brother in Christ. We may have our differences, but we discuss them as brethren do, with our intent being, of course, the glory of God and making sure that what we say lies in accordance with Holy Scripture.

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And also thanking Anthony Uvino of New York Apologetics for joining us as well and co -hosting the program.

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I'm going to be presenting the argument from Calvinism, and we are dealing here with the sovereignty of God and also the question of human libertarian free will.

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Since the fall, man has been at war with God. Man was separated from God.

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In Adam, man died spiritually and consequently was enslaved to sin.

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Man is spiritually dead. And so all those who are in Adam share in this spiritual deadness.

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Contrary to what most people think about Calvinism or Reformed theology, Calvinism does not deny that humans have freedom.

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They do. But it is a freedom to sin, a freedom to sin continually.

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Man freely sins, and he does so every day without fail. And the media is just an example of how low humans can fall in crimes that are committed against one another.

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And of course, more importantly, crimes that are committed and sins that are committed against God.

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In Genesis chapter six, verse five, we are told there that one of the reasons that brought about the flood, it states in Genesis six, verse five, the

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Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.

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And this, of course, is what we read in Jeremiah 17, verse nine, something very similar, that the heart is desperately wicked above all things who can know it.

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The Hebrew of Jeremiah 17, verse nine actually reads that the heart is incurably sick.

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Now, we have to understand from this that while man does have a freedom of a sort, this freedom is a fallen one.

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This is a freedom that has been affected by the fall. And therefore, everything that man does is oriented towards sin.

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Every part of man, as Scripture teaches, and a point that the Reformers also emphasized, was that his mind, his will, his emotions, and his flesh, his human nature, were completely tainted and corrupted by sin.

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The Roman Catholic theologian Thomas Aquinas would differ with the Reformers on this and in arguing that while man was indeed fallen, his intellect was still intact, and that reason could still be used to discover

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God's Word and to discover Revelation and so forth. Even our presumed righteous acts, acts that human beings do, the

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Bible says are like soapy rags before a holy God, Isaiah 64, verse six. It's not to say that man cannot know good or that man cannot know moral evil or moral good, but everything that man does is done from the framework of selfish ambition and not for the glory of God.

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While man is free to sin, and every day is an attestation to that fact, the

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Scriptures are very clear that fallen man does not have the freedom to choose God or to seek

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God because he or she is dead towards God. To quote the

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Apostle Paul in Romans 3 where he addresses the universality of sin, the Apostle Paul in Romans 3 verses 9 to 12 and verse 18, where he is quoting from Psalm 14, he says this,

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For we have already charged that all, both Jews and Greeks, are under sin, as it is written, None is righteous, no, not one.

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No one understands, no one seeks for God. All have turned aside, together they have become worthless.

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No one does good, not even one. There is no fear of God before their eyes.

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Well, if no one seeks for God, as Scripture points out here, then we are all lost, for we have all sinned,

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Romans 3, 23. The good news, the gospel, however, is not that man is the seeker, so much for the seeker -friendly services we often hear about.

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Man is not the seeker who seeks after God, but rather, as the Lord Jesus said in Luke 19 verse 10, for the

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Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost. And so it follows then that the seeker of the lost is the

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Lord Jesus Christ, the Hound of Heaven. The Son of God is indeed the one who comes to seek the lost and to give them life.

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We find, for example, that in the case of the simple condition that man is in, we find also in Scripture that man is utterly incapable of pleasing

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God in that state. And so we read, for example, in Romans 8 verses 7 to 8, where the apostle

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Paul says, as such, man in and of himself, in his simple condition, as we're going to see here in verse 7, starting with verse 7 of Romans 8 verse 7 to 8, for the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God.

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For it does not submit to God's law, indeed it cannot. For those who are in the flesh cannot please

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God. And so a number of things we have to take away from this passage is that the mind, the sinful mind, is hostile to God.

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Number two, it does not submit to God's law, not because it will not, but because it cannot.

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This is an important point. And those who are in the flesh cannot please God. So unregenerate people cannot please

35:55

God. They cannot submit to the law of God. They cannot even understand the things of God. As 1

36:00

Corinthians 2 .14 points out, the natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him.

36:07

And he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned. 1 Corinthians 1 .18 tells us that the preaching of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing.

36:17

The spiritual deadness of man also highlights man's inability to choose. He is spiritually dead.

36:23

Scripture tells us that it is God who quickens, or makes us alive, in Christ, which is regeneration.

36:29

And so in Ephesians 2 .1 -10, the Apostle Paul points out that we were once dead in trespasses and sins, and that it is

36:37

God who quickened us. God made us alive. It's important to note that it is God who has chosen us people.

36:43

It's God who has predestined them from the foundation of the world. And it is God who is the active subject in Ephesians 1 and Ephesians 2.

36:52

Man has no choice in this resurrection to life, that is, spiritual resurrection.

36:58

Just as no human being has a choice in their physical conception or physical birth, so likewise no redeemed human has a choice in their spiritual beginning and birth.

37:07

And therefore, Scripture says, to all those who received them and believed on his name, to them he gave the right to be called the children of God, who were born not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.

37:20

And so the new birth is something that God does, not what we do. Man's also inability to choose

37:26

God is seen in the fact that man is enslaved to sin. Jesus said that everyone who practices sin is a slave to sin, and that he needs to be set free, to know the truth that will set him free, and if the

37:38

Son sets him free, he will be free indeed. The Lord Jesus also pointed out that men in and of himself cannot come to God unless the

37:49

Father draws them. All that the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me

37:54

I will never cast out. No man can come to me unless the Father who draws, unless the

38:00

Father draws them to me. And so it's very clear that this teaching of drawing one to the

38:07

Father, this idea of making us alive in Christ Jesus, predestinating us from the foundation of the world, blessing us, all of these indicators show us that man in and of himself is dead.

38:22

He cannot give himself life. And we also need to understand that that's the very fact of choosing.

38:28

It's not man that chooses God, but as the Lord Jesus said in John 15 verse 16, you did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed that you should bear fruit.

38:40

We're also told that it's by grace that we are saved or have been saved through faith, and that this, this grace and this faith is not of yourself.

