Our Father, we love you and thank you. in life and in death. You are everything to us. Without you, we're nothing. In you we live and we find our existence.
And we thank you that you have privileged us as believers. who have been saved by your sheer grace and mercy to tell other people, as someone once told us. how they can find forgiveness. And we know when we meet the Lord Jesus in heaven, among other things, we know that this will be most important to him.
So we pray you'd sharpen our sword these days, both theologically so that in our hearts and mind we understand the gospel. profoundly that we can share it very, very simply. And that you would equip us here in these months, and we thank you and praise you in Jesus' name. Amen. All right, one of the things that we have mentioned is that um You have an opportunity to share your testimony if you so choose.
There's a little card that you have to fill out. And those are available, or you've gotten them, most of you. Um But if you'd like to be considered, and so tonight we have Jerry Breland. Jerry, come on up here. And Jerry, are you left-handed or right-handed?
Right-handed, okay, so you'll go over to this one here. Yeah, you're right-brained, right-handed. You use the right one on this side.
So, all right, now so I want you to listen carefully to what He asked to share, and we're here to help each other. And sometimes this is kind of the Seat where you know, oh, they're analyzing me, but we're here to help each other. We're brothers and sisters in Christ. You know, I go to this conference in Dallas where when you speak, And it's by invitation only, and it's all these theologues. Pastors and seminary professors, and after you speak, they get up there and they crucify your sermon and they ask you questions and they debate, and it's really an interesting time.
Now, we're not going to do that, but we do want to think through what's done well and if there's one or two things that he might do to improve. Maybe there's nothing.
So, Jerry, go ahead, it's yours. I said be easy with me. Go ahead. I I When I talk to people, I generally try to use Pastor Carl's question as, hey, do you go to church anywhere? And 90% of the time they'll say, Yeah, I used to go, just not much anymore.
And this is how I answer them. I said, Really? Yeah, me either at one time. We don't need to go to church to be saved, right? Tell you a little story about me.
My wife said, I like talking about myself anyway. You know, from a very young age, I've always trusted and depended on Jesus alone for my salvation. I knew I was saved by grace through faith, and that it is the free gift of God, not the result of my works. And I think I stopped right there. You know, we can't work our way there, right?
And we can't be perfect, right?
So why try? I don't think it was like that, but that was probably the result of my actions. I attended church back then very sporadically, always attending the major events, you know, weddings and funerals. After getting married some 37 years ago, I did change a little bit, started attending church pretty regular, hearing that same message the devil's going to get you.
Well, I knew that. Maybe I was getting out of that 15-minute sermon. Exactly what I was putting into it. I don't know. Where our sons grew up to be fine young Christian men, not being saved because of their dad, but in spite of him.
And actually, our oldest was in seminary.
Now, that's a whole other story. When he comes to me and tells me that I needed to grow in my knowledge of Christ and direct me toward a new church, CBC. That's exactly right. Here's a son teaching his dad and not the other way around.
Well, par for the course for me.
Well, we do decide to take the hour drive to this new church, community Bible church, and we have never left. I've grown more spiritually out here in the last five or six years than in my previous 57. I now know why I believe what I believed. And do I give credit to this Bible-believing church or to a scripture preacher? Pastors or to his faithful serving men, and I say, Yes, I can, but mostly I give credit to my Lord and His Word.
I feel that's what changed this man. I remember that day, I was sitting in that balcony right up there, and My pastor, Pastor Carl, was preaching the Christmas service from Isaiah, verses that I had read multiple times. But this time it occurred to me, hey, this is Old Testament. This is written hundreds of years before it happened. And just like a light switching on, it occurred to me that I needed to pay more attention to these faithful and true words of this book.
Everything else is history. I was telling this story to one of our church's elders, and he said that was probably the moment I got saved. I don't think so. I think I've always been saved, but I was completely out of fellowship with my Lord. I hope I'm right because I have a lot of friends, just like you and me a few years ago.
You know, you know the Bible. You know scripture. It is the actual word of our Almighty God. He said his words of living actors sharpened in a two-edged sword that they are. They pierced my heart.
It now burns for his word. I feel my heart changing, and I'm not changing it. I couldn't. Believe me, I tried. But my Lord, through the Holy Spirit, is changing me.
It's no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me. And to say my life's gotten easier lately is an understatement. As a matter of fact, it's gotten much worse, even to the point that I'm... I may lose everything I've ever worked for, but you know the Lord gives. And sometimes he takes away.
I do choose to say, Blessed be his name. I do now have a peace I can't explain, truly beyond comprehension. I understand and know my God is faithful and he loves me and he cares for me. Do I still worry? Yeah, a little now and then.
And to be completely honest, maybe I worry a good bit about how God is going to work all these things out in my life, knowing these trials are for my good. Although sometimes I feel God's light and my path is on low beams and I don't understand why these things are happening, I do choose to put my complete trust and dependence in him every day and for everything. You know, none of us get out of this thing alive, right?
So we need to make sure we know where we're going. I know Christ died for this poor sinner. The least I can do is live for him.
