You're listening to Megiddo Radio. Megiddo Radio is a radio ministry of Megiddo Media. For more, visit our website at MegiddoRadio.com. That's MegiddoRadio.com. Good evening and welcome. This is Paul Flynn with Magetta Radio for the 23rd of September 2017. Thank you all for tuning in. On tonight's program, we're going to be talking about the Doctrine of Original Sin. I am going to try, in the year that it is, the 500th anniversary. It's in the 500th anniversary year of the Reformation. It is 2017, 500 years after 1517, and I don't know, I think some people argue whether that's really the birthplace of the Reformation, things like that, because Luther didn't have all these ducks in a row when it came to the Ninety-Five Theses, but it sparked a debate and questioning of the established church of today in a way that... You know, it's almost like, I don't think we can imagine what that, those 95 theses did in that day. Today, it's no big deal to think of a Twitter, some tweets or something on Facebook going viral or some YouTube video, but back then, how many things ignited debate and discussion like that? It was pretty unique. So in that, if people send on any stories to mcgillifilms at gmail.com, I especially want to focus on things related to the Reformation. So I'm going to try and prioritize stories like that. If there's none of these, I think there will be. I want to maybe do a critique of something on Monday, but we'll see how that goes. In the news, there's A reforming Catholic confession and a bunch of prominent people have signed it. There seems to be a lot of statements coming out lately. Well, Lord willing, we might get to that Saturday. Nothing terrible in it, but I think we're losing the core. We are not losing the core. We've just completely forgotten the core of the Reformation and the differences between Bible-believing Protestantism and what really was a split-room Catholicism, where the errors were with semi-Pelagianism and so on. Today's program, we're going to be talking about a man by the name of Steve Chalk. I've heard of the guy's name before. I'm not sure exactly where. I think I've heard maybe people do refutations on him before. I don't think he's got a great reputation in conservative circles, but I digress. I think we should... I'm going to cover this issue anyway because it's an incredibly important issue and it's an opportunity to talk about the doctrine of original sin. Because I think, I don't think, I know that it's undervalued, under-taught, and sometimes you'll get in seminaries, especially when it gets to places like Romans 5 verses 12 and on, that, well, it's kind of treated like, well, the view, the Reformed view is just one of many, and It gets problematic if you... Look, there's no way of getting around it. There's only one way of looking at this. And if you have other views of Romans 5.12, they're going to have massive issues that affect the gospel. Just to let people know, MegiddoTV is updated to episode 276. This program will not be on Megiddo TV. Uh, this program and next Megiddo radio will not be on Megiddo TV. It's just going to be audio only because last Monday I did a program for Megiddo TV as well. That will be on YouTube, Lord willing, maybe Monday, probably Tuesday, actually more likely. Now that I think about it, if I'm going to get a program on Monday, Lord willing, pray for me on that. So they're getting out of it. So I had to take a break from the TV shows. Basically, we get a TV for it for those who don't listen or you're maybe new to this, basically just the video edition of this program. And some people like that for that. And it's also a way of introducing maybe new listeners who maybe may not know it and things like that. It's people like for YouTube and all that. Okay, so tonight's program is going to be talking about Steve Chalk. Just give you a bit of background on this guy, Steve Chalk. He is a Baptist, British Baptist minister, he's congregations in London, and he's the founder of the Oasis Charity Trust, one of the UK's largest charities. And he's a former United Nations Special Advisor on Human Trafficking, and he sometimes I've spoken, and it says heretical Christian leader here. He's a Wikipedia page, popular speaker, and a social activist. Now, he is also known for his support of same-sex relationships. So straight away, you know he's a meatball. I don't want to just say, well, no need to look at the reputation or anything, but you know he's an apostate. there's that's remember we were talking about the national statement and article 10 which drove the liberals crazy or drove those who are within the professing church and want to be accepted as part of the visible church even though these people clearly do not have a credible profession of faith should be disciplined Okay, their church is being incredibly negligent if they're not. They should call people to repentance, and if they do not repent, if necessary, they are put out and excommunicated from the church. I have no reason to believe somebody who continues in a homosexual lifestyle is a born-again believer. In the same way, if somebody's getting drunk all the time... Look, I have students who drink a lot. In my class, I teach English as a foreign language. And sometimes they tell me, you know, they're out partying and all this, and sometimes somebody will tell me, oh, I'm a Christian. And I will just, you know, probe with a few more questions, but if you're getting drunk, if you're joking in a lewd, disgusting way that dishonors our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, that tells me you're not a Christian. If you love Christ, you'll keep His commandments. So it's not just you're a Christian because you