No, I Don't Teach a Works-Based Gospel

Today I'm going to address the nonsensical claim that I preach a works-based Gospel. It's time for The Line of Fire with your host, biblical scholar and cultural commentator, Dr. Michael Brown.

Your voice for moral sanity and spiritual clarity. Call 866-34-TRUTH to get on The Line of Fire. And now, here's your host, Dr. Michael Brown. Thank you so much for joining us on The Line of Fire.

Michael Brown, absolutely delighted to have this time together with you in these urgent, confusing times in which we live. Welcome to The Line of Fire. If you've been with us for years, we've been on Daily Talk Radio since 2008. If you just found us online or on radio, welcome to The Line of Fire. It is our purpose, our goal, our heartfelt prayer every single day to infuse you with faith and truth and courage to help you stand strong on the frontlines. If you didn't get our frontline newsletter, we sent out just a few days back. You missed an important message about the church standing with Israel, amazing testimony from the Philippines and much more. So sign up today, TheLineOfFire.org.

Sign up today and we'll send you the newsletter that just went out as well. 866-34-TRUTH, do you believe that I preach a works-based gospel? If you do, I want you to call and tell me why. I will allow you, not take 20 minutes, but I will allow you to present your position as to why I preach a works-based gospel.

Of course, it's an nonsensical claim, but some folks believe it. And because this show is not about me, I'm here for you. We're going to talk about this for the sake of the body to help us understand some really important points here. But if you're one of those who say you hold to a works-based gospel, you're a heretic based on that, give us a call. Enlighten all of us. 866-34-TRUTH.

Also, I have a question for you. The man known as the Butcher of Tehran, the President of Iran, many considered to be the likely successor to Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Khamenei, he is dead in a helicopter crash. Again, known as the Butcher of Tehran, responsible for the executions of thousands and thousands of Iranians. Should we, as believers, rejoice over the death of a man known for his wickedness and has spoken about Israel's extermination, should we rejoice over that? Is that a righteous reaction?

866-348-7884. You get to weigh in. Okay, I got the mail yesterday at our house, and there was an envelope.

This is going to tie in with the works-based gospel nonsense. There was an envelope addressed to me. I blotted out the address here. You see, it's giant print. My name is giant print, the address across the front. So, I thought, oh, this is going to be interesting. Some loony got my home address, so let's just see what this is about. So, I opened it up, and it's Xerox pages.

It's all black and white, Xerox pages. The top one, the prophetic judgment of my ministers of sin forever and ever, amen. It's got people in the flames. Tell my three men that I'm against them, even forever and ever, burning in my lake of fire.

So, I guess I'm one of the three men. Then, this next one, this is a really nice one with a satanic picture, the picture of the devil himself, right? Caricature. Your pretty face will burn in hell. Repent now. Ask Jesus to forgive you for all of your sins.

It goes on from there. Somebody with time on their hands apparently thought this was important to do, and I pity folks like this and think this way and actually believe this stuff, but this is just a microcosm of some of the nonsense that's out there. People speaking in Jesus' name and condemning others to hell. Again, this is just an extreme example, but it came in the mail.

I thought I'd share it with you. We get this all the time online, and when I get lied about misrepresented, it doesn't bother me for me because I'm a servant of God. I give account to Him. If He's pleased, we're good.

If He's not pleased, I don't care if the whole world loves me. It should be the same with you. If you have the favor of God, the blessing of God on you, you're good. Rest in that. Be secure in that. And if He's displeased, then get on your face and get corrected and get humbled and fix what needs to be fixed. Because you can have the whole world for you if God's against you.

You are in big, big trouble. So when people blast me, lie about me, post things I know are not true, I feel bad for them, for their own well-being. I feel bad for them because I can't be a blessing in their lives because they have cut me off. So it bothers me because I want to help them.

I want to be a blessing. So there is this notion out there because I've confronted some serious error in the body over the years. I've confronted the error of hyper-grace, which is going beyond what Scripture says about grace.

I've confronted various errors having to do with salvation that I preach, quote, a works-based gospel. So I just started a file where I find some quotes. And again, 99 percent of comments I don't see that come in. But every so often I'll spot something and I'll just throw it in a file for my records.

I kind of smile, but I grieve for the people. So just a few things I filed away under this workspace thing. This is one guy posting on YouTube. This is responding to one of my videos. This is heretical, not of works, not of works, not of works. We are justified freely by the blood of Jesus Christ.

We are under a holy seal of promise. All those who come to me alone will otherwise cast them out. So according to our brother here, the shed blood of Jesus Christ is not enough to save us.

