I have absolutely no idea what preacher or teacher first presented the thought of a three-fold salvation, that we have been saved from the penalty of sin, are saved from the bondage of sin, and one day will be saved from the presence of sin. I know I didn’t! But when I think about it, it’s a great summary of the past, present, and future aspects of out salvation.

We have been saved from the penalty of sin,.

Joh 3:18  “Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God.”

Freedom from the penalty of sin, that the one who believes and trusts in Christ is no longer under God’s judgment, but is ‘no longer condemned’ is the heart and soul of the gospel message we are called to share. That our lives are forever changed is true, and sharing how God has changed our lives should be part of our on-going relationship with those around us, our personal stories are the by-product of our salvation, not the reason we invite people to Christ.

We are saved from the bondage of sin.

Rom 6:6  “We know that our old self was crucified with him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing, so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin.”

When I read the New Testament, especially the letters of Paul to churches, freedom from the bondage to sin and the requirements of the law (dead works) seems to be a major theme, right up there with warnings against last days (since the resurrection) false prophets and teachers invading the church. There is much about how we should behave and conduct our lives as believers in order to bring glory to the God who saved us.

We will be saved from the presence of sin.

Rev 21:3 , 27 “And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God. But nothing unclean will ever enter it, nor anyone who does what is detestable or false, but only those who are written in the Lamb’s book of life.”

Will we have better marriages, success in business, material prosperity, great health, etc? Maybe, maybe not. Those things are never promised in scripture, yet everywhere you turn, you see it. What we have, and are promised is peace – we have been made at peace with God through the righteousness of Christ, and we can have peace in the midst of the ‘stuff of life”. Sadly, that which is never promised seems to be a main theme these days, both as an evangelistic tool to invite people to Christ, as well as what we should expect for our Christian lives.

Do we need to constantly harp about ‘sin’ and nothing else? NO! By all means talk about the earthy ‘benefits’ of salvation and stories of changed lives. But we need to keep the main things the main things.

Precious brothers and sisters in Christ, we have been saved from the penalty of sin, are being saved from the bondage of sin, and one day will be saved from the presence of sin.

But if it  will preach ANYWHERE, preach it EVERYWHERE!

This isn’t a long list of a lot of ‘stuff’ being preached and taught today that won’t preach anywhere you might set foot on this earth. All you need to figure that out for yourself is look around at our planet and the conditions therein concerning the plight of humanity (Christian and non-Christian). If you don’t know those kinds of things, you really need to find out.

The example of New testament scripture, specifically the Apostle Paul, guarantees that this will ‘preach’ anywhere, anytime, under any circumstances:

1Co 1:23  “but we (Paul & company) preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to Gentiles..”,

1Co 2:1-2  “And I, when I (Paul) came to you, brothers, did not come proclaiming to you the testimony of God with lofty speech or wisdom. For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. “

1Co 15:1-4  “Now I would remind you, brothers, of the gospel I preached to you, which you received, in which you stand, and by which you are being saved, if you hold fast to the word I preached to you–unless you believed in vain. For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures.”

God does not ‘need’ my personal story, nor do I need to soften the ‘hard on the ears of the natural man’ gospel with the ‘benefits package’ of becoming a Christian. In fact, all the secondary ‘good stuff’ might distract the hearer from the core issue of sin and what to do about it. If the hearer ‘accepts’ Christ because of the benefits package (many many ‘conversions’ in many ‘evangelical’ churches these days), and not solely because He was the substitutionary sacrifice for his/her sin, a grave injustice has been done – both to the hearer (supposedly converted), and the precious gospel of Jesus Christ.

Why don’t we need to embellish the simplicity of the true gospel message? Listen to Paul again:

1Co 1:23-24  “but we (Paul & company) preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to Gentiles..”, but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God.

To the ‘called’, every last one of ’em, the ‘offensive’ gospel is the power, the only power of God for the salvation of man.

So again, if it won’t preach EVERYWHERE, don’t preach it ANYWHERE, but if it  will preach ANYWHERE, preach it EVERYWHERE!

” . . .and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.” – Matt 1:21

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For the person who holds to the sovereignty of God in salvation, whether or not a believer will be held securely in God’s hand throughout the rest of his/her life is not in question. God’s purpose in the salvation of men was to have a people unto Himself, a remnant if you will, according to the pleasure of His will, for the praise of His glorious grace (Eph 1:5-6). Furthermore, no plan of God can be thwarted (Job 42:1-2)!

He sent His own Son do die for the sins of the remnant chosen in Christ before the foundation of the world (Eph 1), that he would give to His Son and that would surely come to the Son; that would be forever secure in the hand of God (John chapters 6 & 10).

