MBS: 10/27/09

This week of MBS was primarily review.

NOTE: One thing I did want to mention was the possibility that I misinterpreted one of the questions which was asked during the Q&A. A gentleman asked what I thought was a question on the idea of reprobation, to which I replied that it seemed a logical necessity. However, others in the audience later mentioned that they thought he was asking about whether or not someone could desire salvation and yet not be granted it. I have written up a response to this latter interpretation of the question just in case that was the intended meaning of the query and will post it on the blog as well.

The Justification of God (Geoff)

Romans 9

1. The promises of Romans 8:28

Started in Romans 8:28 and the promise that God works all things together for good for those who love Him and are called according to His purpose. We saw that this promise was grounded in the fact that those same ones are predestined to be conformed to the image of the Son, that they are called, then justified, then glorified. None are lost. All who are predestined to be conformed to the  image of the Son will be conformed to the image of the Son. All who are called will be justified and eventually glorified. If even one person who was calledshould fall, then this promise cannot inspire our confident assertion that we  cannot be separated from the love of Christ.

2. The context of Romans 9

Israel was also called elect and yet they indeed are experiencing separation from the love of God.

3. Has God’s word failed?

Has God’s promises and faithfulness failed? Not at all. Why not? Because God has been faithful to those to whom the promise was given.

4. To whom was the promise given?

His promises were always to the children of faith not flesh. Those who were true children of Abraham, by God’s purpose of election, are saved and thus God’s promise has proven to be true.

So, how does God choose? Not on the basis of age, family, works done, etc. Solely on the basis of His choice. He chooses those whom He chooses.

5. Two objections

In theological conversations, the doctrine of predestination and election raises two objections that mirror those same objections that Paul says will be raised which really helps us to understand that we are understanding Paul correctly. If our reading of Paul does not produce the responses that Paul says that it will produce, then we are reading it wrong.

The two objections: God is unjust and man is therefore not responsible.

Response: God’s justice consists not in His working under some abstract concept of justice, but rather in His fierce loyalty to the proclamation of His name. We are mere pots. We don’t like this. We don’t want to be pots. To be honest, we don’t want to be people. In our flesh, we want to be gods. God is the potter and has absolute rights and authority over us, who are mere clay formed  from the dust of the earth. We cannot rightfully argue with Him, or complain against Him for what He decides to do with us. These are deep waters and are not to be casually dismissed if all Scripture is inspired and profitable.

Unconditional Election (Chandler)

2 Corinthians 4:1-6

Blindness: cannot comprehend the glory of Christ who is the image and glory of God. God speaks light and gives us new eyes, a new nature: the doctrine of regeneration.

1. New way of thinking, seeing, loving
2. Awakened to the glory of Christ. What was my role in that? I simply sat in blindness…
3. God spoke light into darkness. Genesis imagery.

Romans 8:28+

Foreknowledge:

He foreknows people, not that He foreknows what people will do. Only some are foreknown…it is the people who are foreknown…not simply the actions of the people

Biblical uses of the words translated as “know:” Gen 18:19 (I have known/chosen Abraham); Amos 3:2 (you only have I known of all the families of the earth); Matthew 7:23 (I never knew you). Hosea 13:5 (I knew you in the wilderness); Genesis 4:1 (Adam knew his wife)

There is a way of knowing that goes beyond simple knowledge. The connotation is  often relationship, love, choosing, intimacy. Those whom He foreknew, that is those whom He knew before time, are those whom He foreloved or forechose. He loved before time, He chose before time. Foreknowledge is God’s sovereign distinguishing love. There is no Scripture that relates God’s election to His knowing who would choose Him. Election is always used to contrast human action, thinking, striving, etc.

Predestination:

God predestines both the object and the goal. He predestines persons for a particular  purpose. What purpose? To be conformed to the image of Christ.

Called:

How? Through diverse means…dreams, apologetics, Michael W. Smith video “Secret Ambition,” reading the Bible

Does He call everyone? Two uses of call: General and effectual.

