Pulpit Magazine has three interesting posts from John MacArthur on what he feels are essential doctrines that should not be compromised. It was helpful to me because rather than just stating a list of what he feels are essential, he provides a method for determining if a doctrine should be essential. Here is a quick overview:

1. All Fundamental Articles of Faith Must Be Drawn from the Scriptures
2. The Fundamentals Are Clear in Scripture
3. Everything Essential to Saving Faith Is Essential
4. Every Doctrine We Are Forbidden to Deny Is Fundamental
5. The Fundamental Doctrines Are All Summed up in the Person and Work of Christ

Read the posts here:

• Part I
• Part II
• Part III

There are a few passages in the Scriptures where it says that God foreknew us in the context of choosing us or predestining us. Have a look at 1 Peter 1:1-2:

To those who reside as aliens…who are chosen according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, by the sanctifying work of the Spirit, to obey Jesus Christ and be sprinkled with His blood:

and also Romans 8:28-30:

And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose. For those whom He foreknew, He also predestined to become conformed to the image of His Son, so that He would be the firstborn among many brethren; and these whom He predestined, He also called; and these whom He called, He also justified; and these whom He justified, He also glorified.

The interpretation of these passages can be fairly different depending on who you talk to, with the main difference between them being “on what basis are we predestined?” Or, “how does God choose who will go heaven and who will go to hell?” I want to dive right into this topic assuming you already believe we are predestined, see Revelation 17:8 if you don’t and post a comment, maybe we can post on that later.

Some would say that the foreknowledge spoken of in these passages is a foreknowledge that God has of our actions and our faith such that when God sees in eternity past that we will respond in faith to his gracious calling, He predestines us and writes our names in the book of life. So the thought is: all men are given the same amount of grace but only those who accept God’s grace in faith will be saved. God, having known and seen this event taking place in eternity past (remember God sees all things at all times, past, present, future), will call those his elect and predestines them for eternal life with Him. You might call this a brief description of Arminianism.

Others would say that the foreknowledge spoken of in these passages is a foreknowledge that God has about His plan for each and every soul such that God chooses whomever He will in eternity past and predestines them to eternal life. The idea here is that not every man is given the same amount of grace but that only those whom God has chosen in eternity past will be regenerated by His Spirit to the point where man can respond in faith. You might call this a brief description of Calvinism.

The difficult part of the argument is how we accept these ideas in our human natures. One side seems fair. The other side seems unfair. One side gives man the freedom to choose. The other side gives God the freedom to choose. But these are human reasonings, what does the Word of God say about…God?

• Deuteronomy 7:7-8 - The LORD did not set His love on you nor choose you because you were more in number than any of the peoples, for you were the fewest of all peoples, but because the LORD loved you and kept the oath which He swore to your forefathers, the LORD brought you out by a mighty hand and redeemed you from the house of slavery, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt.
• Ephesian 2:8-10 - For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not as a result of works, so that no one may boast. For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them.
• Romans 9:16 - So then it does not depend on the man who wills or the man who runs, but on God who has mercy.
• Romans 9:11 - for though the twins were not yet born and had not done anything good or bad, so that God’s purpose according to His choice would stand, not because of works but because of Him who calls
• All of Romans 9 (sorry I should have just put that whole chapter)
• John 6:37 - All that the father gives Me will come to Me, and the one who comes to Me I will certainly not cast out.
• John 6:44 - No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him; and I will raise him up on the last day.
• John 6:65 - …For this reason I have said to you, that no one can come to Me unless it has been granted him from the Father.
• Acts 13:48 - …and as many as had been appointed to eternal life believed.
• 2 Timothy 1:9 - who has saved us and called us with a holy calling, not according to our works, but according to His own purpose and grace which was grated us in Christ Jesus from all eternity.
• Philippians 1:29 - For to you it has been granted for Christ’s sake, not only to believe in Him, but also to suffer for His sake.

Hopefully we can get a sense of God’s “freedom” of choice, if you will, from these passages. But, you might say, how can we get around the fact that:

• 1 Timothy 2:3-4 - …God our Savior, who desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth

is in the Scriptures? Doesn’t this mean that God wants all men to be saved and it’s only their unbelief that keeps them from salvation? If we read through 1 Timothy 2:1-2 we see that Paul is saying that God desires all types of men to be saved. Paul tells Timothy to pray for all men, then he specifically spells out kings and those in authority in verse 2. So Paul is dispelling a common belief that only certain people can be saved, only the poor and destitute, the common man and not the rich or those in authoritative positions. Paul is saying that God wants all people to be saved, the rich, the poor, the Jew, the Gentile, the slave, the freeman, etc.

So, again, when we look into these discussions it always seems to come down to how we see the character of God throughout the Scriptures. When we come across some verses that don’t seem to make a lot of sense, it is helpful to “let Scripture interpret Scripture”. Comments are very welcome, please let me know of some other verses that make the case for God’s foreknowledge being of our faith and actions and that being the basis of his election. My knowledge in that area is very weak so I would appreciate the help!

