😂Luther in The Bondage of the Will although he affirmed that Christ atoned for the sins of the whole world rejected that the Holy Spirit works universally through the Word and sacraments. He held that the Holy Spirit is only efficacious in the Word and sacraments for those who the Father wills to draw to Christ (John 6:44) and that regeneration by the Holy Spirit is irresistible. He maintained that God only desires the salvation of everyone through His revealed will because through His hidden will He has willed and predestined everything that takes place including that some are predestined to be saved and others predestined to be damned. Luther affirmed that the doctrine of double predestination is the teaching of Scripture. I’ve provided evidence for this in my replies below this video. The teaching in the Formula of Concord on single predestination and the universal operation of the Holy Spirit in the means of grace is unscriptural and untrue.
For all that is good in this world, please don't stop making these videos. They are so wonderful for Christian growth and understanding! I cannot stress enough and will be supporting going forward! Your content is fire!
I think it would be very valuable to go through the Catalog of Testimonies. One of the obstacles to me in becoming Lutheran (I'm technically not Lutheran yet but I'm going through membership classes in 2 weeks) was the Lutheran Christology surrounding the Communication of Attributes. I felt this doctrine was binding consciences to believe something that may be coherent, but ultimately is just not Biblically supported or held to by the early church (similar to the Bodily Assumption of Mary for someone considering Catholicism). I felt this way until reading the Catalog of Testimonies. I just was completely ignorant that this view is not only taught in Scripture but consistently held to by Church Father after Father.
Yes the communication of attributes are also important in the context of how Christ can be present in the Eucharist, much unlike the Reformed. Glad to see you are joining the Church, peace be with you.
Thank you for this episode. I may have to watch it a few more times to try to grasp it, but this is definitely a topic I’ve been trying to get a handle on.
As a Lutheran myself I am deeply disheartened by the doctrine of election, or lack thereof. Walther and Chemnitz both say that the elect will persevere and will not fall away. Okay. The confessions affirm monergism, but also resistible grace. So if the Spirit is resistible, than how can anyone be regenerated ? Conversion would then need to be irresistible, or else we are not monergists. If we can not choose God, but God chooses us, and the elect persevere, then conversion would need to be irresistible. If initial conversion is resistible, then no one is saved. After then, why is the Spirit resistible after the irristible conversion?
You have to remember the guy who is generally credited as the first person to really recognize and teach monergism from the scriptures was St. Augustine and he did not believe in irresistible grace. Nobody is willing to say Augustine wasn’t a monergist. The big issue with what the Calvinists and Arminians teach is that they have truncated down salvation to where one can describe it without mentioning Jesus or the cross or the empty tomb. When you can simply say folks are saved or not saved all because of their personal choice or conversely all because God either chose them or didn’t, you make the cross a sideshow instead of the main event. If someone talks salvation in such a “simple,” “logical” way that they don’t have to talk about the cross, red flags should be going off. Take it from Paul who warns in 1 Corinthians: “For who has understood the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him?” But we have the mind of Christ.” He also says right next to there that he resolved to know nothing among the Corinthians, but Jesus Christ crucified. The Lutheran position may seem illogical, but it becomes clear when you understand that the Lutherans are trying not to outflank the cross and the empty tomb with human reason. Salvation and election and all the deep mysteries of Christianity are centered on Jesus hanging on the cross.
@@blondebeauticiannataliewin7118 I Walther and Chemnitz both literally say that election is a cause of salvation so that kind of invalidates your comment. Election=salvation (faith is obviously part of that). Lutherans believe 1) monergism which means God must first convert you before you can cooperate. 2) the elect will persevere 3) grace is resistible. Here is the issue. The Holt Spirit would have to work irristibly in at least conversion, and then resistibly after initial conversion. Okay so God elect some, converts them, and then perseveres them. The elect can fall out of a state of grace via their choice to disobey God, however they will be restored to grace before death (That is a quote from the LCMS). Okay so if God elects people and then preserves them, then what about the non elect ? We reject that God specifically decreed to reprobate people, so we are left with either A) God chose certain people based on some sort of criteria or B) God elects some and simply passes over some, not as a decre but passively, and hence their sinful choices lead them to damnation. Okay well Lutherans also reject option B. So we are pigeon holed to believe in some sort of election criteria. Lutherans also reject Molinism and Arianism which give the criteria. So now what ? No logical answer.
@@jgeph2.4consistently inaccurate! Just because someone has pieces that seem to fit a puzzle we have a hard time grasping, doesn’t make that answer the correct one. You just got lazy and swallowed what you were served. The truth is, not all is able to be understood. Paul says this in Romans 11 with the doxology. Paul openly contemplates the impossible to grasp will (in salvation and judgment) of God and then in the end rests on the fact that God is God and he is not.
Is the Monergistic conversion of the will not an act of irresistible grace? Would it not be better to say that initial regeneration via word and sacraments is irresistible and subsequent cooperation is resistible ? Or is the initial conversion is resistible than how are we Monergistic ?
You've touched on the nub of the problem with confessional Lutheranism which is that if people can resist being regenerated (i.e. born again and converted to faith in Christ) then it follows that regeneration isn't monergistic because it depends on people not resisting in order for them to be converted. Also given the fact that everyone is depraved through original sin and resistant to believing in Christ it follows that conversion has to be irresistible to overcome everyone's natural resistance to believing in Christ. However the reason why confessional Lutherans can never accept that conversion is irresistible is that it would mean (since they also believe in the universal operation of the Holy Spirit in the means of grace) that everyone would be converted through the means of grace when that obviously doesn't happen. The majority of people aren't converted through the Word and sacraments. So given the fact that conversion has to be irresistible otherwise no one would be converted, and that not everyone is converted through the means of grace the only conclusion that one can logically arrive at is that the Holy Spirit isn't efficacious through the means of grace for everyone. This is what Luther maintains is the truth in The Bondage of the Will. God doesn't will to convert everyone but rather He only wills to convert some people just as Christ teaches in John 6 where He says that only those drawn to Him by the Father will be given faith (6:44), and those the Father doesn't draw aren't given the ability to believe in Him (6:64-65). This means therefore that those not granted the ability to believe by the Father through the Holy Spirit are predestined to be damned.