So, going forward, this servant right here has made it his mission for the days he has left on this earth to start boldly standing in front and humbly following his Lord and Savior and faithfully telling everyone how he has saved and transformed this old wretched, hard-headed man. Hey, I got an idea. Why don't you come to church me Sunday? Amen. Good.
Three minutes and nineteen seconds. He told me it was three minutes and 20 seconds. Would that be okay? And I said, yes, that's close enough.
So we're trying to do it in three minutes. That was really great, Jerry.
So if you want to share what he did well, come to the podium because this is being taped. And if you have a thought and you're not afraid to come up here, I mean, I can say it, but it would be nice to hear from one or two of you. Uh You don't think he did anything good? Was it that bad? No, I thought it was great.
It was very personal. Um You know, and so if and as such, conversational. If you were engaging with another individual, he spoke about some of. Um His journey, you know, we mentioned in some people's testimony, they come to Christ maybe at 30 or 15 or 25, and he came seemingly as a very young man, and yet his growth pattern was like this towards. the last five or six years.
And so sometimes that's the way our testimony goes because we remained a young Christian for a long time, sometimes just for the simple reason that We lack solid spiritual food.
So that was very, you know. helpful. And I think someone could relate to that. And neither did he say all of his problems were gone. He still has.
some real trials he's facing even now. Yet he was looking to the Lord to trust him. Uh the only thing I do to tweak it As you did make this statement, I've always been saved, and I think I know what you meant by that in light of the front end of the testimony. I became saved at a very young age. But again, the growth pattern happened a little bit later.
Obviously, we're not always saved. One day we're not saved, the next day we are.
So there is a point in our life when we cross that line into conversion. Not everyone, by the way, as we'll see in this course, can remember the exact date, time, moment. Assurance is not given on our ability to remember that moment or time. In fact, sometimes people think they have the date nailed down and it's actually not the right date. Um but assurance is based first and foremost on a finished work, namely Christ.
That was tremendous. There's very little I would change to it.
So, thank you, Jerry, for being willing to get up here and share. And maybe we'll have another victim.
So, no, thank you. It's not that difficult. And again, it's encouraging. It's encouraging for. For us to hear just how God is working in people's lives.
Now, if you're here for the first time, or if you're live streaming with us, and by the way, the handout is available online at communitybiblechurch.us. We're on handout number four, which will take us, I don't know, a couple months to get through. And we're talking in handout number four about how to effectively present the gospel, the key to effective presentation. We're dealing here in this section not so much with the mechanics as much as the theology. And so under Roman number one, we first began to focus on the Holy Spirit's role in us.
And that's essential because we will see as we work through this endile when the Spirit comes to convict the world of sin, righteousness, and judgment. It's not like this cloud just comes over a person, or he does it through typically another believer. who is open. and willing To share the good news with an individual that God's brought into your life. And so we said that critical to being effective in evangelism.
Being filled with the Spirit. He lives in all of us. I say he lives in all of us who are born again. We've been baptized by the Spirit. We're indwelt by Him.
We're sealed with Him for the day of redemption. Jesus said in John 14, 16, He's in us forever.
So you can never lose the Holy Spirit once you're born again. That's called, again, the baptism, the indwelling, a number of ministries that relate to that, the moment of conversion. But the filling is something that can be lost. And so we're never commanded to get the Holy Spirit after Pentecost. It's assumed.
We have him, but we are commanded to be filled. We went through four commands in terms of not to grieve him, not to quench him, to walk by him, and to sow to the spirit.
Now we're in point D, and I'm just going to briefly review, because we spent pretty much the whole hour on these first two pages or so, and I'm just going to pretty much read through it so that you have a feel of where we're going. We need to be expectant to see the Spirit's conviction. And so we noted John 16 reminds us that no sinner has ever been convicted of his need to come to Christ apart from the revealing ministry of the Spirit. And so I've filled in these blanks for you and what we've covered. And we studied John 14, and when he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will convict the world concerning sin, righteousness, and judgment.
Uh then John 16, 8. It teaches that the Spirit, John chapter 16, I said 14, that the Spirit was sent to convict the world. That is to bring conviction to each and every one of us before we come to salvation.
So the world, contextually, is a world of lost people. And he convicts the whole world. In light of our previous discussion, of those who identify as Calvinists and others who consider themselves non-Calvinists, and they can have a number of terms. The most popular term, of course, is Arminian, or Arminianism is the teachings of Jacobus Arminius. But there's so many gradations of Arminians, just like there are.
of Calvinists, it's hard to nail every person down. But you're either a Calvinist typically or a non-Calvinist, and John 16:8, of course, has been the subject of much debate. This verse stands at the crossroad of how these two groups understand the Holy Spirit's work in bringing the world of people to faith. The Calvinist typically interprets the word world to refer to all kinds or all categories of people. but not every single human being universally.
Now we said there was another side to that, but typically, generally, when someone says they're reformed, Just like when they say, for God so loved the world, they don't mean every single person that Christ died for, but Different people within that world. When God says he wishes that none should perish, but all should come to repentance, that's a qualified all in their theology. When it says that we should pray for kings and all who are in authority, because God desires all men to be saved, all again is qualified, all kinds of men, kings and non-kings, presidents and paupers, and so forth. And so, typically, when they use John 16:8 in terms of the world, they're saying different categories within the world. And that's important for you to understand that.
