Sunday School | Doctrine of Salvation - What Happens When You Are Called?

We're walking through the reformed understanding of soteriology, which is both my understanding and the church and Holy Spirit's understanding. It might be yours, but it might not be your understanding of this. So what I'm grateful for is anybody who comes and listens and engages in this with me.

My plan when I'm handling something that's as large and complex as this is just to finish the ark. I want to make the case biblically, as biblically as I can. What does the Bible say about a number of different subtopics as we're building a coherent framework? And then, when we're done—which won't be too long, maybe two or three more weeks, I think—we're gonna have a Q and A time that'll probably be another two or three weeks, maybe more. Because I really want to give you the opportunity to push back. I want to give you the opportunity to say, "Well, what about this?" I want to give you the opportunity to ask about the implications of these things that I've said.

I think it's really important as we learn together that there's lots of opportunity to disagree. Any of the fellows or any of the feasters have always heard me say that we are allowed to get things wrong on the way to getting them right. It's very important that if we're gonna figure out which parts we're wrong about, we have the opportunity to engage, to learn from each other, to teach each other. But when you do something this large and complex, if the whole thing is Q and A, then it's just incoherent. Our minds learn best with some form of order. So I'm providing the order up front, and then when we're all done, we're gonna roll the tape back and it's a free for all. And as we always do, you get to come to the head of the line. The more that you disagree with me, the more you come to the head of the line, right? I want to promote a dialogue about the places where we have a different understanding of things. But I would just ask your patience. We're gonna get there, but I just want to finish the ark and then it'll be like open season on me. It'll be great. It'll be so fun.

The Four Points We're Covering

The first question we asked and answered is: How bad off are we? I believe it's the most important question in the whole thing. I think the biblical answer to that is we are so bad off that we will not ever respond in faith. We just won't do it. We can't see him, we can't hear him, we're dead in our sins. We are slaves, but we're willing slaves. We live in malice and envy, being hated and hating one another—until something changes. That's all the question of depravity. We talked about that a while ago now.

Then the next question is: Have you ever noticed that not everybody is saved? At the end of the day, why not? Why am I not a universalist? Why do I not believe that all will be saved? We talked about election, choosing. Ultimately, God chooses to override the rebellious hearts of some, but not all.

Third, we looked at the L in TULIP. The L stands for limited atonement. And it happens to be the one point in the five points of Calvinism that I disagree with. The question is essentially: For whom did Jesus die? There really are, biblically speaking, two ways you can answer this. We can demonstrate absolutely without question that Jesus died for the elect, that Jesus died for the church, that Jesus died for his people. And the proponents of limited atonement would say, "Yeah, right there. See, all these things—these are the ones for whom he died."

However, I think there's a host of scripture that goes beyond that, to say that he died and redeemed even those who ultimately reject him. So I am not a proponent of limited atonement. I believe in more of an unlimited atonement, although I affirm that I don't believe in universalism.

So: How bad off are we? Why is it that some, but not all, believe? For whom did Jesus die? Those are the first three questions we worked through over probably a couple months at this point.

And then last week, we began with the fourth point of Calvinism—the I in TULIP. And that stands for irresistible grace. The question we're asking is: When God elects and calls someone to faith, what happens? And the biblical answer is that 100% of the time, they respond in faith.

Now, the reason I think this is somewhat important is because some that are uncomfortable with the total framework of Calvinism would say, "Okay, okay, okay. God elects and he chooses everybody. And then you get to make it. It's like he votes and then you vote. And the combination of your vote is what determines it." They suggest that God chooses all, and that some choose him back. And what I am telling you is I reject that. I do not think that that is a biblically defensible view.

You may disagree with me, you'll get your hour in court. Okay? It's coming, but just not yet. I believe that when he calls us, we respond in faith. And it is not because he is coercive. It is not TULCP, it is TULIP. He is irresistible. Think chocolate. Think your wife on your wedding night. Okay? Think irresistible. You are unable to resist because he is so delightful, so lovely. That when the thing in you that caused you to not be able to see him, when that's finally fixed, it works. It always works. He is irresistible. Okay? That's the I.

