Is not explaining salvation per se. He is talking to them about God making us His children. That this plan that God has had to do this thing. Has been set up long ago from the foundations of the world. It's been established.
God is not groping through or developing What's going to happen to believers? That's done. Long before Earth was made. It's the idea. This is Cross Reference Radio with our pastor and teacher, Rick Gaston.
Rick is the pastor of Calvary Chapel, Mechanicsville. Pastor Rick is currently teaching through a topical series. Please stay with us after today's message to hear more information about Cross-Reference Radio, specifically how you can get a free copy of this teaching. But for now, let's join Pastor Rick as he begins a new message, Predestination. judging others.
Ephesians chapter 1 if you have your Bibles You're gonna wanna turn there and... Stay there a little bit. After tonight, we have maybe five more questions. If we double up on them. Maybe three sessions more.
The topic is going to be two topics. Predestination and judging others.
So we have three Reformed theology questions that have been submitted. We'll only get one part, and you may be a little. fatigued hearing me comment on That doctrine of Calvinism It will be uh predestination versus free will.
Next session that we cover This Reformed theology, the second question to this would be Calvinism versus Arminianism. And then Reformed theology, is it good or bad?
Well, that one I can just answer in a word is bad. I don't agree with any of it.
Now, I don't. for a moment question the faith or the love for Christ that Reformed theology Adherents hold? Calvinist? I don't question their love for Christ. As a rule, But I think Christianity would be better off without it.
I don't think it brings anything to Christianity worth keeping, and we're going to talk about that. And I have every right to say that, just like they have every right. Two. counter whatever it is I say, which they would love to do. We're going to put a phone number up on the Posting for this one.
On YouTube, 1-800 Cry Baby. Yeah.
So we gotta have a little humor with this. You can't be so uptight. I don't wanna sound bitter. Though I'm passionate against them. But I'm I don't have any dislike for the people Until I get to know them, of course.
But anyway, coming back to this. Please explain predestination versus free will biblically. Why do so many get it wrong?
Well, I'm assuming the question is in our favor. They're the wrong ones, we're the right ones.
So, Ephesians chapter 1: Blessed be the God. and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, Who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ? just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, That we should be holy. without blame before him in love. having predestined us to adoption.
As sons by Christ by Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the good pleasure of His will. to the praise of the glory of His grace by which He made us acceptable in the Beloved. In verse 11, he will pretty much repeat the predestination part. Jesus. This is what John said about salvation.
John chapter 1, verse 2, but as many as received him to them he gave the right to become children of God. to those who believed in his name.
So Paul is writing this Ephesian letter. to people who are already saved. He is not explaining salvation per se. He is talking to them about God making us His children. That this plan that God has had to do this thing.
Has been set up long ago from the foundations of the world. It's been established. God is not groping through or developing. What's going to happen to believers? That's done.
Long before Earth was made. It's the idea. But that's not going to be enough to silence The argument. We've got to get to that word predestination because it does not mean What you might think it means.
So The section again, not about How we get saved, but life once we are saved, and that context cannot be dismissed. Not about salvation as Calvinists attempt to make it. The Calvinists are Reformed theologians, have you ever met someone that's race-centered? Everything is about race. You can't get away from it with them.
Maybe it's another subject, but I'm speaking from experience. People are like, man, do you have any other It's everything black and white to you.
Well, Calvinists are like that with this. Everything's got to be the sovereignty of God, as though the rest of us have lost sight of it or something. We absolutely believe in the sovereignty of God. but the free will of man also. They admit they struggle with it.
Predestination is always It has always to do with future destiny It never infers the power of choice or moral accountability. As though that's already been established. Your choice has already been established. That's not the meaning of the word predestination in the original language, which is our judge. the Greek in this case, the New Testament.
God's ability to ordain people to eternal life. never operates apart from our ability To believe? To receive and to obey the gospel.
Now if I board a flight Going to from Richmond to Utah, for example, non-stop, and probably nonexistent, but. If I were to do that. And I got on that plane. I'm predestined to go to Utah. But I chose that.
