You constantly hear people that are Calvinist harp on this. They just keep repeating it and they repeat it so much you start to think it's a biblical truth. Jesus stands outside the tomb of Lazarus. He says, Lazarus, come out. And Lazarus said, I can't, I'm dead. That's not what he did. Lazarus came out. Do you mean to tell me a dead person can respond to the command of Christ? And then you take lessons from Judas White and Jeff Durbin. It shows in this kind of sequential format and... Do you really believe that it parallels the method of exegesis that we utilize to demonstrate those other things? Um, no. Some new Calvinists, even pastors, very openly smoke pipes and cigars just as they drink beer and wine. Even Jesus cannot override your unbelief. He's quoting a verse like that to him. You know what it would sound like if he were listening to it? He wouldn't make any sense to him. A self-righteous, legalistic, deceived jerk. And you need to realize that he's gone from predeterminism, now he's speaking of some kind of middle knowledge that God now has to... I deny and categorically deny middle knowledge. Then don't beg the question that would demand me to force you to embrace it. You're not always talking about necessarily God choosing something for no apparent reason, but you're choosing that meat because it's a favorable meat. There's a reason to have the choice of that meat. And now, from our underground bunker deep beneath the faculty cafeteria at New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary, safe from all those moderate Calvinists, Dave Hunt fans, and those who have read and re-read George Bryson's book, we are Radio Free Geneva! Broadcasting the truth about God's freedom to save for His own eternal glory. Of all the quotes, of all the quotes, in there. I mean, the Gene Kim one is good. Um, you know, that, that, that's... But the Middle Knowledge one... I, I, it just, I... If you want to know what makes me so crack up, uh, in all of that, that's the one that just... But I, I categorically deny Middle Knowledge. Then don't force me. I don't, I can't even repeat. It's just... Oh, welcome to Radio Free Geneva. I'm going to tell you... Did Barry think that one up, or did I think that one up? Because I know he thought up Radio Free something else, like Damascus or something like that, yeah. I know, I know, I know. But we should. In all the years, could we have ever have predicted when we did the first Radio Free Geneva that we would have so much fun? with those. And what we need to do is we need to find an Andrew Sluder. Probably what we're going to look at today would give us a good quote to throw in there. Because there's still a couple quotes in there that I'm not sure exactly where our dear brother got them from. I'm not sure who they are. So, like the one about Greek and Hebrew. Isn't that the guy from Dallas? Is that who it is? I don't know. But we need to make it all Calvinism stuff. Well, don't make me attribute to you. Oh, hey, yo. That's always helpful to know that. So before we get started, I have to acknowledge the tweet that just appeared on Twitter from Dr. Moeller. Look, OK, here's here's here's here's the story. I listen to the briefing all the time, and I've said on this program a thousand times before that I get to say the things that Albert Moore can't say, because I'm just not under as many strictures as he is. And it just struck me, I think last year, it might have been the year before, but I think it was early last year, when he covered a story about dodgeball as bullying and you could just tell by the way he covered that story that he loves dodgeball and that that brought up all sorts of positive um because he even said that he loved dodgeball because when he was a kid the ball was big enough for him to see it And so he'd get to actually play it and enjoy that. And I get that. My vision didn't start going quite that wonky quite that early. But yeah, you know, I've had my glasses knocked off and all the rest of that kind of stuff. But I remember plainly, plainly, was that Rossmoyne Elementary? No, that was not Rossmoyne Elementary. It was the second one that I went to. It was the last elementary school that I went to. before we left Pennsylvania and moved in, so it's been 19, it would be 1974, because we moved out here in 19, well, no, no, yeah, yeah, yeah. And it was up on a hill. And so you can see out over the Harrisburg area is actually Mechanicsville. And I remember playing dodgeball with those red eight inch Playground balls. Do they not have them anymore? They've got to. What do kids do on the playground? I mean, seriously, what can kids do on the playground anymore? Wasn't there something in the late 90s about those being terrible and they wanted to ban them or something like that? Well, I think, yeah, over the past 20 years, there's been, you know, all this stuff about, you know, when you start giving people performance awards and the idea was that sports like that is bullying. Because not everybody is as good at it as everybody else. Yeah, especially, I mean, growing up in northern Arizona, we didn't play dodgeball. You didn't? We played murderball. Murderball, okay. That's what it was called. It was, shall we say, a variation. Yeah, well no, look, it was obvious that... The large German P.E. teacher. Yeah, the rule was you weren't supposed to hit people in the face, but that was so much more fun than when you... Sorry coach, just didn't throw that one right. And see, there are seriously people in our culture now that are sitting around going, this is terrible and horrible. It's how you grow up. It's how you grow a spine. I mean, I told a story, my first year in Little League, we did not win a game. We did not win a single game. It was horrible. We were 0-11. But I learned so much from that. So the next year, when we did real well, funny how one year of growth would do that, and I went to the All-Star game, I mean, it meant so much more because we had lost 11 games the year before. And no, we can't do that anymore. That's just terrible. That's just bullying. Anyways, sorry, I'm preaching. It's already eight minutes in and nobody's listening. The point is that Brother Moeller talked about dodgeball, that I decided right then and there, I said, I've got to send Al Moeller a dodgeball. But I just didn't, you know, I wanted to know where to send it to. So I finally got it done. And if you look on Twitter right now, that's a fairly decent, it says official dodgeball, but it makes me wonder who defines what an official dodgeball is. Is there an official dodgeball league? I don't know. But, um, one of the things that I suggested, uh, was, um, I could just tell that the sound, remember the sound? Bing! That, that boing sound? Um, I could just tell by the way this one's made that that's the sound that it makes. And so, um, whenever he needs a smile, just nail somebody with that sucker. Ask a grad student to come in. Bing! Blood pressure, woo! Everything. Life goes on. It's good. We have to deal with so many people. There are a lot of people in the Christian faith that probably would do better if they would just play some dodgeball. If they would just play some dodgeball. Oh, goodness. So if anyone's wondering, that's what that's all about. And that happened right as the program started. And so there you go. Yeah, I'm also looking at Tim Buchong's thing there. Yeah, we'll see if there's some stuff from today's Andrew Sluder material that might make it into Radio Free Geneva. We'll see what comes of that. Anyhow, before we do the crazy stuff, let's do the important stuff. Well, okay, let me take that back. Before we do the crazy stuff, let's do the more serious stuff. It's not that either one is unimportant. The kinds – and if you're new to the program, Radio Free Geneva is the dividing line, it's just the section where we deal with objections to Reformed theology. Objections to Reformed theology can be very scholarly, philosophical, traditional, religious, whatever. We've done entire programs where we've just dived deeply into issues of theodicy. Theodicy is made up of two words, theos and dikaio, the justification of God in the light of the existence of evil. How can there be an all-good and powerful God in the existence of evil, et cetera, et cetera. We've gone deep into stuff like that, and we've taken on people like Jerry Walls, who are considered to be the best But we gotta deal with that kind of stuff, but that's not what most of us end up dealing with. Most of us end up dealing with really bad misrepresentations that are based upon ignorance. There are a lot of people, there are a lot of brothers and sisters, and this is where we disagree with the doctrinal perfectionists and the hyper-Calvinists, we have brothers and sisters who were introduced to the gospel by pastors who then warned them about Calvinism. And so they have a really hard time even hearing what we have to say, they have a hard time hearing our arguments, they have a hard time in any fair way, hearing what we have to say when we present the doctrines of grace. And so, we have to deal with a wide variety of objections. We've dealt with Roman Catholic objections and all sorts of stuff like that. And so, today we will continue what we began on the last Radio Free Geneva, which was a week ago, I think. Last week sometime. where we start looking at John Lennox's discussion