38:48

It is a gift of God. And so what we need at the end of the day is we need

38:54

God to take away the stony heart and to replace that stony heart with the heart of flesh.

39:00

And so the idea that man has the libertarian free will to choose God, I think the scriptures are very clear that spiritually dead people cannot live.

39:09

Spiritually dead people cannot respond to God. We need the grace of God. We need God to regenerate us and to make us alive in Christ Jesus.

39:19

And that is the only hope that we have in the Lord Jesus Christ. Thank you very much,

39:25

Tony. And now I am going to allow each of our participants, we're going to take our 10 minute rebuttal sections, that's 10 minutes each, after the midway break, because time won't permit us to do it during this first hour, since we have to go to a break at 4 .54

39:45

p .m. So, Dr. Kirk McGregor, if you could ask a question of Dr.

39:52

Costa and he will answer, and then we'll have Dr. Costa ask you a question. So, Dr. McGregor?

40:02

On your view, is it the case that an unregenerate person has to blaspheme against the

40:13

Holy Spirit? Um, you're asking if an unregenerate person has to blaspheme against the

40:23

Holy Spirit? Right. I'm not sure I understand the question. Well, I have no desire to dispute the text on total depravity or God's drawing or God's predestination.

40:37

I have no problem with the vast majority of what you've said. I never affirmed you had to believe that libertarian free will meant that you had the libertarian free will to choose

40:51

God. I thought I was fairly clear on that, that libertarian freedom just entails the ability to choose between various options.

41:00

And so, I'm granting, for the sake of argument, that a totally depraved person can't choose

41:06

God, but they can choose between, say, robbing a bank, robbing a liquor store, and so forth.

41:12

And so, what I'm wondering is, on your view, does the unregenerate person have to commit the specific sin of blaspheming against the

41:22

Holy Spirit? No, I would not say that they have to.

41:27

I believe that if the person is unregenerate and that person was not part of the elect, that those whom

41:37

God had chosen from the foundation of the world, I think it's irrelevant whether or not they commit the blasphemy of the

41:43

Holy Spirit or not. If they're unregenerate, they are reparate, and therefore they are alienated from the presence of God for eternity.

41:55

And now, Dr. Costa, you can ask Dr. McGregor a question. Yes, Dr. McGregor, Louis de

42:02

Molina was a Jesuit, and as you know, the Jesuits were created by Ignatius of Loyola, the

42:08

Society of Jesus, and their purpose, the purpose of the movement of the

42:15

Jesuits was to act as a counter -reformation, to countenance the Reformation.

42:21

And, of course, I'm sure you're aware of the Council of Trent and the Canons of Trent that condemned the

42:26

Reformers, Sola Fide, for example, the Solographia, and so forth. Don't you think it's quite interesting that Molina, as a

42:37

Jesuit, would he not have ambitions to countenance the Reformation, and knowing very well that Calvin, in particular, and Luther, with his bondage of the world, that they had very strong emphases on the sovereignty of God over any election, and so forth?

42:56

Don't you think that Louis de Molina had a purpose in addressing these issues of middle knowledge, and was it not a countenancing of the

43:07

Reformation that was spreading throughout Western Europe in his day? I think that you're correct that Molina surely believed that on Luther's doctrine and Calvin's doctrine of God's knowledge, that his knowledge was not complete, because you don't have any room for middle knowledge or genuinely counterfactual knowledge unless you say that that knowledge comes logically after the divine decree, and Molina saw logical problems with that.

43:49

It doesn't seem like there's any logical constraint as to why God couldn't know it before the decree.

43:56

So I think that, yes, certainly Molina is responding to the views of Luther and Calvin, and what's interesting, and I go into this in the book, is that Molina actually chose a rather Reform -minded

44:12

Jesuit order, and that Molina actually did not agree with Loyola's statement that whatever the

44:20

Church says is white is black, and whatever the Church says is black is white. So Molina is a rather...

44:30

this makes him so interesting biographically, that I would compare his views to kind of like the

44:39

Roman Catholic views of Peter Crete today. He was a Catholic, but very much ahead of his time, and the reason why he was drawn into the

44:50

Jesuit order had a lot more to do with his educational mentors and his background, and particularly the social justice initiatives in that part of Spain that that particular

45:02

Jesuit order was doing, rather than this sort of going after the Reformation, you know, with all guns blazing.

45:12

Well, now Anthony Uvinio, who is my co -host today, he is co -founder of New York Apologetics.

45:19

He is going to ask a question of both of our participants, and if you could just very briefly describe

45:26

New York Apologetics before you ask your questions. Thanks, Chris.

45:32

New York Apologetics is a training organization dedicated to defending the

45:37

Christian claims. We go to high schools, colleges, churches, train them up in the apologetic arguments, give them ways to...

45:46

conversation starters with people who are anti -God, usually atheists, or even people who are in the cult like Jehovah's Witnesses and Mormons.

45:55

We try to give them the information they need to make a defense for the faith that was once and for all delivered to the saints.

46:02

But thanks for that. And what's the website for New York Apologetics? Oh, I'm sorry.

46:08

It's www .NewYorkApologetics .com. Great, and now your question.

46:16

Yes, here we go. My question is actually for both of them. I'd like both of them to respond to this.

46:22

Did God decree a world in which Adam would sin certainly, or did

46:28

God decree a world in which Adam would... he knew Adam would sin, but Adam could do otherwise?

46:35

How would that fit in a Molinistic understanding first, and then in a Calvinistic understanding?

46:42

So, Dr. McGregor, you would answer for him. Yeah, I believe that God chose to create a world in which he knew with certainty that Adam would sin, but that Adam could have done otherwise.

47:01

So the critical issue is the difference between certainty and necessity.

47:10

So when we say that something will certainly happen, that's a psychological state concerning the knower.

47:18

So God is certain that Adam will sin, and God knows that for certain.

47:26

But it doesn't mean that Adam has to sin. Adam could have chose not to sin, but if he had chosen not to sin, then

47:35

God would have middle -known differently. So I seem to think that many of the

47:44

Reformers would agree that Adam did not have to sin, and certainly

47:50

Augustine did not think that Adam had to sin. He said that Adam went from the state of being able not to sin to the state of not being able not to sin, and Calvin mirrors that.