I boarded the flight, I chose the ticket. And it doesn't, this example does not sort of magically evaporate when we come to theological questions. In fact, one of their Great teachers said that We don't have choice because we're dead. in trespasses and sin And dead men don't choose. And he thinks that that's a gotcha moment.
Who can make a comeback to that?
Well, very easily, dead men don't. Do they trespass? Because according to your line of logic They can't trespass either.
So the whole thing falls apart.
So metaphor does count. If you're going to make your point.
So back to this predestination to God.
Now he knows everything. Everything is not only predestined, But pre known but not precaused. God did not cause Nazi Germany to invade Poland. or all the other horrible crimes that are out there. But the fact that he knows what's going to happen.
does not mean he did it. We allowed it. One of the lessons out of the book of Job. But he knows everything, and in that sense, to him, everything is preknown and predestined. But this does not mean that he has removed our say-so.
Our choice, which is what? rattles the person when they hear that word predestined.
Somebody's chosen my fate for me.
Somebody has decided something for me without my consent. And it's God doing it, and I have no say so in this matter. And what else has he done? And that's what they're where they're going with it.
So he Predestined Set up the benefits. of being saved. That's what this means, the word that is used here. But it has been a hijacked word. It has changed.
Hijacking of the word. The entire meaning By them. The Reformed theologians, who were all once Roman Catholics. And they protested against the popes and Roman Catholicism. And they established their Reform theology.
And they hijacked this word to make their five points of Calvinism function. They don't like to hear that, but they can't deny it. The Christian course being set, the destination of the saved is already established. You are predestined to be like Christ. It begins in this life.
It's finalized after this life when the glorification kicks in. That's the predestination Paul is talking about. But by twisting the definition to mean pre-cause. They've made a study on Ephesians 1 grueling. Because now you've got to spend all your time.
disarming that time bomb. Of misdefinition. That one word. predestined to be holy, Without blame. Before Christ in love, look at verse 4, just as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world.
Yes, but why did he choose us? Who makes a critical choice? Without Knowledge. Context. No one.
In fact, we mock those As low information voters, When they just vote. For someone they like without considering what that person believes, supports. And in powers Of course, God chose us because of our reaction to his invitation, which somehow the Calvinists have said that's works, you can't do that.
Now, I'll come to the verse where Jesus says, Well, if that's works, it's acceptable by me.
So back to verse 4. He chose us in him before the foundation of the world. That we should be holy without blame before him in love.
Well, that's not complete. We're not blameless in this life. We aspire to be blameless. We're told to be blameless. The proof that we don't make it is we have an advocate with the Father.
In case we fail. The Greek word here Pro ordidzo, like you need to hear that, and like I need to say it. From God's perspective, again, everything being. Pre-known, which is not what this Greek word does not mean pre-selected, it does not mean. Pre-known, it means pre-assigned.
And This predestination, this pre-knowledge, as mentioned. is not the cause.
So he limits in advance. He pre-establishes things for us. We're on this course, we're on this flight, we know where it's going, we know how it's going to turn out because it has been set and Satan can't touch it. Nothing to do with salvation directly in this verse. He's not telling them this is how you get saved, they're already saved.
But this is the prize. Adoption. You will be made family. If you come to Christ, you will be family. That has been pre-established by God.
which is what he is saying. It's a compound Greek word here. It means to limit in advance. And you can look it up in your Greek concordance, your Strong's Concordance. You look the word up for yourself.
If you go to the English, you got to remember that many of the English dictionary writers not all of them Noah Webster was a Unitarian, but some of the others they were greatly influenced by Calvinism And they were religious men, many of them. And so the meaning is the predestination, predestined, has a theological flair to it, but that's not what the Greek is doing. And that's what we're going by. The second part of the word Horizzo is where we get our English word horizon. He has marked out the horizon.
He's put the limits on these things. God is not figuring it out while He's moving to eternity. Ephesians again chapter 1 verses 5 and 6 having pre-marked. See, that's the word predestination, but I'm giving you. Alternate translation without doing any harm to the word.
