I just want to say I love mice. These little technological gadgets. I'm a little partial to rats myself instead of mice. Yeah, little technological gadgets. So, a little behind the scenes. There are two mouse type objects in the studio. One of them actually looks like why they're called mice. It's got a little tail on it. It's hardwired into the board so it looks like a mouse. The other one is one of these wireless gadgets, so it looks more like a pet rock than a mouse. And the pet rock version of the mouse has a mind of its own. It refuses to operate under the sovereign will of the Lord. Anyway, so I've switched mice, and I'm loving mice right now, and I'm loving life as a result This is the faith debate on newsradio 950 that mouse that this yes. I know conditions. Yeah. Well. Yeah, that's true in a sense I guess natural state it could not be chosen for the year after year, so that's Daniel Raspi trying to get us back on track I'm Troy Skinner. This is the faith debate on newsradio 930 WF MD, and I say get us back on track We just started the show he's trying to get us on track to begin with. We're also joined in the studio this week by Imran Razvi as Daniel's father. They co-pastor a church called The Church That Meets at Imran's House. You can find them online at conqueredbylove.org. And Josiah Bonjwani, he wrote a book called The Head Covering. You can find that online. Just go to your favorite search engine and put in The Head Covering, Josiah, and you'll find a connection to his book or his website and all that sort of stuff. And we've been talking the last couple of weeks about the doctrines of grace, as they're sometimes called, or TULIP, Calvinism, Reformed theology versus Arminianism, all these theological buzzwords. A couple weeks ago we talked about total depravity or radical depravity. Last week we were talking about unconditional election, which is also sometimes called unmerited favor. And this week we're going to try to transition a little bit into limited atonement, which is also sometimes called particular or definite redemption. And these have different labels because the labels have been problematic. So what's at issue is the theology and the labels. Labels can be helpful. But when the labels are misunderstood, and over time, our understanding of words and language changes, which is why dictionaries get updated over the years, right? So what somebody meant by a particular word 400 years ago might not be precisely how we understand that word today. Last week, the word for knowledge came up, actually. And how we would understand for knowledge, we think about intellect and knowing in advance something in our mind, what's going to happen. But biblically, that word would be used differently. And so maybe our English Bible translators should maybe think about a slightly different English translation there so that we would better understand what the Bible is actually saying by that phrase or word. So anyway, we have a lot of dangling participles from last week's show. So, uh, I don't know if we want to kind of pick up and, and continue our thoughts on total depravity and unconditional election, or if we want to try to transition into limited atonement. Uh, Josiah had a lot of things to say in between shows about the unconditional election. So maybe we do want to start there, but Imran's leaning in now. So what do you think? Well, I want to start with an analogy and maybe get us thinking a bit differently. Again, again, I am talking about relationships. We talked about that a few weeks ago. I think it's all about relationships, right? So Troy, I'm gonna pick on you. You've been living in this neighborhood of yours how many years? 23 years. And you have a relationship with all the people in that neighborhood? Not all of them, well, relationship. Speaks to the depth of the relationship, right? But to be honest, some people moved in in recent years, I don't know every single person that lives on my street. Okay, that's just your street, not even the whole neighborhood, right? Right. So how does that happen? I mean, you're in the same neighborhood, we're all separated out, no relationship. And when we moved into our place, we wanted to get to know the neighbors. We went and talked to everyone. We invited them over for dinner. We reached out to them. And we tried to get to know our neighbors. But not everybody came over. Most people did not. So that resonates with me that story So what I'm saying is if we put you in the picture of let's say you're God and these are your people over there you went out reached out and opened the knock on the doors and Said because they're not gonna they're not gonna come to relationship with you. They don't care. They haven't they haven't they're not missing anything They don't know any better. Okay, they don't know who Troy is. They don't know that. Hey knowing Troy Troy would would enrich my life. I Okay? So they're in their little house, closed doors, you go and knock on the door, you make that initial step, and they open the door, and they can reject you. They can say, no, I'm not coming over for a barbecue, I'm not coming over for dinner. This is what it is. I don't want that relationship. They're going to be nice about it or whatever. And I think that really feeds into this tulip that we're talking about. God is going to come knock on the door. We're going to open it. We're going to see him. Are we gonna