To avoid confusion I need to add that when Luther maintained that God doesn't will to save everyone he was only meaning this in the context of God's hidden will as he maintained that God through His revealed will desires to save everyone. God in this way can be said to have opposing wills, but it necessarily follows from the fact that conversion is irresistible that the Father hasn't willed to save everyone and that some people are predestined to be damned. Confessional Lutherans deny this but Luther didn't. He firmly maintained throughout The Bondage of the Will that God from eternity has willed that some are to be damned and that they're predestined to be damned. He affirmed this by maintaining that God’s foreknowledge necessitates everything happening as it does because His foreknowledge is based on His knowledge of what He has willed by His hidden will to happen. His hidden will has willed everything that happens. If people are damned that's because He’s willed them to be damned. The idea that God hasn't willed anyone to be damned but that He somehow foreknows who will choose through free will to resist being converted is false teaching. The Formula of Concord just fabricated a false belief system based on human reasoning. Everything in Article 11 hangs on the mistaken idea that God wouldn't be sincere in desiring everyone's salvation if He didn't endeavour to regenerate everyone through the Holy Spirit. And from this false premise it proceeded to misinterpret Scripture in order to fit this. And since it couldn't logically account for how it is that only the elect will be saved it dispensed with logic and argued that people shouldn't try to make sense of it but just accept it as true. The truth is that the FC teaching of universal resistible grace and single predestination is illogical and therefore isn't true. It's also more importantly unscriptural as Romans 9 in particular teaches double predestination.
@@Edward-ng8oo are you opposed to the idea that God only elected the ones whom he foresees would be cooperative after initial conversion? For example we anre all in the bondage of sin, we can not choose God. God chooses us and converts us. However there are regenerate people that commit apostasy. So what if God foresees that if the will is converted, some people will still choose to reject him, some people will follow him for a short period, and some people will continue to at least try to combat sin and follow him. Hence he calls certain people and preserves them because he sees the poor conversion inclination of their hearts? The non elect are the ones would with full autonomy still reject God. What do you say to that ? Keep in mind I am affirming monergism because God must first convert us before we can come to him.
@@WaterMelon-CatMy position is that God is omnipotent and wills and works everything that happens as Ephesians 1:11 states, and that God foreknows everything because He has willed it to happen in eternity and now in time He causes it to happen so that His foreknowledge necessitates what happens and everything is predestined to happen. This was Luther's position in The Bondage of the Will. So I don't accept that God can foreknow what He doesn't determine to happen. If humans had autonomous free will then God couldn't foreknow what they would do as free will decisions by definition are unpredictable. Basically l don't accept that we have any input into whether we’re saved or damned because salvation and damnation are entirely determined by God who acts like a potter moulding vessels of honour and dishonour. So I don't accept that those who are damned have caused their own damnation by resisting the Holy Spirit. I simply don't accept that the Holy Spirit works universally through the Word. I hold that the Holy Spirit works irresistibly through the Word to regenerate only those the Father wills to regenerate. I agree with Luther that we don't have free will with respect to both salvation and damnation and that if the elect at any time fall from grace then it’s only a temporary fall which God has predestined to happen, and that He will restore them at some point so that they're not finally lost and damned. Whether it happens that the Father converts some who He hasn't elected to save I’m unsure about as it seems rather harsh that He should irresistibly regenerate any who He hasn't elected to save.
@WaterMelon-Cat My position is that God is omnipotent and wills and works everything that happens as Ephesians 1:11 states, and that God foreknows everything because He has willed it to happen in eternity and now in time He causes it to happen so that His foreknowledge necessitates what happens and everything is predestined to happen. This was Luther's position in The Bondage of the Will. So I don't accept that God can foreknow what He doesn't determine to happen. If humans had autonomous free will then God couldn't foreknow what they would do as free will decisions by definition are unpredictable. Basically l don't accept that we have any input into whether we’re saved or damned because salvation and damnation are entirely determined by God who acts like a potter moulding vessels of honour and dishonour. So I don't accept that those who are damned have caused their own damnation by resisting the Holy Spirit. I simply don't accept that the Holy Spirit works universally through the Word. I hold that the Holy Spirit works irresistibly through the Word to regenerate only those the Father wills to regenerate. I agree with Luther that we don't have free will with respect to both salvation and damnation and that if the elect at any time fall from grace then it’s only a temporary fall which God has predestined to happen, and that He will restore them at some point so that they're not finally lost and damned. Whether it happens that the Father converts some who He hasn't elected to save I’m unsure about as it seems rather harsh that He should irresistibly regenerate any who He hasn't elected to save.
@MrLegNick I know. I'm sorry about that. Unfortunately, there was nothing I could do about it. There was a very small window of time I could record that week, and the neighbor just started mowing their lawn during the recording.
He changes times and eras. He removes kings, and he brings kings to power. He gives wisdom to the wise and knowledge to those who have good judgment.-Daniel 2 People don’t give God enough credit for the things that happen down here. He directly moves the people in this life. It goes beyond our ability to grasp. Why? Because He’s God and I am not.
Luther agreed that God has willed in eternity everything that happens on the earth and that He works everything that happens (Ephesians 1:11). In The Bondage of the Will he maintained that Scripture teaches that God through His hidden will has willed and predestined everything that happens and that His foreknowledge necessitates whatever happens. By contrast the Formula of Concord denies that God has willed and predestined everything that happens, and denies that His foreknowledge necessitates what happens. This is why confessional Lutherans aren't genuine Lutherans because they reject absolute predestination and deny that anyone is predestined to be damned. Luther however affirmed that Scripture teaches absolute predestination in that everything has to happen as it does, and that everyone is predestined to be either saved or damned. Confessional Lutherans (so-called) have been misled into believing that Scripture rejects double predestination and that Luther rejected it when he didn't. He affirmed it and interpreted Romans 9 in accordance with it. Those who subscribe to the FC are blind and don't give credit for what happens down here only to God.
@@Edward-ng8oo Luther never said anyone was predestined to be damned! That’s a lie! He agreed that God predestines those who are saved to be saved before the creation of the world. But the scriptures don’t say that God has predestined people to Hell. That’s unjust and completely outside of God’s character who wills that all be saved. Luther said when there is something in scripture that he couldn’t figure out, he’d take of his Dr. cap and assume the Holy Spirit is far more smarter than he!
