45 - Calvinism vs. Arminianism, Part 7 - Christ Died for All People

Well, we are.

We're back with the striving for eternity Academy's school of systematic theology.

We're glad that you're glad that we're here now.

I know that some actually were under the impression that we wouldn't have class they thought they'd get out of class.

Because I have an interview Immediately following the live class and they said oh, but that show that you're being

interviewed on is at 830.

That's right.

It is at 830, but they're not gonna have me on until after class because they know we have class.

Yes, think you're gonna get out of class.

I don't think so.

We even had class.

Well, okay, we didn't technically have class.

We had a hangout during a hurricane as long as we had self -service.

We sat in a restaurant and still did a class.

You guys aren't getting out that easy some of you people some people emailing me wanting to know if there's class tonight,

huh?

I don't think so.

I'm not letting you off that easy.

So Some of some of you students were probably those people that in college like sat there with the

watch going up.

Ten minutes late we can leave.

Yeah, I know your type.

I was like that anyway, so Welcome to the striving for eternity

Academy's school of systematic theology.

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So we'll see anyway enough of that if you'd go and grab your

syllabus that is for the paid students, by the way if you are a Paid student in other words, you've enrolled

you've gone to the website down there and enrolled in the Academy.

You get a syllabus which gives you all of my notes.

The other thing you will get if you haven't already if you have paid you'll get a growing in grace book which is what

we're gonna pick up going through in just a Few for a few weeks after we finish

the lessons on Salvation we're gonna kind of do that in the middle.

What that's gonna be is actually we're gonna teach you how to train someone through that book.

It's a a discipleship book for new believers something you can use in your church or with new People that you have the opportunity

to lead to Christ and you'll be able to see how to use that.

So that I hope will be fun for someone.

Maybe you anyway.

But we uh, we're finishing up.

I hope today on Dealing with we're actually we'll go through we're in book

number two of our study and we've been going through section three, which is the doctrine

of Salvation we spent several weeks now.

Actually, this is the seventh lesson on this or second seventh week in lesson

number eight.

Which is God's sovereignty and human responsibility.

It's it's an issue that many people struggle over.

We are looking at God's sovereignty side and we're looking really with this at looking at what

Calvinism teaches.

Now Calvinism is not purely God's sovereignty.

It's more that side of the argument and we are talking about as we went through this

What the acronym TULIP was so we looked at that as first being Total depravity, which

does not mean that we are as bad as we possibly could be but that we are.

Our entire being is influence controlled enslaved to sin at birth and

therefore we are Totally in our complete being

enslaved to sin even our will so we can't in and of ourselves can't

choose to Put faith in God apart from God doing the work.

That's really what that ends up meaning.

In other words, God takes 100 % of the credit when it comes to our salvation.

We take zero.

We can't take any credit and that's really what follows in with unconditional election to you in TULIP

and this is Unconditional election does not mean something that comes around every four years when you vote for

president.

But it is the idea that God Selected God chose us.

But not based on anything that we did.

The idea being that God knew what we would choose and therefore he chose us that would not that would be conditional

election.

So what you have with unconditional election is one of two things either you are believing that God

Saves us unconditionally meaning that there's no condition from us.

That is the reason he chose to save us.

It's purely his choice.

That's your first option.

That's the unconditional part.

So it's either unconditional or conditional or you have an issue with the election part in other words Did God choose you or

did you choose God?

That's really what it's saying is God chose you apart from yourself apart from anything that you did.

The L which is the one that most people seem to have problems with is limited atonement now with this one We

gave you two different definitions here that you could use for limited atonement so that

you might be able to Get a better handle on it.

There's basically two different ways that you could see this one is going to be

when you look at.

As many historically would argue this is the definition is That God

on the cross Jesus Christ when he died he died Only for the sins of the elect and what

they mean in that is that the limited atonement was at the cross

now that is.

That is a way that many of the early reformers would argue.

But another definition that many hold to with limited atonement is that it is limited in its

application.

Not its offer.

In other words Christ died for all.

But that doesn't mean that all have it applied to them.

That is a different definition depending how you define that will define maybe whether you believe in limited

atonement or not but the Historically, it's really been the first.

But many people have come to accept that more in a latter sense of that definition.

And so this is the reason why we try I really try to stay away from the labels.