Continuing on with Edwards week here.

There is a section in the “Works of Jonathan Edwards, Volume 1” titled The End for Which God Made the Word. In it, Edwards attempts to answer the question of why God made the world (not a simple question to ponder by the way). A very brief summary of his answer would be; He made it for Himself. Of course Edwards unpacks his answer much more than this so have a read if you’re interested in learning more.

But then at the end of his dissertation, and a lot of authors used to do this, he answers objections to his answer. This is similar to what Paul does in Romans when he says, “What then? Shall we sin because we are not under the law but under grace? (Romans 6:15)” or “You will say to me then, “Why does He still find fault?” For who resists His will? (Romans 9:19)” and then he goes on to answer these questions. I’m not sure if these objections that Edwards answered were his own objections initially or if they were objections that came up from others in conversation or if they were just what he though people might say, please comment if you have any details on this.

One objection was as follows:

Some may object, that to suppose God makes himself his highest and last end, is dishonorable to him; as it in effect supposes, that God does every thing from a selfish spirit. Selfishness is looked upon as mean and sordid in the creature; unbecoming and even hateful in such a worm of the dust as man. We should look upon a man as of a base and contemptible character, who should in every thing he did, be governed by selfish principles; should make his private interest his governing aim in all his conduct in life. How far then should we be from attributing any such thing to the Supreme Being, the blessed and only Potentate! Does it not become us to ascribe to him the most noble and generous dispositions, and qualities the most remote from every thing private, narrow, and sordid?

And in his response is this amazing statement about God:

But if God be indeed so great, and so excellent, that all other beings are as nothing to him, and all other excellency be as nothing, and less than nothing and vanity, in comparison of his, and God be omniscient and infallible, and perfectly knows that he is infinitely the most valuable being, then it is fit that his heart should be agreeable to this—which is indeed the true nature and proportion of things, and agreeable to this infallible and all-comprehending understanding which he has of them, and that perfectly clear light in which he views them—and that he should value himself infinitely more than his creatures.

Wow. I wish I had a view of God in this way. Edwards’ writings have an aroma of humility and God-centrality that few match. He knew His place in comparison to a holy God and sought to make others aware of how glorious the Lord truly is in his writings and sermons.

On a side note, why is it that writers don’t answer objections in their material any more? Is it just too formal a thing to do? Or is it looked upon as being arrogant? I wonder if it’s just because so much of today’s writing seems to be answering an objection in the first place. Anyone have any thoughts on this?

The picture above is a rendering of Edwards as a boy looking at a spider. He was fascinated with all of the sciences, especially spiders. He actually wrote a lot of material on spiders and their habits.

Our reflection on the gospel this week comes from Jonathan Edwards in his “Religious Affections” work:

Truly to see the truth of the word of God, is to see the truth of the gospel; which is the glorious doctrine the word of God contains, concerning God, and Jesus Christ, and the way of salvation by him, and the world of glory that he is entered into, and purchased for all them who believe;

Jesus paid a great price to purchase his beloved. The cost was no less than his own blood. But he willingly paid it so that we could enter into the glory that is his alone. But how can we know this is true? How can we know there was a man named Jesus who died on a cross 2000 years ago? There is a book that contains this truth if you are willing to search it out and find it. The reward is great but it will cost you your life to obtain it, just as it did Christ’s to give it.

“And there they continued to preach the gospel” - Acts 14:7

Each Tuesday a different reflection on the gospel and its continual effect on our lives

Justin Taylor has posted an interview with Thomas McCall on Calvinism and Arminianism, have a look.

For quite some time I’ve been meaning to post on a quote from Jonathan Edwards that Desiring God posted a few weeks back:

Objectors may say, God cannot always prevent men’s sins, unless he act contrary to the free nature of the subject, or without destroying men’s liberty. But will they deny, that an omnipotent and infinitely wise God could not possibly invent, and set before men, such strong motives to obedience, and have kept them before them in such a manner, as should have influenced all mankind to continue in their obedience, as the elect angels have done, without destroying their liberty? God will order it so, that the saints and angels in heaven never will sin: and does it therefore follow, that their liberty is destroyed, and that they are not free, but forced in their actions? Does it follow, that they are turned into blocks, as the Arminians say the Calvinist doctrine turn men?

Here is the question this seeks to answer: If God causes us to do things according to his will, then do we have a free-will of our own in our decisions? Now, this question, in and of itself, is not really the issue. It is the secondary questions that arise from this one that are difficult for us to deal with. First, if we have no free-will then we are just puppets on God’s sovereign strings and nothing we do really matters. Second, if we have no free-will then we cannot be held accountable for our sins because God caused us to do them and that makes him the author of sin. Typically at this point, another type of person steps in and says but if we do have free-will how can God have control over the situation and bring about the end that He desires. And so we are left with how to reconcile man’s free will and God’s sovereignty.