48:05

So I think this might be a point on which myself and Dr. Costa will agree. And Tony?

48:12

Yeah, not exactly. I think what we're hearing a lot here,

48:20

I think we're coming back a little bit to the Eurystitian distinctions between potentiality and actuality.

48:28

What God can potentially do, or what people will potentially do, and then what actually happens.

48:35

There's also debates, of course, in Reformed theology on superlapsarianism or infralapsarianism.

48:41

I think that God decreed a world in which Adam would sin. I think that the

48:48

Scripture is very clear that it is God's decrees that determine everything that will take place.

48:55

The Westminster Confession of Faith makes it very clear that although God knows whatsoever may or can come to pass upon all supposed conditions, yet has

49:04

He not decreed anything because He foresaw the future, or as that which would come to pass upon such conditions.

49:10

And so I would take the position that God had decreed that the

49:16

Fall would take place, and some early fathers of the Church even spoke of the

49:21

Fall as a blessed Fall that made the cross necessary for God to display

49:27

His love and mercy, and so forth. And so I don't think it was a case of God creating

49:35

Adam and Eve, and He could have created them in the best possible world, and so forth. I think

49:41

God had decreed the Fall, He decreed the cross. Everything has been decreed by God, and everything rests on the decrees of God and not on God's middle knowledge.

49:52

That's my perspective on it. Great, well we have to go to our midway break now, and when we return from a midway break we will have both

50:03

Dr. McPherson, I'm sorry, Dr. McGregor, Dr.

50:11

McGregor and Dr. Costa give their 10 -minute rebuttals, and you can also during this break, by the way, please be patient with us because this is an elongated station break.

50:25

Grace Life Radio, 90 .1 FM in Lake City, Florida, who airs this program every day in a pre -recorded fashion the next day after it's live, they require a 12 -minute break between our two major segments, so please use this time during those 12 minutes to write down the information that our advertisers are providing so you can patronize them.

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01:07:56

And now we are back to our special program today that we are addressing for the very first time ever on Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, Molinism.

01:08:07

We have had at least one, maybe a couple of guests that were Molinists in their personal understanding of the sovereignty of God and man's freedom, but that wasn't the topic that we addressed.

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This is the first time we have ever addressed this as a topic for the entirety of the program and this is a discussion between two brothers in Christ who disagree over how scripture explains

01:08:32

God's sovereignty and man's freedom. We have on the program today for the very first time

01:08:38

Dr. Kirk McGregor who is a Molinist, he's also assistant professor of philosophy and religion at McPherson College and author of Luiz de

01:08:46

Molina, The Life and Theology of the Founder of Middle Knowledge. And we also have representing

01:08:52

Calvinism Dr. Tony Costa who is a professor of apologetics in Islam at Toronto Baptist Seminary.

01:09:00

And joining me today as a co -host is Anthony Eugenio, co -founder of New York Apologetics.

01:09:07

And if you would like to join us on the air with a question of your own, our email address is chrisarnsen at gmail .com,

01:09:14

c h r i s a r n z e n at gmail .com. Please give us your first name, your city and state, and your country of residence if you live outside of the

01:09:25

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01:09:50

Now, we are going to have our 10 -minute rebuttal sections during the program today, and we are going to start with the

01:10:01

Molinist. And if you could begin,

01:10:07

Dr. Kirk McGregor, with your 10 minutes of I thank

01:10:12

Dr. Costa very much for... I have no problem with the vast majority of what

01:10:19

Dr. Costa said. I only disagree with a few points. I disagree with the notion that libertarian freedom entails that an unregenerate person has the power to choose

01:10:35

God. One doesn't need to believe that, and Molinism doesn't require that.

01:10:41

It is true that there are Arminians who hold Molinism, who would say that the type of libertarian freedom humans have includes the ability to turn to God, but you don't have to.

01:10:54

You can hold, as I've assumed for the sake of the debate today, that the unregenerate person's freedom is only between spiritually evil options.

01:11:04

So I have no desire to dispute the text concerning total depravity or God's predestination.

01:11:13

I also disagree with the dichotomy that Dr. Costa made of decree versus middle knowledge.

01:11:20

He said, God does this by His decree, not His middle knowledge. Why isn't that a false dichotomy?

01:11:27

Why not both? I agree that God has decreed everything that will happen,

01:11:33

Isaiah 46, 10, and 11, and Proverbs 21, 1. That's part of what it means for God to be sovereign.

01:11:40

And what I'm asking is, why can't God equally use His knowledge and His power in His sovereignty?

01:11:48

I fear that by excluding middle knowledge from God, God's sovereignty is reduced to only the exercise of His power, and that has bad moral consequences, and it seems to make

01:12:03

God the author of sin. So when God decrees the fall, does He thereby make

01:12:08

Adam fall, which is where some versions of Calvinism lead? I'm not sure about Dr. Costa's.

01:12:14

Or does He put Adam in a scenario where He knows with certainty that Adam will fall, even though He doesn't have to, which is the

01:12:22

Molinist perspective? I, for the life of me, can't see how the first option avoid making

01:12:28

God the author of evil. The second option, the Molinist option, is analogous to the following.

01:12:36

Suppose that I know with certainty that if I give an exam and I leave the room, then some students will freely cheat.

01:12:48

Now, I don't want any of those students to cheat, but I know with certainty that if I leave the room, some of them will take the opportunity to cheat.

01:12:58

So I give the exam. I leave the room. Some students cheat. I have a video camera on them.

01:13:06

They get caught. Am I morally responsible for their cheating? Well, absolutely not.

01:13:13

The reason is because I am only the indirect cause of their cheating.

01:13:18

I am not the direct cause. And in both moral philosophy and in the philosophy of law, this distinction is very well recognized, that it is only direct causation which accrues moral responsibility.

01:13:40

So if the police set up a sting operation to catch a criminal committing a crime, then so long as they don't compel that criminal to commit that crime, they may set up the circumstances where they know, if I set up the circumstances this way, then this criminal will certainly commit this crime.

01:14:00

And the criminal does. Well, can the criminal say this is entrapment?

01:14:06

The courts will say no, because even though the police were an indirect cause of the crime, nevertheless, they were not the direct cause, and therefore they bear no moral responsibility for it.