What's the point in believing the gospel then? And he goes on with this attack and says about me, this man needs to repent of this blasphemy, misspelled blasphemy, but that can happen. This man needs to repent. This is blasphemy, my position.

Then another guy, this was responding to another video. He said this, Michael, you are a danger to the grace of God. You have muddied the gospel up. You need to have a debate with Joseph Prince.

He would straighten you out. Actually, Joseph Prince and I spent a few hours together when I was in Singapore a few years back because I took issue with some of his teaching in my book Hypergrace and Affirmed Other Parts. And we issued a statement together on what we agreed on and the error in danger of counterfeit grace.

So that was the result of our meeting together. So he goes on and says, this works earned grace is why the church in America is going down the tubes. I've been saying this for years. Free grace is here and it's taking over.

Thank God it's growing like wildfire. And then another comment from the same gentleman. And many of the Hypergrace people are very friendly and lovely like this. He then said Michael Brown is a works religious moron. I always find it ironic that some of the people screaming grace the loudest or the nastiest, the most mean spirited, the most insulting with the least evidence of grace in their own lives.

By the way, I don't mean Joseph Prince. I mean people like this posting. And then another post.

This was also in response to a YouTube video. And it says not a big fan of Dr. Brown who doesn't believe in grace and likes to back load works for salvation. So where do people get that nonsensical view that I believe in a workspace salvation? So let me tell you what I do believe. I believe that we are saved by grace. That the blood of Jesus saves us from our sins. That no amount of our good works in a billion trillion years can ever save us. That we are not saved by grace and kept by works. I've always preached that, never deviated from that in over 52 years of sharing the gospel.

It's this basic foundation. And on that day, the one that gets credit is the Lord for His mercy, for His grace, for His forgiveness. It is undeserved. There's nothing we did to merit His death on the cross for us. It is an act of supreme love, undeserved. That is the ultimate expression of grace, God's riches at Christ's expense, ultimate undeserved favor. I also believe, what Scripture says, that we can reject that grace. In other words, the gentleman that accused me of, quote, blasphemy, he said that we have to believe it, right? Well, isn't that a work?

Isn't it a work to believe it? If Jesus died for the whole world, then the whole world should automatically be saved. The Calvinist would say, no, he didn't.

He only died for the elect. That's why the elect are saved, because he purchased them of this salvation. But if you believe Jesus died for the whole world, and you say the whole world is not automatically saved, then you have to believe it, right?

You say, yeah, but that's the whole thing. Faith is not a work. Ah, so faith is not a work. So if you reject Him, that's not works. If you believe in Him one day, and then reject Him the next. If you receive His grace one day, and then refuse it.

He says, if you deny me, I'll deny you. That's not works, that's rejecting His grace. Hebrews 12 warns about forfeiting the grace of God. Is it workspace to say, prove your salvation through your repentance? If you are truly saved, you will live a different life.

Was it workspace when James says, show me your faith by your works? I'll quote Paul directly, Acts 26-20, he said he preached that people should repent, and turn to God, and prove their repentance by their deeds. So the proof of salvation is a new life. No, you don't earn salvation by living a new life.

No, we'll never be perfect in this world. Every day we live by grace. But, the Word of God tells us to prove our repentance by our deeds, to demonstrate our faith by our works. And says, if someone claims to be a follower of Jesus, and continues to live in persistent, unrepentant sin, they will not inherit the kingdom of God. They are not children of God, they will not inherit the kingdom of God. Were they ever saved or not, that's a debate we can have. But for sure, if they live in unrepentant sin, they will not inherit the kingdom of God. It's not because their works save them, it's because they are rejecting the grace of God.

They are spitting in the face of God, they are refusing the Lordship of Jesus. Now, if you teach that all you do is pray a prayer. You say, God I believe Jesus died for my sins, rose from the dead, and I receive you as my Savior. And you say those words, and there's going to be any change in your life.

You can be a serial killer the day before, and a serial killer the day after. You can be blaspheming the Lord the day before, and blaspheming him the day after. But if you said those words, you say that's no connection to the biblical gospel at all. The biblical gospel saves people. The biblical gospel, which is a free gift of God's grace, which cannot be earned in a billion lifetimes, saves and transforms. Jesus takes us from death to life. He takes us from the power of Satan into the power of God, from the kingdom of Satan to the kingdom of God.

From being children of darkness to children of the light. He changes us, he gives us a new heart, he puts a new spirit within us. It's all a gift of his grace.