We're taking the time to go through them in these weeks because we want you to understand what the labels mean and do not mean.

Because we often find is that people attack and argue against straw men and what you see

is two different people on either side of these arguments will argue and They're arguing

really Not understanding the issue and what happens is is I'm sure you've experienced when someone tells you

that they know what you believe and then they misquote what you believe and you're going that's not it and you know.

You get into this whole debate and you end up arguing against what you think they're saying and not you know.

It becomes just a muddy a bloody mess.

All right a muddy mess.

I said bloody mess.

Well, we're not gonna get into fistfights here.

Save that for the gym.

No, so irresistible.

Grace is the fourth.

That's the I.

This is the idea that when God does the work in us it is

Irresistible, so we receive this grace Irresistibly this this doesn't mean is

this is how many people try to argue this that it means that Oh God is Forcing us to believe God and so people that don't believe

in these doctrines will say God doesn't force anybody to believe On him, that's true.

God doesn't force people to believe on him.

I agree.

That's not the issue the issue isn't whether God Agrees with you or not.

It's whether or not the You know whether you're

fairly interpreting what someone's meaning by what they say, all right

in so the grace the irresistible grace means that God Does

the work and we're gonna spend a little time talking about that the way that I understand this point

Is really what we're going to talk about a little bit today as we try to reconcile these two views together but so we're gonna move

on to the one that most people seem to accept and that is the Perseverance of the Saints and what basically

this means is As some understand it once saved always saved is how a lot of people define

or try to argue it The idea that once a person is saved there.

They can't lose their salvation.

It is the doctrine of eternal security, which we're going to get into In

Next lesson is the next lesson.

Yeah next lesson.

So we're gonna look at that in Probably next week.

We hope Hope that there won't be any More that we're gonna talk about

this lesson today.

We're gonna finish it up.

So let us take a look then at the human responsibility side now, this is where the

Armenians typically end up going and The Armenians Side of it would be

where there's focus more on the human side of the argument.

We looked last week at all the commands to repent and believe and if you

remember and if you're a good student you've taken notes and you have all your blanks filled in

and we said scripture was filled for cut filled with commands for All people to

repent and believe not just the elect.

Now one argument that some would say is yes.

Well, and and and you know, I'll say this also if you happen to catch this week's

Podcast of the Bible thumping wingnut or actually I was last week's it was Episode number 12 in case you want to go look

that up.

But on episode 12, I think Colin Pearson did a good job of trying to

answer an honest question if I'm very correctly it was from a from a Professing atheist a

non -believer but answering an honest question about trying to reconcile these things.

And I think he did a pretty good job of trying to explain that God does the work a hundred percent.

We can't take credit, but we have a responsibility.

We are commanded to repent and he recognized that and it's it is a

tough balance for many to understand and so.

This is why we're taking the time because many many people have really done some damage to the body of Christ.

By arguing over these issues where there really shouldn't be an argument and if you want to

see that, I mean just go on Facebook and declare that you are a Calvinist or a.

Or you declare that you think Calvinism is wrong and you'll see the knives come out with

people.

And why you know say you're an Arminian or a Calvinist on on Facebook and someone's gonna like blast you, you know.

Unless of course all your friends agree with you and you don't have a wide diversity and friends on Facebook.

But the reality is people get really really bent out of shape over this and I think it's it's a little bit

unfair.

Because most often people are not Addressing the real issues.

They're addressing strongman arguments what they would have they define the terms that other people are

using so.

That's actually why I use the term God's sovereignty and human responsibility because

Those terms everyone kind of agrees.

God is completely sovereign.

We have no right to claim credit for salvation and yet we have a responsibility.

We're commanded to repent.

So let's pick this up now with the offer of salvation for all people.

And so I what I was saying this right?

I mentioned Colin Pearce on Bible thumping wingnut what I was saying there with him is that you know it's a tough challenge

where God commands all people to repent and you know the the issue and he brought this out was

the Issue of salvation the offer goes to all people.

We don't know who is and is not saved.

Right.

I mean, there's not some big, you know letter East stamped on their head and we can go.

Oh, hey, you're elect or you're gonna be elect.

So let me just share the gospel with you.

No, you and I when we go out on the streets, we don't know who God is gonna save.

God does though.

Because he already did it.

Because he's outside of time.