Conclusion of the chain of Romans 8:28-30: God loves someone before time, predestines him or her to be conformed to the image of His Son, calls Him through the proclamation of the gospel, justifies Him by faith, and gradually and eventually glorifies.

This is the foundation for the great promises of Romans 8, that God causes all things to work together for good, that nothing can separate us from the love of Christ, that no change can be brought against us, that no condemnation sticks to us…this is why we are spending multiple weeks on this section. This is not peripheral academic theology, this is essential for our assurance and confidence. We cannot trust God’s promises if we divorce them from the ground of those promises! The Arminian system declares that something indeed can separate us, our own wills.

Faith is not your own, thus you cannot boast!

Ephesians 1:3-6

Chosen before foundation of the world for holiness and blamelessness

Predestined for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ

On what basis: love & the purpose of His will

For what reason: the praise of His glorious grace (the glory of His grace)

Ephesians 2:1-10

Dead in trespasses and sins

Children of wrath by nature. (how could this nature do anything contrary to its nature?)

Great love relates to Ephesians 1

Made us alive

By grace

So that He might magnify the riches of His grace

By grace through faith THIS not of your own doing – gift

No boasting!

Effects or Fruits of This Doctrine

1. Worship and gratitude on our minds and lips. Why did He save us?

2. We should be a gracious and merciful people because we have been shown such mercy.

3. Confidence for evangelism: no one is beyond conversion

Common Grace (Trevor)

Much is made in academia about the philosophical problem of evil, if God is good and sovereign, then why does evil exist? But Trevor reminded us that there is also the problem of good. If men and women are truly and naturally depraved, selfish, haters of God, as the Bible declares they are, why do good things happen in the world?

Common grace: The innumerable mercies which God extends to a depraved world.

There are various ways that God shows His love.

Common: general revelation, creation, sustenance: rain and sun and breath and happiness, restrains the flesh and evil (how wicked the world would be if God temporarily removed this grace. Do you realize how utterly dark and evil I would be if God removed His spirit and His common grace from my life and left only my flesh?).

Particular: special revelation, redemption, justification, reconciliation, glorification.

He loves all people in some ways and He loves some people in all ways.

All for His Glory (Jeff)

All things were created, ordained, sustained and will be completed and consummated for the glory of God. The reason the sun rises in the morning, and the rain falls on the righteous and unrighteous, the reason that you awaken in the morning, the reason that He provides you bread and water and children and a wife is that He might be honored and praised and delighted in and worshiped.

This is good news for His children as they trust in Him because we were created in such a way as our greatest joy is found in the magnification of His glory. There is no contradiction between humanity’s true search for joy and the requirement that we worship and serve the Lord. God’s children delight in worshiping Him, in praising Him, in glorifying Him. It is why we exist!

Affirmation of Faith

We believe that God, from all eternity, in order to display the full extent of His glory for the eternal and ever-increasing enjoyment of all who love Him, did, by the most wise and holy counsel of His will, freely and unchangeably ordain and foreknow whatever comes to pass.

We believe that God upholds and governs all things – from galaxies to subatomic particles, from the forces of nature to the movements of nations, and from the public plans of politicians to the secret acts of solitary persons – all in accord with His eternal, all-wise purposes to glorify Himself, yet in such a way that He never sins, nor ever condemns a person unjustly; but that His ordaining and governing all things is compatible with the moral accountability of all persons created in His image.

We believe that God’s election is an unconditional act of free grace which was given through His Son Christ Jesus before the world began. By this act God chose, before the foundation of the world, those who would be delivered from bondage to sin and brought to repentance and saving faith in His Son Christ Jesus.

Resources

Tom Schreiner and Bruce Ware, ed., Still Sovereign: Contemporary Perspectives on Election, Foreknowledge, and Grace

John Piper, The Pleasures of God

Sam Storms, Chosen for Life