When I stand outside in the rain, and it's pouring rain, I didn't earn getting wet, I got wet because I was in the rain. When you are saved, you are changed, you get a new heart. If you show no fruit of repentance, if there is no evidence of a change in your life, if you were mocking God yesterday, prayed the prayer today, and you're mocking him tomorrow for the rest of your life, you were never born again, you just said words. And Jesus said, not everyone who says to me, Lord, Lord, will enter the kingdom of heaven, but those who do the will of my Father. That's the fruit of repentance. That's the proof that you've been born again. If you give me a free ticket from here to LA, I get on the plane, I get off the plane to Los Angeles.

I didn't earn it, I didn't work for it, it was free, but the ticket got me from one place to another. Salvation brings forgiveness of sins and a change of life. That simple. And if you reject God's grace, refuse God's grace, turn your back on him and say, I don't want you. I once believed, I now refuse to believe. That's not a work, you're saved by works, but the same way you can receive grace as a gift, you can reject it. That simple. And it's biblical.

I could quote scripture for every syllable that I just said. Be right back. It's the line of fire with your host, Dr. Michael Brown. Get on the line of fire by calling 866-34-TRUTH. Here again is Dr. Michael Brown. You know, normally I do this earlier in the day, but literally I just finished drinking my Tri-Vita, nitric oxide and myo health. I only start every day with it or before a workout or sometimes after an intense workout, mix those together. I just did it now.

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Use the code BROWN25. They are absolutely totally with us and committed to helping us spread the line of fire around the nation. All right, so we're talking about a works-based gospel. It would be one thing if I said Jesus saves you by his grace, but you have to keep praying, you have to keep reading the Bible, you have to keep fasting, you have to live at a certain level of holiness every day, otherwise you're lost.

That would be works-based, right? And some of you who have Catholic background may have more of a works orientation along with grace, you know, grace plus works, etc. So I don't believe that. I believe that salvation saves you. I believe salvation changes you.

That the blood of Jesus really works, not just to forgive sin, but that God gives us a new heart. And the consistent theme of the New Testament is repent. Repentance and faith go hand in hand. Repentance does not simply mean change your mind. That is a wrong understanding of what the Greek says. It is speaking about a change of heart and mind and life. It is an about face. So Paul said, that's his message, Acts 20-21, repentance towards God and faith in the Lord Jesus.

They go hand in hand. So what are we saying? Jesus came, Matthew 1, to save his people from their sins. So he's a savior who saves us from sins.

And the proof, as James Edmund Morris said, the only proof of the new birth is the new life. So if someone shows zero evidence of any kind, at any point, alright, the thief on the cross was contrite and then he died. But we keep living. So we show no contrition, we show no evidence of repentance, no evidence of a changed life. We continue in sin, we're living just as wickedly from one day to the next.

It goes on for years, that person was obviously never born again. That's simple. That's not a works-based gospel. It's saying the gospel changes us. And if there's no evidence of any change on any level, then you're not born again.

It's simple. It's not just mental affirmation or some transaction in heaven where your sins get mystically forgiven and your life remains bound by Satan. That's not the gospel. The other thing is that the Bible is clear, that without holiness no one will see the Lord.

You say, well what level do we have to attain? That's not what it means. It means that if you utterly reject holiness, if you reject God's standards, if you say I don't want him as Lord anymore, right? I reject him as Lord, I reject his authority, I reject the word of God, I reject the Holy Spirit. I no longer believe you can reject God's grace. It's not salvation of my works, it's in that you can reject the gift. As for those who are his, he promised to keep us forever.

He said no one can snatch us out of the Father's hands. I never for a split second worry about losing my salvation. Why would I? It's just like sitting here at this desk, I'm not worried about falling off into the sea because the water is many, many miles from here and if I'm here I'm perfectly safe. I'm not going to fall into the sea. So if you're serving the Lord, you've given your life to him, he's promised to keep you.

You've got nothing to worry about. He's faithful. He'll keep you. He who started the good work will complete it. If you say, well, if that's the case, I can just live however I want to live, I can leave my spouse, I can go do this, I can go do that, I can worship Buddha. No, you can't because that's to reject him as Lord. So it's pretty simple and it's pretty basic biblically. In any case, let's interact about this.

We will start in Houston, Texas. Jeff, welcome to the line of fire. Hello, Dr. Brown. Good to talk with you. It's probably been three plus years since I've called your show and I really enjoy listening to you.