That's just what they teach, and they don't make apology for it. The Calvinistic emphasis on the word world concerns the scope of the gospel, but not a reference to every single person without exception. John Calvin taught that the world referred to Jews and Gentiles alike, but that it did not refer to every human being without exception. And I could have given you a long quote from his commentary on the Gospel of John, but it's volume 2. If you just go to John 16, verse 8, you'll get a full explanation.
In other words, Calvin and those who ascribe to his teachings see the world here as referring to the elect within the world. who are brought to repentance and faith by the Spirit's convicting work. Most Calvinists distinguish general conviction as a universal awareness of guilt and sin.
So, what I'm saying there is they would not deny that people who are lost, who are not a member of the elect, are convicted of sin. They just say it's a different kind of conviction. And they would say that would arise through conscience, because men have consciences, through creation, because the creation is a witness of God's existence, his attributes, his power, and a moral understanding that sin warrants judgment. And we looked at Romans 2:14 and 15. That even pagans, they're speaking of Gentile pagans who don't have the law unto themselves.
They share the work of the law in their hearts, their conscience either approving or condemning them. They maintain that although this conviction may stir feelings of guilt or fear, it is not sufficient. In itself, to lead to salvation and the non-elect. And I'm going to give you a number of quotes later on in the course directly out of Calvin's own writings from his Institutes and Commentaries on that, and some modern-day Calvinists. Still, other Calvinists broaden this conviction to include the Holy Spirit, literally convicting every individual in the world, yet to no effect, unless the person has first been chosen and elected by God.
So you understand the difference between those two.
So on the one hand, you have John Calvin and many of his followers who say, no, when it speaks of the Spirit convicting of the world, that's just the world of the elect. Then you have other Calvinists who will soften that a little bit and they'll say, no, he convicts each and every person. But unless you're elected, the conviction is meaningless. Because it's impossible for you to be saved unless you are elected. And again, that's because of their understanding of total depravity, which we will cover when we come to point two in the red booklet.
How do you understand total depravity? And so evangelicals use the term differently. A Southern Baptist would use it very differently from, say, a Reformed Baptist. They mean two different things. By contrast, the non-Calvinist understands the word world to mean that every person, without exception, can experience the convicting ministry of the Holy Spirit and not to different types of people.
This definition of the word world fits the plain and simple reading of Scripture. as found in such verses like John 3, 16 and John 12, 32.
So again, it's just a plain reading. You know, many times I think people have to be educated into the Calvinist. Calvinistic perspective. The simple reading of Scripture would not get you there. What I always find interesting is when I've been to countries where The people have had little seminary training.
And the only training that they've received is through the local church, which is nothing wrong with that, because for centuries there were no seminaries. And in one sense, the local pastors should be equipped. Equipping the people on some degree to even get a seminary degree in the local church. But when they don't have all this formal training, it's like, where do they get this stuff? We don't see that.
Of course, you don't, because the simple, plain reading of Scripture does not produce that. In the realm of theology, number 14, the Spirit's universal work of convicting all people, where he awakens a sense of guilt and the recognition of the need for grace, is commonly referred to as prevenient grace. That's a fancy term for pre-salvation grace.
So the non-Calvinists, Jacobus Arminius included, though his followers would be different. And so, you know, you can say what Jacobus Arminius believed, but what some of his followers believed was not always in sync. And so the opening session, I read this paragraph by right out of his own works. and how different it was from say the modern day Arminian. But um he would teach As most evangelicals commonly teach, that since we are dead in our trespasses and sins, The dead men can't respond.
Therefore, we can't take any credit for our salvation. It began with God. It's not that we sought God, but He sought us. and sent his son to be the propitiation for our sins, right? And he began to work in us and stir in us.
The question is, does he do that with all people? And I would say yes, because they take world to mean world. Everybody. They don't always. But still, on the same hand, we're acknowledging a common truth.
That man is dead, so God has to take the initiative. They would simply say that God takes the initiative only with the elect. and not with all people. In simple speech, provenient grace is God's first move towards a sinner as God awakens or draws a person, softening in his hard heart, so as to give the person enough moral capability to respond to the gospel.
Now we went down a side road last week that how that provening grace is given. Differs depending on which Calvinistic camp that you're in.
So Martin Luther taught that you were born again in the waters of baptism. That's when prevenient grace was given. Calvin also taught, but he had a slightly different read in infant baptism and the reading of the word combined with infant baptism. My people might say, well, that sounds like salvation by works, and they would deny that and they would say that, no, that's just when the provening grace is given, but people still have to respond by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone. But again, it's somewhat convoluted.
Because you really Can't pull that out of scripture. And what happens sometimes is people bring a theological lens. To the scriptures. It's what Paul warns about being captured by philosophies, and we think, oh, he means Plato. And he doesn't typically mean that.
He's talking about theological philosophies. That people develop. And when you read scripture through a theological premise that you start with, then you might interpret the passage accordingly.