01:14:20

So I concur with the Calvinist that God is the cause of all things, but I note that biblical

01:14:27

Hebrew makes no distinction between indirect causation, which does not make one morally culpable, and direct causation, which does make one morally culpable.

01:14:38

That conception doesn't exist in the ancient Near East. That's why there's no term in Hebrew for cause as a verb.

01:14:45

Whenever you read cause in an English translation of the Old Testament, if cause is used as a noun, there's a noun for that, but if it's used as a verb, it's actually the translator rendering some other verb as cause.

01:15:02

So my question would be, how does God harden Pharaoh? I agree,

01:15:07

God hardens Pharaoh. How does he do it? How does God send people a powerful delusion so that they won't believe the truth and be saved, as 2

01:15:16

Thessalonians 2 says? I believe that the only way God can do these things and yet remain morally pure, remain a perfect being, is if God has middle knowledge, if God knows with certainty what these creatures would do in various circumstances.

01:15:39

God places them in the circumstances. The circumstances don't compel them to do the evil thing, but they do it.

01:15:47

And so in that case, God is the indirect cause, because if it were not for God placing them in that situation, they would not have sinned.

01:15:56

But nevertheless, God doesn't determine or make them sin. So I would say that God is the indirect cause of every evil act, and is either the direct or indirect cause of every good act.

01:16:12

Let me try to advance the conversation to offer a possible. Now, I stress here possible.

01:16:18

This is speculative. I'm going to publish an article on this in the journal Terry Careses later this year.

01:16:25

This is not the only Molinist way. Molina doesn't put this forward. I'm putting this forward.

01:16:31

So let me try to advance the discussion to offer a possible way to believe in a monergistic model of Molinism that affirms unconditional election, irresistible grace, and yet does not make

01:16:44

God morally responsible for the reprobate's damnation. Jesus made a very intriguing comment at Mark 3, 28 and 29.

01:16:55

Truly, I tell you, people will be forgiven aphethesitai, which is future passive indicative.

01:17:02

People will be forgiven all their sins and every slander they utter, but whoever blasphemes against the

01:17:09

Holy Spirit will never be forgiven. They are guilty of an eternal sin. Now, even though this is not the way the text is normally construed, if we interpret this text quite literally, it could be taken to mean that all the sins of humanity will actually be forgiven except the blasphemy against the

01:17:29

Holy Spirit. But how can it be the case that all sins will be forgiven people except the blasphemy against the

01:17:36

Holy Spirit, an observation which entails that everyone except spirit blasphemers will be forgiven of their sins?

01:17:44

Since forgiveness of sins is the result of justification, and justification cannot occur apart from salvation, it would follow that everyone except spirit blasphemers will be saved.

01:17:56

So, why couldn't one maintain this? That God knows that in some orders of things that He could create,

01:18:09

I, as a totally depraved person, would freely blaspheme against the

01:18:14

Holy Spirit. God knows in some other orders where I exist that I would freely not blaspheme against the

01:18:22

Holy Spirit. I would do other sins instead, and God knows in some other world that I don't exist.

01:18:29

Now, it's up to God which of those worlds is actual, and suppose

01:18:34

God just picks the world that He wants completely without reference to any favoritism toward me or any good thing about me or anything like that, then

01:18:46

God selecting the first world is unconditional election.

01:18:52

But suppose that God uses His mental knowledge to discover which totally depraved persons would freely blaspheme against the

01:19:04

Holy Spirit. And let's suppose that God gives irresistible grace to everyone whom

01:19:11

He middle -knows would not blaspheme against the Holy Spirit at whatever point it best fits in God's providential plan.

01:19:20

In that case, you could have irresistible grace, that the only way anyone is saved is by irresistible grace.

01:19:31

You could have the fact that God is not responsible for anyone's damnation in a moral sense, because people have only themselves to blame.

01:19:41

Had people not blasphemed against the Holy Spirit, then God would have given them His irresistible grace.

01:19:48

And yet, it's still unconditional election. Because even though God chooses a world where some people do not blaspheme against the

01:19:58

Holy Spirit and receive His grace, He could have just as easily chosen a different world in which those same people blaspheme.

01:20:05

And so don't receive His irresistible grace. Or a completely different world altogether, where neither of those people exist, and two other people exist instead.

01:20:15

So, that concludes what I have to say for now. All right, Dr. Tony Costa, it's your time for 10 minutes of rebuttal.

01:20:24

Thank you so much, and thank you, Dr. McGregor, I've really enjoyed our interaction. I could not help feel that, as I was listening to Dr.

01:20:32

McGregor, I almost felt like I was in a statistics class on probability and possible worlds, and what would happen in world number one, world number two, and world number three.

01:20:42

And at the end of the day, I think we have to, as believers, ask the question, is any of this even necessary, this discussion about little knowledge, and what

01:20:51

God would do in this possible world and that possible world? I think that the

01:20:56

Scriptures are very clear that God knows the end from the beginning, that God has taken counsel with Himself, God has decreed things that will absolutely take place, and I think that those who have been listening in will notice that Dr.

01:21:12

McGregor's majority of his arguments have been primarily philosophical, rather than theological.

01:21:18

In my opening statement, if you notice, I kept going back to Scripture, at fontes, back to the sources, and citing

01:21:24

Scripture. And I appreciate the fact that Dr. McGregor pointed out that he's not denying the doctrines of grace, the

01:21:32

Calvinistic doctrines of total depravity, and irresistible grace, and so forth, but the problem here is that Molinism almost seems like a free -for -all.

01:21:42

My good friend, Dr. William Craig, who is a dear friend of mine, whom I know personally, let me just quote something here from Dr.

01:21:49

Craig that he had on one of his podcasts, he says, "...the counterfactuals of creaturely freedom which confront him, that is

01:21:55

God, are outside of his control. He has to play with the hand he has been dealt."

01:22:01

And that really causes me to pause. It creates an incredible sense of caution here, because he speaks of these counterfactuals of creaturely freedom as something that, number one, confronts

01:22:13

God, and secondly, it's something that's outside of his control. And that is extremely frightening, to have something that lies outside of God's control.