claim to be a Christian. If you're really born again in the Spirit, you will act differently. You will stick out like a sore thumb. You will love to read your Bible. You will not perfectly read your Bible, not perfectly pray, but you will be different. The Spirit of God dwells in your heart, giving you holy desires, even though the old clashes with the new. And that annoys a lot of people to hear that. that to approve of... There is a wing, if you want to call it within the visible church, that is trying desperately to get acceptability. To accept it is just another view, another hermeneutic within the church. There's only one thing I have to say to those people, and that is repent. Repent. There's nothing else. There's nothing else to say. Not like, let's sit down and talk about it. I think a lot of them, they want to get together and talk and just say, we have different views of interpretation. No, we don't. The Bible is explicitly crystal clear, could not be clearer. And it's not just spoken about in six different passages. It is from Genesis to Revelation. The only type of union blessed by God and described by God is between one man, one woman. Anything else is an abomination. Something that was driven out of the land in the Old Testament. Now it breaks my heart to see people in this error. It does. But it does not mean in order to be loving towards these people, I need to pat them on the back in their abomination. Okay. The typical question, oh, well, do you know any of these people? I don't personally know of anybody. I know that they exist. I know there's Matthew Vines, people who claim to be Christians and homosexuals at the same time. I know they exist, but do I know plenty? Homosexuals over the years, people who, you know, like as people, they're kind of funny at times and, you know, like nice people that you'd Okay, there's a general level of narcissism that is prevalent in a lot of them, okay? And you get into that as well, and a certain type of lifestyle that skews them in a certain direction. But, you know, as people, you kind of go, oh, you know, if you just meet them, yeah, you think they're nice and all that, yeah, you might. And there's several people I can think of in that way. And they're not just these horrible people. Sometimes you'll even be able to have an intelligent conversation, a Christian, say a homosexual, and be able to talk about different things. And sometimes you might get a homosexual that's far more respectful even to you, sharing the gospel to them, than somebody who's not. Be that as it may. My experiences mean nothing. The Bible condemns it. And in the same way, I need to show respect and love towards the drunkard. I feel brokenhearted for the drunkard who is trapped in the tyranny of their own desires. Total depravity. They are a slave to their desires. That's what the doctrine of original sin is. Slaves to their desires and they need the grace of God to be broken free from that. We should be loving towards them, realizing we would be exactly where they are. Probably worse, maybe a tiny bit better, but exactly where they are. Still continuing our hatred of God, were it not for the grace of God. yes, showing love, respect, all that kind of thing towards the drunkard, etc. and so on, towards the homosexual, towards whatever, but at the same time telling them the truth. If I say to you that that, you know, the talk about Steve Chalk and he's... that homosexuality is okay, it's a lie. If you, but I'm not saying that to not be loving towards a homosexual. I have those in my classes and some of them are very good students. Again, I teach English as a foreign language, give an example. Sometimes it feels like I'm dancing around eggshells with them because, but I'll stay candidly, I'm a Christian, I believe the Bible. I was even having a conversation the other day, I think it was yesterday actually, in my class and I was mentioning, okay, you know, they say, hi teacher, what do you do with the weekend? And I mentioned that I do a radio program. So, and it just turned out that a lot of the programs were about LGBT-related issues, but I care about those people. You share the truth with them because you care about them. All for the glory of God above all else, but you share the truth. We need to constantly remind ourselves there's people out there who we should love, be brokenhearted over, that they do not know Christ, and we should have a love for them. I'm reminding myself of my own lack of love. Sometimes you can get, why don't they get it? Why didn't I get it before I was saved, before the Lord opened my eyes? But unfortunately, there are people within the Church, Steve Chalk and others, claiming to be Christians and do not have a credible profession of faith. There's a greater condemnation upon these people, because they have the truth in front of them. They claim that this is the source of their, you could say, truth. But it's not, they distort it. This is a, what I'm looking at here is an article from Christianity Today. Now, the video in question, the article is called, Forget Original Sin, Says Steve Chalk, We Are Made Originally Good. Oh boy, can I think of, that is becoming more prevalent. Most Christians, sadly today, just having read different people who are popular and having read their books recently, this is what's popping up. William Paul Young is one example that I thought of. It's in his book. Lies We Believe About God, which was his first non-fiction. Of course, it's fiction, a lot of it. But that... Now, for those of you who don't know, William Paul Young was the author of The Shack. And if you don't know what The Shack is, praise the Lord. If you do know what The Shack is and you like The