@@villarrealmarta6103I commented below this video myself and in reply to others provided evidence for the fact that Luther maintained that God has predestined everyone to be either saved or damned, so rather than repeat myself I just want to refer you to what I wrote there. My opening words are “Luther in The Bondage of the Will ….”
@@Edward-ng8oo Luther’s bondage of the will first of all was written in like 1525. Luther’s views on predestination did change as he grew in faith. You have to keep the whole history of development in mind and not get off track by one book written in the early years. None of his sermons also ever expressed that he believed in double predestination, which is why the confessors never put Calvin’s views mixed with pire doctrine.
@@villarrealmarta6103I didn't realise you'd replied to me here. The Bondage of the Will by the way was written in 1525. Luther's views on predestination never changed as he’s recorded in later life saying that of all his writings he valued this book and his catechisms above everything else. Also there's an entry in his Table Talk where he says that he leaves behind his will and testament that what he'd written against Erasmus is “the unchangeable truth of God.”
The whole thing is quite muddled, isn't it, Dr Cooper? I never ceased to be amazed at how highly educated people back themselves into a corner trying to explain how God elects only some to salvation, yet isn't responsible for the eternal damnation of the non-elect, or for all the evil they commit in the world.
Saint Athanasius destroys any sense of the negligent, weak view of God found in reformed theology. "So, as the rational creatures were wasting and such works in course of ruin, what was God in His goodness to do? Suffer corruption to prevail against them and death to hold them fast? And where were the profit of their having been made, to begin with? For better were they not made, than once made, left to neglect and ruin. 8. For neglect reveals weakness, and not goodness on God's part - if, that is, He allows His own work to be ruined when once He had made it - more so than if He had never made man at all. 9. For if He had not made them, none could impute weakness; but once He had made them, and created them out of nothing, it were most monstrous for the work to be ruined, and that before the eyes of the Maker. 10. It was, then, out of the question to leave men to the current of corruption; because this would be unseemly, and unworthy of God's goodness." ~On the Incarnation
I completely agree that confessional Lutheran beliefs on election and predestination are muddled. However the situation is practically impossible to rectify because confessional Lutherans (so-called) believe they have very strong reasons for believing as they do. Their central belief is that God desires to save everyone through Christ (which is Scripturally true) but what they conclude from this is where they go wrong because they believe that God couldn't possibly be sincere in His desire to save everyone unless He at the same time endeavours to regenerate everyone by the Holy Spirit working through the Word and sacraments (the means of grace). So given the fact that they believe that the Holy Spirit is always efficacious in the means of grace and the fact that not everyone is converted they have to conclude that conversion is resistible which means that those who are damned have caused their own damnation and God hasn't predestined anyone to be damned. However because they believe in total depravity and the fact that everyone is resistant to believing in Christ they can't account for how anyone is saved because in order for anyone to be saved it obviously requires conversion to be irresistible in order to overcome people's inbuilt resistance to believing in Christ. So their belief system is riddled with illogicality which is enough to drive those who seek clarity completely insane. This is where Luther rides to the rescue because in The Bondage of the Will he maintained that God has predestined people to be saved and damned, and that the Holy Spirit regenerates irresistibly only those the Father wills to draw to Christ (John 6:44), and that those who aren't regenerated are predestined to be damned as Romans 9 teaches. Luther explained that God only desires to save everyone in His revealed will because through His hidden omnipotent will He has willed and predestined everything that happens. What Luther teaches is balm to the soul. It's Scriptural and logical and even though it seems harsh on those who aren't predestined to be saved nevertheless those who are of the elect accept that He has just reasons for why He doesn't will to save everyone. The trouble is that confessional Lutherans have been so heavily indoctrinated against the idea that Luther believed in Calvinist predestination that it's very difficult to get them to recognise that he did. And even if they do recognise this they're very likely to conclude that Luther was wrong. They're so in love with their belief system that the fact that it doesn't make logical sense is no hindrance to them believing it. They've been convinced by clever arguments that it doesn't need to make logical sense. So since they're not open to the truth that because it's illogical it's not true there’s no way of convincing them that they've misinterpreted Scripture and that they're believing falsehoods.
@@Edward-ng8oo I do agree that the FoC specifically added contradictions to the Lutheran understanding of election. Howbeit I would not say that Luther believed that people were specifically elected and reprobated. Luther was an Augustinian, so let us look at St. Augustine’s view. St. Augustine believed that God willed to save everyone, hence he makes his grace available at all times through the sacraments. St. Augustine’s believed that people could be regenerate with real faith, but that the faith was temporal and could be lost. He also believed that perseverance was a gift given to some and not others. This seems to paint this idea. Gods grace is available to all, in which is created faith and saves, in this will he wants all to be saved. God has decreed and gifted perseverance to certain people, and they will ultimately die within the faith, although they can whilst living fall out of a state of grace, ultimately the elect will be restored before death. Howbeit, unlike perseverance, God has not decreed to reprobate anyone, he simply overlooks some for perseverance, but not by a decree of such. Therefore the reprobate are left to their own. This is basically a moderate form of calvanism but I do not think he taught that reprobation was by a decree but more so passively
Mat 11:27: ²⁷ All things are delivered unto me of my Father: and no man knoweth the Son, but the Father; neither knoweth any man the Father, save the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son will reveal him. John 6:36-37,44-45,63-65: ³⁶ But I said unto you, That ye also have seen me, and believe not. ³⁷ All that the Father giveth me shall come to me; and him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out. … ⁴⁴ No man can come to me, except the Father which hath sent me draw him: and I will raise him up at the last day. ⁴⁵ It is written in the prophets, And they shall be all taught of God. Every man therefore that hath heard, and hath learned of the Father, cometh unto me. … ⁶³ It is the spirit that quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing: the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life. ⁶⁴ But there are some of you that believe not. For Jesus knew from the beginning who they were that believed not, and who should betray him. ⁶⁵ And he said, Therefore said I unto you, that no man can come unto me, except it were given unto him of my Father.
As Calvinist attending a LCMS (as a non member), Dr. J has finally explained better than this Lutheran pastor, how Gods soteriology in election unto salvation is stated in the Book of Concord ch.11 vs some who profess salvation are not really of the elect… that only God sovereignly knows his true sheep from the goats !