Now, what we did last week is we handed out a sheet that looks like this. It's got some quotes on the back, and maybe you have it and maybe you brought it back. I have a few, but I didn't print another 100 of them. I just have about 20 of them. Did you already give them all away? I did. And they're gone, so you get nothing. Okay? But you may receive this from me in an email. If you are part of the CHS doctrine email, then I've already sent it to you like a week or two ago. And if you're not on that and you'd like to, just email chsdoctrine@gmail.com, and I will add you to the list and then send you the whole set of these that we have built. So you'll have all of them. Okay? But today you can just follow along in your Bible as you walk through it. Good enough? Alright.

Is he irresistible? I think the biblical answer is yes. What does that mean? It means that when he calls us, we come. Now, as we talked about last week, do we resist him? Of course we resist him. We resist him all the time. But can he overwhelm our resistance? Does he have the ultimate ability to override our veto? And he does.

Ephesians 2: The Doctrine of Total Depravity and God's Action in Salvation

So let's take a look at Ephesians two. We kind of did the first column yesterday, we're gonna start the second column today and then just process through some of these. So Ephesians two, verses four and five, listen to this:

Because of his great love for us, God who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions. It is by grace you have been saved. — Ephesians 2:4-5

It's possible that you recognize the immediate context of that, but if you don't, let's just zoom out a little bit. Okay? So in your actual Bible, take a look at Ephesians two. Ephesians two and Titus three are probably Paul's two best illustrations of how salvation works. Just listen to what he's saying here. I'm gonna do this NIV. So Ephesians two says:

As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins, in which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient. All of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our sinful nature and following its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature objects of wrath. — Ephesians 2:1-3

I would submit that to you as a pretty good summary of the doctrine of total depravity. Dead in our sins but quite content to be so. Following the ways of this world, following the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient.

I don't know if you ever thought about this, but in Christ, the Holy Spirit is alive in you, moving you to follow his decrees, making you capable of being obedient. Prior to that, you may imagine that you're functioning in the freedom of your will, but the Bible says that's not true. What Paul tells Timothy in Second Timothy is that we had been taken captive by Satan to do his will. What he's affirming here in Ephesians two is that the spirit is at work in those who are disobedient. In short, it's a really bad situation until verse four breaks through.

But because of his great love for us, God who is rich in mercy made us alive. This is one way you can think about this: in salvation, God is the subject. You are the object. God is the actor. You are the acted upon. And if you imagine that salvation is there are two subjects—you and God together cooperating to accomplish something—then I think you misunderstand the gospel. It's not that you and God together saved you, it's that God, the actor, the subject, saved you, the object. The actor acted upon you. He made you alive. You were dead. And he regenerated you. He fixed that fundamental thing that was happening in you. He made you alive with Christ. When? Paul clarifies: even when we were dead in transgressions, which is to say, prior to faith.

There's a question I mentioned this last week: Which happens first? Faith or regeneration? Regeneration or faith? I believe the biblical answer is regeneration comes first. You believe because he brought you to life.

Rather than he brought you to life as a reward for having believed. Regeneration proceeds faith. What this is saying here, because of God's love for us, God who is rich in mercy made us alive when? Even when we were dead in transgressions. And he raised us up with Christ, and he seated us with him in the heavenly realms of Christ Jesus, in order that in the coming ages, he might show the incomparable riches of his grace expressed in his kindness to us in Christ Jesus.

And then here it is—this is key:

For it is by grace you've been saved, through faith and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God, not by works, so that no one can boast. — Ephesians 2:8-9

Now, I have to admit, there's a little bit of ambiguity in the Greek here. What is the antecedent to the verb "this"? Is it: "For by grace you've been saved through faith and this faith is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God"? Or is it: "It is by grace you've been saved, and this grace is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God"?