Shack, go to MegiddoFilms.org and you can watch the movie for free. and share it for free with anybody, whatever. It's called The Shack. It's, oh, I always keep forgetting the title of my own film. It's Theological, it's Dangerous Theology and Theological Error, something like that. Anyway, it's been a while since I do the movie. So that movie is on, is at Megiddofilms.org. Oh man, I'm tired tonight. So if you go on there, if you know somebody who might, Lord willing, be blessed, going through the theological themes in it and the problems with the book, Lord willing, that'll be a blessing to you and maybe a blessing to those loved ones who may manifest, I'm sorry to say, by their love of that book and that movie. that they may not know Christ. And I notice how I say may. I think it's that blasphemous. It's undoubtedly a gospel issue because the book teaches a false gospel. This is not something, if you like the book, that you can just kind of go, that's okay. Now, England and the UK, it's at a very low ebb. So when I see Heresies like this coming out of English churches. Unfortunately, it's not a surprise. And it's like this in Scotland. You might think people, a lot of people who listen to this program, I think are from the United States. I think I looked up the statistics the other day on SoundCloud and I think maybe 80% are in the United States who listen to this program. Guys, you don't realize. how yeah it's bad in America and things are kind of going all leftist and all that kind of thing but yeah it's kind of worse over here especially in Ireland but Ireland's always had Roman Catholicism now it's gone incredibly left and thrown off some good things they've unshackled themselves from and some not so good things So when I see these things, I kind of don't look at everything. I'm trying to, especially if anybody wants to talk to me with stories and things like that, and I encourage and I thank you guys who've sent me on stories. There's been a few people I haven't been able to reply to recently and might not be able to get back to because sometimes some of the questions are fairly detailed, but... Especially stories from the UK and Ireland I really want to cover. Anything that has a wider coverage or something that affects the broader church of Jesus Christ. There's a lot of shows like mine in the United States, and I think a lot of stories that affect the United States and are big stories in the United States, they're covered. And I'm not saying I won't cover them, but I don't want it to be just another show that just does exactly what they do. There are Christians in Scotland and in England and Wales. in Northern Ireland, Republic of Ireland. And so I kind of want to call and just to let you guys know as well what's going on over here, just to try and cover stories. As well, whenever they're relevant anyway, so if you send on those, we get a film to gmail.com. And. So that's another reason I wanted to cover this now. There's a video. On their website. And the name of the website, it's like Open Church Network. If you just Google that. And there's a series of videos, it's on Vimeo, I watched the video. But the other thing is, some of these quotations I'm going to be quoting, I'm not going to play the video. Because they're kind of a bit all, it's a bit all over the place, and it's very... It's kind of sophistry, you know, it's kind of all over the place. I'm not saying it's an intentional sophistry, but it sounds really, really good. But to be honest, it doesn't relate at all. A lot of Roman Catholic arguments are incredibly sophistic, and I don't mean that in a good way. I mean that in the old way, that it used to mean the old philosophers, the sophists of, you know, millennia ago. Now, So, in this, I'm going to quote some of the quotations that this ChristianToday.com article written by Mark Woods says, and then we're going to respond to it. I'm just going to quote from the christiantoday.com article first. He says, the doctrine mistakes, this is the doctrine of original sin, the biblical view of man's relation, God's relationship with humanity and has resulted in untold misery for generations of church goers. Chalk says Western readings of the story of Adam and Eve have been colored by St. Augustine's interpretation. which is different from understandings present in the Eastern Orthodox Church or Eastern Orthodox tradition." Yeah, Eastern Orthodox tradition kind of went semi-Pelagian a lot earlier and drifted from Augustine's Theology, which later became more or less Calvinism in the 16th century, wasn't called that for a long time until really the Armenian controversy popped up, but I digress. Yeah, the Eastern Church went synergistic earlier than the Western Church. I'm not as well versed on the Eastern Church, so I'm gonna try and talk in generalities and kind of stick to what I know. For example, Chrysostom would have been quite leaning, not exactly... he wouldn't be as exactly... you know, Chrysostom was a Christian from what I can see, but not as solid in the Doctrine of Grace. Now, Augustine had his errors as well. You know, his Doctrine of the Church, B.B. Warfield said that the Reformation, I'm kind of paraphrasing here, the Reformation was the victory of Augustine's Doctrine of Grace over Augustine's Doctrine of the Church, and I think that's an excellent statement. So yes, Augustine had errors, but so did all the people around him. The Church was getting corrupted, and it did slowly. By the way, the first century church wasn't exempt from errors either. Go read Corinthians and the problems that they faced and some of the things, you know, Paul didn't say abandon the idea. There was massive problems in Corinth, Galatian, you