So, for instance, if you don't believe that. There's any future for Israel, and you start with that premise that God is done with the Jewish people, then the way you're going to have to conclude Romans 9 is going to be very different from someone who believes that God made an unconditional, eternal, forever covenant with the Jewish people and it wasn't conditioned on their obedience. Of course, while he convicts the entire world, his conviction does not guarantee that every individual will be saved. Since each must freely choose to accept or reject the grace of Christ and salvation. Yet, The Holy Spirit gives people enough light to respond to the gospel without squishing their will or to receive or to reject Christ.
And we looked at Acts 7. Because, of course, again, one of the TULIP and the acronym Tula, total depravity, unconditional election, limited atonement, irresistible grace, they would say that you cannot resist. the Holy Spirit if you're elect.
Well, there's examples of people in Scripture. Who resists the Spirit of God. And we looked at, for instance, at the preaching of Stephen when he's preaching to his Jewish brethren who end up stoning him to death. And he says, You're just like your fathers, stiff-necked, always resisting the Holy Spirit, just like they did. On the one hand, understanding this, we go in dependence on the Spirit.
to work through us with a sense of expectation. Towards those with whom we share, knowing that they can potentially believe. and be saved.
Now if you don't have that expectation I had a plumber in my house today. And I was studying. My wife said, You need to come over here. I don't want to bother you, but you need to come over here.
So I go over, and of course, I have to turn off the well because he has to do the work on the thing.
Now if I thought For one skinny moment What John Calvin believed, then in my heart, I might think. This guy is either elect or he's not. And What I say might have very little effect. and my passion to try to win him. I mean, as if God were entreating through us, we beg you on behalf of Christ.
That sounds passionate to me in 2 Corinthians 5. We beg you on behalf of Christ to be reconciled. Why are you begging? Why are you pleading, Paul? because he recognizes the potentiality for anyone to turn and to be saved.
Well, someone in our church had pre-evangelized this brother. And so we were talking, he said, your voice sounds familiar. I said, yeah, I said, what do you mean? He said, I know who you are. I've seen you on TV.
I live stream you from Yemensey on Sunday mornings. Oh, okay. And as it turns, one of our men had witness to him, and he works for one of our men. And so I ask them the diagnostic questions immediately, zero.
So we talked about the gospel, and he's coming Sunday. He's excited. He said, You mean to tell me that I can be certain I'm going to heaven? I'm going to talk about that on Sunday. It's friend day.
You should come. I'm coming.
Now he'd been before to our Gray's campus, never filled out a visitor's card. But nonetheless, he usually live streamed, but he's going to come in person.
Now, if I didn't think the potentiality that he could be saved. I would have flipped the circuit breaker off. drained the system and gone back to my study. But I took a half an hour with this Young man.
So it affects the way you evangelize. And that's why when you meet your dear reformed brothers and sisters in Christ, they have, in my judgment, little passion for evangelism. They're typically collecting believers. who already know the Lord and then they're bringing them into their Calvinistic perspective, but all you have to do, I have a friend who's The president of the Joshua Project. He was in our ministry at Duke.
He graduated number one from his class. Um He has spent 30 years of his life Cataloging every single unreached people group in the world so that mission agencies could say, oh, well, you already have three missionaries over here. Here's some groups over here where you have no one else. I could I would not care. About trying to reach people, if I thought that some people didn't even have, it just changes your passion.
And I say all that, that Dan Scribner. Will be the first to tell you that the reformed brothers and sisters in Christ are at the bottom of the barrel in terms of Satan missionaries. He has his finger on the pulse of every major missionary organization in the world because he coordinates with them in terms of trying to set them up to reach unreached people. And it's the Reformed Baptists, Reformed Presbyterians, and on and on. They're at the, they're sending very few people.
Of course they are. They don't have a passion to win people. And what's going to suck the passion out? Their view of how God works in people. In addition, number 20, when we understand this, our passion increases because we realize the gospel is sincere and universal and available to anyone who responds in faith.
On the other hand, those who reject this universal conviction believe that the opportunity is not equal. But is only granted to the elect whom they say the Father uniquely draws to himself. No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him. I believe that. And I will raise him up on the last day.
So the initiative again begins with God. Why? Because we're dead in sin. And if I am lifted up, from the earth. will draw all men to myself.
Not some men, but all men.
So God initiates with all. Calvinists see both these passages as describing God's sovereign act of regeneration that brings only those who are elected to faith. By the way, the Reformed Baptists, the Reformed Faith, even some, we have two Reformed churches in our town, they teach you're regenerated before you believe. I don't think that for a moment. You're regenerated when you believe at the moment of salvation.
In Him, you also having heard the message of truth, the gospel of your salvation, having believed, you were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise. You're not regenerated before you believe. R. C. Sprohl and others teach that.