My peer review will be if you go and look it up yourself and say, you know what, he's right. It doesn't mean preselection. Having premarked us to adoption as sons by Jesus Christ to himself according to the good pleasure of his will. All that Christ offers us is according to His will. Not outside his will.
He's not saying, I'm going to offer you salvation, but I really don't want you saved. That would not be according to his will. Through the praise of the glory of His grace by which He made us acceptable in the Beloved.
So it relates specifically to God's intention. For the saved. determined in advance Adopted children by Christ. I am purposely repeating myself because that's what it takes to overthrow a misdefinition. Because once you get the wrong idea about a word, it's hard to shake it.
Rest of your life, that'll be your first thought, maybe.
So how do you You counter it. You have to keep overpaving it or paving over it repeatedly. I believe if God meant pre-chosen or pre-selected, He would have used that word through the Apostle Paul, and that is not what Paul says. Romans 8.29. for whom he fore knew God foreknows everybody.
Satan and the fallen angels included. He also predestined To be conformed to the image of his son. Again, he's not telling us. We're saved because we're that's our fate. Which is what Calvinism preaches.
They'll deny that, then they'll go ahead and say it using different words. And I'll come to that.
So I hope this is helping, but nowhere does it mean saved without receiving, not in the Greek, not in the Hebrew, not in the English or any other language. Predestination, the word, has been corrupted in our English language in the way we. Perceive the word. And again, only because of this reformed theology. Knowing where you are going is the predestination, is getting on the flight.
That you are predestined. to arrive at that location, that destination.
Nowhere. taught that God Pre-assigns people to hell or heaven. arbitrarily. They are sent there based on their rejection or reception of Jesus Christ. And some outside standards that Paul talks about in Romans chapter 2 and chapter 3.
But in the end Lord of the universe will do right. And everybody in heaven will see it and say that was the right call. God's foreknowledge is not the same thing. As He did it. and got away with it.
Luke chapter 22.
Now here's God knew That the universe would exist. And he caused it. We know that because we're told that. God knew that Judas Iscariot would betray him. But he did not cause Judas to betray him.
We know that because it is explicitly said in Scripture that Satan entered into Judas. In his heart, it wasn't his elbow. Satan didn't enter the shins of Judas to get him to betray Christ. It was the heart. And the heart.
Is the head? the feelings, the intellect, the soul, the person. That's how the Greeks and the Hebrews use that word. You shall love the Lord your God with your heart. whole heart.
So Luke 23, 22, verse 3: Then Satan entered Judas, surnamed Iscariot. Who is numbered among the 12.
So now we have identification.
Okay, this is Judas, one of the 12 disciples. And Satan has entered him. John picks it up in the thirteenth chapter. And supper being ended, the devil having already put into the heart of Judas Iscariot Simon's son to betray him. God knew this.
That's foreknowledge. But it's not The cause. God did not cause that. One writer, Lawrence Vance, writing against Calvinism said the basic era of Calvinism is confounding election and predestination with salvation. which they never are in the Bible.
But only in philosophical speculations and theological implications of Calvinism. And some of you say, now, what is that last part? Philosophical speculations, theological implications. When they come to a verse that they want to prop up the doctrine. They form a hypothesis And without basis, they make it law.
And they've done it with the word predestination. We'll come to another one. The big one is when they change the word world to mean the elect. How do you do that? You can go by their study Bibles of the Calvinists.
You can go turn to John 3:16, and you can see when they say, This is the elect. They don't mean Israel, the elect. They don't mean the elect lady that John talks about in his letters. They're talking about those who have been elected. Through sovereign, irresistible.
Grace. If it's irresistible, it's not grace, it's forced. Grace doesn't work that way. Grace is undeserved kindness, but it's not slammed over anyone's head.
So it makes bad doctrine worse because it is popular make-believe teaching. It's definition tampering. And Calvinism cannot function without changing. Three basic definitions. Predestination is one.