reject? Are we gonna move? It depends on how God works. I mean, you could go in there and force yourself. You could put your foot in the door and make sure they listen to you and do that. Again, that's a humanistic type of view. I'm just trying to say is that unless you go and initiate that relationship, it's not gonna happen. How many people actually go out and initiate a relationship? They don't. And I think the same thing with us as being totally depraved. We can't really initiate that relationship with God unless God knocks on the door and says, hey, I'm here. Search me. Come to me. give up all the other relationships you have for me. He's doing that, he's moving in that direction, and he's giving you specific instructions to do that, but he is orchestrating that move. It's not for everybody, whoever he elected and whoever he foreknew. And it's by his choice, not by ours, and we don't understand why he chose that. And I often wrestle with that statement, why did he choose me? I'm the only one saved in my Muslim family. And my father was well exposed to the Bible. In fact, he knew many Bible verses by memory. He memorized them, he knew them, but he was never saved, as far as I knew. And my mother, my brother, my sister, none of them are saved. Why me? Why did he choose me? And I know that he chose me because he came after me, and I could feel the Holy Spirit coming after me. I didn't know what it was at the time. So why did he choose me? And that's often, it's almost like a, you know, if you're a survivor, survivor syndrome, right? Why did I survive? Everybody else is dead. Why did I survive? But I think to understand Tulip, it really is about the relationship. Do we have original sin? Yeah, we don't have a relationship. There's no relationship when a baby's born. He has no relationship with God. Okay. They're an open book. They can have that relationship. God will move in and have that relationship. And then is it conditional? Well, God's gonna decide that. So I think I just want you guys to think a little bit more on the relationship side and how God's relationship works with us. And if you're looking at Tulip or looking at Arminianism and choice or whatever, whatever you want to look at, whatever theology you want to really go into, look at it from the viewpoint of a relationship with God. Because that comes back to the two most important commandments. The most important commandment is love the Lord your God. And again, as Josiah would say, well, you're doing it, God is not making you do it. But I mean, that's the first one. Second one is love your neighbor. Okay? As yourself. So those are both about relationships. And all the law is based on those two things. All the law is based on the relationship. So I think if you look at all these things, when you're looking at TULIP, or looking at Arminianism, or looking at any kind of theology, look at it through the relationship. God, somehow, for no reason whatsoever, wants a relationship with us. It's amazing that the God who created the whole universe wants a relationship with us. Why? I'm nobody. I'm nothing. In fact, I'm depraved. My thoughts are evil all the time. I'm always falling. I'm not doing what I don't want to do. I don't do what I want to do, even though I know what God's told me to do and I should be doing it. I don't do it. Why would he want a relationship with me? I'm so bad. Just think about that. And what he just ended with, I alluded to last week, I mentioned you should probably read sections of Romans, particularly centering on chapters 7 through 9. If you do that, or if you've done that since last week's show, what Imran just ended with, he was basically quoting Paul there in that portion of Romans. So the people on this panel are mostly in alignment so far These these questions I might be the most staunch although I haven't found any reason to think that Imran isn't in full alignment with me so far Daniel's mostly in very close alignment if not full alignment. I think the things we've said so far He's been in full alignment, but there are conversations We had off air that there's some things coming up that we might have some distinction in our thinking So the one that we often joke that he's a pie-eating tulip. Yeah, it's 3.14 not all five So, but the one who's been the most at odds with the reformed Calvinist point of view has been Josiah Bongellani. So, what are some things in response to total depravity, unconditional election, or as we now transition a little bit into limited atonement, on any of those areas of tulip, again, tulip, each letter of the five points of Calvinism start with letters that spell the word tulip. That's where that comes from. Of the first three, uh... on the doctrines of grace anything that you want to go back two weeks ago last week show or start something new what are some things that you've been itching to say well i guess most people would call me an arminian however i do sometimes self-identify as a zero-point or half-point calvinist and i say that because i kind of agree with the the first point of calvinism which is total depravity so i do think that you know people are totally depraved i don't think it's sense birth necessarily Otherwise Jesus himself would have been depraved from birth since Since he was fully human. No, absolutely not because he was not born of a man There was no that that's where a lot of people get that wrong. He did not