Calvinists teach that the word draws, it's the Greek word helko, I transliterated it, found here in John 6.44 means to compel or to draw irresistibly. Such that those whom God elects cannot possibly resist God's sovereign grace. John Piper, he was a Reformed Baptist pastor at one time. He's not pastoring anymore, but in his book, What He Believes, What We Believe, page 76, he said, If our doctrine of total depravity is true, Which I don't think it is. I believe in the doctrine of total depravity, but not the way they do, and we'll discuss that later on.
If our doctrine of total depravity is true, there can be no salvation without the reality of irresistible grace. If we are dead in our sins, totally unable to submit to God, then we will never believe in Christ unless God overcomes our rebellion. And of course, I will show you before we're done that both he and Calvin argue that God only overcomes the rebellion of the elect. In other words, he and other Calvinistic thinkers argue that the Father only draws the elect. And when he does, his work is irresistible, such that for any to deny this is to make God less than sovereign over man.
Non-Calvinists say that this understanding of the word draws. Certainly, it gives God the credit for taking the initiative with us while also maintaining His absolute sovereignty in giving man freedom of choice.
Now they will argue that to give man freedom of choice is to make God less sovereign. And all I would say is, God is sovereign. He can do whatever he sovereignly chooses. And if in his sovereignty he wants to give people the capability to say yes or no, he can so do so. Since the power of choice is an aspect of God's person, God in His sovereignty, who created man in His own image, has made us with the capacity to choose and not as some pre-programmed robot.
This understanding of John 6, 44 is clear from the immediate context, where Jesus just stated, All that the Father gives me will come to me, and the one who comes to me I will certainly not cast out. Most of us who are committed to a grammatical and contextual interpretation of Scripture recognize that the words, all that the Father gives me, refers in the context to the bride that God promised his Son. Each and every one who responds to the drawing ministry of God are promised never to be cast out, such that Jesus can promise, I will raise him up on the last day, underscoring our security. Clearly from this context, the drawing ministry of the Father is not limited only to certain chosen ones, but to all men. For Jesus said, and if I I, and if I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all men to myself.
God is able to draw all men through the Holy Spirit who convicts the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgment. This does not mean that all men will turn to Jesus, but that all men have sufficient opportunity to do if they Choose to.
So He is the light that enlightens every man, right? John 1, 9. John 1:19 is the Romans 1.19 is the opposite, where people suppress that light in their unrighteousness.
Now that was important. That's review, but I think review is one of the best teachers, and I learned that from Jesus because he repeatedly says the same thing over and over and over again. It's important, number 34, to note that the context of John 6:44 does not imply an irresistible aspect to salvation, but instead emphasizes an open invitation. granting all who are willing the opportunity to believe. Jesus said this, for this is the will of my Father that everyone Who beholds the Son and believes in him will have eternal life, and I myself will raise him up on the last day.
Well, how would someone who's in the Reformed faith refer to the term everyone? Let me give you an example. John Piper limits the everyone of John 6.40 to refer only to the elect. He writes, since men are blinded to the worth of Christ, a miracle is needed in order for them to come to see and believe. Those who are called have their eyes opened by the sovereign creative power of God so that they no longer see the cross as foolishness, but as the power and wisdom of God.
The effectual call is the miracle of having our blindness removed. This is irresistible grace.
So for him, everyone means those who are called, that is, those who are elect only. Those are the only ones that represent the everyone. The Calvinist teaches that it is only irresistible grace that can cause those chosen to see.
so that they are unable to resist coming to faith. Non-Calvinists teach that God's grace makes it possible for anyone to perceive spiritual truth by removing their blindness, and that this grace is not irresistible, for one may resist it in unbelief or respond to it in faith. And again, when we come to irresistible grace later in the course, we'll explore that a little bit further. But just think about Jesus, say, for instance, in. John 12, where he's indicting the Jewish people of his day for their unbelief.
And he reminds them: he says, While you have the light, walk in the light that you might become. Uh sons of light. and so that the darkness will not overtake you. Believe in the light that you may become sons of light. These things Jesus spoke, and he went away and hid himself from them.
But though he had performed so many signs, before them, yet they were not believing in him. That's a willful, volitional choice they're making. They were choosing not to believe in him. Is he just blowing smoke and saying, Well, they're non-elect anyway. I'm God, the son, the second member of the Godhead.
They're non-elect. They didn't have a chance anyway. But, you know. I'm going to blame him anyway. These people are making a volitional decision.
So much so that he says what they did was actually predicted ahead of time. The prediction of the prophecy didn't make them do it, it just acknowledged that they would do it, just like Judas has predicted that he would betray the Lord Jesus. That didn't make Judas betray the Lord. But if God didn't know that one of the men would betray the Lord, then God wouldn't be God. This was to fulfill the word of Isaiah the prophet.
Lord, who has believed our report, and to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed? For this reason, they could not believe.
So, because they would not believe, they could not believe. And again, he quotes Isaiah, He, God judicially blinds their eyes. stops their ears and so on and so forth. Um Number 38, right? Yeah.
We could argue that some modern-day Calvinist interpretations come dangerously close to undermining the integrity of Jesus. of Jesus's rebukes. For scolding people over something they couldn't possibly do. Why is he ragging on these people if it's a total impossibility? I mean, if it's all preordained and they didn't even have a chance.