01:22:23

Dr. Craig goes on to say, "...the import of this metaphor of playing the hand you've been dealt is to say that God doesn't determine unilaterally everything that happens, that there are truths about how people would freely choose under different situations.

01:22:36

That does not look like the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob." I think this is, if I may cite

01:22:41

Blaise Pascal, he said, "...the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, not the

01:22:47

God of the philosophers." And so I think that a lot of what we've been hearing is primarily rooted in philosophical thinking and argumentation.

01:22:58

I also did mention Aristotle's distinctions between potentiality and actuality. Dr. McGregor, I think probably for the limit of time, did not have an opportunity to answer that.

01:23:08

But let me just address Dr. McGregor's reference to the unpardonable sin in Mark 3, 28 -29, and the blasphemy of the

01:23:16

Holy Spirit. Dr. McGregor, I think, should have clarified this by looking at the entire context, and especially verse 31, the end of Mark 3, rather, where the evangelist tells us that the reason why

01:23:30

Jesus said this was because some of them had said that Jesus had an unclean spirit. And we have to define what we mean by the blasphemy of the

01:23:37

Holy Spirit. This blasphemy of the Holy Spirit was clearly connected to the Pharisees attributing the work of Jesus, his miraculous power, to Beelzebub, to the devil.

01:23:49

And this is what caused this severe statement on Jesus' part, that those who speak a word against the

01:23:57

Holy Spirit have no forgiveness, a sin against the Son of Man is forgivable, but not the sin against the

01:24:03

Holy Spirit. And he was directing this, according to verse 31 of Mark 3, he was directing this at those who said that he had an unclean spirit.

01:24:12

And so I don't think there's any need to go into philosophical distinctions about the blasphemy of the

01:24:19

Holy Spirit being unforgivable, and tying that into God's middle knowledge. I think the context is very clear that this is an eternal sin, and there's some debate about whether or not that sin can even be committed today.

01:24:31

It seems to be a sin that was connected to the religious leaders of Jesus' day who saw his miracles, who had this incredible light before them, and yet they disparaged the

01:24:44

Lord Jesus Christ and blasphemed the Holy Spirit. The other thing that we were talking about,

01:24:52

Dr. McGregor said that in Hebrew there is no verb, or no causative verb, something along those lines.

01:25:01

There's nothing in Hebrew that speaks about causal relations, and I would contest that.

01:25:06

In Hebrew there is, in the verbal stems, there's what we call the binyam stem in Hebrew.

01:25:12

There is what's called the hithal, the hithal verb stem, and the hithal means causative. It's the causative form of the verb, which means to cause, to do something.

01:25:21

So I'm not sure if Dr. McGregor is familiar with that part of Hebrew grammar.

01:25:28

We're also talking about God being an indirect cause of evil.

01:25:33

I was kind of taken aback by that statement by Dr. McGregor, of God being in some sense an indirect cause of evil.

01:25:41

I don't think God in Scripture is ever an indirect cause of evil.

01:25:46

It's very clear that I think Dr. McGregor would agree with me that God is not the author of evil.

01:25:52

First John 1 -5 says that God is light, and in Him there is no darkness. James 1 -13 and following says that let no one say when they're tempted that they're tempted by God, for God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does

01:26:05

He tempt any man. I think that what we see in Scripture is that God is not an indirect cause of evil, but rather that men, and I believe in compatibilism.

01:26:18

I'm not saying that compatibilism argues that God's sovereign decrees are compatible with the actions of men, including evil men, and therefore we could see in the story of Joseph and his brothers that we see the compatibility between God's decree that Joseph would have been sold into Egypt and that eventually he would rise to power in Egypt, but at the same time

01:26:43

God worked to the secondary means, as the Westminster Confession puts it.

01:26:49

God used secondary means, and that is He used the evil machinations of Joseph's brothers to sell him as a slave into Egypt, which would eventually save the nation.

01:27:03

So that at the end of the day, Joseph can say in Genesis 50 that what you meant for evil,

01:27:09

God meant for good, and that it was God who accomplished this act.

01:27:15

And in so doing, of course, God does not impugn himself with any evil or malice.

01:27:22

The maliciousness of Joseph's brothers in wanting to kill him, of course, does not impugn God's character, because they were simply acting in accordance with their own sinful nature.

01:27:31

The same thing can be said about, I know Dr. McGregor pointed back to John 18 -36, that if my kingdom were of this world, my servants would fight me, and so forth, and some

01:27:43

Holiness have argued this as an example of the counterfactuals, the if -then situations, and so forth.

01:27:50

But again, we hold to the God of Ephesians 1, who has elected us,

01:27:59

He has predestined us from the beginning of time. I just think that these arguments about middle knowledge, at the end of the day, what are we really accomplishing?

01:28:11

Does this really ring down to the glory of God, or does the decrees of God that He has decreed when

01:28:19

He took counsel with Himself from the foundation of the world, that God would do all things according to the counsel of His will, and that this would redound to the glory of God, to the praise of His glory, as Paul sets out.

01:28:37

And so, to be quite frank, I've been scratching my head trying to get around what exactly is this middle knowledge all about, and I understand where Dr.

01:28:47

McGregor is coming from, but at the end of the day, the libertarian free will of man was an integral part of Molina's argumentation.

01:28:57

Dr. Craig, being Armenian, of course, capitalizes on this concept, and so I cannot help but look at Molinism as an attempt to syncretize the sovereign will of God with the libertarian free will of man.

01:29:16

And again, that's why I started off by pointing out that I'm not denying that humans have free will, but that that free will is constrained by sin, that man, outside of regeneration, will always do that which serves his own purposes, his own selfish ambitions, and so forth.

01:29:39

And I just cannot help but think that Molina, being with the Jesuits, not to say that this is a conspiracy theory of any sort, but there was a mission.

01:29:47

The Jesuit mission was to undermine the Reformation, and to undo what they perceived to be the spread of heresy in Western Europe, in the

01:29:56

Roman Catholic world at the time. And so I think that if we go back to the basics, like the

01:30:03

Reformers did, we will find that at the end of the day, man is in bondage in his will, and he needs to be set free by the grace of God, and those whom the

01:30:13

Son sets free will be free indeed. Thank you very much. Well, we have to go to our final break.

