Alright, we're going to continue on in our evangelism and sovereignty of God discussion as part of walking through the canons of Dort. And so, we're going to skip actually ahead to the second head of doctrine. We went through articles one through five of the first head of doctrine, which was election and reprobation. The remaining articles under section one, I encourage you to go uh... and look at those but a lot of them have to do with the details of sovereign election and uh... maybe only secondarily relevant actually to uh... our main purpose of this study which is to uh... help us uh... and to encourage us in the area of our personal evangelism so we're actually going to head on to uh... the second head of doctrine which is the death of Christ and the redemption of men thereby. And so, let's dive in. So, what I would say is, as you go through the rest of the articles under the first head of doctrine, election and reprobation, what you should glean from those is, at the end of the day, is encouragement. And the reason you ought to be encouraged by that is because what it tells us is that God has marked out for himself a people. In a sense, there's a guaranteed return on investment for us. That doesn't mean that necessarily you will bring tens or hundreds of thousands of people to Christ personally, but what it does mean is that for the Church, uh... catholic universal for the church around the world there is a guaranteed return on investment the gates of hell will not prevail uh... against the kingdom of heaven and that we together uh... will have a guaranteed return on investment so be encouraged by that uh... the person that you're talking to today who doesn't know jesus christ very well may according to god's sovereign uh... and unconditional grace any comments on that So, be encouraged as you study, uh, the doctrine of election. So we're gonna move to the second head of doctrine and we're gonna begin with Article 1, which we'll read here. So, the death of Christ and the redemption of men thereby. So, God is not only supremely merciful, which again we discussed in previous sections, previous articles, but also supremely just, which we've also discussed. And his justice requires as He has revealed Himself in His Word, that our sins committed against His Infinite Majesty should be punished, not only with temporal, but with eternal punishments." Matthew 25, 46, and other places. Both in body and soul. Which we cannot escape unless satisfaction be made to the justice of God. Okay? I wrote here underneath. That is, God, in his perfection, is perfectly just. Which means... that the sins of men committed against an infinitely holy and just God deserve an eternal recompense or punishment as manifest in humans' bodies and souls. Humans cannot escape such eternal punishment unless the justice of God is somehow satisfied." So, as we do evangelism and we talk about God's wrath, which we've previously discussed, and God's righteous wrath against sins committed, right? this particular article talks about the nature of that punishment against those sins, and that punishment is hell, and hell is eternal. So I encourage you to tell people that, because that's real. It's not popular, and it's not easy, but it's real. At this point, I'm gonna sort of help, my goal was to help a little bit, and I have this apologetics note here, okay? I have gotten the question myself, perhaps you've gotten this question, why is hell eternal? It doesn't seem fair. that an eternal punishment is prescribed for a temporal set of sins, i.e. a person has sinned for 70 or 80 years, let's say, on average, and it doesn't seem fair that 70 or 80 years worth of sins is punishable by an eternity of condemnation and punishment. Okay? This is a fair question. I'm sure you've gotten it a thousand times. Okay? Mike and Rudy and Wayne. Alright? Let's talk a little bit. So I'm going to help you in your evangelism by talking a little bit about apologetics, right? Giving a defense. So, we're going to do this on three levels, right? Multiple arguments. Alright? First, you can see in the second paragraph there in the red, some theologians argue that punishment deserved is measured not by the number or the nature of the sins committed, but by the nature of the one who is so offended. Okay? That is, because God is infinitely holy and infinitely perfect, sins against Him must be justly met by an infinite, that is, eternal punishment. Okay? So, for example, we can appeal to our own justice system in this regard. Okay? Murder is always wrong. Murder is always terrible. But even we have this sense of that the murder of one street thug of another street thug is in some sense categorically different from Lee Harvey Oswald murdering John F. Kennedy, the President of the United States. They're both murder, they both ought to be punished, but there's a sense in which perhaps we might understand, categorically, that one of those is deserving of a greater punishment. And why is that? Well, because John F. Kennedy is, from a human standpoint, quote-unquote, more important, end quote, than the street thug who was murdered on the streets of Brooklyn. Does that make sense? And so we have this sense, okay, that the person offended, the person sinned against, okay, the nature of that person has some bearing on the nature of the punishment that is received by the person who's committed