from Determined to Believe, chapter 9, I believe it is, drawn by the Father and coming to Christ in the paper edition. This begins on page 169. That's fairly close. In fact, I think, It's fairly, let's see, 174? That's fairly, yeah, that actually meshes up pretty well between what's showing on my Kindle edition and the paper version. But looking at the discussion of John chapter 6, once we're done with that, then we will go to the Andrew Sluder stuff. And of course, Andrew Sluder is a well-known King James-only fundamentalist Baptist. Yeah, it's a very different level of objection to Calvinism than what you have with John Lennox. So, to get you back up to speed, we had been looking at John chapter 6. What I've done on my screen, if you recall from last week, is I have the English and the Greek on the one side in Accordance Bible Software, the best Bible software that I know of anywhere. And on the right-hand side is my Kindle app. And, uh, Dr. Lennox's book. So I have Dr. Lennox's book in heart and in paperback. I have it on there. Uh, who knew you'd, you'd have to start buying books in multiple forms, uh, in, in the future, but that's, that's, that's how it works. Um, so we had gone, we had started looking at what he was saying and what we detected was there was a, um, sort of a, an attempt earlier on, to provide a context that would allow us to overcome the very clear statement of divine centrality in John 6, 37. All that the Father gives me will come to me. In answering the question of unbelief, Jesus' first answer is, those the Father gives me are the ones coming to me. Because Dr. Lennox's position is one of human autonomy as the primary necessary element for justice to exist, in essence. And so, we read what he had to say. We saw that he did not observe or attempt to respond to the reality that grammatically, logically, contextually, the giving of the Father precedes the coming of an individual to Christ. And see, that's what the whole argument is about. The synergist, the person who believes there's two powers involved in the accomplishment of salvation, the one does not determine the other, it's not the basis of the other, where God is trying to save, but he can't save unless mankind cooperates. The synergist is going to look at this text and say, well, the Father gives to the Son, those that he has foreseen will come to the Son. And this can take different forms, this can be simple foreknowledge, this can be Molinism, depending on what the approach of the particular individual is. But the problem is that in the language, in the text itself, if you're just trying to hear what the text says, the text says that the giving of the Father is what results in coming to the Son. So, you can't go, well, the Father gives to the Son, those that He's foreseen will come to Him, and then at the same time saying the reason someone comes to the Son is because the Father has given them to the Son. That's consistent with John 8, that's consistent with John 6, that's consistent with John 10, that's consistent with John 17, etc., etc. So, we had observed this, and then we had seen that Dr. Lennox focused a lot of attention on the fact that Christ will never cast out one who comes to Him, but that's the second part of the sentence. The reason He will not cast out one that's come to Him is because He's come down out of Heaven not to do His own will, but the will of Him who sent Him, and this is the will of Him who sent Him, that all that He has given Him, He lose none of them, but raise them up on the last day. The focus does not shift from Jesus in this entire section. That's one of the problems, I think, in most of the treatments of this text. When I dealt with this in a little book called Drawn by the Father, I think there's a new edition of it out, but in Drawn by the Father, I started and I walked through all of John 6 so you could see the focus remains on Jesus. It does not shift from that. When you keep that in mind, and you keep in mind that Jesus is explaining the unbelief of these men, this communicates a consistent message. And, interestingly enough, yesterday on the program, I made reference to a conversation that I listened to between a Roman Catholic apologist and a Protestant, and one of the issues that came up was John 6. And as is always the case in dealing with Roman Catholic apologists' utilization of John 6.53 and following, there was no reference made, or any understanding made, or shown, an understanding shown, of what came before that, and how it fits into the entire dialogue, and why turning that into some type of proof text for the Aristotelian concept of transubstantiation which would have meant absolutely, possibly nothing to anyone to whom these words were initially spoken. Why that's just completely outside the realm of what the message of John chapter 6 is, that should be seen by a person who's actually following the argument of John 6. But very few people are following the argument of John chapter 6. So, we got down to 39 through 40, and 39 to me If the Son is to do the will of the Father, and the will of the Father is that He lose none of all that has been given to Him, then the Son has to have the capacity and power in and of Himself to be a perfect Savior. Not only initially, in bringing a specific people, those given by the Father, to Himself, but in keeping them. Christ, this is emphasizing the power of Christ as a perfect Savior. Those, the sad, and it is a sad, and Dr. Lennox didn't go here. Thankfully, he didn't go here. But the sad, in fact, may I call it pathetic attempt of some synergists today. to say, well, John 6 is just about those individuals. This was a situation of judgment, and it doesn't have anything to do with anyone today. It means that the very same text where Jesus says, I will never cast out the one coming to me, and I've come down out of heaven to do my Father's will, the will of the Father is that I lose none that he has been given. If that's just the apostles, then none of these promises have any meaning to us. You might as well throw out John 10, John 17. They're all just about then, and we all get to sit back and go, boy, it must have been nice to have been part of that group there. That's where some people are actually willing to go. And there's nothing in the text that indicates that, but there you go. So, what we have is an emphasis upon Jesus' incredible capacity and ability as the Son of God. This is directly parallel with John chapter 10. If you're in the Son's hand, you have eternal life. Father's hand, you have eternal life. This is an emphasis always upon the power of God in salvation, not upon our ability to keep ourselves safe. So, having in 37 and following emphasized all of this is God, God, God, God, God. God does this, God does this, God does this. Then you get to verse 40, and you can always detect when someone is a synergist, when someone is trying to pry open someplace to insert the will of man in this perfect work of the Father and the Son, because they're going to emphasize verse 40 rather than seeing verse 40 as the means by which what came before it is accomplished. So, for my Father's will is that everyone who looks to the Son and believes in Him shall have eternal life, and I will raise him up in the last day. Now, this again is the NIV, and the NIV, it's been a long time since I used the NIV very often. But it is difficult to bring out some of the emphases in the original language. And there have been, just over the past two decades, there has been somewhat of a revolution in regards to aspect, modality, tense, things like that, and how this is understood within the teaching community. But the point is that in John, there is clearly an emphasis, through John's usage, upon the present tense. And here, the present tense participle It's a substantival participle. Henapas ha-thearon tan huyan. The one looking upon the sun. Kaipisjuon aisau tan. Now that doesn't have the article, but that's borrowed from the preceding usage, I would say. So the idea is looking upon and believing, not like this, but looking upon and believing as looking to the source of one's spiritual life. So, the will of the Father for the Son is that He save all those that come to Him who are given to Him by the Father. And then, for this is the will of my Father, in order that everyone looking to the Son and believing in Him And then, you know, translations say might. We read too much into might. It's the subjunctive, but it is the subjunctive purpose, the result. The result of looking, the result of this ongoing action of looking, ongoing action of believing, is that they have eternal life, and I will raise him up in the last day. So, we already had a discussion about being raised up, about not being cast out, about being given eternal life, but who raises that person up? They don't raise themselves up. Jesus raises them up. Who then is the one looking and believing on the Son? The ones given by the Father to the Son that are entrusted to His salvation, trusted to his work, he's to lose none of them, and so what's going to be the result? If you've been given by the Father to the Son, does that mean you can just simply kick back and go, hey, all is well? No. The result is going to be a change in you so that you are going to be looking to the Son and believing in Him. Remember what's going to happen at the end of the chapter. Well, remember