I don't understand why since you believe in Calvinist double predestination you’re attending an LCMS church. The LCMS agrees with the teaching on predestination contained in the Formula of Concord (FC), and the FC condemns double predestination as false doctrine. Confessional Lutherans (so-called) hold to the universal operation of the Holy Spirit in the means of grace (Word and sacraments), and hold that people are damned because they've resisted the Holy Spirit’s regeneration, not because they've been predestined to be damned. They reject that the Holy Spirit irresistibly regenerates people, so if you're a Calvinist then you do believe that people are regenerated irresistibly. If you've read The Bondage of the Will (TBOTW) you'll know that Luther affirmed double predestination and that the Holy Spirit irresistibly regenerates some so that they're saved and bypasses others so that they're damned, but confessional Lutherans reject this. They’ve been misled into thinking that Luther agreed with them when he didn't. Luther completely rejected single predestination and the universal operation of the Holy Spirit in the means of grace. If Luther was alive now there's no way he would attend an LCMS church. The LCMS isn't a genuine Lutheran church. Those who call themselves confessional Lutherans are followers of Martin Chemnitz not Luther. Chemnitz was the chief author of the FC and he denied what Luther affirmed in TBOTW. Luther affirmed that God has willed and predestined everything that happens and that His foreknowledge necessitates what happens, whereas Chemnitz in the FC denied all this. Luther strongly maintained in TBOTW that Scripture teaches that God has predestined everybody to be either saved or damned. In contrast to this I had one confessional Lutheran say to me recently that double predestination is the doctrine of demons, and I think that a lot of confessional Lutherans will probably agree with that. They are therefore without realising condemning the teaching of Scripture as Romans 9 teaches double predestination, which Luther also affirmed was the case in TBOTW. So by attending an LCMS church you’re allying yourself with those who condemn what Scripture teaches. I don't attend any church because I neither agree with confessional Lutherans (so-called) over predestination or Calvinists over the Lord's Supper. All the churches are heterodox and so I can't join any of them.
In view of predestination unto salvation and universal atonement, how do you reconcile that with the geographic limitations of the Church. How would you explain why 0 peasants from the mountains of Western China are saved while presumably many peasants from Europe are saved. Or is there a possibility that salvation can be granted to those who live far beyond the reach of the visible church on Earth?
Nestorian missionaries went and preached in China in the 600s and the Church of the East survived there until the late 1300s. There were efforts from Franciscan missionaries to reach China in the 1300s, but they were mostly unsuccessful. Jesuit missionaries would lead a renewed missionary effort in the 1500s, and Christianity has not left China since, despite the best efforts of Imperial and later Communist governments.
11:59 Just one point of critique: Contrary to the popular sentiment, this is not the case. Arminius did not teach that. I have immense respect for you, but that statement - though extremely prevalent - is inaccurate. "Faith is a gracious and gratuitous gift of God, bestowed according to the administration of the means necessary to conduce to the end, that is, according to such an administration as the justice of God requires” -Jacob Arminius
"So, as the rational creatures were wasting and such works in course of ruin, what was God in His goodness to do? Suffer corruption to prevail against them and death to hold them fast? And where were the profit of their having been made, to begin with? For better were they not made, than once made, left to neglect and ruin. 8. For neglect reveals weakness, and not goodness on God's part - if, that is, He allows His own work to be ruined when once He had made it - more so than if He had never made man at all. 9. For if He had not made them, none could impute weakness; but once He had made them, and created them out of nothing, it were most monstrous for the work to be ruined, and that before the eyes of the Maker. 10. It was, then, out of the question to leave men to the current of corruption; because this would be unseemly, and unworthy of God's goodness." "Now in truth this great work was peculiarly suited to God's goodness. 1. For if a king, having founded a house or city, if it be beset by bandits from the carelessness of its inmates, does not by any means neglect it, but avenges and reclaims it as his own work, having regard not to the carelessness of the inhabitants, but to what beseems himself; much more did God the Word of the all-good Father not neglect the race of men, His work, going to corruption: but, while He blotted out the death which had ensued by the offering of His own body, He corrected their neglect by His own teaching, restoring all that was man's by His own power." On the Incarnation by Saint Athanasius
Dr. Cooper, I love your content and think you covered this topic very thoroughly, however, I think you are not describing the overarching reason that Lutherans hold to what others consider an irrational idea of election. You describe how for Calvinists why some are saved and others aren’t is simplified down to God’s sovereign choice. Then you describe how for Arminians the answer is down to human decision, but when you discuss the view of Lutherans, you simply say there is no easy answer. Why not explain how both the aforementioned pat answers may sound logical, but are actually ways of explaining salvation without mentioning Jesus Christ crucified and Jesus Christ risen (yikes). Why not explain how Lutherans never talk about election outside of the cross and the empty tomb? I listened to your Romans 9 commentary and found the same issue. You did a superb job explaining verse by verse why the Calvinist and Arminian views are simply wrong, but you don’t really talk to an overarching reason that drives Lutherans to see the verses and their meanings the way Lutherans do. I could go to a Calvinist video of the same topic and they will clearly explain how their high ground is the sovereignty of God. I think for people growing up in Calvinist America, this overarching articulation is extremely persuasive and sometimes people need someone to point out (which I think is obvious to Lutherans) that such a view makes the cross and empty tomb a sideshow. I think your content is awesome and please don’t take my coment too hard. It just seems like when talking election you are doing it with one hand tied behind your back and I don’t understand why. Maybe it is too much off the top rope. Maybe there is something I don’t understand. I think that even with one hand tied behind your back you do a superb job that blows away the opposing arguments. I just think it’s good to always explain for folks how for Lutherans Jesus Christ crucified and Jesus Christ risen is the high ground. Just my two cents.
In my comments below this video I showed that Luther in The Bondage of the Will maintained that God has predestined people to both heaven and hell and that he rejected single predestination and the universal operation of the Holy Spirit in the means of grace as taught in the Formula of Concord (FC). He held rightly that regeneration is irresistible and that only those the Father wills to regenerate through the Holy Spirit are drawn to Christ and given faith (John 6:44). Luther was therefore a Calvinist with respect to predestination except that he rejected limited atonement and believed that Christ’s atonement is universal. Although I reject the teaching of the FC as Luther did it does rightly teach that the elect have been predestined to be saved from before the creation of the world as Calvinism does. The fact that true Christians have been predestined to believe in Christ doesn't detract from the fact that they can only be saved through Christ's atonement and resurrection. So I don't follow why you think this makes the cross and empty tomb a sideshow.