Do you understand the question? Is the thing that is the gift the grace, or is the thing that is the gift the faith? And I'll tell you—it is both. I do think it is both, and included in the gift is faith. What I want to suggest to you, at the risk of the arrogance of Christianity, is that we who have been given the gift of faith should never look down on those who have not. Because faith itself is a gift. As I labored last week, repentance is a gift. My goodness, everything that he required of you, he also provided to you. Which is just so absolutely insane, so that no one can boast. That's what's going on in Ephesians two.

Alright. Take a look now at Second Timothy. We walked through this. I'm going to read it, but we're not going to labor it because we've hit this probably on every point:

The Lord's servant must not quarrel, he must be kind to everyone, able to teach, not resentful. Those who oppose him, he must gently instruct and hope that God will grant them repentance, leading them to a knowledge of the truth, that they will come to their senses and escape from the trap of the devil who has taken them captive to do his will. — 2 Timothy 2:24-26

The only thing I will point out here is when he says, "in the hope that"—this is the great hope of every evangelist. That when I walk up to somebody who I know is dead in their sins, who is deaf to this thing, who is blind, who cannot see the glory of God in the face of Christ, who is living in malice and envy but they like it there—who is exactly what I was as a pagan high school kid. When I go to them, my great hope is that God will grant them repentance. Not that I will be eloquent, not that the burden rests on me. I would like to do a good job. I would like to proclaim it clearly as I should, as Paul says at the end of Colossians. But my hope is not in my clarity or my eloquence or my persuasive power. It is in a God who graciously grants repentance, gives faith.

Or, take a look at this—go to James one eighteen:

He chose to give us birth through the word of truth that we might be a kind of first fruits of all he created. — James 1:18

What are the implications, you guys, of the language of new birth that pervades the New Testament? When Jesus talks about this in John three, when Peter talks about it in First Peter, when James talks about it here, the idea that we must be born again, that he gives us new birth—what are some of the things that might flow out of that metaphor?

Remember, Nicodemus thought it was literal. He's like, "How's that going to work?" And Jesus is like, "No, it's a metaphor." What are the implications of the metaphor? What functions because you're born again—born—what?

There's something fundamentally humiliating about this. You who are high and mighty, he's telling you—when Jesus gives this illustration to Nicodemus, he's high and mighty—"You've got to become like a baby." Great. Peter affirms that too. You never outgrow craving milk. You will always be, in some regard, an unweaned infant longing for the milk. It's excellent.

One of the things too is that I remember when I was a little boy, I thought my dad was the smartest person in the world. There's something about our posture before him. The idea that you're born again puts us back into that childlike state before the Father. I had a professor once who said that the cathedrals of Europe were designed to accomplish three things. When you walk into them, just without anybody instructing you, when you walk into these great cathedrals—number one, you fall silent. Number two, you feel small. Number three, you look up.

And now you are prepared to worship. There's something here about this that we are meant to be in this posture that we recognize that I am just a little child and I know nothing. It is not of your own will, it happened to you.

This is great. For Nick Floyd to say that, this is actually really exciting to me. He has historically been one of my antagonists on this point. So he said, your birth is not of your own will, it happens to you. I think that pervades whenever we see this language of being born again. Remember your birth? No. Of course you don't. It's ridiculous. But talk about being acted upon. You are not a decision maker on the day of your birth. You were given birth.

Any others? Gil?

It reminds me of Jesus talking about children in general and how you can only receive me if you're like a child. So if you humble yourself like a child.

It's totally the humility. You're exactly right. To be like a child is to have a posture of humility before him, to recognize that we are the recipients of a gift.

He chose, once again, he's the elector, the chooser. What did he choose to do? To give us birth. And you don't have the opportunity, as a newborn infant to decline. When the labor begins, it may be a tricky process but you're coming out. That's how this is—that he chooses to give us birth.

Catherine?

I thought of that scripture like a weaned child in the Psalm.