the sin. Okay? And so if we take this to its logical outworking, theologians argue that because God is infinitely holy, and infinitely perfect, and infinitely good, and infinitely beautiful, then, because he is the one offended, the punishment should be infinite and eternal. Does that make sense? I am, and so that's, it's a valid argument, not one of my favorite, that's why I present it first. Okay, not one of my favorites. Even human judicial institutions almost always prescribe punishments that are longer, often markedly longer, than the duration of the crime committed. So, for example, a bank robbery may take only three minutes by the time the car pulls up in front, everybody's in, right? Demand the money, they're out, they're off. Three minutes. But the jail sentence for such a crime may be years or even decades. Okay? And no one, the person you're evangelizing to, who struggles with the eternality of hell, no one declares that this common occurrence in our judicial system is somehow unjust. Right? No one would argue, no one you're talking to who's reasonable, would argue that, well, the bank robbery only lasted three minutes, and so these people should only go to jail for three minutes to justly pay for what they've done. Nobody would argue that. And as long as that person concedes the point, now all we're doing is arguing about whether or not, quote unquote, eternity's too long. And in fact, the death penalty is another one, whether you're, you know, whatever side you are on this issue, right, and that's not where, but it is true, right, that a first degree murder, right, conviction in many states, and in actually many countries around the world, the institution of the death penalty is real, okay, and many, many people who are not Christians, right, are for it, and they understand that that ultimate punishment, right, is deserved. Okay? This third argument, right, this third argument is actually the one that is most convincing for me. Is this, those in hell never stop hating the God who has condemned them. because they forever remain in their unregenerate state, which is by nature at enmity with a righteous and holy God. That is, sinners in hell continue to sin against God, and so are forever adding to their sentence. C.S. Lewis affirms, and again, I don't affirm everything that C.S. Lewis taught, but C.S. Lewis affirms this when he declared, quote, the doors of hell are locked on the inside. And so we imagine that if we went to the gates of hell and we threw them open and said, come out, you can come out if only you will bend your knee, repent of your sin, bend your knee, worship this God who's good and true and beautiful. They would shut the doors and lock them on the inside because those souls in hell are still unregenerate and are still hating God. And that does not change. So the question has to do with the parable of Lazarus and the rich man, right, in the Gospel of Luke. It's a good question, right? There's a sense in which what's happening in there. So one thing we need to remember about parables is that we should not try to glean too much detail from the parable, okay? So the question is, what are we to glean, necessarily? What is Jesus trying to teach? in the parable of Lazarus and the rich man. I would argue that there are some simple lessons only that are to be drawn from that particular parable. One is that upon death, there is an eternal separation between the righteous and the wicked. And that upon death, that separation is permanent and eternal. Would you like to glean more detail from that parable? I think we would have a difficult time. Did you want to say something? Yeah, I mean, we would have a difficult... So, the rich man who... He's trying to make it sound like how terrible and awful it is, and nobody would ever want to be in here, so that if he could get out, he would. Okay, so that's true, alright. Actually, all he wanted was for Lazarus to dip his water and, right, dip his finger in the water and to touch his tongue because he was thirsty, right? But, and to go back and tell his brothers, which he seems to suggest. Correct. So I think that it's true, there's a sense in which probably the rich man didn't want his family to come here because it was bad, and so there was a manifestation of the man's love for his family. I don't know that there's any indication, and I have to go back and check, I don't know that there's any indication in the parable that he himself was trying to escape. There are a couple of scriptures. I don't know them off the top of my head. There are a couple that seem to point to the fact that people in hell are going to continue to be obstinate and not want to bow down. And I can't speak to your question. It's a good question. Yeah, it's a great question. I don't have an answer. However, I think it needs to be said that when we talk to people today on this earth, who obstinately hate God, and we've all met them, and we've all had conversations with them, you can tell just by talking to them, you know? They'll say things like, oh, hell's gonna be a party, man, you know? They want nothing to do with God. You can offer them God 25 different ways, on gold plate, silver plate, whatever. They don't want anything to do with Him. And I think, in a sense of what you're saying, that attitude will continue on in hell. However, I cannot answer your question. And in fact, I