By affirming single predestination you simply back handedly affirm double predestination. Just admit it Lutherans! It's OK! Come! Be with us!!!! Shall we goith out and call the elect unto the Father? I think we shall Lord willing. 🙏
Luther affirmed double predestination on the basis of Scripture and logic, but confessional Lutherans (so-called) completely reject that Scripture teaches it and reject that it's necessary to believe it because it's logical. They oppose Calvinist double predestination because they think Scripture only teaches predestination to heaven and not predestination to hell. Luther however in The Bondage of the Will disagreed and maintained rightly that Scripture teaches that God has predestined people to hell as well as heaven. He taught that everything that happens has been willed by God's hidden will in eternity and that His foreknowledge necessitates everything happening as it does, and everything is predestined to happen. Confessional Lutherans however subscribe to the teaching in the Formula of Concord (FC) which specifically denies that God has willed everything that happens, and denies that His foreknowledge necessitates what happens, and denies that everything is predestined to happen. So it’s a complete reversal of what Luther held to be true. But the crazy thing is that the majority of confessional Lutherans think that Luther was in agreement with them and rejected double predestination. They have a complete distaste for double predestination and regard those who agree with it as being slaves of logic whereas in contrast they believe only what Scripture teaches. Luther, if he was alive today, would regard confessional Lutherans as having been misled by illogical unscriptural teaching. He would have rejected single predestination on the basis that not only does Scripture teach double predestination but also because single predestination is illogical and therefore can't be true. However confessional Lutherans have been misled into thinking that what they believe doesn't need to be logical. Their false belief that the Holy Spirit is universally efficacious in the Word and sacraments is why they reject predestination to hell as they believe that those who are damned are responsible for their damnation through having resisted being regenerated by the Holy Spirit. Luther rejected this and affirmed that the Holy Spirit is only efficacious in the Gospel and sacraments for those who the Father draws to Christ (John 6:44) and that the Holy Spirit works irresistibly to regenerate people. Also given the fact that everyone is depraved and an enemy of God it’s necessary that regeneration is irresistible or else no one would be converted. Also in order for God to predestine the elect to be saved it’s necessary that they be irresistibly converted. So nothing that confessional Lutherans believe about predestination and regeneration makes any sense. It's just an unscriptural and illogical mess. I didn't mean to make this reply so long but I’m motivated to argue against what the FC teaches because it’s responsible for destroying genuine Lutheranism through misleading many thousands of people from the 1580’s onwards.
The truth is the idea of single predestination to heaven with no corresponding predestination to hell is an unscriptural and illogical idea which makes any attempt to explain it in rational terms impossible. It’s not capable of being understood because it doesn't make logical sense so it needs to be mentally flushed away. But confessional Lutherans (so-called) have been mentally captured by single predestination because of their belief in the universal operation of the Holy Spirit in the means of grace. They believe that the Holy spirit is always efficacious in the Gospel and sacraments so that if anyone is not saved that's because they've resisted being regenerated by the Holy Spirit and not because they've been predestined to be damned. Luther however rightly rejected that the Holy Spirit is always efficacious through the Gospel and sacraments, and held that the Holy Spirit is only efficacious with those who the Father wills to draw to Christ (John 6:44), and that the Holy Spirit irresistibly converts them. He held that God has predestined all people to be either saved or damned, and that everything that God foreknows is predestined to happen. Those who call themselves confessional Lutherans aren't in reality Lutherans. They're followers of Martin Chemnitz who was the main author of the Formula of Concord. This document contradicted Luther's teaching in The Bondage of the Will, but confessional Lutherans (so-called) have been misled into believing that Luther was in agreement with single predestination when he absolutely wasn't. It’s one big deception that's been going on for nearly 450 years. Luther was right in holding that scripture teaches double predestination, and the FC is wrong in teaching that God has only predestined people to be saved and not damned.
Since Satan’s fall with other angels (now demons) and Adam & Eves fall into sin for all mankind, all we deserve is GODs wrath and eternal damnation ! That he saves any is Amazing Grace unto eternal salvation !!
Hope Dr. J responds with a theological y ! I think like Judas they’re really not of the elect unto salvation; like in the sower parable respond to the gospel message for a season but will eventually fall away in apostasy of Jesus general gospel preaching message…what do you think ?
@@claytongellerman8787 yes there is the elect, whom do not fall away, and the non elect whom can hold temporal faith. Howbeit if faith is a gift and Lutheran’s are Monergistic then that means the Holy Spirit works irresistibly during the conversion of the will. And then later cooperation is what? If it is resistible then the elect can fall, which they can’t. The Spirit would have to operate irresistibly in the elect and resistibly in the non elect. Unless God only elects in view of cooperation and hence the irresistible grace is in accordance with our freewill side he knows we cooperate after initial conversion
@WaterMelon-Cat The elect can and do resist after conversion, like King David. Yet they don't fall away at the end. We know that salvation is a gift of God's Perseverance but we don't know why some persevere and others don't
Luther in The Bondage of the Will (TBOTW) maintained that everything that happens has been willed to happen by God's hidden will, and that since He foreknows what He has willed His foreknowledge necessitates what happens and everything is predestined to happen. Luther argued that God’s foreknowledge is synonymous with His predestination and he didn't agree with the teaching that predestination isn't coextensive with His foreknowledge. Luther maintained that Scripture teaches that everything is predestined to happen and people are predestined to both heaven and hell. When the Formula of Concord (FC) states that there’s been no public debate amongst Lutherans over election and predestination that's a misleading statement because those who agreed with Luther's teaching were labelled as Calvinists and not true Lutherans, and those who rejected predestination to hell were wrongly regarded as true Lutherans. Luther denied that the Holy Spirit is always efficacious through the means of grace (the Gospel and sacraments). He argued from John 6:44 that only those drawn by the Father are regenerated by the Holy Spirit, and that the Holy Spirit works irresistibly in the hearts of the elect so that they can't fail to come to faith. If the Holy Spirit tries to work in the hearts of everyone through the Gospel and He can be resisted as Lutherans believe then no one could come to faith as everyone is naturally resistant to God through being depraved. We're all born in a sinful state because of original sin and are unable to come to Christ unless we're regenerated irresistibly by the Holy Spirit, and therefore those the Holy Spirit doesn't irresistibly regenerate are predestined to be damned as they're passed over by the Holy Spirit. This is what Luther teaches in The Bondage of the Will. He taught that Scripture teaches double predestination not single predestination. Although Luther held that Christ’s atonement is universal and that God desires everyone's salvation through the Gospel, he made a sharp distinction between God’s revealed and hidden wills and maintained that even though God has a general desire to save everyone in His revealed will He nevertheless in His hidden will has predestined some to be damned. I believe that what Luther taught in TBOTW is the truth as taught in Scripture, and I also agree with him that what is taught on predestination must be logical. I therefore don't accept that the FC doctrine of single predestination is Scriptural and true. The idea that predestination to heaven can exist on its own without predestination to hell I don't accept is a paradox. It's rather a logical contradiction for which there's no possible logical explanation, which means it isn't true. Scripture and logic teach double predestination not single predestination.