Most of the time I listen to you later in the day on YouTube, but I do want to see if I can jog your memory. You and I share a few things in common. Number one, your mom and my mom gave birth to two boys on the same day. So number two, I grew up in a conservative Jewish home. Number three, after I had my bar mitzvah and checked the box, I became one of the most wild and crazy party animals until Yeshua Jesus. I was confronted with the gospel and was completely forgiven of my sin because I really understood. No one had to convince me I was a sinner, but I understood the plan of salvation.

Very quickly from the scriptures, Isaiah 53, and the transformation that happened, this happened in 1981. So I'm really big on grace because I didn't do anything but get a revelation of who God was from the scripture, realized that I was certainly an enemy of God and wanted to get out of that condition. And by the grace of God, have been enjoying watching and living and receiving wonderful information from the Holy Spirit day by day by day and living out the life that Paul says that he who started a good work in you is going to be faithful to perform until the day of Christ Jesus. So I'm big on grace, but I also totally agree with you that there's going to be something, there's going to be a change.

And there has been. It's been a wonderful change and I don't have time to tell you all the incredible things God has done. And your repentance, you recognize that you're a sinner and you turn from that and say, God saved me from my sin and He did it. It's not like you suddenly got a new moral will or convinced yourself to live differently. He intervened. You cried out for mercy and He intervened. That's salvation, that's repentance, that's grace. And you're a different person because of it.

Oh, completely. And one of the first convictions that the Holy Spirit gave me was, hey, Jeff, I want to use you, but your mouth is in the way. So I had the worst mouth you could imagine. And then I began to be convicted about saying the wrong things and then done about that. But I was really hungry to know the word of God. So I would spend hours and hours reading the Bible because I didn't really know what it said. But one of the challenges you gave about the death of Racy and I'm very pro-Israel, love Israel and looking for the salvation of Israel spoken up in Romans 9, 10 and 11. But my heart breaks when I hear people that are enemies of Israel when they die because they probably could have received Jesus at some point, but most likely didn't. So when I hear an enemy of Israel, I don't rejoice. I think they probably went to hell and hell is a horrible place. And I think the part of the gospel that's not really understood, there's a terrible consequence when you don't believe and when you don't receive.

And take that free gift that the Lord gives you and get a changed heart. Yeah. Hey, Jeff, I appreciate that.

Yes, thank you so much. And thanks for reminding us of the power of God's grace. Bless you, Jeff. I appreciate it.

And we'll come back to President Racy and our response. So I appreciate Jeff's response to that. But look, if you say the gospel changes someone, the gospel changes someone. How is that a workspace gospel? Jesus saves people and changes people. He does it. The power of the gospel does it. Right. That salvation is not simply get your name written in the Lamb's Book of Life in heaven while you continue to live in sin and rebellion and disobedience on earth. No, it is be transformed. Paul said you got to serve someone.

Bob Dylan turned it into a song. You're going to either serve sin, the flesh, the devil, or you're going to serve God. But all of us are serving one or the other. First John 5, 19. We are of God, little children, but the whole world is under the power of the evil one. So we are no longer under the power of the evil one. We are no longer serving sin. We're serving God. Jesus is our Lord. We've not reached perfection.

We won't in this world. Every day we receive grace even when we don't know it. Every day we receive mercy even when we don't know it. Even when we're not conscious that we fell short in our devotion and prayer.

Many times we're sitting unconsciously because we're not aware of how we've hurt someone or how we've neglected the Lord. But he's merciful and kind and compassionate. It is completely different when someone says, I don't want Jesus as Lord.

I refuse him as Lord. And Paul says, Romans 11, to Gentile believers that God cut off the Jewish branches that didn't believe. And if you don't continue in faith, you'll be cut off. It's faith.

It's not works. It's faith. It's faith.

If we reject God, if we no longer believe, we have cut ourselves off from him. We'll be right back. It's the line of fire with your host, Dr. Michael Brown. Get on the line of fire by calling 866-34-TRUTH.

Here again is Dr. Michael Brown. Thanks again for joining us on the line of fire. You get to weigh in on the conversation. If you have accused me of preaching a, quote, works based gospel, make your scriptural case. I'll give you chapter verse in context for every syllable that I have said thus far. And I live by grace every moment of my life. I'm conscious of the grace goodness of God. Probably just a fraction of a fraction of a trillionth of a fraction of how deep in grace and wonderful, how deep and beautiful that grace is.

I'm sure I'll only comprehend it in the most marginal fraction. That's because I don't know the depth of my evil in God's sight before I was saved and how far I've fallen short since I've been saved. None of us fully understand that because we don't have the perfect holy perspective of God. So His grace is more abundant than anything I can imagine. And I also know that it's possible for me to reject that grace, forfeit that grace, disbelieve in it, cast it off. And He will not force me to stay in His house. But I love the Lord.