have man's blood in him He was born of a human so he had to be a man was fully human, but he was born of a virgin Mary There was no man's Um, DNA. Are you saying that the sin gene only passes down through men and not through women? Yeah, well, I mean, that's interesting. He was created to be fully man and fully God. We're putting scientific, you know, contemporary or modern scientific terminology to it. I don't, I mean, it's an analogy and it can work to a certain degree. It's not so much about it's built into our DNA. It's built into the spiritual reality because we're much more than just our DNA. Well, I thought I would just throw that in to push some buttons for the fun of it. I would talk about relationships. I really liked what you had to say about relationships, by the way. Jesus was born with that relationship already with God. He was God. He already had that relationship. So he's not born without that relationship. He is the only one that was, besides Adam, that was born without a relationship. Adam was created with the relationship intact and he threw it away. Jesus was born with that relationship intact. And only on the cross, when God stepped away, did he fell lonely and said, why have you forsaken me? It ties to original sin, and you're saying you're a half-point on total depravity. But in fairness, based on how you've articulated what you mean by that, a true blue Calvinist would say, no, you don't agree with that one either. Yeah, so so you're zero point and if you're zero point in your you seems like you're agreeing with the arguments that the Calvinists of the day 400 plus years ago were responding against when they came up with their five points you're agreeing with the arguments they were trying to refute or correct and So, you don't have to call yourself an Arminian, but your theology fits somewhere within the Arminian camp. And I'm not saying that as a pejorative. I'm just trying to make it simple for us all to kind of get a sense of where we're coming from, particularly for the listener to have a sense of where we're coming from. But Imran jumped on that right away about Jesus and his sinlessness and him not having a natural, biological human father. And that ties to the federal headship idea. Who's the spiritual head of the family? The father. Right? So the, so the, the lineage, the spiritual lineage is tied to the man in the husband wife relationship. And so federal headship says that Adam sinned and all of humanity coming through Adam share in that shame and guilt. uh, in Adam. So that's why, that's one of the reasons why Christ is, uh, comes into being as a human the way that he does. So he has a human mother, so he's fully human, but he has a, uh, a deity father. So he's fully God and he's not sullied by the original sin because his spiritual head isn't Joseph. his spiritual head is God himself, the Father. So, I don't know if that's helpful in helping you to understand at least where the Calvinist would be coming from on that, so that you could probably tell any Calvinist, if you continue to want to think the way that you're thinking, you could say, yeah, I reject all five, because I don't agree with even a half a point of the total depravity thing. So, I don't know if that's, I'm trying to not come across adversarial, I'm trying to respond in a concise way which sometimes, we can have this conversation over hours and we're trying to squeeze it into 25 minute episodes which can make it feel a little more terse. And I'm not meaning it to be terse, so I hope, and you have, you're a really easy going guy, so even if I was being, meaning to be terse, I don't know if you would take it that way, but anyway, so what else do you have to say in response to any of that? Well, I probably could have a lot more points to do with original sin, but just skipping on to unconditional election, I also, I'm totally not on board with the Calvinist opinion about unconditional election. I believe there are conditions that we have to meet as Christians to be chosen by God, to live with Him in eternity. He's not an arbitrary God, He's a God of wisdom, of foreknowledge, of understanding, omniscience. So I think those attributes come out when God chooses wisely. Why is it you think that the Calvinists would disagree that God knows all things and sees all things? I don't think they disagree with that. It just it doesn't play into this doctrine of unconditional election. God chooses. I don't see the disagreement like even a little bit. So that's why I was asking that question. So how is it God knowing all things? How is that like a knockout blow against unconditional election? Can you repeat your question? I'm sorry. I understood you to say that God's omniscient, He's all-knowing, He has all this foreknowledge, all this intellectual understanding of the creation that He's made, and all this wisdom, and so therefore, unconditional election can't be true. Well, that's how I'm hearing it. Anyway, I'm saying in God's wisdom. Well in his foreknowledge He knows what's going to happen in the future and in his wisdom. He chooses those who are going to respond in But again, I want faith and repentance I don't want to come across as being a dead horse, but his foreknowledge has nothing to do with his intellect has nothing to do with omniscience. It has to do with the relationship that Imran's been focusing on. I would beg to differ on that point, because I