Then why is he rebuking them? That to me questions the integrity of the statement that he makes. To chastise his own people for their persistent spiritual blindness makes little sense if some people are entirely incapable of. of seeing. And I've given you some other passages that are very similar.
The problem is, Jesus will underscore because you are unwilling. Unwilling, that's volitional. To chastise, number 40, if total depravity renders individuals entirely incapable of responding. Then Christ's rebukes would be akin to scolding a deaf man for not hearing, or reproaching a man without legs for not walking. The Calvinist rejects that the Father universally draws all to himself and that these verses, like John 6, 44 and John 12, 32, refer only to the chosen.
They say both passages speak of sovereign grace limited only to the elect.
So, you see the dichotomy here. On the one hand, you have those non-Calvinists, you call them whatever you want, there's a lot of different labels. We'd say, we acknowledge man as dead in sin. No one can take any credit.
So when you give your testimony, you don't make it a braggamony about how great you were and how smart you were and this book you read or that apologies you studied. If you did any of that, it was because God initiating was stirring your heart.
So it begins with God, but it doesn't begin with only a select few. God starts with general revelation and creation and conscience, and light responded to brings more light. And if a man suppresses that light, God might choose not to give any more light. But if a person will respond to the light he has, God gives more light. Classic example we noted last time was Cornelius, or Cornelius if you prefer, in Acts 10.
Um 44. Is that what we are in 44? 43. By contrast, non-Calvinists hold that these two passages describe different aspects of divine drawing, with John 6:44 teaching that no one can come to Christ apart from the Spirit's initiative.
So we're affirming that. The Bible teaches that the Father draws by convicting, by convicting or convincing. Which is kind of the nuance of the word. You could translate it, he convicts the world of sin righteousness, or some translation says he convinces the world, where it's a dual nuance, like born again or born from above, dual nuance, you could translate it either way. Convincing the world of the need to turn to Jesus Christ while at the same time allowing people to resist the Holy Spirit stirring.
And so Acts 7:51 to 58, you're familiar with that? I just briefly mentioned it a moment ago. Let me just read those verses. Feel free to turn there. He's speaking to his Jewish brethren: You men who are stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears are always resisting the Holy Spirit.
You're doing just as your fathers did. Which one of the prophets did your fathers not persecute? They killed those who had previously announced the coming of the righteous one. Whose betrayers and murderers you have now become, you who received the law as ordained by angels and yet did not keep it.
Now, when they heard this, they were cut to the quick, and they began gnashing their teeth at him. But being full of the Holy Spirit, he gazed intently into heaven and saw the glory of God and Jesus standing at the right hand of God, and said, Behold, I see the heavens opened up, and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God. He had been sitting, now he stands, of course, for the first martyr. But they cried out with a loud voice and covered their ears and rushed at him with one impulse. When they had driven him out of the city, because that's the religious place to stone somebody, they began stoning him, and the witnesses laid aside their robes at the feet of a young man named Saul.
So when Jesus speaks of the Father, number 45, who will draw all men to myself, the non-Calvinist believes that all means all. The non-Calvinist believes that all means all, such that we can understand this to mean all people and not just all types of people. Likewise in John 12, 32, the lifting up refers to the cross by which he provides an atonement sufficient for all.
Now they deny that right off. They don't believe Jesus died for all. We'll speak of that when we come to L, limited atonement. To me, that's a damning doctrine. That's a doctrine that poisons people.
And so, one key Christian leader in the Calvinistic movement. Has a son who mocks his dad online as a confessing atheist. Where did the poison come from? Right here. and this doctrine of limited redemption.
You think about it. You're growing up in a home, maybe you haven't turned to faith in Christ, and all of a sudden you're 14, 15, and 16 years, and your dad's teaching or your churches or denominations teaching is saying that God doesn't love all. He didn't die for all. He only loved the elect. And that's like a barb in your heart.
You'll either somehow ingest it and work your way through it, or you'll turn away from it. And I have too many Reformed pastors who kids did exactly that. And I know what was behind it. But you know, they're going to cling to their limited redemption in spite of their kids. You know, one of them told me: he said, My son's just not elect.
I said, man, that's sick. That's your flesh and blood. You're just writing them off as non-elect? Maybe the problem, brother, is you. And what you taught that kid.
And maybe you need to step back and refine your doctrine.
So he provides an atonement sufficient for all, they would say, and so accompanied by a universal call. To all for salvation and not just Jews and Gentiles.
So the Calvinist says, all means Jews and Gentiles, all kinds of people. Where the non-Calvinist says, all means all. Because Jesus died for all, He now sends His Spirit to convict every person so that each one receives some measure. of divine drawing. Though this drawing does not ensure salvation, since it may be resisted, it remains genuinely available, enabling all to respond.
So, the widespread conviction and ability and need for each person to respond in faith. are clearly seen in a passage like Titus II. You know this passage for the grace of God has appeared bringing salvation encircle the word all To all men. Instructing and then circle the next pronoun, os. He's drawing a comparison between all men And us.
Jesus died for all. That doesn't mean all are saved. But it instructs us. That is, those who've responded to this grace. To do what?