Because God is sovereign and man is responsible, but unable on his/her own to ‘come to Christ’, God gives life to the spiritually dead sinner (Eph 2), and so acts upon the human will that those chosen for salvation (Eph 1, 2 Thess. 2:13) will come to Christ, just as God planned, and they come ‘willingly’!

This view of atonement demonstrates the awesome power and glory of God in the salvation of men! God the Father planned the salvation of the remnant, God the Son secured the salvation of the remnant, and God the Holy Spirit brings about the salvation of the remnant by raising the spiritually dead to life and leading them irresistibly to the Cross of Christ. In this view, the glory of God is central to the atonement; the God who saves us, keeps us!

For the person who holds to the sovereignty of man in salvation, that Christ died for all men everywhere and salvation depends on man’s self-determined free will decision, the concept of eternal security seems to violate that selfsame free will.  A person might not be able to ‘lose’ salvation like ‘losing’ a watch or other personal possession, but surely he/she must be able to ‘toss salvation aside” should he/or she ‘un-choose’ Christ!

At best, this view of the atonement can leave a person ‘riding the proverbial fence’, when confronted with some of the ‘troublesome’ passages of scripture. This old soldier was sore for a long time – fence riding is not a comfortable enterprise!

So there you have the atonement in light two differing views of the atonement. Is this an issue of salvation itself? No. So what’s the big deal, as long as people come to a saving knowledge and living relationship with Christ? Does one’s view of the atonement have anything at all to do with living the Christian life?

Not directly perhaps, but it does speak volumes concerning our view of God. Does God save men, from beginning to end, or do we save ourselves with our decisions? How we answer that question will impact the course of our Christian walk, and most assuredly determine how we present the Gospel of the atonement of Christ to others.

What’s this old soldier’s opinion of the matter? Well, that doesn’t matter. However, one pastor and teacher offers this:

“The most powerful argument for eternal security is Romans 8:38-39, “For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” Our eternal security is based on God’s love for those whom He has redeemed. Our eternal security is purchased by Christ, promised by the Father, and sealed by the Holy Spirit.” (Emphasis added)

Food for thought. . .

Isaiah 53:6, “All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned—every one—to his own way; and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.”

The above verse is often used as absolute proof that Christ died for everyone, that his atonement paid the penalty for everyone without exception (unlimited atonement). Jesus bore the sins of everyone who ever lived. Yet a few verses further we find:

Isaiah 53:12, “Therefore I will divide him a portion with the many, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong, because he poured out his soul to death and was numbered with the transgressors; yet he bore the sin of many, and makes intercession for the transgressors.”

Which is it? Did Christ die and bear the sins of everyone, or just some (many)? If both passages are true, because the Bible does not contradict itself, Christ died for “all” and He died for “Many” which is NOT “all”. Is that possible? Well. . .yes it is.

I serve on the board of directors of an organization and as boards do, we have meetings. At the outset of any meeting, you will hear the question, “Are we all here?” In that case “all“ means everyone who was supposed to be in attendance. I am sure you can think of any number of identical usages of the term “all”. In fact, when do we ever use “all” to mean every person on the planet, without exception? Never?

Back to our two passages. “We” in verse 6 and “us” in verse 12 define the “all” in both passages. So Who does “we” and “us” refer to? Who is Isaiah talking about? There is only one answer – the chosen people of God – the elect. The iniquity of all of God’s elect was laid on His Son, and His Son bore all of the iniquity of all the elect.

Does the above apply to the uses of “all” in the New Testament? Search them out and judge for yourself. In the end, you will probably believe what you want to believe. but go for it anyway.

Let me leave you with just one question:

How is it that we almost never use “all” to refer to everyone without exception in our daily lives, yet we love to say it means everyone on the planet almost everywhere it is used in connection with the extent of the atonement? What’s up with that?

Food for thought. . .

John Chapter is all about the Shepherd and His sheep. Most of it is fairly easy to understand, especially to anyone familiar with sheep and sheep herding. There was a group of Jews hanging around the synagogue who couldn’t believe Jesus was the promised Messiah, in spite of all he had told them and the miracles He had performed. Finally Jesus said this to these religious types who couldn’t seem to get the picture:

“But you do not believe because you are not of My sheep.” – John 10:26

All of us who cal ourselves Christians readily agree that Jesus is the shepherd and we are His sheep. So here’s the question:

“Do we believe because we’re sheep, or do we become sheep because we believe?”