They've changed it to pre-cause. One doesn't mean that.
Sovereignty. God is sovereign. You can't ask. He just does it, and that's that. That's tyranny.
In fact, some of them will say, if you believe, that you can be saved. By accepting God's invitation. You believe in salvation by works. And not the sovereignty of God. That's how they twist this.
It's like, are you crazy? I believe in the sovereignty of God, and in His sovereignty He has allowed me to choose. Toj is going to get to a good quote of him on that one. But coming back to the words, they. They tamper with.
Election. It's baseless with them. It's just, it's, you know, he's like the guy behind the curtain in the Wizard of Oz. You can't look back there. He's sovereign.
No, we can. That's what the revelation of the Bible gives us. It says: this is the character of your God. This is Baal. This is Ashtareth.
This is God Almighty, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, this is his heart. This is what he does. He loves sinners. He wears a crown of thorns for us. There's no secret compartment to this.
Faith has become works with them. As I mentioned, the word world has been changed by them arbitrarily, without basis. to apply only to those who God Predestined.
So, that corruption alone is sufficient to expunge their credibility. If you take the word world and you change it to the elect, I don't need a second example. You have just ruined your credibility with me. What other verses do you like to overturn to prop up your doctrine? I'm talking about their heroes like John MacArthur doing this kind of stuff.
The over-exaggeration of the word depravity. We're depraved, we're born sinners, we are born in iniquity, but nowhere in the Bible does it say. That we are so depraved. that we've lost the ability to reason when something is offered to us. We still have free will.
Nowhere does it say we've lost this. But In their TULIP, the five points of Calvinism, and the acronym TULIP, T stands for total depravity. You can't even say yes if you're offered salvation because you're too depraved. Where do you get that from?
Well, it helps our doctrine stand. These are intelligent. Articulate People. That are pushing this doctrine forward. And you scratch your head and say, well, it's like Trump derangement syndrome.
They make up words. They have to label you if you don't agree with them.
So if you Here's a word they just make up. Compatibilities compatibilism. Yeah, right. Who even cares how to pronounce it? Teaching that God's sovereign election Enables the human will to respond in faith, but only through divine grace.
That is saying Oh yeah, God allows free will. To the one he has chosen to save. That's double-speak. That's double talk.
So it's not free will. He's forcing me to have free will so I can choose. But he's bypassing the other guy because he's not elected. And I'm supposed to be comfortable with this approach to the Scripture. And it gets worse.
But if you believe. That God's sovereign election enables the human will. And to respond or not. That's Compatibilism. The Intellectual Department of Protestantism controls this doctrine.
And they have Locked God into the age of the Reformation, and they will go no further. And they're very proud of it, and that's why they call themselves Reformed Theologians or Reformed Theology. Trying to distance themselves a little bit from having, you know, being called Calvinists, because if you say to them, well, why would you name your doctrine after a human being? And you you really can't answer that.
Well, they can, but it's a weak answer.
So they suppose their redefinition of predestination cancels free will, as I've said a few times, insisting that it's not a misdefinition and you can be the judge. You get your concordance. You type in, you can Google it. The Greek word for predestination in Ephesians chapter 1, verse 5. and it will give it to you.
And you'll find it does not mean precaused. John chapter 7 Verse 17, Jesus said, If anyone wills to do his will, It would be meaningless if you didn't have free will to say that. If anyone wills to do his will, if God, his major will. willful enough to do his will.
Well, then he would have said that. It's such an important topic. You don't it it's a child can understand this. And you parents know you share your gospel with a child. If you want to receive Christ, sweetheart, you just have to invite him into your heart, and the child gets it.
Then the Calvinists come along. And then they tell, no, no, no. Don't you believe that? John chapter 6, verse 28. Does it sound like.
Been very clear. I don't like this doctrine. I don't think it brings anything to Christianity. I think many God-loving Christians have fallen for this, but I respect none of it as doctrines go. Uh Thanks for tuning in today to Cross-Reference Radio, where Pastor Rick has some answers for various questions that have been asked.
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