I want to serve Him and His grace is at work in my life. It's nothing I worry about, think about any more than I worry about Nancy and I getting a divorce. We love each other.

We were married 48 years. We are precious soulmates. Why would I even think about it? The same way I don't think about losing salvation, God's promised to keep me. However, same scriptures tell us, warn us, take the warning seriously, don't play games with God's grace. Don't frustrate His grace.

Don't play games with it. So we have the potential of doing that. If we turn from, and if your heart is set on evil, I want you to feel warned. If your heart is set on evil and disobedience and rebellion and casting off the lordship of Jesus, you better believe I want you to be deeply concerned.

A hundred percent. And every writer of the Bible wants you to be deeply concerned as well. 866-34-TRUTH. Let's go over to Sean in Jacksonville, Florida. Welcome to The Line of Fire. Sean, are you there? Sean, there.

All right, seems not. Let's try Luke in California. Welcome to The Line of Fire. Hey, Dr. Brown.

Thank you for sending the phone call. You bet. I have a question for you.

I haven't read Hypergrace, which I want to read, but perhaps there's listeners right now who are also curious about this question and have not read your book, so I do apologize if it's in the book and I just have not read the answer myself. No, that's fine. There's a lot of books to read. Yeah, go ahead.

Yes, there are. So I wanted to know your position. I don't believe I disagree with you. Can you give clarity on your view of lordship, salvation, free grace and then hyper grace?

If you could just explain each one of those and then just land where you land on those. Yeah. So lordship, salvation, if you mean that you must reach a certain level of holiness and complete obedience before you are saved, that you must submit fully and completely to the lordship of Jesus consciously in order to be saved.

Although no one ever attains that perfectly. If you mean that in order to be saved, you receive Jesus not just as Savior but as Lord. Of course, that's basic gospel. Jesus is called Savior about 15, one five, about 15 times in the New Testament. He's called Lord over 400 times. So the one who saves us is the Lord. So salvation is Lord Jesus, forgive me. I want to serve you the rest of my life.

So that's where I land on that. A free grace, it all depends on how someone defines it. So I'd be curious as to know how you define it before I comment. Hyper grace teaches this. The consistent teaching of those that I critique in my hyper grace book and as brothers.

Here and there there's a heretic among them but otherwise these are brothers and sisters in the Lord. The fundamental error of hyper grace is to say this. That the moment you are saved, God pronounces your sins forgiven. Not just every sin you've committed. Not just forgives you yourself.

But in advance pronounces your future sins forgiven. So Jesus died for them. But the same way that He died for our sins but we were not saved until we turned to Him. So the same way it says in 2 Peter 1 that He forgave us for our former sins.

In Colossians 2 there was an IOU. There was a debt against us of sins we committed. So the moment we're saved, what do we say? God, I've sinned. I'm guilty. Forgive me. Cleanse me. We don't say, God, six months from now if I commit adultery or a year from now if I rob the bank. Or two years from now if I murder someone.

Cover that as well. No, no. That's not what we're thinking. So the fundamental error of hyper grace is to say that the moment you're saved, God forgives your future sins in advance. Therefore the Holy Spirit will never convict you of sin. Therefore you never need to confess your sin. And therefore you cannot even grow in holiness because everything that's already been done is done. Joseph Prince would say you can't grow in righteousness but you can grow in holiness.

So we agree on that point. That's the fundamental error of hyper grace. That your future sins are pronounced forgiven the moment you're saved. Therefore the Holy Spirit will never convict your believer of sin. And therefore presence of sin in someone's lifetime, no matter how extreme, is not an indication of any lack of grace because it's already been dealt with. That's the fundamental error there.

Okay. So the way that I would define free grace is the belief or the view that everlasting life is a free gift received by faith alone and Christ alone apart from works of any kind. Yeah, that's the basic gospel.

Apart from works does not, see here's what we have to understand. When that definition was given, it meant that no one can say as long as you also go to church every week, as long as you also pray one hour a day, as long as you also participate in this religious rite or that that's what it means apart from works. If it means apart from repentance, then it's not the gospel. If it means that you will not demonstrate the new birth by a new life, then it's not the gospel. So if free grace means that you will never show a pattern of good works like Paul says that we're predestined to in Ephesians 2. I mentioned Acts 2620 when he says, I preach that people should repent and turn to God and prove their repentance by their deeds. If repentance is not part of it, then that's not the gospel.