Discussions about human ‘free will’ are always interesting but often run afoul and accomplish very little, except for those engaged in the debate coming away convinced more than ever that their particular opinions are the absolute truth of the matter. I think it safe to say that most of the difficulties that render objective discussion rather difficult revolve around not basing the discussion on a particular definition of the term ‘free will’ at the outset. We end up with individuals supporting whatever definition each of them brought to the discussion, designingly unavoidable arguments, and even shattered friendships. Sometimes, but not often, the ‘free will’ discussion ends amicably, with everyone patting each other on the back for their ‘insights’, proud of their individual opinions, having only skimmed or totally avoided what scripture tells us of the state of the human will.

Much of the time when we talk about ‘free will’, all we really mean is that we have freedom of choice, which is certainly true! Our lives are filled with instances of having to weigh options and choose one thing over another, from what cereal to eat for breakfast or what shirt to wear, that merely indicate ‘preference’, to other issues of far greater ethical or moral significance. Does the fact that we make ‘free’ choices necessarily mean that we are equally ‘free’ to choose any of the set of options available to us? 

Is the human will in some sort of neutral state, uninfluenced by anything outside of itself? That’s what ‘free will’ means to the vast majority of evangelicals these days. But is that true? What does scripture tell us about the human will?

Paul, in describing the characteristics of a good workman for Christ in relation to opponents of the gospel, says to treat them gently so that:

“. . .God may perhaps grant them repentance leading to a knowledge of the truth, and they may come to their senses and escape from the snare of the devil, after being captured by him to do his will. – 2 Tim 2:25-26

Paul seems to  be saying that those who oppose the gospel are in ‘the snare of the devil’ and prisoners to to the will of the one holding them captive. Even more emphatically, Paul, in his letter to the Romans describes the condition of the man apart from Christ:

“We know that our old self was crucified with him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing, so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin.” – Rom 6:6

Here Paul states that before encountering Christ and trusting in Him for salvation, we were ‘enslaved’ to sin. Sin is the ‘master’ of anyone who is apart from the saving grace of Christ.

In using the slave/master analogy Paul was only echoing Christ:

So Jesus said to the Jews who had believed in him, “If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”

“They answered him, “We are offspring of Abraham and have never been enslaved to anyone. How is it that you say, ‘You will become free’?”

Jesus answered them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, everyone who commits sin is a slave to sin.   . . .So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.” – John 8:32-34, 36

Jesus told them, despite their objections, that before they believed in Him (the Son) and were set free, they were ‘slaves’ to sin.

Does that sound like ‘free’ will? Slaves do not have free will and are obligated to serve their masters. Concerning the matter of a lost person ‘choosing’ Christ all on his/her own, listen to Paul once again:

1Co 12:3  Therefore I want you to understand that no one speaking in the Spirit of God ever says “Jesus is accursed!” and no one can say “Jesus is Lord” except in the Holy Spirit. (Emphasis mine)

The word ‘can’ is significant here. It means what it says – no one is able without the Holy Spirit to say Jesus is Lord. Put another way – it is not possible for anyone to ‘decide’ for Christ on his/her own, as the common definition of ‘free will’ would have us believe.

The Westminster Confession of Faith (1646) summarily describes the human will from the creation of Adam to it’s eventual state in glory.

CHAPTER IX.

Of Free Will.

1. God has endowed the will of man with such natural liberty that it is neither forced nor—by any absolute necessity of nature— determined to good or evil.

2. Man, in his state of innocence, had freedom and ability to will and to do what was good and well-pleasing to God, and yet not unalterably, so that he might fall from it.

3. Man, by his fall into a state of sin, has completely lost all ability to choose any spiritual good that accompanies salvation. Therefore, an unregenerate man, because he is opposed to that good and is dead in sin, is unable by his own strength to convert himself or to prepare himself to be converted.

4. When God converts a sinner and brings him into the state of grace, he frees him from his natural bondage to sin, and by his grace alone he enables him freely to will and to do what is spiritually good. Yet, because of his remaining corruption, he does not perfectly nor only will what is good, but also wills what is evil.

5. The will of man is made perfectly and unchangeably free to do good alone, only in the state of glory.

So the question remains How ‘free’ is the human will? No soapbox or opinion here, just a question that needs asking in light of how ‘free will’ is these days commonly defined. Let the Bible speak.

A common phrase heard these days, in various forms, among professing Christians who seem to have swallowed the ‘tolerance’ mantra that doesn’t allow criticism of others’ beliefs, no matter how ‘interesting’ they might be, is this:

“I know some Christians who go to church a lot more than I do and have tons more Bible smarts, but don’t know anything about love, forgiveness or humility. All they know is how to judge others and they have no right.”

