. . .and why is it important as long as we choose?
These days, if you even ask the first part of that, you might be told that it’s not important or that you are just being divisive. The only thing that matters is that a ‘decision’ was made. Some of those who do not think it’s an important question might accuse you of being divisive and maybe even being ‘lost’ and not saved at all! You’re just all into theology and book learning, and since you didn’t provide a testimony with the ‘theology’, about how you went downtown to feed the homeless, you’re just not saved!
My friend, I am here to tell you this morning, as God is my witness, that the answer to that question is of critical importance, and has eternal consequences! It’s the difference between eternal life in the presence of God and an eternity in the everlasting torments of hell!
IF you came to Christ for any other reason than because you realized your desperate straights apart from the saving grace of Jesus Christ, that you are a spiritually dead and lost sinner; and realized that God sent His beloved son to die in your place – to suffer the just wrath due your sin; and based upon that realization, you believed in Christ, it is entirely possible that you believed in vain and are as destined for hell this morning as before you walked an aisle, signed a decision card, or said a special prayer!
Many, if not most invitations to Christ that are offered these days from the stages of alleged ‘churches’ these days are all about having lives ‘fixed in’ one way or another, and never bring up the sin issue, the central and perhaps only issue of biblical evangelism! .
To omit the single most important issue of the gospel message, is to have NO gospel message! To leave out the issue of sin is to be a fraud and a charlatan – a spiritual ‘snake oil’ salesman. To save the sin issue for later (after they like you a lot) and invite people to Christ to have their lives ‘fixed’, is a spiritual ‘bait and switch’ con game.
So this old man is going to continue to ask the question. Eternal lives are at stake!
I am saved because GOD SAVED ME! He gave life to a dead man and opened his ears to hear the gospel and his eyes to see Christ. And when he saw Christ, he desired Him so strongly that there was no way he would not end up at the foot of the Cross. It was ALL God.
Friend, examine your heart this morning. WHY did you choose Christ? IF it was for some other reason, any other reason than for the forgiveness of your sin, you have cause to be concerned about your eternal destiny. Search your soul, search scripture, asking God why He sent His Son to die or you.
This is my plea.
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life and death
The Battle Cry 
“You did not choose me; I chose you and appointed you to go and bear much fruit, the kind of fruit that endures.” (Jesus Christ, John 15:16)
The issue is clear to me. If it has to do with bearing much fruit and enduring, the choice is Christ’s only; otherwise, ours.
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This may come across as confrontational, but I am actually trying (against my better judgment) to either help you see the gaping hole in your logic, or give you a chance to fill it in for me.
If salvation works as you have said: the only people going to Heaven are the ones chosen for Heaven before the foundation of the world – and those souls will NOT under any circumstances refuse the call – in fact are incapable of refusing the call. (group 1)
And conversely, a soul not in that group will never get to Heaven no matter what their desire is, or what they believe, or what they do – in fact they probably wouldn’t desire it anyway. (group 2)
Then how can you turn around and say that the answer to “why” they choose Christ is “critical”? How can it be that it matters at all if I have come to address my sin, or not? If I am in group 1, even if I am in total error currently, your system says it will somehow turn around and work out (I will be drawn and I will answer) before I die. If I am in group 2, then it doesn’t matter if I try to address my sin or not, I will fail. I was created to be damned.
In your system whether or not I think I am saved, or want to be, is irrelevant. How I act may indicate whether I am, but it doesn’t actually influence the outcome, right?
And ultimately, if that is the way it works, why argue with people? Why do you have this blog? Why do you care about so many weak preachers or churches out there? If I’m in group 2, you won’t change me. If I’m in group 1, we’ll all have a good laugh about how wrong I was in Heaven, right?
WHAT IS ONE OF US MISSING HERE DAN???
Do my actions make a difference? Does my attitude matter? Is my reasoning and theology important? Does confronting and abandoning the sin in my life make a difference? Of course I say all that matters tremendously. But for the life of me, I cannot reconcile why you think it is important. And yet you argue so passionately against what you perceive as error. Even if you say it is about obedience, don’t you believe that obedience comes as a natural consequence of being in group 1?
I guess what I’m getting at is please explain how, in your view of how we come to God, evangelization, in any form, by one human toward another – including your blog – is not a totally wasted effort.
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I am not sure what to say to you at this point, Willison. Anything I would say has been said before. Every scripture passage that I would offer you, for nearly every question you just asked has been provided, if not here, elsewhere, probably more than once.
I actually prepared an entire long and separate post with my comments interspersed with yours, including scripture passages, but it’s all vain unless you are able to just set the Pope and Mageristium aside, and just read the Book for yourself.
Regardless what you might believe, what I believe comes first from scripture. That Luther, Calvin, Edwards, Whitefield, Spurgeon, and others hold to the same beliefs is I think divinely coincidental.
I do what I do because it’s The Great Privilege! God has chosen ordinary men, with all our faults, as His messengers in delivering the Gospel of Jesus Christ! Is there a greater privilege?
I pray that God will give you a desire to hear directly from the throne of grace, unfiltered by any man.
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