think not only will it continue on in hell, but I think that it's magnified in hell because whatever lack of hatred men have in this world for God is due to common grace. And when that common grace is withdrawn from men and women on the last day, and men and women are revealed to be truly what they are in their nature as unregenerate and at war with God, their enmity toward God or their hatred for God actually is magnified after death and after the judgment, and not lessened. And if the punishment increases in hell, then the obstinacy will increase. Absolutely. Absolutely. I think that today, the next generation, I guess the generation after mine, which I guess you guys are always considering my generation is... I was born in the last years of the far boom, or 64. But the people, from my observations, which, you know, here in Pittsburgh and somewhat across the country, I think a little bit where I've been, but it's the people in their 30s and their 40s are doing exactly what you say. They think that hell's going to be a party and God's not even in the conversation with them or in their mind. We're going to have a big party. I'm going to be with all my friends and that's I'm sorry, I think a lot of people have that equation in their mind even when it comes to heaven. God's not a part of it, it's going to be a big party. Yeah, well I'm just saying, the whole mindset and then what Steve and Mike are saying is after they get there... Then they, you know, because right now they, God's not even, who cares? They're just like, we're going to, I'm partying now, I'm going to continue partying. But then when they find out what it really is, that's when the hate's going to come by. Why did you do this to me? You know? Yeah, the cousin who died, he was a gambler. And so his wife says, you know, Junior's up there in heaven playing the slots. No, he's not playing the slots. Well, and I think this attitude that you guys are talking about, this sort of hell is up an eternal party, right? Party, it's sort of, You know, in 1979, ACDC had an album called Highway to Hell, right? That happened to be Bon Scott's last album with ACDC. He died from alcohol poisoning. Yeah, actually it was an asphyxiation. But yeah, so yeah, he was gone less than 18 months later. But you can hear that they still play the song on DVE today, right? And it's very much an anthem for many, many people. And it is very, very wrong perception, and it is a justification of continued hatred against God, to color it in that way. Yeah, we had to pick a song in 8th grade that represented us, and I picked Only the Good Die Young. I was just sticking the line from there. I'd rather laugh than sit here and die with this answer. And I was convinced that Only the Good Die Young. At 14, I was, because that's what I was taught. Society teaches that, too. Absolutely. It's society first. Well, God's somewhere down here. And there's scriptural support for why that is. I think it's Isaiah 47. The pure are taken on their couches in heaven to rest, and people wonder why, and they don't understand that God taught them to prevent them from experiencing the evil on the earth. Okay, so this particular article is about multiple things, but I thought from an evangelistic standpoint, I wanted to help a little bit with the apologetics question with regard to the eternality of hell, and so hopefully it's helped you a little bit. Any other questions or comments on this particular article? I have to think and do some reading on the whole Lazarus thing, because that will bug me now. I don't know why. No, that's a great question. I've read it, but I can't. I think for me the big issue with parables is we should be careful not to read in too many details. The parables are meant to teach usually one or two very distinct things, and then if we start pressing them for details, they don't hold together a lot of the time. And so it sounds like a cop-out, but I don't think that it is. I think the purpose of the parabolic teaching is, okay, I'm going to teach you this, and as people start to press, right, then you just need to sort of step back a little bit and go, wait, wait, wait, I don't have all the details rounded out here. It's meant to be a warning as to... Oh, I'm sure that it's meant to be a warning, there's no doubt about that. I would imagine if you go pretty far back, maybe 1st through 4th century, you're probably going to read when you study that, somebody's going to say the general consensus will probably be that that's not hell, that's Hades, that's the holy place. Correct. Abraham's bosom is what they defined as Hades or the holy. So they might say, you know, he wasn't really in hell. Right. Yet. And Jesus is still alive and so, you know, the captives have not been set free and so on and so forth. I think there's some deeper theological things there as well. I would agree. Right. Yeah, 1 Peter 3, so on and so forth. So it's a good question. The answer to your question is probably not concise. There's probably a lot of theology in the answer. So, okay. Article two. The canons say, since therefore we are unable to make that satisfaction in our own persons, or to deliver ourselves from the wrath of God, he, God, has been pleased of his infinite mercy to give his only begotten son for our surety, who was made sin and became a curse for us and in our stead, that he might make satisfaction