Remember, this is why I say these these lessons are all rooted back in those first lessons of this this

school where we talked About God's attributes because that's what all these are tied to.

God is outside of time and he's omniscient.

He didn't learn anything.

All right.

So what we end up having Is the fact that we have to remember

who God is when we talk about these things and not put him inside of time.

Or put him as if he had to learn something.

All right.

So if we look in if you look in your syllabus some people argue that the word

world Does not mean all People that's your first blank all people.

So some people argue that the word world Does not mean all people but a

subset.

That's your next blank a subset so the idea here is that the word world means all people

groups or all Tribes and languages, you know all all.

You know, so all means, you know some Americans and some Canadians and some

Mexicans and some Chileans and some you know French and you know

everywhere in other words the all just means everywhere in the world.

There's some so it's a subset of all those people.

Now I think that the clearest passage on this and this is one that I think

I find Many people have struggled with if they really hold to a view of that first

definition of limited atonement that Christ died only for the elect on the cross.

Now you're gonna come when you come to text of Scripture.

You're gonna do one of two things and this is why we started our schools with the school biblical Harmoneutics

learning how to properly interpret if we follow those principles and not all of us are gonna follow them all the time

perfectly.

Okay, we should try to but if we do We're gonna

let the text Define our theology now there is not a

person that I know that would argue that they come to the Bible and

That the their systematic theology is going to define the Bible.

They're going to say that the Bible and it you know defines their systematic theology.

That's not true for any of us.

We all come to the Bible with Presuppositions.

Every single one of us.

We're gonna come to the Bible with our Presuppositions from our Theology

from our systematic theology now if you haven't studied that theology now.

You're kind of an open book if you're someone like me who became a Christian and didn't know any other Christians.

It was just me and a Bible for two years before I met another Christian what I learned I learned just

from reading.

Which is why when the Jehovah Witnesses tell me that someone had to teach me that Jesus was God.

No, I read it for myself.

Thank you very much.

But what you end up seeing is this.

We come to the Bible and We have to try to mentally shut off our

theological system and address the text as it says and if the text says something different than our

theology, then we need to adjust our Man -made system for what God has said.

Okay.

So with that said let us take a look at first John 2 2.

And see what this says because there's this is this is really I think the clearest text.

For this and it says is speaking of Jesus.

He is The propitiation try saying that 110 times fast

that basically means he is the The right the this substitute of wrath

he is the payment of God's wrath he is the propitiation For our sins

and not for ours only.

But also for the sins of the whole world.

Now, let us take a little time to look at this.

And we're gonna well we're gonna go through this actually in the in the Syllabus, so I'll hold off and let's break this down.

First off Jesus is the propitiation.

That's your blank their propitiation for our sins.

That Clearly means that Jesus Christ is the

propitiation of the sins of all Christians.

But the verse doesn't stop there.

So the propitiation to remember it means that he was the substitute of wrath for us.

He paid the punishment of wrath.

Who did he pay it for.

What says the world?

How do we define world in this case?

Well, it says here that this verse it doesn't stop with us as Christians.

It continues to state that Jesus was the propitiation not.

Let's put it put it back up so we could see Not for ours only but

also for the whole world.

Now, let's break this down for a moment and look at this.

All right.

There are three ways that Reveal clearly that this means every person and

that's your blank there every person.

Okay?

All right.

The word world is used now.

Let us stop and look at this the word world can mean All people in all you know

all the tribes like like some are arguing it can mean that.

It doesn't always mean that and it doesn't always mean all people.

Well the word world is qualified by whole

world.

Now that could mean everywhere on the globe or every person.

Still haven't qualified it.

Have we even the world?

Can mean all people.

Doesn't always even the whole world is kind of emphasizing all over the place.

So it's not a subset of people in a specific area.

But it's either all people or all over the world, but then there's this one catch the

comparison between the Christians and the world.

Okay, he says put put it we'll put it back up there for a second and you see it says

Not for hours only well who the hours the hours are Us

as believers.

This is John writing about Believers, it's not just us as believers only

but also for the world.

So it's a contrast the believers and The unbelievers now

that's gonna cause some people to freak out.

I understand and some people I've actually heard argue that what this is This is really talking about is

the Jewish Gentile mindset the hour is Jewish people the

Others the non us are the Gentiles.

That would be very very strange.

