MS Top 6 #41

This is the Truth Network. Monday through Friday, Matt takes calls from all around the world on his radio show. We've compiled this week's best, Matt Slick's Top Six.

Number six. And then when I was in Bible college, one of my professors took a question, and the question was, you know, what's the need of evangelism? God's already planned it out. Why evangelize of God's predestines and things like that? Because he told us to. Plus, we don't understand how God's sovereignty works and all things. We don't know how our prayer effects and works and all that. We don't know. So what we have to do is go witness and evangelize. Paul the Apostle taught this stuff of predestination and election, and he was out witnessing all the time.

Number five. Quote, unquote, apologists who claim that a man and a woman are considered married. There's a moment that they have relations with one another. Yeah, I would say that those people who say that could not exegete their way out of a wet paper bag if they had a compass and a rope and people saying, come this way. If it's the case that men and women are married as soon as they have relations, then there could be no fornication, because as soon as you do that, you're married and you're no longer fornicating. So that wouldn't make any sense.

Number four. So my question is, I need to say that I come before you in the name of Jesus to even go before the throne to get my prayers answered. Is that biblical?

Yes and no. There's no formula for prayer other than Matthew 6 and Luke 11, where, you know, our Father, heart and heaven, hallowed be thy name. The idea is to pray to the Father. But you can also pray to the Holy Spirit. You can pray to Jesus. Let's say you're praying, for example, for two hours. You know, you're really good prayers. And then at the end, you're going to say all this in Jesus name and you just nod off right before that.

Oh, I guess all the prayers didn't matter, did it? Because you didn't say the phrase. That's not how it works in scripture. It's not a legalistic magic phrase with power embedded in it.

Number three. Is it possible from a scriptural point of view for those who are appointed to reject their salvation through free will? Let me give you an example of something. We would teach that regeneration precedes faith logically, not temporally. So if there's a light switch and I turn on electricity, the light is instantaneously there.

But it is the electricity that causes the light, even though it's simultaneous. So it's logically prior. God regenerates us and gives us the ability to freely believe. And we do. It's our free will that we do that. But God changes us so that we're no longer slaves of sin. But we're regenerated in so far that God's work is in us and we can believe. Once we're regenerated, we freely choose God.

Number two. What is your concept about God the mother? There is no mother God. There's only one God in all existence, all place, all time.

Not too long ago, a group of church was just harvesting that idea for me. They've been using passages that God has a feminine aspect of it. Well, when people say that God has feminine aspects, what is a feminine aspect? Is femininity being loving?

I love, men love. Femininity is a biological thing. So when they say a feminine quality, I want to know what those qualities are that are exclusively feminine. Now, we know that there's biological structures, unless you're of the ilk that believes in gender, fluidity and, you know, going to girls' bathrooms if you're a guy because you identify all this sinfulness. What's a feminine thing?

Love, patience, kindness. Men are that way, too. It's a masculine trait as well. So I have to ask them, what does that mean?

Number one. It's okay to flirt in marriage, right? Let's define our terms first. So flirting is to behave as though you're attracted to or trying to attract someone else. That is foolishness and ungodly behavior has no place in a Christian marriage or in a Christian's heart. It is inviting trouble and it is giving to someone else what belongs to your spouse. And we have to understand that as spouses, we need to continue our covenant commitment to our spouses. A covenant is a three way covenant in marriage. It's vertical between the couple and God. It's horizontal between the couple and the people, who are the witnesses, and it's internal between the two people. And it's a promise to keep themselves to one another. The issue of flirting is to attract someone else.

Well, once you've done that and you're married, you have no right to continue to do that with anybody else. You guys give up or you're thirsty for more? I always trust a guy named Matt Slick on the radio. We hope you've enjoyed this episode of Matt Slick's Top Six. For more on Matt and his live syndicated call in radio show, go to truthnetwork.com. Got a question? Matt Slick has your answer. This is the Truth Network.