If free grace is talking about the transforming grace of God that will be now demonstrated in a new life, but the new life does not earn the salvation, the works do not earn the salvation, the works are the demonstration of salvation, then I affirm the definition. Perfect. Awesome. Thank you so much.

You are very welcome. 866. 866. All right, there we go. Okay, let's try to reconnect with Sean in Jacksonville.

Are you there? Yes, can you hear me, Dr. Brown? I can. Go ahead. Okay, I'm so glad to know that.

Okay, three quick questions. In regards to you dealing with this situation, all right, this is where I get confused at. I have people that are, I have friends of mine that are messianic, so they observe the Sabbath, the kosher, the Sabbathizer, the child, all that stuff or whatever, right? People tend to say, hey, you are dealing with a works-based salvation when they are talking, like when I have Christian friends talking to them. But yet it seems like once you are saved, you are still expected to keep some form of the law, you know, as far as the ethical and moral part of the law. And nobody questions somebody saying like, oh, you know, that's a works-based salvation or whatever.

So I'm confused, like why do people get attacked? That's messianic for observing Shabbat, kosher, circumcision and things of that nature in the these days. Right. Okay, go ahead.

I'm sorry. Yeah, no, great question. So in other words, if you said, hey, you're a born-again believer and you're a paid assassin, you're going to have to give that up or you're a born-again believer and you're a porn star, you know, you're going to have to give that up. No one would question that. Like, of course, if you're truly saved, you're going to live differently.

So why would people question this? So the one thing would be if it's taught in such a way, if a messianic congregation taught it in such a way and judged you, judged your salvation as to whether you observe the seventh-day Sabbath or whether a Jew circumcised their child or whether you kept dietary laws, then they would be preaching error and that would be works-based. But all the messianic congregations I know, they fully understand that seventh-day observance, seventh-day Sabbath observance does not save them or circumcising their male child does not guarantee his salvation or keeping the dietary laws doesn't save them.

They fully understand it. They simply feel as Jews this is part of our calling, part of our heritage, part of our witness to our community, part of our continuity and it gets misunderstood by the church because the church has swung so far from that. But that would have been the norm among the first century Jewish believers, Sean, that wherever you go you run into believers living just like this and people understand. As the church became increasingly gentile and lost sight of Jewish roots, then when Jewish believers lived like Jews they thought it was weird and they questioned. So it's really the church has shifted. Messianic Jews are just doing what's been done from the start.

Absolutely. So why is it when someone continues to keep the ethical part of the law they're not questioned the same way like, oh, you're trying to deal with a works-based salvation? Yeah, well, I mean, some extremists… Why do we continue to observe such things after finding salvation? It seems like that would be considered worse as well, right? Like if you continue with the ethical part of the law.

Exactly. So we understand with salvation God's written the law in our hearts, right? A Jewish believer would say it's not obligatory in terms of salvation, but 1 Corinthians 7, Paul says, remain in the calling you were in when you were called, meaning salvation. So were you saved Jewish? Well, continue to live as a Jew. Were you saved Gentile? Continue to live as a Gentile in terms of Jewish customs and traditions.

But the reason, again, Sean, that a lot of people get this wrong is because it's foreign. The moment they see Sabbath day, it's foreign and they think you're just doing that for salvation. And there are some extremist views that are out there.

There are some extremist views that are out there that present things in a wrong way, in a dangerous way. But in a healthy way, no. It's like, talk to a Jewish believer. Are you saved by keeping the seventh-day Sabbath? No, we're saved by Yeshua's blood, by His grace. Are you saved by keeping the dietary laws? No, we just do it in solidarity with our people or feel it's pleasing to the Lord. But no, that doesn't save us.

We're saved by grace through faith. But a lot of Christians, it's so foreign to them, Sean, that they misunderstand it and think it's, quote, going back under the law, just because they're not familiar with it. Ironically enough, sir, think of this, think of this, that many of these same churches will teach tithing, right? And everyone should tithe, but then they'll question a Messianic Jew worshiping on the Sabbath, like Paul and Peter and John would have done.

So, it's just the churches lack your familiarity. Alright, I will take one more call on topic. So, Rita in Maryland, stay right there. And then we will talk about how we should respond to the death of the man known as the butcher of Tehran. And friends, if you have not yet gotten my book Turn the Tide, I'm doing lots of radio interviews about it, I was just telling a staff colleague that I really feel the Lord's grace and anointing as I'm talking about this, our calling to rise up today and bring about moral and cultural change through the Gospel, practical strategies of how to do it. Wherever we are in life, there's a voice we have, there's a role we can play. If you don't have the book yet, wherever you get your books, or on our website, thelineoffire.org, get a copy of Turn the Tide. It will not only inform you, it will inspire you and equip you.