I'll tell you three reasons why one It would be strange because nowhere in John's writings.

Do we see him bringing up the Jew Gentile issue?

To it would be strange because what he's addressing is the Gnostic issue, which is a Greek philosophy

not a Jewish philosophy and The third reason is because by the time John

was writing this it is far Along in this start of the of the church and the Jew

Gentile Argument isn't really used anymore at this point.

It was one church.

So for those three reasons I find it hard to believe that he's arguing for Jew Gentile distinction.

He's making a distinction here.

I think very clearly between the believers and the unbelievers.

Okay, and so this one verse first John 2 2 says that Jesus

Christ is the pay the payment of wrath For us as believers

and also not just us but also The whole world in other words all people

the believing community and the unbelieving community now I understand that for some people they

are spinning and going.

Wait a minute.

How could that be?

That can't be because if Jesus died for all then all would go to heaven

if he made that payment.

Hold on.

I'm gonna answer that I'm not just teasing you to get you to pay attention all the way through class.

Well, maybe I am but I'm gonna try to answer that.

Let's take a look at a couple more verses first John 1 29 The next day he

saw Jesus coming toward him and said behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of some people.

No takes away the sin of the world.

John 3 16 for God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son that whosoever should believe in

him Should not perish but have everlasting life.

John 6 51 I am the bread of life that came down from heaven if anyone

eats this bread I will live with him live he will live forever and The

bread that I give for the life of the world is my flesh.

Okay.

So here you're seeing a distinction that he's talking about the world.

And again, you see a subtle distinction here not as clear as in 1st John 2 2.

But you see a subtle distinction between those that believe in him and those that don't.

Okay, let's go on 2nd Corinthians 5 19 that is in

Christ.

God was reconciling the world to himself.

So this is the world Reconciling the world to himself not counting their trespasses against

them and entrusting to us a message of reconciliation.

1st Timothy 2 3 and 4 mentions the word world.

This is good.

And it is pleasing in the sight of God our Savior who desires all People to be

saved and come to the knowledge of the truth.

This is saying all People this isn't necessarily saying world and we are trying to in this point

show that The offer of salvation is for all people and here you see it.

God is willing that all Would come to truth, but just because God is desiring this.

Let's keep this in mind that just because he's desiring it.

There is a difference in his willingness he might will for us to be saved in a.

One sense he has this desire, but he doesn't force it.

He doesn't enact it and it's not his sovereign will.

All right.

One last one that we'll look at for this is all we like sheep have gone astray.

We have all turned Everyone to his own way and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of

us all.

Now, let's take a look at this because here you see all we like sheep have gone astray.

So we are saying that all there is all human beings every one of us now

if we are if all people if this verse is all people then The Lord

laid him on him the iniquity of us all.

Then the Lord laid the iniquity of all people that the all in has to stay in its context.

So we have to make sure that in this case we let the context define it and

this is what you do with the word all and and world when it says of John the

Baptist that all of You know Judea was coming to him.

Well, not every single human being was man a lot of people men like large numbers of people.

But it doesn't mean every single one.

But in the context of Isaiah 53 we accept that all means all.

I mean all means every single human being is born Into sin that all have fallen

short of the mark of God and therefore the all in that context also means that he

died for all that the The iniquity of sin was laid upon Christ for all and you go,

but but doesn't that mean then the payment is made?

Hold on.

Just wait, we're gonna try to reconcile it.

We're gonna try to answer 2 ,000 years of debate.

If there's anyone still in class because you all think I'm a heretic by now one way or the other I understand.

Let's look at one more point before we try to reconcile and that is that salvation.

The salvation of the whosoever believes.

Now this is where we get into the Some of the issue that many argue

the scriptures are clear that everyone who believes Will be

saved that's your blank there Will be saved.

So every single person that believes will be saved.

This doesn't mean some believe they're just not saved.

I Think it was I think actually on the Bible thumping wingnut they dealt with it.

Either in episode 12 or 13 this idea that God doesn't save people against their well.

It's not like if someone really really really sincerely believes in Jesus.

But he didn't save them.

If someone believes in Jesus a saving belief.

It's because God did the work and they're gonna believe and they're gonna be saved.

But there's many people that believe for selfish reasons because they want to avoid hell.

They want to see family is why don't tell your children.