what happened at the beginning of the chapter. These guys have crossed the lake to listen to Jesus. They are seeking after Jesus, but for all the wrong reasons. They are not looking to Him for spiritual sustenance. They saw the miracle and were fed. They want some more special food. the one who is constantly looking and constantly believing, not with perfection, but it is the mark of that person's life that they are following Christ. They're looking to Christ, believing His promises, they have eternal life, and they are raised up in the last day by Jesus, which in and of itself is a rather exalted reference to who Christ is and the power that He has. So, and I myself raised him up on the last day. And the Jews knew who raised the dead on the last day, that's Yahweh, and so there is gungus-mooing, my favorite Greek word, grumbling gungus-moo. Well, here it's a gungudzon, but gungus-moo is a term. grumbling of the Jews concerning him because he said, I am the bread which comes down out of heaven. And so, they don't like this. They've caught the fact that he is claiming a heavenly origin. He is claiming a very high exalted status for himself. Now, let's look at what Dr. Lennox has to say. He says, the double reference to the Father's will suggests the second statement explains the first. Now, what was the first statement? The first statement was about the Father's will for the Son. The second is about the Father's will for those who are given to the Son. So, the second is not explaining the first because they have different subjects. They have different subjects. The emphasis in the first is on the Father's giving, and in the second, on human responsibility to look and believe. No, I'm sorry, Dr. Lennox, you missed this badly. the first emphasis is upon the will of the Father for the Son. The Gospel's Trinitarian, because all this could be accomplished by the Spirit, so it's a Trinitarian act. So, the Gospel's Trinitarian and the Father's will, because, I mean, Jesus even emphasized this, He says, I have come down out of heaven not to do my own will, but the will of him who sent me. So, this repeats the emphasis of the preceding chapter, John chapter 5. If you ever find yourself, and I say this to my fellow pastors, if you ever find yourself working in a tax, and you don't remember what the immediate preceding context was, you need to stop and find out. Because here is where No one, and this is important apologetically because so many people say John is ahistorical. John is weaving a fabric of truths. He already knows the other Gospels have been written. He's weaving a fabric of truths to reveal things to us that would not be revealed by simply telling the public stories about Jesus. And in John chapter 5, what you had was the perfect harmony of the Father and the Son, so that the proclamation of Jesus' deity in John 5, 17 is not contradictory to monotheism and the worship of the Father. The reason you can honor the Son even as you honor the Father, the reason that we Christians can have one God, is because of the perfect unity of the divine persons in accomplishing that covenant of redemption that we are experiencing in this world right now. So, you have that perfect unity. I've come down out of heaven not to do my own will, but the will of Him who sent me, and this is the will of Him who sent me, that I lose none of those that are given to me. That's one expression of the Father's will. And then, Secondly, for this is the will of the Father, that those looking to the Son and believing in Him have eternal life, and the Son raised them up on the last day. So, both are fulfilling the will of the Father, but they're not identical, and the one is not explaining the first. That's a simple error, because the object of the will is different. The emphasis in the first is on the Father's giving. Yes, which Dr. Lennox skipped over in verse 37, the Father gives the Son and that's why they come to the Son. That doesn't fit Dr. Lennox's theology and therefore it gets de-emphasized. And the second, on human responsibility to look and believe. Or, as in every other text we could look at, once again the Bible, the issue is are we talking about prescription or description? Is this a prescription that everyone has this responsibility? Or is this a description that those who are given by the Father and the Son will look and believe because Jesus is a perfect Savior? And He's going to accomplish this, they're going to have a new nature, the new nature is going to look to Christ and believe. That is, those whom the Father has given Him are precisely those who have looked to the Son and believed in Him. Now, is Dr. Lennox saying that it is the looking to the sun and believing that results in there being given? That God foresaw this? That's not what you get from the text. If you follow the flow of the text, that would be the last thing that would suggest itself to you. But people come to text with preconceived ideas. The giving is not an act, an arbitrary act of divine determinism. God is determined that those who come, look, and believe will never be lost. Now, you see what's happened? You have reversed the entire statement of the text on a philosophical ground that had no basis within the text whatsoever. I think we need to see that because John Lennox, you'll see him doing great work with atheists and things like that, This is where you need to understand, folks, the theological perfectionists are wrong because they'll look at an error like this where I believe we will be able to demonstrate John Lennox is mishandling this text and the flow of this argument because of a pre-commitment to a human tradition. But every theological perfectionist I know also has their human traditions that they simply don't recognize. And we all do, every single one of us. And if not having one of them is what determines who is and who's not a Christian, no one's ever going to be saved. And so I can be thankful for John Lennox, I can view him as a brother in Christ, I can pray for God's best in his life, I can pray that God would give him a great platform to speak truth and use, you know, it was my former elder, last church that I was at, years and years and years ago, and I'm sure he got it from somebody else, said, God can draw a straight line with a crooked stick. I am disagreeing with John Lennox, I'm saying John Lennox is wrong about this, and I'm saying if you then have adopted the attitude that says, therefore, let's shoot John Lennox, you have missed it. You don't get it. Don't go away from this program going, I've got my theological shotgun ready to go for everybody who likes John Lennox. If you're doing that, I rebuke you. You've got the wrong attitude. It's one thing to say, let's look at this. This is a good example of tradition overriding the text. But that doesn't mean that because I can detect that, that that means we're dealing with an unbeliever in any way, shape, or form. So, what's being said here? The text, we have had the emphasis upon the sovereignty of God, back here in verse 37, all that the Father gives me will come to me. There is the Father's action, it's prior to all the rest, it determines the second action, which is coming to me. The one coming to me, I will never cast out. Why will he never cast them out? Because I've come down from heaven, not in order to do my own will, but the will of him who sent me. And this is the will of the one who sent me, in order that all he's given to me, I lose none of it, literally, but raise it up on the last day. This is the elect being seen as the whole. They're given by the Father to the Son. As a result of being given by the Father to the Son, they come. Verse 40, then, shows us what this coming looks like. And it's exactly what these men will not do. They are going to walk away. They're not looking to Christ, they're not believing in Christ in an ongoing fashion, and the entire incident of John 6 demonstrates this. From a human perspective, man, they look like they should be made deacons. Right then and there, they rode across the boat, they rode in the boat across the lake to find Jesus. We can't get most people to show up to church on time. But these folks did. Looked good from the outside. Jesus knew they had not believed. Because true saving faith is ongoing. It's ongoing. So, the emphasis then is upon the power of God And then the description of the one that is given by the Father to the Son and is coming to the Son as a result is that they are looking and believing in Him and that Jesus will raise them up on the last day. So when he says that is, those whom the Father has given Him are precisely those who have looked to the Son and believed in Him, he's reversing the order. There's nothing in the text that places the looking and believing as the prior activity that then determines who's given by the Father to the Son. No. The giving is not an arbitrary act. By the way, God can't do anything arbitrary because He's ultimate. As soon as you find someone saying God does something, that sounds arbitrary. He's ultimate. He can't be arbitrary by the very nature that He's God. So the giving is not an act of arbitrary divine determinism. God is determined that those who come, look, and believe will never be lost. There is how tradition takes a brilliant mind and makes it see something that was never in the text. Because I want you to see