know, there was false Gospels around the place. So everything wasn't rose in the garden that early either. But there was departures from the truth. There was the Arian controversy. in like the 3rd, 4th century, and later on, and it's still around today, you know, in the form of Jehovah's Witnesses. But yeah, the eastern part of the church became corrupted more than the western. And it was very much in the Western Church where this controversy between Pelagius and Augustine. Pelagius denied the doctrine of original sin and believed that man could obey the law of God. That original sin did not affect him. that infected the church to varying degrees for centuries, and very much in the medieval church. Now, very much what the medieval church became after about the 6th, 7th century was very much semi-Pelagianism, which was kind of a middle road between Augustine saying it was all of grace, you know, the Pelagian side believed in grace too, but redefined it, The all of grace that man was dead, truly dead spiritually and could do nothing to cooperate towards his salvation. It was all of grace that man would not even seek it out, that he needed to be regenerated in order to seek after God. And, you know, going, you know, like for examples of things like that, Psalm 14 comes to mind. So you have that controversy, and then as often happens, you get two views, and people then say, well, Pelagianism's too extreme. Is Pelagianism around today? Well, Steve Chalk is a Pelagian. Jesse Morrell, who I've talked about before in the program, is a Pelagian, denies he's a Dr. Richardson. Charles Grandison Finney, who I hope to talk about properly in a show in the future, but I'm doing a lot of research on him at the moment, he was a Pelagian, undoubtedly, and very much the father of many movements. Revivalism, the father of probably even the church growth movement, some say. But anyway, so there's been various Pelagian heretics throughout the centuries. It is a denial of the gospel. Seriously. Somebody who believes this, they do not have a credible profession of faith. Notice how I say that. I'm not saying, definitely not a Christian. You know, like the young Christian who can't explain a property or whatever. what I'm saying, does not have a credible profession of faith. If somebody says they don't believe in the doctrine of original sin, and they don't believe what, you know, Romans 5 verses 12 to 20 state plainly, and that man is born dead in trespass and sins, and it's up to him and he can obey the law of God and all this kind of stuff, you don't baptize that person and you don't let them into the visible church. If you do, you're derelict in your duties. You instruct them, you pray that they will truly repent of that error. but you don't admit them into the visible church. To do so is to invite goats in among the sheep. Now that will happen anyway. Even if you do everything quote unquote perfectly. Judas from all intents and purposes looked like he was a converted Christian, but at the end we found that he wasn't. You can't take out all the tares among the wheat, it's not possible. We're not told to, actually we're told not to. But at the same time, we're only supposed to admit those with a credible profession of faith. So in the Eastern Church, then you had this view that came up from John Cassian, which was a middle road between Pelagianism and Augustinianism, which basically later became known as semi-Pelagianism. And nowadays it's just been basically repackaged in Arminianism. Jacob Arminius and his supporters, the Ramonstrands, basically they claim to be Reformed, however they opposed central truths such as the way the doctrine of original sin was taught by the Reformers, man could cooperate and must cooperate, had free will, things like that. Election was conditional upon man and foreseen faith and the atonement was really for all, things like that on and on. And that's where you get the tulip in response to this kind of, you could say, repackage. There are the slight differences, of course. There's always slight differences in almost, you know, you get a number of semi-Pelagians together or Synergists together. They're going to explain things in slightly different ways because there's no real systemized way of doing it almost. How much is God and how much a man, but they really, you know, like Synergists will really say, no, that's not how it is. they'll say, it's all of God, if they're truly saved. You know what I'm saying? But then you have the Pelagian that says, no, man is not corrupted by original sin. The Bible clearly states it's not true. That's just Augustine's, and this line of argumentation's been used for centuries. Oh, it goes back, right back to, I think even the claims that Augustine was corrupted by his Manichaean background goes right back to when Augustine was alive, and I think he refuted that. I think it's against Julian, but I digress, it's been a while. Yeah, just because the Eastern Orthodox Church taught it before... Antiquity doesn't mean something's true. Does the Bible teach it? Okay? That's where you start. And if the Bible teaches it, you're going to see other people in church history teaching it. It does not mean that they were correct. Okay? John Calvin writes about this. A lot of the early church fathers... He did not slavishly stick to any early church father. at all, when they agreed with him and all this kind of stuff. But in his letter to the king of France, which is right at the start of the Institutes of the Christian Religion, he talked about this, how there was errors in the church fathers, we just can't just blindly go with them. But they can be a great help and things like that, you have to intelligently do it. And