Don't believe don't you want to believe in Jesus because you want to see grandma or grandpa.

Don't don't guilt your kids into believing in Christ and have it making a false profession of

faith.

Don't guilt your kids into believing.

You know, don't you want to avoid hell?

That's not the message of the gospel.

All right, and that's the reason so many people say they believe.

But they didn't believe.

They wanted fire insurance.

Whosoever means and so get ready to write this in your blank there whosoever means who?

so ever.

That was pretty hard, huh?

Whosoever means who? so ever.

Therefore it is.

Anyone that's your next blank there anyone.

The gospel can be offered to all People because anyone that

believes will be saved.

For Christ is Romans 10 verse 4 for

Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who

Believes you see this everyone who believes Romans 10 going

a little further.

For Everyone who calls and this is the whosoever in the King James.

For everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.

Those are emphatics emphatic statements first.

Timothy 4 10.

For to this end we toil and strive because we have our hope set on the Living God

who is the Savior of all people.

For who is the Savior of All people especially those who believe now

notice how it has.

He's a Savior of all people.

Especially those who believe.

What does that mean?

That he's the Savior of some who don't believe.

That's that's what that's saying there.

In other words, he is the he's the Savior especially to those who believe.

Means that he's also a Savior to the some who don't believe but they there are those who still.

They're not the whosoever they're not those that believe but those that believe they will be

saved first.

John 5 1.

Every one Who believes that Jesus is the

Christ has been born of God and Everyone who loves the father

loves whomever has been born of him.

So what he's making it really clear that everyone who believes on Jesus.

They've already been born of God, but they all every one of them that believes is saved.

One last one.

John 6 40.

For this is The will of my father that everyone

who looks on the Son and Believes in him should have eternal life.

And it will raise him up on the last day.

So he's saying here that everyone that means

Everyone.

Okay, whosoever means whosoever means everyone.

So there are plenty of verses that talk about all People everywhere every person

that Christ died for them and you're.

I know there's probably some of you shaking your head going.

No, no, no, no, no, no, no, and if you're.

If you're being a fair you with the text and with me.

Listening you're you're before you're attacking.

You're at least saying all right.

Let us let us at least say that this is What the text is saying.

Let's try to reconcile it and and try to hear me out before you start attacking and tune me out.

Because you're not gonna understand how we're trying to reconcile this if you're tuned to me out because you think you're right.

All right now the scriptures teach.

And this is in in your book there in your syllabus under reconciling both positions.

The scriptures teach that God is sovereign over our salvation and that men have a responsibility.

Okay, humans have a responsibility.

Many think these two positions are mutually exclusive.

However that I do not believe to be true.

So how can both be true?

However, we know that the doctrine of inspiration.

Which we're going to look at in a future lesson.

The doctrine of inspiration is the idea that both God wrote the Bible and Paul wrote Romans, right?

So we look at Romans.

God wrote it and Paul wrote it.

Who's the who's the the authoritative author God is.

Who would we say is the author of the scripture?

It's God's word.

So God gets a hundred percent of the credit yet Paul wrote what how he wanted to write with his own words.

So did John and Peter and Luke and everyone else.

So they had their own personalities you see it in the text you see their own way of writing it's very different in style.

Even though they use their own words they had their own choice of words.

It was exactly as God intended it to be and there we have the issue.

So we have is that the scripture is saying?

That God works through men in the writing of

Scripture so that every word That they wrote Was

exactly as God intended it to be so God worked through them.

All right.

So, let me Reread that quote now from the syllabus.

However, we know that from the doctrine of inspiration discussed in another lesson that God can work through

a person so that the choices That the individual makes are exactly as God

Intends it's what the theological terms super intend.

God is the Being super intending through us.

Okay, the same is true for salvation.

We see this actually in sanctification as well.

Sanctification is the process after a regenerate until we're glorified.

That's when we die.

So when we're born again told death God is working through us so that we do

good works to Become more spiritual to become more holy to become more like Christ, but it

is God who's doing that work.

Well, am I doing it or is God doing it?

Yes God works through us so that even those works that we do God takes

100 of the credit.

We don't take credit for good works.

God takes the credit and yet we chose to do them and you go.

Well, how could that be?

That's the way God does it now.

God doesn't take the credit for the sin.

We do we get that on ourselves.

All right.