I'll stick with Jesus on this. He said, "that whoever believes in him should not* perish but have eternal life." God's will is for us to be his sons. What was predestined is that this would be accomplished through Christ.
@@tedroybal5231It sounds like you're in agreement with Leighton Flowers in believing that we're not individually predestined to be saved but that those who through free will believe in Christ will be saved because God has promised to save everyone who believes in Christ. Is this your view? I don't agree because I believe that those who believe in Christ have been individually elected and predestined to have faith in Christ from before the foundation of the world as Paul teaches in Ephesians 1. So of course it's true that whoever believes in Christ will be saved and obtain eternal life. There's no dispute over that. The dispute is over whether we're predestined before creation to believe in Christ, and that in time the Holy Spirit irresistibly regenerates the elect so that they come to faith in Christ. This was Luther's position and is my position.
@@TheSpider-hs4jo Honestly my only problem with the Lutheran confessions are their immense lack of clarity on the doctrine of election. Walther argued that election is a source of salvation, the Wisconsin scholastics argued differently and maintained a sacremental intuitu fide. I think there is room for different predestinstion views. I just wish the Lutheran magisterium would convene globally and make a ruling on this.
@@WaterMelon-CatThe idea of a Lutheran magisterium is in principle a return to Rome. It's the Holy Spirit who leads Christians into the truth, and He doesn't tolerate a range of beliefs on predestination. It’s necessary to believe that God has predestined people to both heaven and hell as Paul teaches in Romans 9 if one is to be saved. Luther was right when he said that it's necessary to believe only the truth because if one believes false doctrine then one won't be saved. The only exceptions are those who are unaware of the truth and who believe false doctrine through lack of proper instruction, but they must be open to correction otherwise their faith is false.
The Lord has elected me as an eternal subscriber
WAHHAHAHAHA eternal liker of this comment 😂
But God has not predestined anyone to not subscribe. So if you don't, it's your own fault.
Based
Around the same time Ps. Bryan Wolfmueller posted on the doctrine of election, neat! Looking forward to this one!
Ikr!? So very convenient 😁
I really liked his simplification into three truths and explanations about how people always try to pick two.
😂Luther in The Bondage of the Will although he affirmed that Christ atoned for the sins of the whole world rejected that the Holy Spirit works universally through the Word and sacraments. He held that the Holy Spirit is only efficacious in the Word and sacraments for those who the Father wills to draw to Christ (John 6:44) and that regeneration by the Holy Spirit is irresistible. He maintained that God only desires the salvation of everyone through His revealed will because through His hidden will He has willed and predestined everything that takes place including that some are predestined to be saved and others predestined to be damned. Luther affirmed that the doctrine of double predestination is the teaching of Scripture. I’ve provided evidence for this in my replies below this video.
The teaching in the Formula of Concord on single predestination and the universal operation of the Holy Spirit in the means of grace is unscriptural and untrue.
For all that is good in this world, please don't stop making these videos. They are so wonderful for Christian growth and understanding! I cannot stress enough and will be supporting going forward! Your content is fire!
@sebastianfonseca1788 thanks! I have no plans to stop.
I think it would be very valuable to go through the Catalog of Testimonies. One of the obstacles to me in becoming Lutheran (I'm technically not Lutheran yet but I'm going through membership classes in 2 weeks) was the Lutheran Christology surrounding the Communication of Attributes. I felt this doctrine was binding consciences to believe something that may be coherent, but ultimately is just not Biblically supported or held to by the early church (similar to the Bodily Assumption of Mary for someone considering Catholicism). I felt this way until reading the Catalog of Testimonies. I just was completely ignorant that this view is not only taught in Scripture but consistently held to by Church Father after Father.
Yes the communication of attributes are also important in the context of how Christ can be present in the Eucharist, much unlike the Reformed. Glad to see you are joining the Church, peace be with you.
Could you do the Smalcald Articles por favor? I also want your thoughts in Article 4 and its statements about Mary
Thank you for this episode. I may have to watch it a few more times to try to grasp it, but this is definitely a topic I’ve been trying to get a handle on.
Love it, what a blessing! Thank you so very much.
As a Lutheran myself I am deeply disheartened by the doctrine of election, or lack thereof. Walther and Chemnitz both say that the elect will persevere and will not fall away. Okay. The confessions affirm monergism, but also resistible grace. So if the Spirit is resistible, than how can anyone be regenerated ? Conversion would then need to be irresistible, or else we are not monergists. If we can not choose God, but God chooses us, and the elect persevere, then conversion would need to be irresistible. If initial conversion is resistible, then no one is saved. After then, why is the Spirit resistible after the irristible conversion?
You have to remember the guy who is generally credited as the first person to really recognize and teach monergism from the scriptures was St. Augustine and he did not believe in irresistible grace. Nobody is willing to say Augustine wasn’t a monergist. The big issue with what the Calvinists and Arminians teach is that they have truncated down salvation to where one can describe it without mentioning Jesus or the cross or the empty tomb. When you can simply say folks are saved or not saved all because of their personal choice or conversely all because God either chose them or didn’t, you make the cross a sideshow instead of the main event. If someone talks salvation in such a “simple,” “logical” way that they don’t have to talk about the cross, red flags should be going off. Take it from Paul who warns in 1 Corinthians: “For who has understood the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him?” But we have the mind of Christ.” He also says right next to there that he resolved to know nothing among the Corinthians, but Jesus Christ crucified. The Lutheran position may seem illogical, but it becomes clear when you understand that the Lutherans are trying not to outflank the cross and the empty tomb with human reason. Salvation and election and all the deep mysteries of Christianity are centered on Jesus hanging on the cross.