this. So many believers, especially when they're new to the doctrines of grace, they're thrown off by, but I've learned so much from this person. Yes, and you can. And you can! But how can they not see this? That's up to God! This is something that breaks your ego. This is something that breaks the ego of your traditions. To recognize. His absolute sovereignty and my absolute dependence. Man, the will fights against that. We want to have that control. But look, God is determined that those who come, no, the text says God gives those to the Son, who then, as a result of having been given, come. Those are not the same statements. The one is the reverse of the other. This is the reverse of what we just read in the text of Scripture. God is not determined that those who come, look, and believe will never be lost. I mean, that's a true statement if it was isolated off to itself, but since we're talking about what's going on in this particular text, What God has determined is that the Father gives a people to the Son, as a result, they come to the Son. And the Son is a perfect Savior, and we'll lose none of them that raise Him up in the last day. And the process by which they are kept is that they're always looking and they're always believing, and unless you think, and again, if you don't have a biblical anthropology and think that looking and believing is just something any old person can do and continue to do that, then I suppose that's where you insert man's will. You gotta be looking for some place to get that in there. But Gius himself will deal with that here in just a moment. Okay, back to Lennox. John later gives us a further example of people being given by the Father to the Son. I revealed your name to those whom you gave me out of the world." Now here he's talking John 17, and he's specifically talking about the disciples. That being given by the Father to the Son here is for service, and then in John 17, you're going to have the saying, and I ask not just for them, but for those who believe based upon their testimony, which would be all of us. There's still a massive distinction that is made by Jesus. He says, I'm not praying for the world. I'm here as the high priestly prayer. I'm not praying for the world. I'm praying for those who have given me out of the world. I revealed your name to those who gave me out of the world. They were yours. You gave them to me, and they have obeyed your word. Now they know that everything you have given me comes from you, for I gave them the words that you gave me, and they accepted them. They knew with certainty that I came from you, and they believed that you sent me. This is about the disciples. The context is Jesus is speaking to his father about his disciples, and so the expression, they were yours, not yours they are. They were yours, not yours they are. means that they had been true and genuine Jewish believers in God. They were yours. Again, do you see the thinking here? You're going, eh. The idea here is, and I've seen this in many other people, this is a common thought, the only people the Father can give to the Son are those who have already given themselves to God. Now, I think the disciples would have been pretty surprised by that. Oh, we had given ourselves to God and therefore that's why we were given to the Son by the Father. Oh, yeah, given the attitudes they had, the selfishness that was theirs, the infighting, everything else. Really? But that's the idea, is that they were They had been true and genuine Jewish believers in God. A whole host of such people is named in the New Testament, Zechariah, Elizabeth, John the Baptist, Anna, Simeon, the disciples, and so on. You gave them to me, involved them, coming historically to believe in Jesus as the Son of God." So, what you can't have is the idea that God can actually give a people to the Son based upon His will. He can only give a people to the Son based upon their performance. That there was something special about them, They were particularly holy in some way. And of course, for most of these people, we're only given a brief snippet about Simeon or Anna or something like that. And they're there to confirm that Jesus is the Messiah, by the way, just in case you missed that. There's miracles going on and they are a part of the bringing Messiah into the world and all the rest of that stuff. But the idea that the disciple band was made up of particularly holy Jewish believers who then came to historically believe in Jesus as the Son of God and therefore are given to Jesus. The disciples themselves, I think, would have said, are you kidding me? And that's certainly not what those disciples then taught about the nature of saving faith. You look at Peter, Paul, John, that's an amazing interpretation. A momentous transition for an Orthodox Jew. John tells us how it happened. God took the initiative and sent His Son into the world and He revealed God's name to them. They came to believe as a result of Him giving them the very words that the Father had given Him. But what had to happen for them to understand those words? Remember John chapter 8. Why do you not hear my words? Because you don't belong to God. You're not of God. Those who are of God hear His words. Here you're saying, you become of God by hearing His words. Backwards! It's backwards! And I understand what you win them with is what you win them to. When you use a gospel that is man-centered, it is really hard to get people to break out of that, because it's almost like it's hardwired in the first few months or years of preaching that you hear, especially if it's that preacher that was involved in your salvation, If they regularly – and this is important, guys, if you're a preacher. We, by how we express ourselves, teach our people how to handle and hear the Word of God. We've got to be so careful about how we do that. because I know many a person who this day just can't hear what we're seeing right here, the difference. John Lennox saying one thing, that's not what the text is saying. He's shoehorning it into the text to try to avoid what seems to him to be absolutely horrible conclusion of the text, that the reason these people come is because the Father gave That's the explanation. He then goes on to say that he has kept them and not lost one of them except Judas, whom we shall consider in chapter 18. That's another issue. And of course, Judas was not lost in the sense of having been entrusted to Christ for his salvation. He was the son of perdition. Jesus teaches that he was prophesied, that he had to do what he did. And I cannot believe how many people say, and that means that there's really no divine election. Okay. Once more we observe the statement, you gave them to me, does not override the responsibility of the individuals involved actively to receive Christ's words and believe in Him. But it is the basis upon which they do so. It is the basis upon which they do so. And Lennox's philosophy states that if that ability has to be given by grace, then it can't be a responsibility. So, instead of going back and saying, well, does scripture give me a paradigm where I can see where God holds men accountable to do things, but because they have fallen in Adam, they are not able to do those things because of their nature? Yes, it does, over and over again. In fact, pretty much Everything in Jeremiah argues that. But, Genesis 50-20, Isaiah 10, you've got the examples. We are much more familiar with the idea of someone giving something to another, like a birthday present, rather than a person being given by one person to another. However, there is one ceremony that is precisely what is done when, in some traditions, the father of the bride gives his daughter to the bridegroom at the wedding. This recognizes there is a sense in which she belongs to her father. She is her father's daughter. Now she is being given to the bridegroom. Of course, there are arranged weddings where this Giving has a strong deterministic element in it, since the bride has no say in the matter, which happened to be the entire context of the New Testament. However, most weddings that occur in the West are not arranged by the parents, but by the mutual free decisions of the bride and groom, which has nothing to do with applying this to a New Testament category. I would not wish to push this analogy, nor should you, but merely mention it to indicate that even at the human level, matters are not as simple as you might imagine. Okay. So, then we have, in the midst of all this, a universal offer of salvation. Ever stop to thank the Lord for just cold water? It's a wonderful thing. We who live in the desert do it a little bit more often than those of you who live like in New Orleans, where you got too much of it anyways. All right, there is more to be said about John 6. Jesus' claims about doing the will of the Father result in his audience becoming restive and giving vent to what is really on their mind. Then we have 41 through 43, stop grumbling amongst yourselves, Jesus answered. And now we've got the important part. So I'll go ahead and use his, because he may make a point based upon the NIV, which is troubling. Even though the NIV was primarily by Reformed folks. No one can come to me unless the father who sent me draws him, and I will raise him up at the last day. It is written in the prophets, they will all be taught by God. Everyone who listens