01:30:20

It's going to be very brief, and if anybody would like to join us with questions for our two guests, both

01:30:27

Kirk McGregor, the Molinist, and Dr. Tony Costa, the Calvinist, our email address is chrisarnsen at gmail .com.

01:30:35

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01:34:02

Welcome back. This is Chris Arnzen. If you've just tuned us in for the last 90 minutes and the next 25 minutes to come, we have been discussing and will continue to discuss

01:34:13

Calvinism versus Molinism, a discussion between two brothers in Christ who disagree over how

01:34:19

Scripture explains God's sovereignty and man's freedom. And our participants have been and will continue to be the

01:34:27

Molinist, Dr. Kirk MacGregor, Assistant Professor of Philosophy and Religion at McPherson College, and Dr.

01:34:34

Tony Costa, the Calvinist, Professor of Apologetics and Islam at Toronto Baptist Seminary. On air with me as my co -host today is

01:34:42

Anthony Eugenio, co -founder of New York Apologetics. And if you'd like to join us on the air, speak now or forever hold your peace, because we are rapidly running out of time.

01:34:54

Our email address is ChrisArnzen at gmail .com. ChrisArnzen at gmail .com.

01:35:00

What I'm going to do is I'm going to ask my own two questions, one for each of our guests.

01:35:07

And actually, each of our guests can respond to the other guest's answer as well.

01:35:15

And then we'll have Anthony Eugenio and I taking turns reading questions that we received either before or during the show.

01:35:26

My questions from the audience that came in have all been submitted during the live broadcast, and I have their names and locations.

01:35:35

I don't know if Anthony has the names and locations, but I know that he has a list of questions that came up while promoting this program.

01:35:44

But my questions are, and I'll start with, I will start with Dr.

01:35:53

Kirk McGregor. My question is, do you believe that evil things, horrible things, wicked things, have been at any time ordained by God himself?

01:36:11

And not only would I include the most dramatic example of that, the execution of Jesus Christ, the only perfect and sinless human that ever walked the face of the earth, but also we have an example

01:36:26

I think that is quite startling in 2 Samuel chapter 12, where Nathan the prophet is exposing

01:36:37

David for being guilty of adultery and murder. And through the prophet

01:36:45

Nathan, the Lord is speaking and he says to David, this is what the

01:36:52

Lord says, out of your own household I am going to bring calamity on you.

01:37:00

Before your very eyes, I will take your wives and give them to one who is close to you, and he will sleep with your wives in broad daylight.

01:37:11

You did it in secret, but I will do this thing in broad daylight before all

01:37:17

Israel. Here you have God saying that he is going to do these things, and these are horrible and wicked things, including adultery.

01:37:25

So if you could answer my questions about God's decreeing evil acts. Yes, these things are ordained by God.

01:37:36

My question is, how is it ordained? When God ordains something, is it sheerly

01:37:45

God's power, or is it a combination of God's power and God's knowledge?

01:37:52

To respond to an earlier point, what I was trying to convey, maybe didn't speak clearly enough, is that the causative verbal stem in Hebrew doesn't make a distinction between indirect and direct causation.

01:38:07

And I would say the same thing here, that if in the ancient Near East you don't have a distinction between indirect and direct causation, both of them would be read as God causes it,

01:38:21

God does it, God brings it about. Then we have to compare Scripture with Scripture and say, given that other

01:38:29

Scriptures, like in 1 John, teach that God cannot sin, that in him is light and in him there is no darkness, then how on earth can

01:38:40

God ordain these things? How can God do these things? And my answer is, middle knowledge allows

01:38:46

God to do these things indirectly rather than directly. If God does them indirectly, then it seems that God is not morally culpable, as in the cheating example that I gave.

01:39:03

But if God does them directly, then it does seem that God is morally culpable.

01:39:09

Now, just one follow -up question real quick, in regard to something like the crucifixion of Christ, which although he willingly and voluntarily laid his life down and had complete sovereignty and power over the whole circumstances, those around him certainly didn't know that, and they in essence murdered him, that was an event that had to happen.

01:39:35

It was a necessity in order for the sins of his people to be saved.

01:39:45

Was God just looking through the corridors of time and knowing that Jews would cry out for his death and Roman soldiers would nail him to a cross, or was this something that was specifically decreed before the foundation of the world?

01:40:02

Well, again, I reject the either -or distinction. I think that it's both, although I would disagree with the looking down the corridors of time.

01:40:12

That's a particularly Arminian view, and Molina doesn't hold to that view. Molina is a conceptualist when it comes to God's knowledge of not only middle knowledge, but also

01:40:26

God's knowledge of the future. So Molina doesn't think that God looks ahead and sees out there what people will do, as though people are somehow the cause of what it is that God knows.

01:40:39

Rather, it's the idea that God is so intelligent, is so unbelievably intelligent, that he knows the pattern.

01:40:51

Or if you want to get philosophical, I've actually been trying not to, if you want to get philosophical, the essence of every possible person that God might create,

01:41:04

I would say, is contained within God himself. That God knows, as the ideas of his own mind, that this is a possible person

01:41:13

I could create, this is a possible person I could create. God knows his imagination that well, and God is so intelligent that he can look at each one of those patterns and know, if he were to create it, what it would do.

01:41:29

And one might say, well, how could God know that? Well, I don't claim to have an answer to that, except to say that just our asking how

01:41:37

God could know it doesn't mean that God can't know it. After all, we can't answer, how did

01:41:43

God create out of nothing? The only condition for God to be able to do something is for that thing not being logically impossible, and it's not logically impossible for God to have that knowledge.

01:41:55

And so I think that, yes, with the crucifixion of Jesus, God knows that if he were to create these various actors in these various circumstances, that they would, he knows this with certainty, he knows that they would do these horrible things to Jesus, they would commit the ultimate atrocity, and God, in order to redeem the world, decrees that particular course of events.

01:42:22

So I think it's both. And Tony, if you could respond to that before I ask you a question. Yeah, I think that, as I said earlier, that God's decrees that Jesus Christ was the

01:42:35

Lamb claimed from the foundation of the world. He was foreknown from the foundation of the world, as 1 Peter tells us.