not the same with anybody. If you read a book from a modern author or anything like that, you test everything against the Word of God. And if it's a novelty, if it's something that is unknown to church history, there's a good chance it's not true. Okay? So, let's go to Steve Chalk's comments now. Finally, we're getting there. Steve Jock said, we make some assumptions that aren't there, he says. The story of Adam and Eve and the eating of the fruit that's been forbidden from them doesn't mention original sin. It doesn't even tell us that the serpent is really Satan. This is really silly. It's a really silly argument. It's a really bad argument. The Bible doesn't use the term the Trinity, but I'm presuming Steve Chalk would believe in a Trinity. I don't know. My only two points of references that I know about him is his support of so-called same-sex relationships and Also his denial of this doctrine of original sin, which tells me the man is not a Christian, he's not born again, he does not belong to Christ. He is a reprobate who needs to repent and be born again. So to say there's assumptions not there, which would be strange assumptions, think about it. That you're going to a text And you're going to have assumptions contrary to our nature to think that we're good. Come on, doesn't everybody think that they're good? And that's the one thing that we have to repent of? These mad, murderous dictators, the people on the left who have their own set of morality, all their perversions and stuff like that, the Clintons and all these other people, You know, Stalins and Hitlers and all those people that are in church history, or not church history. Well, actually Hitler was in the Roman Catholic Church, but I digress. All these people throughout history, they believed they were good. And the people that were exterminating were horrible. So they all had their code of ethics. So contrary to nature, children have a problem being told that they're bad and being convinced that they are not good. Where are the good children who are left to themselves and just do good things? So purely from the law of nature, we can deduce a number of things. The heavens declare the glory of God. We have the law of God written in our hearts, okay? We have fallen in sin. That image has been marred by the fall. We hold the truth in a righteousness, Romans 1.18, but we know from experience, from the law of nature itself, that man is evil. We know this. We know this. Okay, we suppress that truth because of our sin, and we go into further and further absurdities, but we know. It has been revealed to us. This is natural revelation I'm talking about now. This is things that the reformers would have talked about in great detail. Now, so where is this wonderful evidence that children are good? If we are good, do you think that the best people around us will be children? But can anybody really argue that, if they have any experience with children? No, you have to teach children how not to lie, not to cheat, not to steal. want to see a horrible person get a child, spoil them. Do not let them do whatever they want. Put them in charge and they will quite possibly be in prison by the age of 15 or 20 or whatever. They will be of no use to society. They will believe that the world revolves around them because they've been given that role from day one and haven't been taught anything. That is what experience shows us. and is even more emphatically declared in divine revelation in the scriptures. So why, with all that evidence, would we come with assumptions contrary to our nature? So the assumption part is false on its face. He says it doesn't mention original sin. The word isn't there, but the concept is. It's the same thing like saying, well, the Bible never says the word Trinity. The Bible never said the word sacrament, but the concept is there. Okay? It doesn't say the serpent is really Satan. We find this out from comparing Scripture with Scripture. Ezekiel 28, for example, shows that this was the serpent in the garden. Whether the serpent was used by Satan or whatever form that takes, we know from Scripture that the devil was there in the garden. Ezekiel, I'll just read this really quickly. Ezekiel 28. This is what the Bible says to do, comparing scripture with scripture. No scriptures of any private interpretation. You know, isolate a text and say, well, it doesn't say those words. That's a pretext, not a context. So, says in Ezekiel 28 and it talks about the king of Tyrus and then I'll read from verse 11 in Ezekiel 28. Moreover the word of the Lord came unto me saying son of man take up a lamentation upon the king of Tyrus and say unto him thus saith the Lord God thou sealest up the sum full of wisdom and perfect in beauty thou hast been in Edom Garden of Eden. So is this passage saying the King of Tyrus was in the Garden of Eden? No, it's clearly talking about, from the context, Satan because, we're told later in verse 14, thou art the anointed sheriff. So what's it talking about? It's not saying that the Prince of Tyrus is talking about in verse 12 of Ezekiel 28. But this anointed cherub is behind him, the power through which fueling him, or whatever way you want to put it. Thou hast been in Eden. Every precious stone was a covering. Talk about how beautiful he is. Clearly talk about the devil. And it says, you were in the garden of Eden. Verse 14, thou art the anointed cherub that covereth. Verse 15, thou was perfect in thy ways in the day that thou was created. Verse 17, thine heart was lifted up because of thy beauty, and thou hast corrupted thy wisdom by reason of thy brightness. And there's other places you can go. Comparing scripture with scripture is quite clear that he