to the father and learns from him comes to me. No one has seen the father except the one who is from God. Only he has seen the father. I tell you the truth, he who believes has everlasting life. I am the bread of life." So, instead of facing the mounting evidence before them pointing to Jesus' deity, or actually, yes, I would agree that it's pointing to Jesus as deity, but more so to the centrality of Jesus as the means by which the God of Israel will save his people. Because that's what Jesus is saying. I've been sent down by the Father. I'm giving my life for the life of the world. So if you're going to have eternal life, it's going to be through me. So what Jesus is saying is, just as in John 5, honor the Son even as honor the Father, and here, I am absolutely central to having eternal life. I mean, John 6 is extremely anti-inclusivistic, if you understand inclusivism as being their salvation separate from union with Christ. Been a lot of people who believe that, a lot of people who believe that. Jesus tells them to stop grumbling, continues to explain what was involved in coming to Him. He now uses a new metaphor, not that of the Father giving, but that of the Father drawing people. Well, I'm not sure that's a different metaphor. Both continue the same emphasis, and that is they're grumbling, but just as He had said they're not believers in verse 36, and then explained because the Father hasn't given them, He's going to explain the same thing here. The key idea is that in order for someone to come to Christ, the father must draw him. Once more, the emphasis is on God taking the initiative in salvation. Well, that's true as far as it goes. But as before, no deterministic inference should be drawn. Since Jesus goes on to explain how much drawing is evidenced, listening to the father and learning from him. Whoa, whoa, wait a minute. So you jump past 44 and its plain statement of human incapacity and ability to verse 45 and assume that listening and learning are human capacities and human actions. I'll explain why it's an error in just a moment. And that is precisely what many in his audience were failing to do. They were not really listening to him, but he had spoken, he had taken initiative in speaking to them. Indeed, Jesus cites the prophets to say they will all be taught by God. There is no exclusivism here. The teaching is open and accessible to all. Absolutely wrong. This is where, again, tradition results in bad eisegesis. Let's look at the text. I hope we get to Andrew Sluder today. But I don't know if it will. 644. No one is able to come to me unless Iyanme always introduces a subjunctive clause. So, the first statement is, no one is able to come to me. I just simply have to ask, do you believe that? I do not believe that synergists believe that that is a true statement. They rush past it to the provision in the action of God without first hearing the statement that there is a fundamental incapacity in the nature of fallen man, that no one has the ability to come to me. That is a very clear statement of human inability. That's why people have tried to get around it by saying, it was just them, it was just a particular act of judgment back then, whatever. Dr. Lennox realizes that that is theological suicide, but what he does is he just glosses over it. No one has the ability to come to me. Unless, because he's already said there are people who come to him. Unless Hapater Hapempsasme, the father who sent me, Halkusei Auton draws him. Kago Anastaso Auton, and I will raise him Ente Eskatehemera on the last day, please note. and I will raise him on the last day." Roll back here to verse 39, and I will raise him on the last day. Actually, it's it at that point because it's the—but on a steso, I will raise him on the last day. Verse 40 and verse 44 are identical to one another in how they conclude. So, if we're doing exegesis, If we're following context, if our goal is to understand what was being communicated by the words of the Savior at that time, then what we have to recognize is that those who are drawn by the Father are the same ones who were given by the Father to the Son, in verse 37, who are entrusted to the Son, in verse 39, and they're described as those looking and believing, in verse 40. What all of this does is do away with any inclusivism. Okay, this is not, who's going to be raised up on the last day? Well, people who had vague positive feelings about God. No. No. They were looking and believing in Jesus. They were drawn by the Father to whom? To Jesus. No one is able to come to me unless the Father sent me draws him. He has already established the centrality of who he is as the means of having eternal life. That's what being raised up the last day is, have eternal life. So, The key, obviously, in verse 44, I'll cover this briefly. We've covered this many, many times before. The key is the fact that we have right here, I'll outline it so you can see it. Well, that makes it impossible to read, but you have Helcuse, Altan, Cago, Anastasia, Altan. So you have one, two, three, four, five words. And so you have draws him, that's the unless, that's the subjunctive form, unless the Father who sent me draws him. No one has the ability to come to me unless this is the fulfilled condition. The Father draws him. And I will raise him on the last day. Now, the synergist wants to differentiate between the first Auton and the second Auton. Even though there's only two words in between them, the synergistic mindset is, unless the father who sent me draws him, that's everybody. If I be lifted up, I'll draw all men into myself. Different context, six chapters later, that violates the context here, but that's what they do. It means all people there. Here, it's talking about something completely different. It's an abuse of the text. But that's what they do. So, everybody gets drawn, and if the person comes, then I will raise them up on the last day. So, they have to differentiate these two hymns. They have to say, this is a different one from this. Now, when you have the same word separated by only two words, And there is nothing in the sentence that substantiates the idea that you're supposed to distinguish them, and you do. It's because you have a tradition and you don't believe what this text actually says. That's all there is to it. What is Jesus actually saying? You're grumbling? You're unbelievers? No one can come to me. I understand you're grumbling. Can you stop grumbling? Because no one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him. Who does he draw? Those he's given to the Son. Those he's entrusted to the Son for their salvation. And I will raise him up on the last day. If you're drawn by the Father to the Son, the Son will raise you up on the last day. It's the same group. It's the elect. The Father gives them to the Son. The Son's their perfect Savior. It's all about Jesus. I just have to look at you and say, why do you want to make it about you rather than Jesus? And the reason is synergism, so I can control. So, that's what really ends up causing a problem in verse 45, because people really struggle with this one. It is written in the prophets, and they shall all be taught by God." So, you can click on this. There's some different possibilities there. Isaiah 54, 13, Jeremiah 31, 34 are some of the possibilities. They shall all be taught by God. The one hearing from the Father and learning is coming to me. Now, here's what the Synergist does. O is coming to me. Okay, I need to find a way for everybody to be able to do that. Because if we're not all able to do that, then salvation becomes dependent upon the efficacious grace of God, and we don't want that. We want to maintain control. We want God to do 99%, but we want that 1% so we can maintain control, because otherwise then you just have to trust that God's going to actually glorify himself perfectly in how he works all this out. We don't want to do that. So, the idea is, if I can find some way of inserting human autonomy in here, Well, maybe I can find it in the hearing and learning. But hearing and learning are passive actions. Passive in the sense, they're not passive here in the sense of being in the passive form. But hearing, isn't that something that requires something else to produce what is heard? And learning. I have to take in instruction from outside myself. They're both passive actions. I can't create the sound that's heard. I can't create the knowledge that is learned. I am the recipient of these things, and that's the whole point. The whole point here is that the Synergist has to miss the Old Testament text here. What does it mean they shall all be taught of God? Who's the they? Lennox assumes it's everybody! But verse 44 was talking about a particular people who are drawn by the Father to the Son, an explanation of why the Jews aren't believing. So the point, if you just allow the text to speak for itself, is that when it says, they shall all be taught of God, the being taught by God, hearing and learning, is how he draws to the Son. This is the drawing. And it's effective because Jesus says, if you're drawn by the Father, guess who raises you up in the last day? I do. You see the perfection of this? It's perfectly balanced. The Father, the Son together, and we know, it's not discussed here, it's going to be brought out more in John 14-16, and then more in the epistles. Spirit is