to divine justice on our behalf." So what we saw under the first head, under election and reprobation, was that all have sinned in Adam and lie under the curse and deserve eternal condemnation. Right? And also affirms that we cannot satisfy God's perfect and infinite justice ourselves, right? To deliver ourselves from the wrath of God, it says. God has been pleased of His infinite mercy to give His only begotten Son. made him sin, and there, 2 Corinthians 5.21, became a curse for us, and in our stead, Galatians 3.13, that he might make satisfaction to divine justice on our behalf. That is, because men are utterly unable to satisfy the righteous, eternal, infinite justice of God, deservedly, uh, justice of God, he deservedly poured out on them due to their sin, God, in His equally infinite mercy, provides His Son, Jesus Christ, as a surety, that is a guaranteed payment, it's a legal term, a guaranteed payment, to suffer under said justice on behalf of sinners. And here we are again, this is the Gospel, right? And so in our evangelism, so there's sort of a doctrinal note here for you, right? In our evangelism, an important term that we should be providing to lost, unredeemed sinners is the word substitute. Substitute, okay? It is our goal. to convince men and women that they, in themselves, cannot satisfy the righteous requirements of God's law, nor can they, in themselves, satisfy the justice of God that demands payment for their sin. To be reconciled with God, that is to be saved, all men and women are in need of a divine substitute who can satisfy both God's law, and God's justice. And the only conceivable solution to this conundrum is Jesus Christ, the spotless Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world. So, when we evangelize lost persons, we should be talking to them about substitute, or substitutionary atonement, or substitution, making it very clear that they cannot meet the righteous requirements of God's law, they in themselves cannot satisfy God's justice. Okay? And so we talk about the substitutionary atoning work of Christ. That atoning work whereby we are reconciled to God must be performed and completed by someone who is not us. Someone, a substitute, who steps into our place, right? Interposed, we sing in the hymn, interposed his precious blood, okay? Interposed means to position oneself in between. That's what interposed means. We sing it in the hymn. Someone had to come, Jesus Christ had to come and stand in between us and God. That's a substitute, okay? or even if you read other theological works maybe that predate the 20th century. The word is vicarious atonement, vicarious, meaning substitute or in the place of. Okay, so I was riding along this past Monday with a guy from Bettis. We were on our way on a business trip. And I asked him, so how do you get to heaven? He said, well, you know, I'm a good person. It was just classic setup and classic answer. And I said, no you won't. You need a substitute because you are inadequate. And let's go to Article 3, because I think it comes down to this, and I really want to help you in your evangelism from Article 3. The death of the Son of God is the only and most perfect sacrifice, Ephesians 5, Hebrews 9, and satisfaction, and there, Romans 3, Hebrews 2, 1 John 2, 1 John 4, are the four places in the New Testament that if you have a good translation, the word propitiation is used, propitiation. most perfect sacrifice and satisfaction for sin, and is of infinite worth and value, abundantly sufficient to expiate the sins of the whole world." Okay? So let's talk about this, right? So this is in my own words. Alright, yeah, we're gonna get there, okay? So, from the beginning of redemptive history, God has made it clear in His Word that a perfect Spotless. Unblemished. As you're reading through your Old Testament, you'll see it over and over again. Spotless. Unblemished. Spotless. Unblemished. Okay? You should read perfect. A perfect sacrifice is the only acceptable sacrifice for the expiation or removal of separation of sins. We see this requirement, for example, in the Passover lamb. The Passover lamb had to be spotless, unblemished, perfect. I mean, God is making it abundantly clear to us what the substitute, what the sacrifice has to be. Thus, to remove sins once for all, as Peter's epistle says, only a perfect, spotless, unblemished sacrifice will qualify. That sacrifice is the sinless Son of God, Jesus Christ, whose death is sufficient to atone for every sin of all His people in the entire world. That is, His sacrifice is of infinite worth and value. So, God is infinitely holy, infinitely perfect, infinitely righteous, infinitely good, and so sins against Him, as the theologians would argue, deserve eternal punishment. Jesus Christ's substitutionary atoning work on behalf of sinners is of infinite value and so cancels out that punishment. So, doctrinal note for your evangelism. Try this next time you witness to a lost person. Tell them unashamedly that no one gets to heaven without having a perfect righteousness, period. I said that on Monday to my friend. Only men and women who have a perfect righteousness go to heaven. For perfect righteousness alone is what qualifies a person to stand in the presence of God. Now, what's the objection to that statement? No one is. Including you, you jerk. Don't tell me that I need to be perfect. Who do you