@@blondebeauticiannataliewin7118 I Walther and Chemnitz both literally say that election is a cause of salvation so that kind of invalidates your comment. Election=salvation (faith is obviously part of that). Lutherans believe 1) monergism which means God must first convert you before you can cooperate. 2) the elect will persevere 3) grace is resistible. Here is the issue. The Holt Spirit would have to work irristibly in at least conversion, and then resistibly after initial conversion. Okay so God elect some, converts them, and then perseveres them. The elect can fall out of a state of grace via their choice to disobey God, however they will be restored to grace before death (That is a quote from the LCMS). Okay so if God elects people and then preserves them, then what about the non elect ? We reject that God specifically decreed to reprobate people, so we are left with either A) God chose certain people based on some sort of criteria or B) God elects some and simply passes over some, not as a decre but passively, and hence their sinful choices lead them to damnation. Okay well Lutherans also reject option B. So we are pigeon holed to believe in some sort of election criteria. Lutherans also reject Molinism and Arianism which give the criteria. So now what ? No logical answer.
That’s why I’m a Calvinist . It’s consistent
@@blondebeauticiannataliewin7118Calvinist don’t believe that
@@jgeph2.4consistently inaccurate! Just because someone has pieces that seem to fit a puzzle we have a hard time grasping, doesn’t make that answer the correct one. You just got lazy and swallowed what you were served. The truth is, not all is able to be understood. Paul says this in Romans 11 with the doxology. Paul openly contemplates the impossible to grasp will (in salvation and judgment) of God and then in the end rests on the fact that God is God and he is not.
@DrJordanBCooper Do one on the Small Catechism and children's ministry! Luther's best work!
Hi brother Jordan please can you explain the doctrine of semper virigo and what's your take on it, kind regards Siphesihle Gwala (South Africa)
The ELCA holds to the doctrine of Semper Vertigo- "Always dizzy."
Is the Monergistic conversion of the will not an act of irresistible grace? Would it not be better to say that initial regeneration via word and sacraments is irresistible and subsequent cooperation is resistible ? Or is the initial conversion is resistible than how are we Monergistic ?
You've touched on the nub of the problem with confessional Lutheranism which is that if people can resist being regenerated (i.e. born again and converted to faith in Christ) then it follows that regeneration isn't monergistic because it depends on people not resisting in order for them to be converted. Also given the fact that everyone is depraved through original sin and resistant to believing in Christ it follows that conversion has to be irresistible to overcome everyone's natural resistance to believing in Christ. However the reason why confessional Lutherans can never accept that conversion is irresistible is that it would mean (since they also believe in the universal operation of the Holy Spirit in the means of grace) that everyone would be converted through the means of grace when that obviously doesn't happen. The majority of people aren't converted through the Word and sacraments.
So given the fact that conversion has to be irresistible otherwise no one would be converted, and that not everyone is converted through the means of grace the only conclusion that one can logically arrive at is that the Holy Spirit isn't efficacious through the means of grace for everyone. This is what Luther maintains is the truth in The Bondage of the Will.
God doesn't will to convert everyone but rather He only wills to convert some people just as Christ teaches in John 6 where He says that only those drawn to Him by the Father will be given faith (6:44), and those the Father doesn't draw aren't given the ability to believe in Him (6:64-65). This means therefore that those not granted the ability to believe by the Father through the Holy Spirit are predestined to be damned.
To avoid confusion I need to add that when Luther maintained that God doesn't will to save everyone he was only meaning this in the context of God's hidden will as he maintained that God through His revealed will desires to save everyone. God in this way can be said to have opposing wills, but it necessarily follows from the fact that conversion is irresistible that the Father hasn't willed to save everyone and that some people are predestined to be damned. Confessional Lutherans deny this but Luther didn't. He firmly maintained throughout The Bondage of the Will that God from eternity has willed that some are to be damned and that they're predestined to be damned. He affirmed this by maintaining that God’s foreknowledge necessitates everything happening as it does because His foreknowledge is based on His knowledge of what He has willed by His hidden will to happen. His hidden will has willed everything that happens. If people are damned that's because He’s willed them to be damned. The idea that God hasn't willed anyone to be damned but that He somehow foreknows who will choose through free will to resist being converted is false teaching.
The Formula of Concord just fabricated a false belief system based on human reasoning. Everything in Article 11 hangs on the mistaken idea that God wouldn't be sincere in desiring everyone's salvation if He didn't endeavour to regenerate everyone through the Holy Spirit. And from this false premise it proceeded to misinterpret Scripture in order to fit this. And since it couldn't logically account for how it is that only the elect will be saved it dispensed with logic and argued that people shouldn't try to make sense of it but just accept it as true. The truth is that the FC teaching of universal resistible grace and single predestination is illogical and therefore isn't true. It's also more importantly unscriptural as Romans 9 in particular teaches double predestination.
@@Edward-ng8oo are you opposed to the idea that God only elected the ones whom he foresees would be cooperative after initial conversion? For example we anre all in the bondage of sin, we can not choose God. God chooses us and converts us. However there are regenerate people that commit apostasy. So what if God foresees that if the will is converted, some people will still choose to reject him, some people will follow him for a short period, and some people will continue to at least try to combat sin and follow him. Hence he calls certain people and preserves them because he sees the poor conversion inclination of their hearts? The non elect are the ones would with full autonomy still reject God. What do you say to that ? Keep in mind I am affirming monergism because God must first convert us before we can come to him.
@@WaterMelon-CatMy position is that God is omnipotent and wills and works everything that happens as Ephesians 1:11 states, and that God foreknows everything because He has willed it to happen in eternity and now in time He causes it to happen so that His foreknowledge necessitates what happens and everything is predestined to happen. This was Luther's position in The Bondage of the Will.