To deny ungodliness and worldly desires and to live sensibly, righteously, and godly in the present age. That's why we can say, as a general rule, though there's exceptions to the rule. That when someone is born again, they're declared perfect, but this process of sanctification results in a new direction. We're not saying perfection. But a new direction.
And so, again, in the reform camp, because of their perspective on sanctification, which we're going to explore a little bit later, when a key pastor at Grace Community Church and Grace Seminary fell last year morally, because he's shacking up with some 28-year-old girl as a 72-year-old man married to his wife for nearly 50 years. Oh, he mustn't be saved. Stave Lawson's lost. And that was all over the internet from our reformed brothers. Oh, is there not a possibility that he was just out of fellowship with God?
As evil and as sad and as terrible as what he did, he is a believer. I sat next to him all day in a conference. I did invitation-only conference in New York City. My wife, his wife. And Audrey and myself.
He knows the Lord. But you see, there's no room in some of these theological camps. There's a rigidity here that I think is unhealthy. One number we on. 50.
What I do not want us to miss is that some bring an entire system of thought by which they interpret passages like John 16, 8 through 11. Again, in He, when He comes Will convict the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgment, concerning sin because they do not believe in me. Jesus promised that the Spirit's coming would bring deeper conviction. to those who are lost, about sin, righteousness, and judgment. Though verse 8 records three nouns.
Sin, righteousness, and judgment. The tenses implied in these nouns refer to past sin, present righteousness, and future judgment. And that will be clear when we work through verse 10, probably next time. Before Pentecost, conviction had mainly come from the Old Testament, what they would call the Tanakh. John the Baptist, Jesus, And the disciples personal influences.
The word convict, or in some translations, convince. or reprove is a Greek verb that means to bring a guilty verdict. Occurring some 18 times in the New Testament with a view to bring about repentance. The word metana'o, the verb, means to change your mind. That's what repentance is.
Now, some reformed people, and we'll discuss it, I'm not opposed to using the word repent, but understand that the only book in the New Testament. That is expressly stated was written, these things I've written that you might believe Jesus is the Messiah, and believing you might have life in His name. The Gospel of John, written with an evangelistic purpose in mind, does not contain the word repent once. But if you properly handle the gospel in what it means to believe, then you are preaching repentance. But some people create repentance like a work.
And then they muddy the gospel. We're coming to that when we get to the red booklet. The trembling and urgent plea of the Philippian jailer for salvation shows conviction. of his sin And need for Jesus brought by the Spirit's conviction. Through Paul's testimony in the earthquake.
So the Spirit's working on him. Paul's testifying. In fact, he and Silas are singing after they've been beaten up. And then there's a miracle earthquake. I mean, you're talking about a miracle earthquake.
It shakes the prison doors open, and the walls and the roofs stay up. It's a very controlled earthquake that came from heaven, and only God could pull that off. And he called for lights and rushed in, and trembling with fear, he fell down before Paul and Silas. And after he brought them out, he said, Sirs, what must I do to be saved? Jude By the way, Paul says, believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and you'll be saved.
He doesn't even use the word repent. But he's asking him to change his mind by believing. Jude uses this word convict for when Jesus returns, bringing the same kind of sentence about sin. But at that time it will be too late. But he uses the same word.
You know the book of Jude, one chapter, verses 14 and 15. It was also about these people that Enoch, and the seventh generation from Adam, to distinguish him from any other Enoch, prophesied, saying, Behold, the Lord has come with many thousands of his holy ones to execute judgment upon all and to convict all the ungodly. Of all their ungodly deeds which they have done in an ungodly way, and of all the harsh things which their ungodly sinners have spoken against him.
So when Jude writes, the Lord has come, he's using what's called a prophetic past tense. In Koine Greek, and there's a way to do it in Hebrew too, like in Isaiah 53, Isaiah uses a prophetic past taste. Past tense. He was crushed. He was pierced.
He was, he was, he was. All past tense. It's a prophetic future. When you want to underscore something that is so certain that it's going to happen, you use what's called a prophetic past. You write it like it's already taken place.
It's a grammatical thing in Koine Greek.
So when he writes, the Lord has come, he uses a prophetic past tense describing a future event. which is obvious its future to emphasize the certainty of its happening. Many thousands of His holy ones refer not simply to His angels. But redeemed believers who will accompany Christ at his return.
So when Jesus is on that stallion and we're riding horses behind him. How did we get there? We were raptured. Seven years before, or seven plus years before. That's why we're coming back with them.
So it's not like in the post-tribulation rapture, you just get sucked up and then you come back on a horse. No, you've already been taken up into heaven. You've met the Lord at the judgment of the just, the famous seat of Christ, the reward seat of Christ. He's rewarded you accordingly, and then you come back riding with him. And so it says, many thousands of his holy ones are speaking to those who will accompany him at his return.
What I do not want us to miss is that when Jude says the Lord will convict. All the ungodly of all their ungodly deeds, he's referring to. Yeah. The just and final punishment of unbelievers at his coming. It's the same word, convict, but a different context.