think a single word can have multiple meanings. And you can see that when you open an English dictionary, you might have a single word that has like four different meanings. So knowing could have to do with relationship. You know, Adam knew his wife Eve. It could. But in this context, I think that the translators have done a good job translating it. But in context, let's use the Bible context as opposed to a Webster's or Oxford Dictionary context. In Romans chapter 8, And we know that for those who love God, all things work together for good. That's one of the favorite passages that Christians quote all the time, right? And, uh, and then they kind of stop there, but for those who are called according to his purpose. And then this is verse 29 now in chapter eight of Romans, because those whom he foreknew. So if we, if for no, there means what you're saying, it's about his intellectual understanding, his omniscience, the mind of God of the future, right? Then, How does that flow? Because those whom he foreknew, those who he saw in the future, he also predestined to become conformed to the image of his God. So did he predestine them? Or did he already know? Like, it seems like those... See, this is... And I think if he's outside time, those two are one and the same. But if... See, this is a distinction that's actually... It takes a bit of thought to think about. But I would argue that the Calvinist actually reverses the words in that phrase. They say, for knows according to what he predestines, because they see them as kind of equivalent. But as an Arminian... You're missing the point. You're totally missing the point. I'm getting frustrated now because foreknowledge doesn't mean intellectual. Well, I believe it does. And you are biblically on thin ice. So if, let's put it this way, if foreknowledge means relational love, I have set my heart upon this person in advance of the creation. If it means that, if it means. Right, I'm just saying for the sake of argument, if he loved these people, he therefore predestined those who he loved to be conformed to the image of his son so that he would be the firstborn, and those whom he predestined he also called, and those whom he called he also justified, and those whom he justified he also glorified. This is called the golden chain of redemption here. They're all tied together. How is it that foreknowledge, the way you're defining it, fits there? Well, I want to also add in a little bit and have you think about this. If it's only intellectual knowledge, then it makes God a puppet. Well, I believe God has relationship too, I just don't think this verse is specifically speaking of that aspect. Again, to me, that's what comes to mind. If I was trying to explain something to a non-believer, your interpretation of saying that this was intellectual knowledge. God knew that these people were going to be saved, and so He saved them. That sounds like God is doing the will of man, not His will. He knew that they would exercise faith in response to His calling them. Right. And so He is basically responding based on humans, and the humans are in charge. And that's where I have to disagree with you. Humans are not in charge. They cannot. so let's look at it like this we have a election and like a like a political election okay, so if I'm running for office and I go in foreign time, and I see who's going to vote for me And I know who's going to vote for me, so now I choose to only canvas and only advertise to those people Why would I bother advertising people that are not going to vote for me? but then I'm basically making decisions based on what the other people are going to do not what I want and And so I think that's the argument. We're putting God in that position where we're saying He's now a slave to man. He is deciding who He's going to save based on what man is going to do. I don't think He's a slave to man. He just set conditions. He's like, here are the conditions. If you meet these, then you can go to heaven with me. Right, but then He's choosing only to show those people who He knows. He's the one who initiates. He's the one who concludes. But only those people that He knows are going to, you know, rather than He's causing it to happen. It's more like he knows that'll happen, so he's initiating only with those people. It'd be like me as a politician only advertising to those people that I already know are gonna vote for me, only to my base. But I'm not showing, I don't know. The analogies can only take us so far, but. Yeah, and you've mentioned some verses, and in fairness, I probably should mention some too, so that we're arguing scripturally here. In Revelation chapter 17, It's talking about, well, I'll just read the whole verse here. The beast that you saw was and is not and is about to come out of the abyss and go to destruction. And those who dwell on earth, whose name has not been written in the book of life, and here's the key phrase, from the foundation of the world, will wonder when they see the beast that he was and is not and will come. So if their name is written in the book of life, before they had any opportunity to meet any conditions, how does that fit your framework? Well, I believe God is outside of time, so he may have written the Book of Life way before the worlds existed, or you could look at it as way after, it doesn't really matter because he's outside of time. But, in other words, it's not