A lot of times, lines are drawn in the sand and people are forced to call themselves either Calvinists if they believe God causes all things to happen according to his sovereignty or Arminians if they believe man has free-will in his decisions and that God will not force him into something. But I think this attempts to take these systems of theology too far. Both of these systems attempted to explain the process of man’s salvation and from that people drew their conclusions on man’s free-will/God’s sovereignty.

Calvinism says that man is too depraved to ever have faith on his own and so God unconditionally chooses whom he desires and quickens him to the point that man can choose nothing other than God’s free gift of grace. Arminianism says that man is too depraved to ever have faith and so God conditionally chooses whom he desires based on who will freely accept his gift of grace. These are extremely oversimplified explanations of these two systems of theology and so I would encourage you to study these things in much greater depth if you have not before (like my good friend Andrew is doing). But one can see how people would draw conclusions about God’s sovereignty and man’s free-will on the basis of how they believe a man comes to faith.

So, my point in all this is that we should prayerfully study these topics on the basis of Scripture and not on the basis of a system of theology that man created. If we want to know the extent of God’s sovereignty we should study what the Word says about that topic (this would be what systematic theology attempts to do). If we want to know how a man is saved, we should prayerfully study what the Bible says about that topic.

If you want to know where I stand on the issue…you’ll have to ask!

When we look to the cross, we see the extent to which God despises sin. He does not take lightly our rebellion against Him nor does He see any of our good works as worthy enough to satisfy His wrath against our sins. At the cross we see God willing to send His only son to die a most horrific death to pay the penalty we justly deserve. The gospel shows us the lengths God has gone to so that we can be free from the enslavement our sin keeps us in. If God was willing to send His beloved to die in our place for our sin, He could not expect anything less than that same sacrifice from us. The sacrifice He desires is for us to offer up our most beloved, to put to death the sins that keep us from following after Him.

When the Jews were about to cross over into the Promised Land, God commanded them to wipe out all of the nations that were in the land He was about to give them. They were not to leave any remnant in the land because He knew that their idolatry and worship of false gods would lead His people away from the one true God. We have this same command with the sin in our lives, we are to remove every idol and be perfect as our heavenly father is perfect. We are to leave no remnant of sin and idolatry in our lives, God demands nothing less than the complete eradication of sin throughout the lifelong process of sanctification. In the gospel we see the death of Jesus Christ for our sin and that compels us to put to death the sin in our lives.

“And there they continued to preach the gospel” - Acts 14:7

Each Tuesday a different reflection on the gospel and its continual effect on our lives

I stumbled onto a fantastic book, The Enemy Within, by Kris Lundgaard. The Enemy Within is a great work on the power of indwelling sin and what can be done to help in the battle against sin. The book relies heavily on John Owen’s works, which can be found here. Owen may be difficult for some to read through considering the language and style he uses, but for sure it is well worth the effort to read through them.

When I read through books, I scribble notes in the margins and underline things I find interesting. Usually the notes are illegible to anyone but myself and that’s ok because I take notes for myself anyway. I did not want to keep these notes for myself though, this book has great value to all believers since we all struggle with sin in some form. I am posting some PDF slides that are a quick summary of the book. They probably will not be very useful if you haven’t read through the book or do not have a copy of the book in front of you though so I would encourage to pick up this book for yourself.

Here is the first slide with a quick summary of the book:

• Sin must be mortified in the believer
• The flesh wars against three areas in the believer:
  • the mind – the watchman of the soul
  • the affections – the desires of the soul
  • the will – the doer of the soul
• Sin occurs when any area is dragged away in temptation and the other two follow
• Mortification is done in faith, with the Spirit because of the work done on the cross by Jesus to make us into God’s holy people
• We must understand how the flesh wages war if we are to have any victory over it

Download the slides here

I really just wanted to post some new sermons from Tim Keller but I thought that would make for a slim post, so here are a few more:

• Tim Keller at City Life Boston: A Broken Spirit and Encounter With God (HT: Reformissionary)
• C.J. Mahaney on our adoption into the household of God
• Mike Minter’s fantastic sermon titled I Want to be Like That
• D.A. Carson on Jeremiah (HT: Andy Naselli)
• Woodhouse on church unity (HT: Andy Naselli) though honestly I am not sure how I feel about this series yet. Have a read and let me know what you think

That’s it, enjoy!

Because of the gospel, we love others more than ourselves. We put their interests ahead of our own. Why do we do this, isn’t the gospel something that saves our own lives? Isn’t it something personal to us? It’s what gets us into heaven, what does it have to do with others? Look at Christ’s example. Jesus’ needs were met before we were created. He already had everything He needed in the Father. He didn’t need to create us and certainly didn’t need to come down here and die for us. But He wanted to.

In the gospel, we find all that we need and that frees us to practice a similar kind of love. One that seeks the good of others over ourselves. How can we truly love others when we are still seeking after our own good? Philippians 2:5 tells us to adopt the same attitude that Christ had when he gave up His throne to become one of us and take on the punishment we deserved. This is an attitude of selflessness.

“And there they continued to preach the gospel” - Acts 14:7

Each Tuesday a different reflection on the gospel and its continual effect on our lives