Aside from the fact that the above statement, and others like it, are in themselves judgmental, the commonly held belief that we are not to ever judge anyone about anything is simply unbiblical.

“Judge not, that you be not judged. . . . You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother’s eye”. – Matt 7:1, 5.

Our favorite passages for never judging is first of all speaking of the Pharisees’ practice of judging hypocritically. And concerning logs and eyeballs, notice the “then you will be able to see clearly”, telling us to judge ourselves before judging others.

You could say that what we have in a short passage in Matthew is Jesus’ passing judgment on improper forms of judgment, not a commandment to never judge anything or anyone.

If it isn’t sufficiently clear, consider the following:

Mat 7:15 “Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves.”

Mat 24:11 “And many false prophets will arise and lead many astray.”

Mat 24:24 “For false christs and false prophets will arise and perform great signs and wonders, so as to lead astray, if possible, even the elect.”

In order to ‘beware’ of false prophets, you have to be able to suspect something might be amiss, apply a standard of judgment, and make a judgment!

While we are not to pass judgment in certain matters, we are to discern between true and false teachers/prophets. We are even given at least one very specific area of judgment in Paul’s letter to the Galatians concerning false teachers:

“As we have said before, so now I say again: If anyone is preaching to you a gospel contrary to the one you received, let him be accursed.” – Gal 1:9

In cased you missed it, we should be ‘experts’ in the gospel and be able to spot ‘false’ gospel messages, which means those who would preach/teach a false gospel are false ‘prophets’, who should be treated according to their judged ‘status’.

There are most certainly areas in which we should not be in the ‘judging’ business, but there are other areas where we are commanded to judge, chief among them the gospel message itself.

That is a great question to ask anyone! The answers you get will tell you if the one with whom you are conversing even believes there is a God, and if that person does believe there is a God, how he/she thinks about God.  By how a person thinks about God, we don’t mean all of the specific details that might surface in the conversation, but the larger context, or framework, of thoughts about God.

The question, when posed, will certainly result in sorts of details, or characteristics about God. That’s a given – the question will draw them out. The details will always provide the larger framework of thought from which they come, or how a person thinks about God. The descriptions of God that surface in such discussions most likely indicate two main categories of thought, or mental paradigms.

The first of those reveals the tendency of picturing God being like us, just BIGGER. After all, we are created in the image of God, therefore it’s quite logical to think of God that way – isn’t it?

The second way of picturing God is in terms of who He has revealed himself to be through the scriptures.

It’s probably a fair assumption to say that for most, if not all of us who call ourselves Christians/believers/Christ followers (pick your favorite term), our thoughts of God are a combination of the two. The ratio between thoughts of God as a ‘BIGGER us’ and the revealed God of scripture will speak volumes.

Food for thought on a Friday morning………

The hearts of all mankind are closed to the gospel, to the preaching of the word, the beseechings and invitations of the Lord.

by Geoff Thomas

Lydia’s home town was four hundred miles away in Thyatira a city famous for its dyes (there is an early inscription to a guild of dyers there). Lydia was a business woman and an entrepreneur. She traded in purple cloth, up-market material because purple dye was expensive (she may have been the agent for a Thyatiran manufacturer). We are also told that she was also a worshipper of God, that is, she had been influenced by the Old Testament Scriptures and come to believe and behave as the Jews did without having become a Jew. So she was a godfearing woman. There was a place a mile outside the city where she and other women like her met together on the Sabbath day for prayer. So it seems that there was no synagogue in Philippi (a quorum of ten men would be needed in order to have a synagogue constituted).

But the most significant truth we are told about Lydia is that her heart was closed. In other words, it was closed to God and to Jesus Christ. It was closed very effectively to the message of salvation. Before I became a minister of the gospel I worked for a year for the National Coal Board as a wages clerk in their south-west Wales headquarters. The miners in the 20 collieries in the region were all being paid in cash in 1964, and every Thursday we would fill their wage packets from a million pounds in cash, and we would carry the metal cash-boxes for each pit into a strong room for the night before paying the miners on Fridays. The strong room had a mammoth door which two men would push closed and then turn a wheel in the middle. A fly couldn’t pass that door and a burglar would find it a very considerable and lengthy challenge. That door was closed shut on Thursday nights.