01:42:41

And I would not see it again as God knowing what possible person would do this, or the range of possibilities, and so forth.

01:42:51

I think the danger here is, well, and I cannot help but think of Psalm 50, verse 12, where the

01:42:56

Lord says, you thought that I was like yourself, but now I rebuke you and lay the charge before you.

01:43:03

Yes, we are made in the image of God, yes, we are made in the likeness of God, but I think we need to be careful.

01:43:08

Sometimes I think we're judging the infinite mind of God from a human perspective. God is not exactly like us.

01:43:16

God is an eternal being. He's an infinite mind. We cannot fully comprehend what that means, to be infinite, to be omnipresent, omnipotent, omniscient.

01:43:25

This is something that is beyond our comprehension. My ways are not your ways, nor are my thoughts your thoughts.

01:43:30

I think we need to be very cautious here. But what I would say with the crucifixion of Jesus, as Acts 427 points out, that all of these people,

01:43:38

Pontius Pilate and the Gentiles and the Jewish leaders, they all did what your hand had predetermined.

01:43:44

And so what I see here is God's eternal decree, and God uses the secondary means, and that is he uses the evil machinations of people to bring about his purposes.

01:43:55

Okay, now my question for you, Dr. Costa, is actually in regard to a scriptural text that Dr.

01:44:04

Kirk McGregor cited earlier, and it's an interesting passage because on its surface it appears to contradict both

01:44:16

Calvinists and Arminians in certain areas. It appears to clearly contradict the

01:44:22

Arminian understanding of, and I'm not saying that Dr. McGregor is an Arminian necessarily, but I'm just saying that the

01:44:29

Arminian concept of the universal parity of God's love for humanity, and his desire that each and every human who is ever born, and will ever be born, that they enter into eternal life with Christ.

01:44:46

It seems to contradict that, but it also seems to contradict the

01:44:51

Calvinist understanding of total depravity and his inability, man's inability to please

01:44:58

God by offering to him a faith that saves him before he's regenerate.

01:45:04

And this is the passage, and I'm going to start earlier in the text than Dr. McGregor, than where Dr.

01:45:12

McGregor began in 1 Thessalonians 2, beginning at verse 13, for this reason we also constantly thank

01:45:18

God that when you receive the word of God which you heard from us, you accepted it not as the word of men, but for what it really is, the word of God, which also performs its work in you who believe.

01:45:31

For you brethren became imitators of the churches of God in Christ Jesus that are in Judea, for you also endured the same sufferings at the hands of your own countrymen, even as they did from the

01:45:45

Jews, who both killed the Lord Jesus and the prophets and drove us out. They are not pleasing to God, but hostile to all men, hindering us from speaking to the

01:45:57

Gentiles so that they may be saved, with the result that they will always fill up the measure of wrath of their sins.

01:46:05

Now this is an English translation, obviously. Does the Greek require that in the text, hindering us from speaking to the

01:46:16

Gentiles so that they may be saved, does that Greek necessitate that without these

01:46:25

Christians sharing the gospel with the Gentiles, these specific

01:46:31

Christians sharing the gospel with these Gentiles, that they will be lost?

01:46:36

That it's somehow depending upon the acts and efforts and words of men to usher these

01:46:44

Gentiles into eternal life. Does the Greek require that, that understanding of it? What verse are you referring to in particular?

01:46:53

Well that'd be specifically verse 16, 1st Thessalonians 2. Right, okay.

01:47:00

About forbidding, hindering us? Yeah, they are not pleasing to God, but hostile to all men, hindering us from speaking to the

01:47:07

Gentiles so that they may be saved. Right, right, okay.

01:47:14

Well, again, I see this as the secondary means that I was mentioning earlier.

01:47:21

I think that even the very opposition that they were facing, I think, was something that was ordained of God, and I think as well that this plays into the understanding of God's righteous indignation and his justice against the wicked and those who disobey the gospel and oppose the gospel.

01:47:42

And so the way I would see that, Chris, is I would see that as part of God's secondary means.

01:47:50

Yeah, so what I meant is, does the Greek indicate that without the efforts of men, these people are certainly doomed?

01:48:02

And the other flip side of the coin is, could the preaching of the gospel to a reprobate person bring them to eternal life?

01:48:12

The English might lend one to believe that one may be saved without being regenerate, if you follow what

01:48:23

I'm saying. Okay, I would have to be honest with you. One may come to faith without being regenerate, is what

01:48:31

I meant to phrase it. No, no. Can they come to faith without being regenerate? Absolutely not. No.

01:48:37

You believe because you have been born of God. Right, but is the Greek there so ambiguous that it allows for a more

01:48:45

Calvinistic understanding? Because in the English reading of it, it seems like a Romanian proof text.

01:48:55

Well, I don't want to just give an off -the -cuff remark. I would honestly have to look at that a and look at the

01:49:04

Greek language more closely. I don't think I could do it justice in the small amount of time we have. Okay, because that's why

01:49:10

I said earlier, it both seems to contradict Calvinists' understanding of some point, but also

01:49:15

Arminians, because Arminians believe that God wants every single person to be saved, so there seems to be a conflict with both views.

01:49:27

But anyway, Dr. McGregor. Dr. McGregor, can you respond to that as well?

01:49:39

I'm, I guess, trying to find the passage.

01:49:46

I'm looking. I'm not really seeing it. Could you, so you're in 2

01:49:51

Thessalonians 2, verse 16? Yes.

01:49:59

Well, that was the last verse that I read. I started at 13. Right. Started at 13.

01:50:10

And I thought that was the verse that you brought up earlier. Perhaps I was wrong, but it still plays within the construct of my question.

01:50:20

Yeah, yeah. What I was referencing earlier is when it says, the coming of the lawless one will be in accordance with how

01:50:29

Satan works, he will use all sorts of displays of power through signs and wonders that serve the lie, and all the ways that wickedness deceives those who are perishing.

01:50:38

They perish because they refuse to love the truth and so be saved. For this reason, God sends them a powerful delusion, so that they will believe the lie, so that all will be condemned who have not believed the truth, but have delighted in wickedness.

01:50:52

And so what I'm saying is, because I believe in the inerrancy of Scripture, one reason this issue is so important to me is that I don't want to give up biblical inerrancy.