is the devil. Now, what else does Steve Chalk state in this video? He says, Jewish scholars say that the story is about the growth of humanity from innocence to knowledge. I'll just say this, as a secondary or tertiary source, maybe you could look and say, I'm not against There's extremities with all these things. There's the kind of the Hebrew roots, which almost make the Midrash and all these kinds of things. The main source, the Jewish sources, these extra biblical things, almost like they're like the canon of scripture and there's various things within Hebrew roots movement, which is Judaizing heresy. Non-Christian cults, really, they are apostasy, but When you look at... So you have all these sources, right? If you look at John Gill, John Gill would mention some of these sources then. I don't mind that. You argue the case, you start off with scripture. And then you work your way through, and then you say, oh, it's even mentioned in this other source. I don't have a massive problem with that. I don't think it's really needed, but I don't have a massive problem with that as an extra on top of, by the way, okay, saying, okay, within this body that broke away and apostatized, even they still hold to this truth. It was kind of done by, a little bit different, but Myers Hill, Paul mentioning one of the poems from the pagans, had truth, there was similarity between them and all this kind of thing. Now, but you don't start there. It's a terrible place to start and say, hey, by the way, you know these apostates, those who have been broken off through unbelief, look at Romans 11. We're going to say, hey, they have a different view of this. You think? Yeah, yeah, they probably would. And there's which kind of Jewish scholars? There's different ones of them, okay. He said the growth of, unless they're born again, Jews, it seems like that's not what he's talking about. How do they have anything to show you? The Spirit of God must show you or you're going to be spiritually blind to these truths. He goes on to state that the growth of humanity to the place where we're tempted. And why are we tempted, by the way? Just we'll pause it. Why are we tempted? And we have to learn to make moral choices, good or bad decisions. Why do we always make the bad ones? Why are all our deeds but filthy rags, as we're told in Isaiah? Why does none seek after God, no not one, in Psalm 14? Why... I'll just go to Romans 3. Why is this the case? Romans 3.23 states, where all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. Why have all sinned? If we're created good, why has every single person, bar Jesus Christ, sinned? Why has everybody sinned? Why have none sought after God? Why? Why, as it says in Romans 6, get the right part in front of me here, Why does the Bible make it crystal clear that all have broken God's law? Romans, the first few chapters, makes it quite clear both Jew and Gentile are sinners before God. Why? Why aren't there some that keep the law? Why is there no example in the Bible of anybody keeping the law perfectly? If they can keep the law, where are these people? Why does every single person fall into sin? Because in a Pelagian view, people become sinners. They're not born sinners. Well, if that's the case, why do infants die? Because when the area was used by the Reformers, many of the Reformers, Wouldn't it be, if a baby is completely innocent and there's no original sin, why does an infant die? You know, who takes, who giveth life and taketh it away? The Lord giveth and taketh away life. So isn't it, wouldn't it be a monstrous thing if there is no original sin? There is death, death falls upon all of us. we eventually all will die. Apart from those who are caught up at the end of time and all that, but I digress. Now, so does it, it doesn't bear out, does it? If we want to believe in a just and holy and righteous God, This brings into question the integrity of scriptures, and it's always about, because he states at the beginning, right, the quotation he says, you know, it has brought misery. What was the quote there it says? Yeah, it's actually not a quote from him, it's actually in this ChristianToday.com article, that it has resulted in untold misery. Well, how about the misery of sin and the tyranny of their own desires? What else did Steve Jock say in this video? So he gives his view, which comes from Jewish. Jewish interpretation. He says the Bible doesn't begin with Genesis chapter 3. This argument again. It begins with Genesis chapter 1. So yeah, God created everything good. If you go to Ecclesiastes chapter 7 and see how man was created Good. He wasn't created bad. And nobody who believes in the doctrine of original sin, at least the Orthodox version of it, says in Ecclesiastes 7.29, Lo, this only have I found, that God hath made man upright, but they have sought out many inventions. They departed from the truth. The devil was created good. And he, and he talks about this in Ezekiel chapter 28, and he departed from the way. And he was corrupted by reason, he was pride. Pride rose in his heart. Says, Chalk said, in other words, it begins with a story that tells us that we're all made in God's image. Yes, we are all created in God's image. People who believe in original sin believe that too. And God looks at humanity and says, this is very good. Genesis chapter three, the story that we've begun, and look, he did. When Adam and Eve were created, they were in right standing with God, they were created perfectly holy and perfectly righteous. They were placed in a covenant of works where if they obeyed the law of God, written in their hearts, which is summarized in the Ten Commandments, which is represented, you know, the kind of the additional