We'll be right back. It's The Line of Fire with your host, Dr. Michael Brown. Get on The Line of Fire by calling 866-34-TRUTH. Here again is Dr. Michael Brown. All right, welcome back to The Line of Fire, 866-34-TRUTH. Let's go over to Rita in Maryland.

Welcome to The Line of Fire. Hi, Dr. Brown. I had a few comments about the topic and then a question if that's okay. I don't know how much time. Well, let's see.

Get started. One of the first comments about the topic, you know, the Word of God is balanced. It's very balanced, and I think people, like, you know, we tend to want to be on one side or the other.

Like, oh, no, workspace. Or, no, we just, it's grace. And, you know, I see both in the Bible and we just have to really understand the context of it in the Bible. And I think that's something we as Christians, we just, you know, I love the body of Christ, but we just need to learn that, that it's balanced.

And we need to, like, remove the names, like, oh, this is Calvinist, this is whatever. No, this is biblical. Like, some of these things that people are going back and forth on, like, even election and all of this predestination, I'm like, these things are biblical, but we don't want to stick with just this.

This is only it. And I think that's one thing. My take on once-saved, always-saved, because I, like, when I have talked about this with other people, when I say this, people say, oh, you're a once-saved, always-saved person. I'm like, no, I'm just what the Bible says. He who endures until the end will be saved. That is what the Bible says. You know, there are things in the Bible about salvation and, like, not, like, you know, the Holy Spirit is so powerful, like, to have that encounter with a radical God.

There's no way, you know, like, some people say, oh, there's no way because it's just this amazing thing and it's so powerful. But there are things in the Bible that also say that you can, there's apostasy, that things can happen. The promises are there to keep us, and the warnings are there to warn us, and they're both true. Paul says in Romans 11, 22, consider therefore the kindness and sternness of God.

Sternness to those who fell, but kindness to you, provided that you continue in his kindness, otherwise you will also be cut off. So it's the promises that we rest in and revel in. And like you say, the Holy Spirit working on us, that's radical, that's transformative. And that we don't play games. Salvation brings high responsibility. We don't play games with grace. Right, exactly. And so I believe he who endures until the end shall be saved. You know, like, if you are enduring, if you are living a righteous life, if you are reading your word, praying, fasting, seeking God, sharpening it because iron sharpens iron.

You cannot do this walk alone. So anyway, that was my comment thing. One last comment is about, you know, religion over relationship.

And I've made a comment about this before. You know, I recall Jesus saying, like, do as they say, not as they do. Like, the Pharisees had a wicked heart. But there were things that they did that were good, quote unquote, but they did it with a wicked heart.

It was the hot posture. That's why the New Testament in everything they talk, it talks about, you know, now the laws are not written on our hearts. I think we're so afraid of like, oh, this is, you know, like my church, we we've done Seder and things and they're like, oh, this is so religious.

I don't want to do this. And it's like, well, this is in the Bible. Like, we're in ground again as Gentiles. Either way, it's a good thing that God laid on your heart.

So wonderful. Hey, listen, just for time's sake, let's dive in your question. Go ahead. OK, there I've heard people say that Christians should really know the entire Bible. Like, all Christians should know, like, from Genesis to Revelation and understand the entire Bible, every Christian. I just want to get your take on that.

Well, that's ideal, right? Ideally, we should. But the degree to which we'll fully know it, we only know in part. So you could you could read it an hour a day every day of your life and ask God for insight and wisdom and live for 100 years and you'll still be learning.

You'll still be growing. So we do our best. In other words, we don't just want to look at one place only and just live in the Gospel of John and be unfamiliar with the rest of the Bible. So we want to do our best to be familiar with scripture and to seek to understand it. But look, I don't I don't know a a pastor on the earth who understands every verse in the Bible. I do not understand every verse in the Bible.

And I'm considered a biblical scholar, et cetera. So we're all there are things we're growing in our understanding of joining us to learn better, et cetera. So you don't want to put an undue burden. So there's the healthy mentality, Rita, which is that that we we want to be reading the word and taking the word and growing in our understanding and never stop until we meet them face to face and read the whole Bible.

Absolutely. But the idea that everybody's going to know it from Genesis to Revelation, that's that's going to put a burden on people that they're unable to to to live up to. And then what does it mean? Know it as well as I know it. Know it 10 times better than I know it. You know, where's the standard?