01:51:04

And I don't see how that particular passage can be true unless God's sending is indirect rather than direct.

01:51:15

That was the point I was trying to make. So I'm not sure if that answers your question or not.

01:51:23

Okay, that's fine. And now we're going to take some listener questions, as many as we can take, and I already know that we need a part two.

01:51:31

I hope that you all can return for part two, and we could discuss what date that will be after the show is over.

01:51:38

But let me start with Mark. Hello?

01:51:46

Chris, can I get one in there real quick? Okay, we do have a long line of people who have written in from my audience, but go ahead.

01:51:54

All right, listen, before Professor McGregor said that God decrees something, it is certain, but not necessary.

01:52:02

So my question would be with regards to the crucifixion, is it possible that the crucifixion wouldn't happen?

01:52:11

Wouldn't God's decree be certain? Every decree of God would be certain and necessary by the very fact that He decreed it, because otherwise men could overturn

01:52:24

God's decree and God's decree be worthless. So I guess my question would be, was it necessary for Jesus to go to the cross based on God's decree?

01:52:36

Is that a question for me? Yes, for both of you, actually. Okay, I would say it's necessary in order to forgive the sins of the world.

01:52:47

I don't think it's logically necessary from God's decree. I think that it's certain from God's decree.

01:52:55

And that because God has infallible omniscience,

01:53:01

I'm not an open theist by any stretch, because God's omniscience is infallible, then what

01:53:09

God middle knows will happen is what will happen. And I just think that God is that intelligent.

01:53:19

And it's not that God is like taking a risk here, or that somehow maybe the crucifixion won't happen.

01:53:27

But when you talk necessarily, a philosophical term, what you mean is that the decree is the necessary and sufficient condition for the end.

01:53:41

And what I'm saying is the decree is a necessary condition and conjoined with God's knowledge of what various people would do in certain circumstances, which

01:53:55

I honestly don't see any difference between that and the secondary means and what

01:54:01

Dr. Costa terms compatibilism. I'm unclear as to his definition of compatibilism, but I don't see much difference between our two views.

01:54:13

I wonder if we're not speaking past each other. Well, one thing that I have to ask that make it more clear as to how you two disagree, is that does

01:54:28

God, and I'll ask specifically Dr. McGregor, does God ordain anything that he does not know, through his omniscience, his creatures will already do anyway?

01:54:46

Does God decree anything without, because of his omniscience, knowing that this is something they will do anyway?

01:54:58

It almost seems like the way, now that could be just because of my stupidity, and that won't be the first time, that's the result of a confusion on my part, but it almost seems as if in order to protect the righteousness of God, you are saying something that seems really close to an

01:55:17

Arminian understanding of the sovereignty and providence of God and so on, and his decrees, that it seems you are saying that God doesn't ordain something to happen unless he knows, because of his omniscience, and I know that you don't like the corridors of time analogy, but you seem to be saying that he doesn't decree anything unless he knows that these wicked humans will do these things anyway, as far as evil acts.

01:55:50

Well, it can be both. What I'm saying is that God, in his decree, in his sovereignty, can use both his power and his knowledge.

01:56:02

So, I think that there are certain actions in the course of human history that God directly does, that God is the direct cause, and that happens in our lives all the time.

01:56:15

So, in my life and the lives of people in scripture, that God has directly caused.

01:56:21

I'll bet you you're probably speaking of wonderful things that you view as blessings.

01:56:26

I'm specifically speaking about evil acts, like the murder of Jesus. Right. I would say that with regard to evil acts, that God does not directly cause them, and that he cannot directly cause them, without being the author of sin.

01:56:47

Now, honestly, I don't know if that's an Arminian position. I've never considered myself an

01:56:55

Arminian, nor have I grown up in an Arminian background. So, if there's disagreement between myself and Arminians, I'm unaware of it.

01:57:06

Wow, I always thought that the Anabaptists were uh historically Arminians.

01:57:11

I didn't know that they existed before Jacob Arminius, but I mean, I always thought they did. Yes, yes. The Anabaptists predate

01:57:19

Arminius by about 70 years. Right, but what I meant was, just like some might say that Luther had

01:57:25

Calvinistic views, even though he was a reformer before Luther, before Calvin was.

01:57:31

But anyway, we're running out of time, and my brains are leaking out of my ears right now.

01:57:37

But I think we definitely need a part two, if you guys are all agreeable, because we don't have any time to answer any of our listener questions now.

01:57:45

So, we will discuss that after we go off the air, and I want to make sure that our listeners have all of your contact information.

01:57:54

First of all, we have Dr. Kirk McGregor. The website for McPherson College is mcpherson .edu,

01:58:05

and that's m -c -p -h -e -r -s -o -n dot e -d -u, and you can find out more information about Dr.

01:58:11

McGregor on the faculty link on that page. And Dr. Tony Kost is a seminary where he is on the faculty, that is.

01:58:19

Toronto Baptist Seminary is tbs .edu, tbs .edu.

01:58:26

And do either of you have any additional contact information to share with our listeners?

01:58:33

Well, my email address is m -a -c -g -r -e -g -k at mcpherson .edu.

01:58:40

Okay, repeat that, please. Yeah, your voice disappeared.

01:58:46

Your voice disappeared. Repeat that again, please. My email address is m -a -c -g -r -e -g -k at mcpherson .edu.

01:58:55

Okay, and Dr. Kosta, any additional information? Yeah, they can contact me at tmkosta at gmail .com,

01:59:03

tmkosta at gmail .com, and they can also check my website, which is in need of a major renovation, tonykosta .web

01:59:12

.com, all in words, tonykosta .web. And Anthony Uvinio, New York Apologetics, please give us the website.

01:59:20

www .newyorkapologetics .com, and you could reach me at anthony, a -n -t -h -o -n -y, at newyorkapologetics .com.

01:59:29

Okay, keep your ears open for part two of this discussion.

01:59:35

I want to thank everybody who participated in today's show, and those of you who have written in questions, but we didn't have time to ask or have them answered, but we will,

01:59:44

God willing, when we have a part two of this broadcast. I hope you all always remember for the rest of your lives that Jesus Christ is a far greater