Like a weaned child, I do not trouble myself or bother myself with things too lofty for me, but like a weaned child who is content to sit beside its mother. — Psalm 131

That's a great picture. On the one hand, we're always unweaned in that we're always craving for the milk according to Peter. But you're exactly right. In the Psalms, there's that exact image that I used to be fighting constantly for everything, but I have finally learned to rest and just to be at peace with whatever he chooses to give me.

But isn't that a choice?

Yes. That is right. And I don't think he's describing conversion there. He's describing maturity. A weaned child is moving towards maturity and so can we, albeit slowly.

Faith and Repentance as Gifts

Take a look at this:

Simon Peter, a servant and apostle of Jesus Christ, to those who through the righteousness of our God and savior Jesus Christ, have received a faith as precious as ours. — 2 Peter 1:1

Faith is a gift. Repentance is a gift. And those who have been given the gift should never become arrogant about all that they have been given.

Or, how about this?

For those that God foreknew, he predestined to be conformed to the likeness of his son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. And those he predestined, he also called. Those he called, he also justified. Those he justified, he also glorified. — Romans 8

Here's the question for you, like for right brain thinkers. Is this paragraph shaped like a rectangle or like a triangle? Can you envision what I mean by that strange question?

The top line of your shape is those he predestined. The next line is those he called. The next line is those he justified. The next line is those he glorified. If you believe that each set in the first description is the same people as the set in the second, and the third, and the fourth down the line, you believe it is a rectangle. If you believe that he predestines a bunch, and he calls some of them, and he justifies some of them, but will glorify only fewer of them, then you believe it's a triangle. Do you understand? Is it a rectangle or is it a triangle?

Rectangle.

It is a rectangle. It is not—Paul is not describing a windowing. It is not a set that's getting reduced and reduced. He is like, I think I'll do this, but then I'll actually do this, and then some will respond, and then I'll finish the game. There is no windowing. It's boom boom boom boom boom.

Which is to say, when the question we're asking is, what happens when God makes the inward call and says to Paul, hey, believe? Is Paul like, maybe? Or once it's fixed, once faith is imparted, once repentance is granted, once blindness is lifted, once death is replaced with life, what happens? And the answer is conversion.

Now, we'll talk probably next week: does it last? Does it persist? Will the saints persevere? We'll get to that.

But right now, the question is, does it work? And the answer is, it works every time.

I'm gonna throw another view out there. I don't see it as a rectangle or a triangle. I see it as a pyramid where each one is a leg.

A pyramid is a triangle. Is your pyramid upside down or right side up?

Mine is right side up. So you think he predestined some and then calls more and then justifies even more and then glorifies even more?

Yeah. Because I look at it at the base where each one of those legs goes down to a point on a base. That's the area inside of that base that all of these mix.

I don't quite know what to do with that. I don't know how it would be rational to say that he's gonna glorify more than he justifies. Or that he justifies more than he calls, or that he calls more than he determines to call. But it's okay, and it may be that your shape is not trying to answer the same question that I'm asking possibly.

I don't think I've ever heard anybody suggest that over time, there's gonna be people glorified that we're not justified. And I doubt that you're saying that. He uses people to bring on something godly, that may be very ungodly. Just take a really wild example. Hitler—he used Hitler to combine all the Jews, to create a nation state, to create his people back to the holy land.

Well, if your observation is that God uses all sorts of crazy means to accomplish his end, we're in complete agreement about that. So I think we could agree on that. I'm not sure though that it's necessarily illuminating the question I'm trying to ask, which is, is there a winnowing process? And I'm suggesting there's not. And I don't even think you're contradicting that. I think you're just talking about a parallel idea. But I think we're gonna keep moving.

God Doesn't Want Robots

So he does all these things. Now I wanna give you an illustration. Very often, when we talk about Calvinism, or Arminianism, or predestination, or free will, there is an idea that's floated that God doesn't want robots to love him. He wants people to actually love him, to genuinely love him. And so therefore, it's clear that he wouldn't just say, "Susan, love me." He wouldn't just do this because that would be lame.