law, which you could say was the test of that love towards man and love towards God by the eating or not eating of the fruit of the tree of knowledge, good and evil. OK, these were the two sacraments in the Garden of Eden. So. perfect personal obedience. Adam failed. In Adam all die. Notice how it's in Adam all die, but in Christ we're made alive. It's not in Eve. Eve sinned first, by the way. But it doesn't say in Eve all died. It wasn't just Eve's, if it was purely by a bad example being passed on from generation to generation, surely the Bible wouldn't be talking about Eve, would it not? Because it was her who sinned first. No, in Adam all died because Adam was the federal head of all mankind. He was the legal representative in the garden. And who better to represent? People said, no, that's not fair. Who better to represent All of humanity before God! Should we put a sinner in there? No, no, he was not a sinner when he was created. He was created perfectly holy and righteous before God. Right? And he was a grown man. And a perfect hell compared to, you know, much more now. Who better to represent than anybody else was ever created. And he couldn't keep the law, but you are. You're not going to keep the law for five seconds. You haven't even kept it by listening to this, you know, even last five seconds. Our greatest deeds are but filthy rags. Even when we're lustful, even when we're in church and our thoughts and affections wander from what we're supposed to do. On the Sabbath day, when we don't focus on Christ, we think about things that have nothing to do with that day, we sin. So back to Chalk's quote. He says, the story that we've been told about original sin turns out to be, in the view of Hebrew scholars down through the ages, not about that at all, but about our journey to discover how to live well. Yeah, that sounds like Orthodox Jews who don't know the Lord. To make good moral choices, to learn to resist the temptation and consequences of living badly, we are made originally good. Again, Adam and Eve were, and they fell into sin, and in Adam all die. That is 1st Corinthians 15.22. Dead. What was the threat to Adam and Eve? He ate of the tree of knowledge, good and evil. Dying, literally it says in Hebrew, dying you should surely die. Oh, that doesn't mean death, it means something else. Is it a poem or something? He talks about, actually in the video, I don't know what he's talking about in this article, he talks about something about it being a myth. But he says, oh, myth doesn't mean it's not true. And that's always the way that they try to sell it. Oh, it's just a parable. It didn't really happen. So why is this important? I'm going to quote from Jonathan Edwards' treatise Well a treatise on original sin if I get the title of this. This is from his collected works. The great Christian doctrine of original sin defended evidences of its truth produced and arguments to the contrary answered. They had long titles back then. He was responding in this book to a man by the name of Dr. Taylor. I'm not exactly sure who he was. It's a good book and Edwards is not the guy to, if you're new to the Christian faith, Edwards is not the guy to start with. Maybe read, maybe Martin Luther's Bondage of the Will. Is it the best book on original sin? No, but it's still a classic. Who else would be good to read? And there's some good introductions on Calvinism. Actually, there's a good recent book if you are new to the Reformed faith. Well, good thing to do, we just get a Westminster Confession of Faith, read the confessions, read the catechisms, larger catechism, shorter catechism, it'll take you through the basics. And there's a good publication by the Free Presbyterian Church of Scotland, I think it is. Not to be mistaken with the Free Presbyterian Church in Northern Ireland, very different. Unfortunately, there's a lot of disunity among Presbyterians. I need to do a show on this at some stage. Brethren, okay, I'm a Presbyterian. We should labor for unity. There's so many denominations out there. I think, like, I may be ignorant at times, but some of them seem so close, doctrinally, and they don't unify in one church. We've become so separatistic and schismatic today. It's really tragic. So if we truly believe, I'll probably go into this another time maybe, just an exhortation to unity. I can understand Baptists, you know, they kind of, is the view, but if we're Presbyterians, and especially if you're maybe, I don't know, if you're post-millennial, that is neither here nor there. we should aim for unity, especially if we see it as one church in the Old Testament, one church in the New Testament. So if you're a minister, surely we should pray for that and exhort it, something you should pray in your presbyteries, in your sessions, the churches where you agree on worship, you know, exclusive psalmody, things like that, and you you both hold and preach the gospel. Anyway, I digress, a bit of a bit of a segue. Jonathan Edwards spoke about why this doctrine of original sin is important. He said, this is in part three, the fourth point he makes in chapter 1 if you're reading from the works this is on page 212 volume 1 and kind of like the second paragraph it's kind of small writing but anyway it will follow on our author's principles not only with respect to infants but even adult persons, that redemption is needless and Christ is dead in vain." He's responding now to the author, this is the guy who first is Dr. T throughout this, who is, from what I can see, a Pelagian. He goes on to state that not only is there no need of Christ's redemption in order to deliverance from any consequences of Adam's sin, but also in order to perfect freedom from