like he... How am I to put this? One didn't come before the other because it was outside of time in the first place, is what he's saying. Thank you. Yeah, but in this kind of thing, it's in the Book of Life from the foundation of the world. So from the foundation, when the foundation of the world is established, there's already a Book of Life. And people are in it. Right? I mean, that's how... I mean, everything is present to God, so it doesn't really matter. Okay, in Acts chapter 13, when the Gentiles heard this, they began rejoicing and glorifying the word of the Lord. And as many as had been appointed to eternal life believed. So those who came to belief, who met the conditions, met so because they had been appointed to that eternal life. How do you understand that in your framework? So I understand that as God has certain conditions. He's like, you have to believe in me, you have to repent, and you have to forsake your evil ways and follow after Christ in order to be a Christian. And He knows ahead of time what people are going to choose to do. And He's the one who initiates it. Can God be wrong? God cannot be wrong. So if He knows in advance that you're going to choose Him, aren't you bound by his, to use your way of understanding the word, his foreknowledge, his omniscience, aren't you bound to make that decision? So, I don't believe you're bound to. You have free will that you can exercise. God just happens to know how you're going to exercise that free will. And so, he makes his decisions ahead of time, but you want to look at it that way, even though he's outside of time. Before the creation. Yeah, so before the creation, he's like, I've determined that these people are going to heaven. For very good reasons, because namely they... Could he have made the universe, could he have looked down the quarters of time and saw a situation where you believed... But your next-door neighbor didn't but then decided in his wisdom that you know I'm gonna have the next-door neighbor believe and not just I believe could he have created? Differently in that way and made that so God could have made us robots where he controls whether we believe or don't believe but he wanted us to be People who have the ability to actually love him from their from our hearts and to express, you know Being the image of God so he created us in his image and that means specifically that we have free will and can exercise that That's how I view it I mean, what about that verse about God loved Jacob and hated Esau? So, once again, God could foresee what type of character these people would exhibit. So before they were even born, He could say, I love Jacob and hate Esau, because He knew what types of lives they were going to live and how they were going to respond to His offer of grace or whatever. In His foreknowledge, He was able to predestine. Yeah, so just to clarify a little bit, and maybe I'm gonna be on a different page than Troy, as we said earlier, is I do believe in free will, but under the authority of God. And I think God gave us free will to an extent, and that he built us that way he chose, and there's room for free will and for a predestination in the Bible. I think, and that's one of the things that I struggled with a long time, you know, how does that- How do they harmonize? And it also comes down to, as a human, I'm offended that I don't have the free will to choose what I want to choose. That's my humanistic view. And we're not in disagreement. I believe in free will. I like to use the word free agency because it creates less semantical disagreements, because it's a different label. But in this context, I'm fine saying we have a freedom of the will, but our will is in bondage to sin. so we are dead in sin. And so we are free to choose as we want, but we want to choose against God because of rebellion. So until God changes the heart, takes away the heart of stone and gives you the heart of flesh, you choose what you want to do. And until you're in Christ, or until you're given the gift of faith, you're choosing to be in rebellion. But once he gives you the new heart, once he sets his affections upon you, Jesus says, those who the Father gives me are the ones that I have. So God gives the people, and then their will is changed because they have a new heart. They no longer have the heart of Adam, they now have the heart of Christ. And I would say, I struggle with sin every day still. I'm saved. I know that I am going to heaven, and I have no question about that. I'm not at all concerned where I'm going to end up. I know I'm going to heaven. Yet I struggle with sin every day. I struggle with my sinful nature of longing for sinful things and not godly things. And that's why, as Paul said, I do what I don't want to do and I don't do what I want to do. Because even though intellectually I understand it, so why would God choose me? I'm an evil, nasty, terrible person. And I struggle with that because, again, me only in my Muslim family He chose. Why not anybody else? Why me? I'm not any better. In fact, I think my mom's a better person than I am. She's very nice. At least I don't see all the evil that I see in myself. Why didn't he choose her? That's Imran Razvi. That's Josiah Bonjwani. We've hosted her from Daniel Razvi this episode. I'm Troy Skinner. This is the Faith Debate on NewsRadio 930 WFMD. We'll be back 167 and a half hours from right now. Until then, God bless.