Let me chase that for a second. I want you to imagine a high school. In this high school, there's all the usual assortment of characters. There's the jocks, the athletes, the burnouts that are smoking cigarettes outside, the nerds over here, the Dungeons and Dragons kids—maybe they're the same. You got all these different populations. You got the cheerleaders, the pretty girls, all these different things.

And there's this one kid in the school and he's a dork, but he's really smart. He is like a little living genius. But nobody likes him very much. In fact, they quite specifically dislike him. But not to worry, because he is so brilliant that he figures out how to create some little concoction, some little elixir. All he's got to do is trick a pretty girl into taking a sip of this drink and she's gonna fall madly in love with him. She doesn't love him. She doesn't like him at all. But once he casts his spell on her through his little elixir, she's in love. And now he's got her.

This is Calvinism. This is God walking up to people who don't like him, and making them like him. And don't you see what a loser move that is? Why Calvinism depicts God as just an absolute loser.

That's the illustration. What's wrong with it?

The trickery. Everything. What in particular? Break it down.

I'm presenting to you a common strawman that is presented against what I'm saying. Tell me, what's wrong with my illustration?

God is not a dork. He's the quarterback. He's the Tom Brady. God is not a dork. He's the smartest kid in the school. He is the most athletic kid in the school. He is the most gracious kid in the school. He's the kindest kid in the school. He gets the best grades in every class, and he is the most humble kid in the school.

He is the kid who, in addition to being the quarterback, also started the club to befriend the kids with down syndrome in the school. He's the best kid in the school. And the reason that people hate him is not because he's a dork, but because they're selfish, and they're jealous, and they're wicked. The high school is just full of the worst kids that there are. And what this jock, genius, humble, gracious, friendly kid does is he moves towards the ones that are rejecting him because of their jealousy, that are rejecting him because of their self-righteousness, that are rejecting him because of their love of their own wicked fantasies. He goes to them and he pulls them out of their darkness. He pulls them out of their selfishness. He pulls them out of their orbit around themselves so that they might see how lovely he actually is.

God does not cast a spell on people to enslave them to a faulty view. He casts a spell on them to waken them from their stupor, so they can see reality as it actually is. So that they can see him in all of his beauty, in all of his perfection, in all of his delightfulness. So that now and only now, finally, at last, they can stop worshiping themselves. They can stop living in malice and envy, being hated and hating one another.

What God is doing, what God has done to unbelieving sinners is not suppress them, but free them to see what he actually is.

Catherine: I think just by who he is and what he does, without saying anything, he makes people aware of their sin. And I think that's a lot of the reason why people reject him—because they see how good he is. They see what he does, and it's like they're far from it.

Tim: That's exactly right. That's exactly right. Here's how R.C. Sproul would put it. Flip your page over. I'll give you a couple of quotes, or one quote, and then we'll go to Calvin himself. Listen to what R.C. says:

The idea of irresistibility conjures up the idea that one cannot possibly offer any resistance to the grace of God. However, the history of the human race is the history of relentless resistance to the sweetness of the grace of God. Irresistible grace does not mean that God's grace is incapable of being resisted. Indeed, we are capable of resisting God's grace and we do resist it. The idea is that God's grace is so powerful that it has the capacity to overcome our natural resistance to it. It is not that the Holy Spirit drags people kicking and screaming to Christ against their wills. The Holy Spirit changes the inclination and the disposition of our wills so that, whereas we were previously unwilling to embrace Christ, now we are willing and more than willing. Indeed, we aren't dragged to Christ, we run to Christ and we embrace him joyfully because the spirit has changed our hearts. They are no longer hearts of stone that are impervious to the commands of God and to the invitations of the gospel. God melts the hardness of our hearts when he makes us new creatures. The spirit resurrects us from spiritual death so that we come to Christ because we want to come to Christ. And the reason we want to come to Christ is because God has already done the work of grace in our souls. Without that work, we would never have any desire to come to Christ. And that is why we say that regeneration precedes faith.