personal sin and all its evil consequences, for God has made utter sufficient provision for that, vis-a-vis a sufficient power and ability in all mankind to do all their duty and wholly to avoid sin. Yea, he insists upon it, that quote, when men have not sufficient power to do their duty, they have no duty to do it. Just a little segue, that's what Binney said in Revivals of Religion, in one of his lectures. So this is not I don't think that's the part, and people are still influenced by Finney today. Continuing this quote from Dr. T, Dr. Taylor, we may safely and assuredly conclude, says he, that mankind in all parts of the world have sufficient power to do the duty which God requires of them, and that he requires of them no more than they have sufficient powers to do, unquote. Now this is going back now to Edwards says this, and in another place, going back to Dr. T, God has given powers equal to their duty which he expects, which on its face is ridiculous. Have you loved God perfectly for any second as you ought to in the law of God? No, you cannot, because of your sin. We've never loved God, but the Bible says to love God. Do we have ability to do that? No. And the problem comes from us, not from God. Now, I'm going to read a little bit more from Jonathan Edwards. "...and expresses a great dislike at our supposing that our propensities to evil and temptations are too strong to be effectually and constantly resisted, or that we are unavoidably sinful in a degree. that our appetites and passions will be breaking out, notwithstanding our everlasting watchfulness." These things fully imply that men have in their own natural ability sufficient means to avoid sin and to be perfectly free from it, and so from all the bad consequences of it. And if the means are sufficient, then there is no need of more. And therefore, there is no need of Christ dying in order to it. Do you see that? Just not quoting anymore from Jonathan Edwards. Do you see that? If this is true, then there's another way of salvation. Obeying the law. You're establishing your own righteousness, and Christ has died in vain. It's a blasphemy, it denies the gospel. This heresy has plagued the church for many a century and we need to study it and to understand the issues involved. It threatens the very heart of the gospel. Is our federal head, is it in Adam or is it in Christ? Again, I won't have time, unfortunately, to go through this read from Romans 5, 12 onwards. In Adam... Adam was the federal head of all mankind in the Garden of Eden. But our new head, ever since the fall of Adam... Salvation is only through Christ. And Christ becomes our federal head, our surety, our legal representative. That is how we stand justified before the Father, because of His righteousness and because of His merits. In another part, and that's another thing, that's the problem. If you have a Pelagian system that will create a good, if an infant dies they automatically what? Go to heaven. And why do they die in the first place if they're not sinners? You then have to bring in a heresy that death was there even before sin. So in many different ways the Pelagian system is illogical and it is most certainly above all else unbiblical and heretical. Edwards goes on to write that if all mankind in all parts of the world have sufficient power to do their whole duty without being sinful in any degree, then they have sufficient power to obtain righteousness by the law. And then according to the Apostle Paul, Christ is dead in vain. This is not an issue where we can go, I don't know if this is so important. This is massively important. And you know what's so scary? I don't know. This is treated as if it's not that important what we believe about original sin. And Lord willing, I'll be able to, if... Well, we'll see how we go on Monday. There's a couple of different topics I want to cover on Monday and I'll have to just pick one. But there is that new confession or a new kind of statement that's been released called a reforming Catholic confession signed by a lot of different, a number of them are Arminian, some of them, one or two of them that I notice are professing reformed, probably Calvinistic or whatever. But it's almost like the view of free will by the synergistic side, it no longer matters. And so the very core of what Martin Luther talked about, it's no longer seen as an important part of the Reformation. The very hinge on which it turned has been kind of cast aside. Can you obey the law? If you believe that, then you need to be born again. You cannot keep the law. You are a sinner, you've been born dead and trespassed in sins, Ephesians 2 verses 1 down to 3. And unless you've been given, do you know what dead means? Dead means dead. Dead spiritually. When they talk about, the scripture talks about dead people are big on being literal, except when it comes to being spiritually dead. From that point, Adam and Eve and their sin were spiritual corpses. And none seek after God. No, not one. And if you're listening to this and you've been brought to Christ, it wasn't your free will. If you truly believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, it was because The Father chose you in Christ before the foundation of the world. You might say, I don't know if I'm elect. That's irrelevant. There's a way. What does Christ tell you to do? He doesn't say to you, do you know if you're elect or not? That is patent nonsense. Come to Christ. Be saved, saith the Lord. Repent of your sin and trust in him. And then as you grow in assurance and as you know you belong to him, then you will know you are his, you are part of his people. You are the elect. of the Lord. This has been Paul Flynn, talk to you again soon.