think you are? You think you're perfect? And do you know what I say? No. I'm not even close. In fact, I'm worse than you. Now they're confused. Now they're confused. Because, you know, we're vocal Christians. We tell people we're Christians. We tell people we're going to heaven. We're joyful about the whole thing. And then we tell them we don't qualify. Now they're confused. And this inevitably leads us down a path to proclaim that it is not our righteousness that gets us to heaven, but Jesus' righteousness imputed or credited to us by faith alone. This is the gospel. This is the message we have to take to these people. At least if I can get them to argue that I'm not perfect, and so I don't qualify for heaven, then I say, well, that's true, as long as you affirm that for yourself, which means we're both in trouble. That is why we need a perfect, spotless, unblemished substitute who's willing to stand in our place, interpose himself, take upon himself God's wrath that we deserve and credit to us by faith His perfect righteousness. This is the doctrine of justification and it is glorious. It is glorious. And it causes that gap to be wider than they believe. One, they don't admit their own imperfection and how bad the human condition itself is. So they don't understand the state of their own condition. Or even a small offense, because of who and what God is, the holiness of God, and how magnificent He is, they're not seeing how great and holy He is, that the smallest offense against such a holy and righteous on both of those ends, where you underestimate the sin of man and underestimate the holiness of God, well, even where they think they are, their world's apart. Absolutely. Absolutely. This is such a great comment. And I think if I were to say what Rudy said in a different way, I would say a person's perception of their need is directly proportional or it's consistent with how far they see the divide between God's holiness and their depravity. Right? And the problem with unregenerate people is that the holiness of God is down here and their badness is about level with that. And if there's no difference between God's holiness and their depravity, if there's no difference, then they don't perceive that need. Exactly what Rudy said. They wouldn't perceive the need because holiness is never part of the conversation. It's always about how loving God is. He loves me. He's all-forgiving. Right. He's all-forgiving. He's gracious. He's merciful. He'll overlook my sin. That's the only attribute they know. That's right. That's right. And that's why, as preachers and teachers and witnesses, all of us, We have two responsibilities, right? We have two responsibilities. One is to magnify God's holiness. I have no problem telling people that no one goes to heaven unless they have a perfect righteousness. God is so holy, so holy, that he cannot even exist in the presence of sin. Bible affirms that. Might be a backache, but I might have that wrong. And as evangelists, as personal evangelists to our friends and family and co-workers and all of these people, we should also make it very clear to people the extent of their radical depravity. This is dangerous. It's dangerous because, you know, the best thing that might happen to you, of course, is that they would get saved, right? Then, working our way down the ladder, right, you may lose a friend. They may never speak to you again. Working your way down the ladder, you may get punched in the mouth. But until we create this separation between God's holiness and man's badness, radical depravity, then the need will not be perceived. I think you even explained it to me, like, just reading in the Bible, I never picked up about when Christ is being crucified, and it says, you know, God turns away, or, you know, why have you forsaken me? To explain it, he couldn't even look at the sin that was being put on Christ. I never even got that before until it was explained to me. Right? That's right, and so that's a good comment, right? The Father turning His face away from the Son while Christ is suffering under the righteous wrath of God. Right? And so in Galatians 3.13, which we previously noted, under Article 2, Christ became a curse for us. You go all the way back to Numbers chapter 6 and the common Jewish blessing. May the Lord bless you and keep you. May his face shine on you and so on and so forth. This idea that to have God's countenance upon you, according to Numbers chapter 6, was a blessing. May God turn his face to you. That's a blessing. That's what they would say to each other. The Levitical priests would say that to their people. Well, when Christ becomes a curse, curse is opposite of blessing. And so God's countenance, God's face for a moment doesn't shine on His Son. That is the essence of what cursing means. And when God turns His face away, as we sing in the modern hymn, the Father turns His face away, as wounds which mar the chosen one bring many sons to glory, right? We sing that in the hymn. The Father turns His face away, and in that moment, that is Christ becoming a curse, which Paul says He did for us. Are you going to elaborate more on exeiation versus propitiation? Not today, but I will make a note to elaborate. So the request has come to elaborate more on expiation versus propitiation. And I will make a note and we'll pick up there next week. It's a good comment. Okay.