God chose us Outside of time and God and

we choose God inside of time and this is

How I try to figure this out so we know from the the doctrine of superintended

that God can work through people to Work in them in such a way that the choices they

make are as exactly as he intends them to be.

We also know that from the doctrine of The attributes of God that God is outside of

time and we are not God being outside of time is going to.

When he deals with things He's he's dealt with them in a timeless way now.

He can work inside of time, but he is a timeless being.

He's an omniscient being.

I've been saying these two throughout these seven parts of this lesson because this is

really the heart of the matter.

This is where we really need to address these issues.

Because this is where I think so many people struggle when you hear people talking over the Calvinism Arminianism debate.

That's usually how it's framed.

You'll often hear them Talk in language that puts God either inside of

time or learning something.

Okay inside of time meaning that he somehow Waited for us to

decide to choose him and then he chose us.

No, or they'll say well God's outside of time.

But he looked down the tunnels of time who saw who would be saved and then he chose them.

Then he had to learn something and he's not omniscient you you end up falling into

traps on either side of the issue and I know that some people will try to say look

you're either gonna be monogistic or synergistic what does that mean either the Genesis the the creation

of being the Regeneration is either from a mono or one source or it's a

synergistic source.

It's it's two.

It's more things coming together.

I'm monotheistic.

Very much.

So God does 100 % of the work of salvation.

He gets all the credit and he does all the work and yet we chose him and if you can't

reconcile that.

That's perfectly.

Okay.

I think one of the ways we get ourselves into trouble often Is that we try to reconcile what we can't

reconcile and we want to have everything nice and neat and put into.

You know little boxes so that we have it all figured out and there's no questions to be asked and we got it all.

And the reality is there's some things we just don't understand.

And we don't understand because we don't have the mind of God.

That which he's revealed to us.

Got it.

We should teach we should follow we should obey that which we can't comprehend.

Let's not act unchristian toward our brothers and sisters.

Okay, so I'm gonna wrap these Lessons up this one lesson actually with in seven parts.

Lesson eight in seven parts.

Gee good thing.

I didn't go to Lesson eight party, right?

I want to finish it up with just a and maybe I should have started with this.

I kind of did a little bit but in part one, but I want to just end with a little encouragement to you.

I understand there's many people who feel very strongly on their positions and and.

Some in this area cut off relations with other people some people.

Go from one side of a camp to another typically you have people that because we experienced us choosing God.

We usually start off kind of with more of a human responsibility or our minion mindset.

Okay, because that's what we experienced and we study the scriptures and we start to learn about God's glory.

And we see what God did it.

It's like ah the revelation and we want everybody to think like us now.

Okay, and we make it sometimes if this is the one issue we got a nail everyone on this they

must believe this.

We must pound it into people.

We got to get people to believe then God's sovereignty and salvation.

They must be Calvinistic and.

And then some people go as far as they see everything through what I call five -point grid.

I mean everything every scripture comes back to the five points of Calvinism in one way or another.

Maybe you've seen those types.

I mean everything is you know, I've seen some pastors and every week is a Calvinistic message every text.

Somehow points to God's sovereignty and salvation.

I mean every single week.

And and God is sovereign.

We should praise that we should highlight that.

But it doesn't mean that we're have no responsibility either and we need to be fair when we

dialogue with one another.

We have a video on our YouTube channel called fighting, right?

Kind of talking about an incident and how to how to get into discussions debates in

a Winsome way, okay.

Remember you and I are wrong.

We don't know where.

Otherwise, we'd probably change what we believe.

I mean some people are willingly wrong, but most of us I think just we don't know where we're wrong,

I have Strong views on different things that my Presbyterian brothers and sisters would

disagree with.

That's okay.

I Can still be friends with them.

I can still enjoy fellowship with them.

I can even discuss the differences in our theology.

But if we're starting to do name -calling and ridiculing and

belittling and Telling people they're stupid or tuning people

out if we're gonna turn to people and say You know, you're just

wrong.

Because you disagree with me and and I'm not gonna hear you and listen to you.

Let's remember we need to we need to hear one another we need to Understand what the other

person is saying when they say words.

When they use these terms limited atonement.

Irresistible worse.

What do you mean by that great thing to ask?

Don't assume, you know what they believe unless they've told you this is what they believe.

Let's try to be fair with one another.