the one that brings so much of this to bear in our lives. Being sent by the Father and the Son makes perfect sense, but the point is that the Synergist continually turns these words on their head, literally upside down, not out of malice. I have never seen anything that makes me think that John Lennox has malice. when he does something like this. This is what happens when your tradition gets in your way of your exegesis. And I have seen great men of God, men who will be much closer to the throne than I'll ever be, and yet they had their traditions, and they simply couldn't see them. But you need to see it, and you need to act upon what you're now seeing. So when it says, they will all be taught by God, there is no exclusivism here. In the context, the text is talking about the means by which God draws certain people to the Son. The very text is exclusivism. The they are those given by the Father to the Son, not all of mankind. the assumption of the tradition ends up turning the text on its head. Isn't that amazing? Because John Lennox is a smart man, but he is not the first philosopher who has wandered into the exegetical realm and made a mess of things as a result of the tradition that he's bringing with him. Not the first one. But don't you dare take my demonstration of this as some grounds for then attacking him as an individual or anything else. Don't you think that it would be wonderful if Dr. Lennox might come to understand these things? He seems like he's the type of person who would go, you know, I used to say this, I've come to understand this. That might be a wonderful thing. Gotta be glorified in that. Really quickly, however, some theologians ascribe to the term, draw a compelling, if not coercive dimension. How about a powerful dimension? Because in the text, if you're drawn, you're raised up in the last day. That is, they regard the drawing as irresistible, the eye of tulip. But this cannot be! For Christ uses the same term later in John's gospel in this way, I, when I am lifted up from the earth, would draw all men to myself. If the drawing is compelling and irresistible, this would mean that all would be saved, which is not the case. Or, you missed John 12 badly, Dr. Lennox. And so we'll cover that real quickly, and then we will conclude this and go from there. And if I, and I, if I am lifted up from the earth, will draw Helcuso pras Imalton myself. But he was saying this to indicate the kind of death by which he was to die. He wasn't talking about the father giving the son. Different context. And therefore, The meaning here is pantos means all kinds. Pantos normally means all kinds. Pantos rarely is meant in the universal sense of all, every single individual. And so, the easy way is to remember that John chapter 12 is the end of Jesus's ministry And you will notice that it starts here, this section starts at verse 20. Now, there were some Greeks among those who were going up to worship at the feast. These then came to Philip, who was from Bethsaida of Galilee, and began to ask him, saying, Sir, we wish to see Jesus. So, they found the guy with the Greek name, and they want to see Jesus. Philip came and told Andrew, Andrew and Philip came and told Jesus, and Jesus answered them, saying, The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls on the earth and dies, it remains alone. But if it dies, it bears much fruit. He who loves his life loses it. He who hates his life in this world will keep it to life eternal. And if anyone serves me, he must follow me. And where I am, there my servant will be also. If anyone serves me, the Father will honor him. I sort of wonder, by the way, just in passing here, If those who try to turn these texts and John into, that was just back then, it's not about us now. What about this? You saying that's not about us now either? Talk about making a mess out of the New Testament. Now my soul has become trouble, and what shall I say? Father, save me from this hour. But for this purpose I came to this hour. Father, glorify your name. Then a voice came out of heaven. I have both glorified it and will glorify it again. So the crowd of people who stood by and heard it were saying that it had thundered. Others were saying an angel had spoken to him. Jesus answered and said, this voice was not come for my sake, but for your sakes. Now judgment is upon this world, now the rule of this world will be cast out, and I, if I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all men to myself." But he was saying this to indicate the kind of death by which he was to die. The crowd then answered him. He goes on from there. First of all, he does not meet with the Greeks. Secondly, he's talking about the manner of death by which he is to die. Crucifixion. Simple question. Does crucifixion draw or repel? Because if that's what you're talking about, what Jesus is saying, if I be lifted up, if I be crucified, I will draw all kinds of men to myself. In perfect consistency, with John chapter 11, which came before when Jesus raided Lazarus from the dead, the high priest prophesies and says that by his death, he's going to draw together all the children of God from all the nations. There is the meaning of John chapter 12. So, doing what Lennox did, very common, but erroneous, and ends up turning the text on its head. So, he's not the first one to do it. In the Potter's Freedom, I documented that Norman Geisler looked at the same text and came up with the free will of man. What do we learn from this? Tradition is powerful. And the greatest antidote to tradition is to constantly push yourself to derive your actual faith from the scriptures. And people hear that and go, well, everybody does that. No. No. The idea that I'm trying to communicate to you is the idea that you want your exegesis to be so transparently obedient to the text that you're constantly asking yourself, am I coming to my conclusions because that's the conclusion that's forced upon me by the original intent of the author? in its language, in its context. It is that discipline that will allow you to detect when your traditions end up causing you to literally turn the text upside down. Okay. I think most people would say that I have been fair to my analysis of John Lennox's text there. Let me see if I can go back here. There we go. Close enough. All right. Let me bring this up. Beep. And do this. All right. Now, we go from, I think, Oxford-trained or Cambridge-trained, I think Oxford-trained philosopher, Brother Andrew Saluter. And we've talked about Andrew Sluder, we've played clips from Andrew Sluder, he was the one that was doing the numerology, you know? And 6 and 6 and 66 and all that wonderful fun stuff. But here is a couple years ago, he just decided that we all needed to understand why Calvinism is hogwash, because that's how he described this. Calvinism is hogwash. Well, let's hear, and remember, I've lost track of how many people I've now talked to who were in churches led by Andrew Sluders, the Andrew Sluderan brethren, or whatever, and it was because of Facebook, YouTube, the internet, They went looking for answers because these guys don't have a lot of answers, especially on apologetics issues. And that's when they ran across the King James Only controversy and then like, oh, that's interesting. And then they end up looking at debates and they run into this reform stuff. And yeah, and that's why these folks preach so much against doing that, because they realize how many people they've lost. and will continue losing because they don't have answers to these things. So it's one of the reasons we deal with them. I've had a lot of people go, oh man, thank you for dealing with that. I mean, I literally had a guy, I told you last week, I literally had a guy walk past me at G3 because I had responded to something Andrew Sluder had said right before G3. And he said something like the eastern half of North Carolina thanks you or something along those lines, wherever it is that Sluder's located at. So, let's take a look at it, let's listen to this, and I'll pick it up a little bit so we can try to get through this. they do total presidency, Tuesday unconditional election, so forth and so on. And just deal with this topic of Calvinism because I hate Calvinism. This idea of certain people go to heaven, certain people go to hell, there's nothing you can do about it. I'm against it. And I'm going to show you this idea of elected to salvation. What does the Bible have to say about election? Alright, well they're all going to go to Ephesians chapter one in verse number four where the Bible says this, according as he hath chosen us in him It's a very interesting word, in him. We'll look at that in just a second. In fact, in John Calvin's, the guy who basically came up with Calvinism, in John Calvin's commentary on Ephesians, he leaves that phrase, in him, out. I'm going to show you why I think he did it. Yeah, let me show you John Calvin's commentary on Ephesians, because most of you have seen It's, let me zoom in here a little bit. There we go. So here's Ephesians 1, 4. I think this is what happened, is he doesn't, he may not use a lot of commentaries or be familiar with them, according as he hath chosen us. And so he sees that, and he goes, oh, he left it out. Except you scroll down, what's the next comment? In Christ. In him. To which he says, this is second proof that the election is