So that statement leaves a lot to be desired to be can. Hey, thank you, Rita, for the call. Hey, one quick comment. You know, in the Bible says we're sealed there. There are two different aspects to the Greek word sealed. One is that sealed like a stamp of approval. You know, good housekeeping stamp or, you know, when you get this, OK, it has a stamp that it's been that's a seal.

Very, very commonly used like that. The New Testament verb and noun involved with sealing very, very commonly used in the ancient Greek world for just putting the steel seal on a stamp. And then there's a seal where something sealed and it can't be opened. Right. So for those who believe that salvation, that we are sealed by the spirit, and that means that it's like we're sealed in such a way that we can never reject the spirit or reject God.

That's not what the words are saying. There's the spirit's given us to us as a deposit. It's that's that's God's stamp on our lives, that he's with us, that we belong to him. And the spirit's work in our lives is very real and rich and beautiful and should be enjoyed and experienced. But it's not sealed like the package is sealed and it can't be opened. It's sealed like God's stamp. And again, very, very common use of the Greek word.

And that's where you'll find dictionaries, lexicons, commentaries, understanding those verses in that regard. OK. Abraham Raisi, president of Iran, killed in a helicopter crash May 19th. There's an article published on Newsweek by Sheila Nazarian. I will shed no tears for Abraham Raisi, the butcher of Tehran. And she says, as a woman born in Iran, I feel not just a sense of celebration at the death of this evil man, but of relief.

There's a feeling I share with a great many of my countrymen and in particular countrywomen. To understand why, you have to know that Abraham Raisi, the role by his brutal regime of the divinity of president, was a mass murderer responsible for atrocities and oppression in Iran and across the region. That is why he is known as the butcher of Tehran.

And she goes on discussing some of this, seen as the likely successor to Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Khamenei. He gained notoriety in the early days of the Islamic Republic in 1988 as a young deputy prosecutor in Tehran. He was appointed to the Death Commission, a group responsible for the extrajudicial executions of thousands of political prisoners. So extrajudicial meaning outside of a proper trial.

The victims were subjected to sham trials that lasted mere minutes. Raisi played a pivotal role in these proceedings, deciding who would live and who would be sent to the gallows. One former political prisoner wrote that Raisi clearly reveled in having power over life and death, and they wielded freely in thousands of cases during that summer's massacre.

For those who have dealt with him personally, Raisi symbolizes the death of hope. This is former Iranian political prisoner Mahmoud Rowiai. Another article, this was published in, hang on, let me just scroll up here.

Oh, I'm not quite sure what this news outlet is. Abraham Raisi, the Butcher of Tehran, life was one brutal rise, then he came in for a hard landing. And this also talks about the Death Committee. The Iranian revolution transformed the fates of millions of people, seemingly overnight. Until 1979, the country was ruled by the Shah, a dictator who maintained a tight grip on power, while also pushing Iran to become a Western-style secular nation.

The revolution was fueled by outrage over the suppression of religious minorities, as well as government extravagance and corruption. With the Shah in exile and hard-line conservatives in power, men like Mr. Raisi stood to reap all the benefits of this new Iran. The son of a cleric, he became the deputy prosecutor of the capital Tehran in 1981 when he was just 25 years old. There he earned the fearsome nickname, the Butcher of Tehran. He was one of four judges who sat on a prosecution committee in the 1980s that is believed to have ordered the executions of thousands of political prisoners. The prisoners, some reportedly as young as 13 years old, were alleged to be part of the armed opposition group, the muhajideen khalq organization, which attempted to topple the Iranian government, A6.

And he goes on from there. Nobody knows how many people died during the five grim months that followed, but estimates range from 2,500 executions up to 30,000 executions buried in mass graves. And again, he was largely responsible. So I share the sentiments of the earlier caller, Jeff, that you grieve over the death of a lost person because they're lost. That unless there was some last-minute encounter with the Lord before his death and he truly turned to God for mercy, he's a lost sinner and his sin was manifest in his outrageous murderous acts against others in his hatred of Israel. So you mourn and that he's lost another human being, created an image of God, who did evil, who brought destruction and pain. To the extent that he was still hurting people, to the extent he was still being used as a tool of Satan, then you're glad that he can't do what he was doing anymore, to the extent that he was fueling hatred of Israel.

And he won't be there or that it makes the government more unstable and perhaps there could be an overthrow of the radical Islamic government. You're glad for that. That's a positive. But you grieve over a lost soul. I think you can do both at the same time. Hey, thanks for calling in today. We'll be back with you tomorrow.