That closed door is a picture of Lydia’s heart, and the heart of every man and women outside of Christ, so of your heart too. The hearts of all mankind are closed to the gospel, to the preaching of the word, the beseechings and invitations of the Lord. This woman was a very capable women with considerable responsibility in the world of commerce, and I am sure she did her job with great competence and integrity, but her heart was closed. There is no mention of her husband, simply the members of her household, and she was working to support her children or her parents, and she seems to have had their trust, but her heart was closed. She was a religious person with some knowledge of the God of the Old Testament Scriptures, and one day each week was different for her, but her heart was closed. She was not simply ‘dead orthodox’ as the phrase puts it, but she believed in prayer and met regularly with other women and prayed. She was deeply devout, but still her heart was closed. With all her intelligence, and respectability, and business acumen, and religion, and piety her heart was closed.

There were a number of women gathered there outside the city gate by the river, and Paul spoke to every one of them with the same sincerity, yearning that every one of them should come to know his Saviour for themselves. Yet there was just one woman whose heart was opened. How solemn is this matter of the sovereignty of Christ. Many fishermen lined the shores of Galilee’s lake but just two sets of brothers taken to follow Christ. You yourself once went to a meeting and there the Lord opened your heart. You thought the heart of your husband who was sitting alongside you would have been opened too but he had nothing to say of the salvation of Christ. Or you went with a gang of your friends, but afterwards they talked of football and school and music. Jehovah Jesus meant as little to them after the meeting as he had before, but you were changed. Your heart had been opened. That is how it is in this solemn and humbling experience. It is initiated by Christ. It is accomplished by the grace of Christ, and that grace works sovereignly, and selectively. That grace falls with all its particularity on favoured men and women as he determines. This is his grand prerogative, and in that honour none shall share. Please don’t presume on that grace. Don’t say as boys in school would say to me, “I’d like to be religious. I want to taste what the world offers first, and then when I’m older I might become religious.” It is not in our power to determine the time or place. The only moment we have is now. All the years gone can never return, and all the future is unknown. We may soon be dead. Now is the time to plead with the Lord to open our heart.

What happened when the Lord opened her heart? We are told that she was able “to respond to Paul’s message” (Acts 16:14). The message demanded a response. It demanded repentance for her sins. It demanded trust in the finished work of Jesus Christ. It demanded baptism and a life of discipleship, and all this was possible once the Lord had opened her heart. She heard Paul speaking and she thought, “I have never heard anyone speak like this.” She thought to herself, “What an orator he is. He really believes what he says.” She thought, “This is all making sense.” But it was not because of Paul’s eloquence or sincerity that his words were having such a transforming influence in her life. It was all due to the Lord opening her heart. I once spoke to a woman in hospital who had been involved in a minor accident outside Aberystwyth and for fear she might have had concussion they were keeping her in hospital for 24 hours. She was fed up with life, but I spoke to her about the God who is in control of all our circumstances, even the fall of the sparrow. “That God has come to this world in his Son Jesus Christ to save us,” I said. She looked back bleakly to me and she said, “Words, only words.” The gospel came to her, but in word only. When the gospel came to the Thessalonians it did not come in word only, but in power and with the Holy Spirit and with much assurance so that the Thessalonians received the gospel of Paul not as the word of men but as it is in truth the word of God. So it was when Lydia’s heart was opened she was able to respond to Paul’s message.

Douglas MacMillan and his elders were interviewing two teenage boys who had come to profess faith and were applying for church membership. “Tell us what changes have taken place in your life that would lead us to believe you have been converted,” said Douglas. Their spokesman said, “Oh, it was no change in us. The change was in you, about six months ago, when your preaching got interesting.” Of course it was no change in Douglas’ preaching. What had happened was that the Lord had opened their hearts at that time and then the preaching seemed more relevant, and the worship more enjoyable and Sunday was no longer a boring day. So as Paul opened the Scriptures using the sword of the Spirit the same Spirit of Jesus opened Lydia’s heart so that she believed what Paul said to her. She became the first convert of whom we know anything on European soil.

What an encouragement Lydia is to us all to go on praying for those whose hearts have long been closed. We sometimes have the misfortune to hear certain preachers inform us that God lacks the ability to open the heart. “God can do no more. It is all up to you,” they tell proud sinners who are glad to hear that they are mightier than God, and that they can keep the Lord wringing his hands in heaven wondering whether men will condescend to accept him or not. Who would want to worship and follow such a god? If that were really the way it is then prayer itself for loved ones’ salvation would be futile. Such a theology says so mournfully that God has no power to open our loved ones’ hearts. Man almighty: God impotent. But that is not how it is! The Lord opened Lydia’s heart and he can open the hearts of the most obdurate sinners. Pray on!

____________________________________

Geoff Thomas is a Reformed Welsh preacher currently living in the South West of England. He is the Pastor of a Baptist Church in Alfred Place, Aberystwyth, UK. He also maintains the Banner of Truth website.