free, for if we are chosen in Christ, it is not of ourselves, it is not from a perception of anything that we deserve, but because our Heavenly Father has introduced us to the privilege of adoption into the body of Christ. In short, the name of Christ excludes all merit and everything which men have of their own, for when he says that we are chosen in Christ, it follows that in ourselves we are unworthy. That is online. You don't have to own Calvin's commentaries to see that. This is just the kind of lack of meaningful research that marks the IFB movement. It really does. And those who oppose reform theology. So that was... Rebutting stuff like that isn't all that difficult to do. according as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before him in love, having, here it is, predestinated us. Okay, now let's stop for just a moment. Is holiness something that we experience now? Is this something? Yes. What he's actually going to end up doing is saying that we are not adopted into the family of God yet. He doesn't understand the now and the not yet, he doesn't understand how Paul's gonna say in Ephesians chapter 2, we are seated in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus right now, but we await the redemption of our bodies. So for the amazing thing, and again, these guys don't care about history, they don't care about whether their interpretation has anybody in history that's ever understood it that way, that's irrelevant to them. It's just them, their Bible, under the tree, and these guys are solo scriptura, not sola scriptura. Very important to differentiate between those two phrases. They are solo scriptura. But the idea is going to be, we're not adopted. Therefore, election, that's how Calvinism is hogwash. I'll let you listen. The adoption of children by Jesus Christ to Himself according to the good pleasure of His will. Now, I want you to notice this. I want you to notice what the Bible clearly says. It says that He's predestinated us to the adoption of children. Now every Calvinist, and a lot of Baptists unfortunately, we don't do it on purpose, but every Calvinist will say, well look there, it says that he predestinated us the adoption of children. And we'll sing songs, the Primitive Quartet came out with a great song several years ago about being, I'm no longer an orphan, someone rescued me, about being adopted. But if we were to get down to the bare, just what the scripture says, I'm gonna show you what adoption is. Now, adoption is not salvation. In fact, nobody on earth today is adopted. Nobody is adopted on the earth today. If you... You catch that? I just hope you hear these things. Because one of the most beautiful realities of Christian teaching, because we are adopted as the sons and daughters of God, the Spirit of God dwells within us and we cry out, Abba Father. This is going to be, in Ephesians, in Romans 8, I mean, the whole idea that there is no one on earth today who is adopted is so massively heretically wrong. And I don't even know, I don't think this is even representative of the majority of even IFB preachers. But when you want to get rid of Ephesians 1, you've got to come up with something. And here's the Calvinism is hogwash. So I'm going to destroy one of the most beautiful realities of the Christian message, and that is the person who repents and believes in Jesus Christ. has been adopted as the son or daughter of God. Yes, we are looking forward to that final adoption, the freedom from this fallen flesh in the redemption of that flesh, not the Gnostic idea of just getting away from it. But just as we continue to live here on earth, we are already seated in heavenly places in Christ Jesus. We are adopted as sons and daughters. We have the Spirit of God. We're the firstfruits by which we cry out, Abba, Father. And someday, that process is completed. That process is finished. What a beautiful truth that is, that Andrew Sluder can't offer to anybody. Are saved, you're not yet adopted. Now, don't lose me right here. Now, by the way, Fundamentals Baptist are completely lost. And I don't mean that salvifically. when it comes to the language of salvation. So they struggle to recognize, for example, the ordo salutis, to distinguish between regeneration. This is why, for example, even in some of the groups that I was raised in, when you look at the use of the present tense, those who are perishing and those who are being saved, oh man, you will find a lot of these folks. that because the King James missed the parallel, and it did, in 1 Corinthians, between those who are perishing and those who are saved, they think that if you say, are being saved, that you somehow embrace some kind of heretical theology or something like that, because they don't, they just don't seem to be able to make the distinctions between such things as being regenerated, adopted, sanctified, justified, even though these are biblical terms. The Golden Chain uses some of them, though not all of them. Clearly, they refer to different aspects of what? Of what God does within us. but they use saved sometimes as meaning exactly regenerated, or exactly justified, or exactly sanctified, or exactly adopted, rather than recognizing that these are all subcategories of a much broader field. Categorical thinking is not something that King James onlyists or IFBs Excel at. Why? Because they're stupid? No, because they don't have it modeled for them. They don't have it modeled for them. I've been posting these IFB preacher clips, and there was this kid two days ago. All he's doing is staying up there screaming. He's not communicating anything with passion. There's nothing particularly true or relevant what he's saying, but he thinks that screaming it makes it those things. It takes a lot of work to come up with important, eternal truths that you need to communicate to the people of God. Screaming at them is not the same thing. It's not the same thing. Show you from the Bible what adoption is, okay? Adoption is this, Romans chapter number 8 and verse number 23. And not only they, but ourselves also, which have the firstfruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves Or, yeah, we ourselves grown within ourselves waiting for the adoption. To we it, that means to know the redemption of our body. So the Bible clearly says in Romans 8, 23 that we are waiting for the adoption. And the Bible says the adoption is when our bodies are redeemed. Now I don't know about you, but I'm two-thirds saved. Alright? My soul is saved, my spirit is saved, but my body or my flesh is not saved. Paul clearly taught us about this in Romans chapter 7. where he talks about, in our flesh there dwells no good thing. But the Bible clearly says that redemption of our body is what the adoption is, and we are waiting for the redemption of the body, and that takes place at the rapture, when God calls us up and we're called up together with Him in the clouds. And the Bible says in 1 Corinthians 15 that our bodies are changed, all right, in the moment of the twinkling of an eye. Now, so what is... Okay, so we're two-thirds saved. And then you've got somehow the rapture popped in there. And that's when the other third, because I guess he's doing, he's a tripartist as far as that concept is concerned. But he's two-thirds, only two-thirds saved. But the body isn't. And to see what this means is he's using saved as if that somehow is relevant to... So, is he regenerated? Is he sanctified? Because, see, sanctification is used in both ways. We have been made holy, but we are being made holy. So there's a now and a not yet. What about the body? Well, yeah, the body must be made incorruptible. That's not the rapture, that's at the resurrection. I'm not going to get into the eschatology today, but that's their thing on that one. But the idea that that makes you two-thirds saved is a really odd idea. But the concept of being indwelt by... Because he missed... A lot of fundamentalists have the idea that what you do is that you interpret every word by how it first appears in the Bible. Or that if you find the meaning of a word in one book, that you can just simply transfer that meaning over to another. You've probably seen this, and I've experienced it many times, when people use Strong's exhaustive concordance interpretation. Where you look up a word, you find out what number it has, isn't this cool? And you look up the meaning, and therefore that must be the meaning everywhere, and then it's crammed into every... That is the exact opposite of how you do sound exegesis. And I just simply point out to you, if anyone were to take... Let's say you have to write a lot of letters and emails to people. If anyone were to take that methodology and apply it to the emails that you write, let's say, for business, for school, for your church, and for your family, and demand that you use the same words with the same meanings in each one of those, it would result in a complete mess of miscommunication. because you're going to use a different vocabulary writing to your kids that you will use in writing to your parents, or to the people in your church, or to your professors, or to your students, or to your boss, or to those who work for you. The reality is you determine the meaning of a word based upon its usage. And you immediately, in its close context, the wider context of the epistle, the wider context of the author, but