Here the word is convict is not with a view towards bringing someone to Christ. Here the word is convict where their jaws drop. And they're guilty in the presence of a holy God who's returned. That's why Paul can say in Romans 3 and verse 20: every mouth will be shut. No excuses, nothing to say, overwhelmed with the presence of a holy God and therefore their own sin.
The lost will be removed at Christ's second coming when He judges the living nations on earth. And finally, after the millennium at the great white throne judgment.
So when Messiah comes to reign and rule in the thousand years, there's two judgments that take place on earth: a judgment of Jews and a judgment of Gentiles. Those Jews who had not come to faith, which represent a minority, because Paul uses a collective term when he speaks of all Israel being saved, just like Matthew uses a collective term when all Jerusalem was in grief. Does it mean every single individual? No. But Paul, even in the context, makes that clear, that not every single Jew believes.
And that's why there's a judgment of believing and unbelieving Jews. And only believing Jews enter the kingdom. And then there's the judgment of the nations, the Gentiles. They're described as sheep and goat, and how they treated my brethren, the Jewish people. Because during the tribulation, anti-Semitism, which is growing, will reach its peak like never before.
All the peoples of the world will come against Israel. They'll hate the Jews and they'll treat them like dogs. And God will say, the way we show whether or not you were born again and therefore had the fruit of conversion is by the way you treated. My brethren. And so one is taken.
One is left. That passage has nothing to do with the rapture. It has everything to do with what happens when Jesus comes back. Unbelievers are removed. And believers are left to enter into the kingdom.
Um 61. My point is that when the Spirit brings conviction today, he produces a deep sense of guilt and urgency, an essential prerequisite. For salvation, and that's what we need to be praying for, right? Before I do a meet the pastor, God knows I'm alone with him. Because I can I can preach words, only the Spirit of God can impart truth, and only the Spirit can convict a person.
So I'm praying for DJ there in my kitchen today. Because I know he's lost. But unless God really convicts him and he sees that there's consequences to his lostness. He's not going to He's not going to turn. And that's this sense of dependence that we go.
One, we have to be spirit-filled, but we're also going with this expectation that God has to move and work in the human heart. There can be no conversion without conviction. And there can be no conviction apart from the Spirit of God. Which is why Jesus previously said, If I go, I will send him to you. And by the way, he works in ways that Maybe not as we expect.
So, I'm thinking about my plumber today, and I have a thing with plumbers, I guess, because I had a plumber who I would hire him because he was so cheap. You know, I mean... He would charge me what they charge just to drive up in the driveway today. And he was all done. That was, you know, and he was thrilled for the work.
But I worked on Merle for worked on him. I witnessed to him over the course of 20 years. And then finally he comes and He says, Pastor Graham, I'm here to talk to you, not to fix your plumbing. What's up, Merle? I got stage four cancer.
He's looking at death in the face. He receives Christ. I baptize him, he goes home to die, do his funeral.
So sometimes, like at the church at Thessalonica, the first time they hear the gospel, they believe. Many times, because there's a work that's been going on before you ever got to them. And we'll discuss that some more next time. But sometimes, you know, don't be discouraged. Your job is to be filled with the Spirit, present the gospel in the power of the Holy Spirit.
You leave the results to God. Because drawing doesn't always happen in a day.
Sometimes there is a process that is leading up to that point of conversion.
So the Holy Spirit comes to dwell the church and not. The world, and that is important to understand because he does not minister in a vacuum, but he ministers in and through the body of Christ.
So we'll leave it there. And we'll pick up here next time. All right. A few people have been asked to pray, and so someone at the podium at all times, bring the monitors up. Let's bow our heads.
Father, we love you and thank you. That we're not in this endeavor alone. But you're with us. You promised never to leave us nor to forsake us. But you also promised the work of the Holy Spirit through us in the lives and hearts of unbelievers.
So we go with that sense of expectation. We know, in the truest sense, none of us have ever introduced anyone to Jesus. It's the Spirit's work. But thank you that we can have a small privileged part. Is the body of Christ being his voice box?
to speak on behalf of the Lord Jesus who loved And loves all men and died for all that all Might be saved if they will turn in faith to him. We pray even for this coming fruit. Friend Day. Many are inviting their friends, and we are thankful for that. May it be an equipping time, but more importantly, we pray that there would be lost people.
We pray even at the harvest festival is where meeting folks and Maybe asking them if they have a church home to invite some of them to come the very next day.
So use us for your glory in Jesus' name. Father, we lift up our brothers and sisters in Nigeria. Hundreds have been murdered and slaughtered for their faith in the last few months. Be with the church there. Strengthen them in this hour.
Help them to persevere. We pray that just as at the murder of Stephen, you used it as a goad to convict the Apostle Paul and bring him to faith. That your spirit might do that. even in the hearts of these who have expressed wicked, wicked things. Thank you that you are sovereign.
and a day will come when all the wrongs will be made right. And there'll be a perfect expression of your justice. Thank you that we who deserved wrath Have been shown grace and mercy. because of a substitute. We love you, Lord Jesus, for what you did for us.
May we never be ashamed. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.