I want to pull one line out of that. When he says we aren't dragged to Christ, we run to Christ and we embrace him joyfully because the spirit has changed our hearts. This might feel, out of context, contradictory, but it's not. Stay with me here.

I believe that Tim Henderson freely, volitionally chose to follow Christ. I became a Christian as a free act of my will. But I only did it right after my will was freed. I think the first free will decision I ever made was to follow Christ. Because once my slavery was ended, of course I wanted to follow him. Of course I did. What else would I do?

And subsequent to that moment, I do think that though the doctrine of Christianity—the Calvinistic doctrine—repudiates the claim of free will, because I think in our nature we are slaves to sin, we're slaves to Satan. Bear in mind, that's only in the nature of will. Now, having been freed, if Christ sets you free, you're free indeed. Do I have a free will? Yes. Do you? If you're in Christ, of course you do. And you have ever since he freed you.

The Son sets you free, you are free indeed.

And Paul will exhort you over and over again in Romans and Galatians in particular: live in your freedom. Use your freedom to worship the one who freed you. Don't use your freedom to return back to slavery.

So though I am arguing against a free will framing of salvation, I will also argue richly in favor of a free will experience of life for those who have been freed.

Just recognize you didn't used to be free. Free because he made you free. Dig it? Alright. Calvin says this: the statement amounts to this, that we ought not to wonder if many refuse to embrace the gospel because no man will ever of himself be able to come to Christ. But God must first approach him by his spirit and hence it follows that all are not drawn but that God bestows this grace on those whom he has elected. True indeed as to the kind of drawing, it is not violent, so as to compel men by external force, but still it is a powerful impulse of the Holy Spirit which makes men willing, who formerly were unwilling and reluctant.

This is just the way that salvation works. This is how God has done it for ages and ages. This is how he does it. This is why in the final analysis, when all is restored and all is well, we will praise him for his grace, for his grace, for his glorious grace. Because we will know, with beyond a shadow of a doubt, that all that we have received was granted to us as a gift. And we will not be congratulating ourselves that we were so clever to figure this out. We will be marveling: What in the world am I doing here? Who deserved none of it, but was given everything.

I believe that same process and work isn't just a one-time thing; it carries us throughout our Christian life. I keep going back to John 6: "Will you also turn away? To whom do we go?"

Will you also turn away? To whom do we go? — John 6

What's being said here is this is not a one-time thing and it continues. We are saved by grace, we are sustained by grace. I didn't just have to repent of my sin when I became a Christian, but I need to repent of my sin on a continuing basis. Right? And God needs to mercifully remind me of how stupid I'm being, or how selfish I'm being, or how wicked I'm being, or how narrow my vantage point is, and that too is a mercy.

Perseverance Versus Preservation

You're setting this up for perseverance of the saints. And I will simply say, the P officially in TULIP stands for perseverance of the saints, which is that you finish the race, you're gonna keep going. But many since that term was coined have suggested an alteration from perseverance of the saints to preservation of the saints. And I like that a lot better. Because the hope is not like, "Look at me, now I can finish the race." But rather, "Continue to look at him who enables me to finish the race." So we'll unpack that more.

I was just gonna piggyback off what was said. Back to your birth analogy: do we have any partner at birth? We had no partner. Nor did we have any partner in the first year of life. We are utterly dependent as infants. And our growth and our thriving and everything is by the grace of our parents. It's not just a one-time deal; it's a sustaining deal to help us grow and develop.

We weren't just acted upon in the moment of our birth, but we were acted upon perpetually thereafter. It's very obvious when we're children.

Thank you for coming to this class. I know it can be difficult to listen to somebody talk about something that you disagree about. And I know that some of you agree, some of you disagree. It's more fun to talk to people that I disagree with, or that disagree with me. And it's really commendable to sit and remain as something that might make you uncomfortable. So thank you for doing that. As we move toward more dialogue, I really hope that you'll stick around and invite your friends to come in. I think these things are really important. I'm just so grateful for your kind curiosity and attention, and I'm eager to hear your thoughts as we get to that phase.