the author can be writing to different people at different times. Lexical semantics, understanding the use of language, extremely important. Unfortunately, there are a lot of really bad ideas out there about that. The point is that Paul had begun Romans chapter 8 in talking about the requirement of the law being fulfilled in us who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the spirit. Those who are according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who are according to the spirit, the things of the spirit. For the mind set on the flesh is death, but the mind set on the spirit is life and peace, because the mind set on the flesh is hostile toward God. for it does not subject itself to the law of God, for it is not even able to do so, and those who are in the flesh cannot please God." Sort of need to bring that into the discussion. However, you are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you. But if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Him. If Christ is in you, though the body is dead because of sin, yet the Spirit is alive because of righteousness. of the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you. He who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you." So, we are in this middle place where we have the first fruits of the resurrection. We are the sons and daughters of God. The Spirit testifies to us that we are. And yet we know this is not the end. There is a fulfillment coming. This is the beauty of Pauline theology, seemingly unknown to certain people within the IFB. Adoption. The Bible says the adoption is when we are changed. The Bible says in Ephesians chapter 1 verse 5 that he's predestinated us to the adoption of children, not to salvation. Nobody is predestinated to salvation. Okay, so that's... This is what I said you can... when you try to chop stuff up and don't... They're predestined to adoption! So you can adopt unsaved people? You can adopt people who have not had their sins forgiven? Who have not been made righteous, not received the imputed righteousness of Jesus Christ? That's absurd! That's simply absurd! He predestined us, now remember, what came before, He chose us in Christ, before the foundation of the world, that we would be holy. Are you holy, sir? blameless before him, or are you condemned before him? I mean, you're turning Paul into a mishmash. You really are. Just to try to get away from what the Bible actually teaches. He predestined us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to himself, according to the kind intention of his will. So what they want to say is, well, that's just simply God choosing that if someone's going to get saved, they will eventually be adopted. No, this is the statement that God chooses a particular people, unites them to His Son, and so that they, too, can be the very sons and daughters of God, only in and through their relationship with Jesus Christ, to the praise of the glory of His grace. Are you saved by grace, or are you only adopted by grace? When you try to cut those things apart, you've got to make that decision. If you can't see that, sir, I don't even know what to say to you. to the praise of His glorious grace which He freely bestowed on us in the Beloved One, that is in Jesus Christ, in Him we have redemption through His blood. That's right now. It's the same hymn that was chosen, sir. You can't get away from divine election by cutting adoption out and saying we are not yet adopted. By running to another context, and trying to make that meaning fit in. You can't do it. You failed miserably to do so. And all you have to do is just look at these texts. Every single time with Andrew Sluder, all we had to do was just stop and, could we open our Bibles, please? And just take a look at what it actually says. What an amazing reality. Sorry, I got preaching there. And if you wanted to talk about predestination more, let's go to Romans chapter number 8. And look there at verse number, let me find it quickly here, verse number 29. For whom He did foreknow, then He also did predestinate. He also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of His Son. So, He predestinated us. to be conformed to the image of his son. Now, what does that mean? Does that mean that God predestinated us? Well, when I got saved, I became conformed to the image of the... No, you didn't, okay? You were predestinated to be conformed to the image... What is that? When does that take place? Well, if you study 1 Corinthians 15, and let me get there quickly. Now, you notice what he's doing? Bing-a-bing-a-bing-bing-bing-bing! It's pinball eisegesis. He can't derive any of this from actually exegeting any particular text, because did you see what he forgot in verse 29 where he stopped? This is amazing to me. He also predestined to become conformed to the image of his son so that he, the son, would be the firstborn among many brethren. What's that about? And these whom he predestined, he also called. These whom he called, he also justified. And justification isn't about salvation? I mean... I'm not even sure that you could do a debate with someone like this. I just don't even... I'm not even... It really makes me wonder if it wouldn't turn out to be like something I did over in California, you know what I mean? Where you're just bing bing bing bing all over the place. 1 Corinthians 15 says clearly that when the rapture happens, when our body is changed, the Bible says that we shall bear the image of the heavenly. Alright, notice 1 Corinthians 15 verse 49. And as we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly. Now this I say, brethren, that flesh of... It's not even talking about the same topic. It's talking about the resurrection. He's responding to people who are questioning the reality of the physical resurrection in light of the fact that they're in a Greek culture, the Greek culture is dualistic, and therefore everybody around them is saying that's a stupid message that you have because of the reality that salvation is getting the spirit out of a physical body. We don't want resurrection. We don't want that which died coming to life again. We want to get out of this physical body. And Paul is saying, no, no, no. God made us body and spirit, and therefore resurrection really is. Jesus rose from the dead. You're going to rise from the dead. God cares about the body. And so it's a completely different context than Romans chapter 8, but he just jumps over there and grabs it and throws it in. Okay, yeah, that's, I can't handle nine more minutes of this and we don't have time. Let's listen to a little bit more, I guess. Yeah, that's exactly what Romans chapter 8 was talking about. No, it has nothing to do with what Romans 8 was talking about. This is how you completely discombobulate the teaching of one book by jumping to another book on another topic and saying, oh, this is the same thing, let's cram them in. It's a little bit like what we saw Dr. Lennox do when he jumped out of John 6 and John 12, too, but this is on a much worse level. Much, much worse level. Predestinated to. As you can see, both times the word predestination is used in the Bible. It's never talking about a man getting saved. It's talking about at the rapture, his body is changed. That's what God predestinates us to. And guys, A lost man is not predestinated to have his body changed. So everybody was born lost. Everybody was born a sinner. And so the moment you got saved, God said, okay, now I'm predestinating you to have a changed body at the rapture. Study the verses out. That's what it's always... Okay, so did you catch that? So what you've actually got in Ephesians 1 and Romans 8, though neither one of them said it because they had to go someplace else, is, I am predestinating you to have a changed body at the rapture. But it's all up to you whether you get saved. That's... That's what you're left with. That's what you're left with. There's more here, but I'm... Please. Okay. This weekend, I'm going to be in the Gardnerville area. That's about half an hour's drive south of Reno. Did we ever put anything up on this? on Facebook. We need to put something on the site. We'll get that put up there. But I'm going to be up in that area if you happen to be in that area. It's a growing area. It really is. But I'm going to be talking about Sola Scriptura, the Reliability Scripture. I'm going to be doing something on Saturday that's going to be a bit of a challenge. I'm going to be attempting to do what I've started doing in this program, but haven't ever finished up. Sorry about that. In fact, I really need to work on that presentation tonight. But I've been asked to give a layman's introduction to CBGM. And that's not easy to do. I don't want to scare you off. But I will try to at least introduce the basic concepts because you're going to be hearing more and more about it. It's already impacting the readings of your New Testament. You need to know about it. Some of the things we'll be talking about over the course of the weekend. So you'd be welcome to come. We'll get that information up right after the program, hopefully. And then we'll be back. And I think looking at a regular schedule next week is how that's going to work out. So we appreciate your listening. We hope it has been useful to you. That's why we do these programs. Lord willing, we'll see you next week. Thanks a lot. God bless.