Let's I know this is gonna be radical but let's try to show the love for one another as brothers in Christ.

That Christ showed for us.

Yeah, remember that first we said let's let's.

I think that was first John 5 was it.

Was that one?

So whoever Believes that Jesus is the Christ has been born of

God and everyone who loves the father.

Loves whomever has been born of him.

Let's live that out.

Do you love the father?

Then love those that the father died for even if they disagree with you.

Maybe you can learn something from them.

That's a crazy idea.

Just maybe.

We can learn things from other people.

Let's be teachable.

Let's be humble let's learn from one another and we can do

it in a way with respect and honor.

The way Christ would have us to be.

Because we see way too many arguments and debates that end friendships relationships and even split

churches.

In these areas where they really don't need to be now I realize that by now everybody

probably hates me and thinks I'm a heretic.

Either you're a Calvinist and you think I'm Arminian or you're an Arminian you think I'm a Calvinist.

I'm Sorry, but I don't go by either label.

Typically unless I know what you mean by the label and you I agree with what you mean by that label.

But I don't use those labels why?

Because I think the labels cause problems because many don't have the same definition.

They don't have the same meaning.

And so let's try to maybe stay away from the labels and get clear definitions.

Alright, so next week we're gonna have class.

We're gonna deal with the doctrine of eternal security.

So we're gonna talk about the fact that you can't lose your salvation again, and I'll be called all kinds of names online

again.

But that's okay.

I can delete you.

I mean I can take it.

All right, if you have any questions comments snarks anything at all, you can email us at

Academy, thank you.

I forgot at Academy at striving for eternity org.

Academy at striving for eternity org if you'd like to get one of the syllabuses and not enroll in the class.

Just get the syllabus.

You can go to the store at store at striving fraternity Org you can get all the other cool stuff that we shill

do we have the t -shirt?

Where's okay?

It's here.

We you can pick up your own striving for eternity t -shirt.

Here it is.

That's uh, and You could pick one of those up.

Oh.

They're not on the store yet.

Okay.

Silly me they will be on the store.

But you can always email the store at shop at striving for eternity org and say hey

I want one of those here's my size.

But if you want to pick one up really soon like in just a few weeks you can come to the Jersey fire.

Jersey fire July 11th and 12th of 2014 Phil Johnson will be talking on

two messages on the life of lot and his wife.

Then we will see two messages from Emile's Wang.

Emile will be will be coming out and Talking on

how to make your family last for eternity and then how to pass on that to the next generation of faith.

Brother, Phil Cessa is new.

He's gonna be joining us.

It's a someone new that we've announced to come to Jersey fire he is going to be talking about how

to do discipleship within your family and That's I think gonna be an

important lesson for fathers.

I will deal with some You know touchy issues same -sex marriage and what is

destroying the Christian home?

I'm gonna deal with something that is gonna make a lot of people cringe.

I'm just saying and you don't want to miss it.

I will say this we are not addressing the same -sex marriage issue many of us.

Biblically, we're using the world's terminology to define an issue that the church should

be Handling correctly and we're gonna say why it is so important.

So I encourage you to come out now.

I did say earlier when we were trying to get everything all working and all I don't have a slide for the brother

of encouragement.

Because well, basically I We were trying to get the show ready

that's what happens when you leave the slide to the last minute.

So when we had the the problems the technical problems, I didn't get that done.

So I'm gonna ask this I'm gonna do something totally off the wall and different this week.

I'm gonna ask you all to go into our striving for eternity Facebook group

and I want you to Name your own Brother or sister of

encouragement and say why so I want all of you right now to go into the face

Into Facebook go to the striving for eternity group and I want you guys to just name a whole bunch of different people.

You know, I think so -and -so should be encouraged this week.

Here's why and then we can all kind of you know Work off of that and all try to encourage all the people may we'll get a whole lot

of people encouraged This week and we do this because you know Basically, we say the most encouraging things when people die.

I've just been working on a video for a friend of mine who died this summer and you know

the video of his his funeral and it's just hearing the things people say when someone's Dead and

they never heard you say these things.

Let's say these things while people are alive just a thought.

You know, let's not say the best things for when someone's dead.

You know, so until next week when we talk about eternal security.

We are glad to have you with us and remember to strive to make today an eternal day for the glory of God.

See you next week.