So I don't accept that God can foreknow what He doesn't determine to happen. If humans had autonomous free will then God couldn't foreknow what they would do as free will decisions by definition are unpredictable. Basically l don't accept that we have any input into whether we’re saved or damned because salvation and damnation are entirely determined by God who acts like a potter moulding vessels of honour and dishonour. So I don't accept that those who are damned have caused their own damnation by resisting the Holy Spirit. I simply don't accept that the Holy Spirit works universally through the Word. I hold that the Holy Spirit works irresistibly through the Word to regenerate only those the Father wills to regenerate.
I agree with Luther that we don't have free will with respect to both salvation and damnation and that if the elect at any time fall from grace then it’s only a temporary fall which God has predestined to happen, and that He will restore them at some point so that they're not finally lost and damned. Whether it happens that the Father converts some who He hasn't elected to save I’m unsure about as it seems rather harsh that He should irresistibly regenerate any who He hasn't elected to save.
@WaterMelon-Cat My position is that God is omnipotent and wills and works everything that happens as Ephesians 1:11 states, and that God foreknows everything because He has willed it to happen in eternity and now in time He causes it to happen so that His foreknowledge necessitates what happens and everything is predestined to happen. This was Luther's position in The Bondage of the Will.
So I don't accept that God can foreknow what He doesn't determine to happen. If humans had autonomous free will then God couldn't foreknow what they would do as free will decisions by definition are unpredictable. Basically l don't accept that we have any input into whether we’re saved or damned because salvation and damnation are entirely determined by God who acts like a potter moulding vessels of honour and dishonour. So I don't accept that those who are damned have caused their own damnation by resisting the Holy Spirit. I simply don't accept that the Holy Spirit works universally through the Word. I hold that the Holy Spirit works irresistibly through the Word to regenerate only those the Father wills to regenerate.
I agree with Luther that we don't have free will with respect to both salvation and damnation and that if the elect at any time fall from grace then it’s only a temporary fall which God has predestined to happen, and that He will restore them at some point so that they're not finally lost and damned. Whether it happens that the Father converts some who He hasn't elected to save I’m unsure about as it seems rather harsh that He should irresistibly regenerate any who He hasn't elected to save.
Thank you so very much ❤
This record contains sounds from outside, so like a machine working outside is quite bothering to listen to😢
@MrLegNick I know. I'm sorry about that. Unfortunately, there was nothing I could do about it. There was a very small window of time I could record that week, and the neighbor just started mowing their lawn during the recording.
thank you dr cooper
He changes times and eras. He removes kings, and he brings kings to power. He gives wisdom to the wise and knowledge to those who have good judgment.-Daniel 2
People don’t give God enough credit for the things that happen down here. He directly moves the people in this life. It goes beyond our ability to grasp. Why? Because He’s God and I am not.
Luther agreed that God has willed in eternity everything that happens on the earth and that He works everything that happens (Ephesians 1:11). In The Bondage of the Will he maintained that Scripture teaches that God through His hidden will has willed and predestined everything that happens and that His foreknowledge necessitates whatever happens. By contrast the Formula of Concord denies that God has willed and predestined everything that happens, and denies that His foreknowledge necessitates what happens. This is why confessional Lutherans aren't genuine Lutherans because they reject absolute predestination and deny that anyone is predestined to be damned. Luther however affirmed that Scripture teaches absolute predestination in that everything has to happen as it does, and that everyone is predestined to be either saved or damned. Confessional Lutherans (so-called) have been misled into believing that Scripture rejects double predestination and that Luther rejected it when he didn't. He affirmed it and interpreted Romans 9 in accordance with it. Those who subscribe to the FC are blind and don't give credit for what happens down here only to God.
@@Edward-ng8oo Luther never said anyone was predestined to be damned! That’s a lie! He agreed that God predestines those who are saved to be saved before the creation of the world. But the scriptures don’t say that God has predestined people to Hell. That’s unjust and completely outside of God’s character who wills that all be saved. Luther said when there is something in scripture that he couldn’t figure out, he’d take of his Dr. cap and assume the Holy Spirit is far more smarter than he!
@@villarrealmarta6103I commented below this video myself and in reply to others provided evidence for the fact that Luther maintained that God has predestined everyone to be either saved or damned, so rather than repeat myself I just want to refer you to what I wrote there. My opening words are “Luther in The Bondage of the Will ….”
@@Edward-ng8oo Luther’s bondage of the will first of all was written in like 1525. Luther’s views on predestination did change as he grew in faith. You have to keep the whole history of development in mind and not get off track by one book written in the early years. None of his sermons also ever expressed that he believed in double predestination, which is why the confessors never put Calvin’s views mixed with pire doctrine.
@@villarrealmarta6103I didn't realise you'd replied to me here. The Bondage of the Will by the way was written in 1525. Luther's views on predestination never changed as he’s recorded in later life saying that of all his writings he valued this book and his catechisms above everything else. Also there's an entry in his Table Talk where he says that he leaves behind his will and testament that what he'd written against Erasmus is “the unchangeable truth of God.”
Where do Roman Catholics fit on the spectrum of Augustinianism?
Catslogue of Testimonies!
The whole thing is quite muddled, isn't it, Dr Cooper?
I never ceased to be amazed at how highly educated people back themselves into a corner trying to explain how God elects only some to salvation, yet isn't responsible for the eternal damnation of the non-elect, or for all the evil they commit in the world.
Saint Athanasius destroys any sense of the negligent, weak view of God found in reformed theology.
"So, as the rational creatures were wasting and such works in course of ruin, what was God in His goodness to do? Suffer corruption to prevail against them and death to hold them fast? And where were the profit of their having been made, to begin with? For better were they not made, than once made, left to neglect and ruin. 8. For neglect reveals weakness, and not goodness on God's part - if, that is, He allows His own work to be ruined when once He had made it - more so than if He had never made man at all. 9. For if He had not made them, none could impute weakness; but once He had made them, and created them out of nothing, it were most monstrous for the work to be ruined, and that before the eyes of the Maker. 10. It was, then, out of the question to leave men to the current of corruption; because this would be unseemly, and unworthy of God's goodness."
~On the Incarnation
@@vitaignis5594 so what is St. Athanasius’ view of election ?
I completely agree that confessional Lutheran beliefs on election and predestination are muddled. However the situation is practically impossible to rectify because confessional Lutherans (so-called) believe they have very strong reasons for believing as they do. Their central belief is that God desires to save everyone through Christ (which is Scripturally true) but what they conclude from this is where they go wrong because they believe that God couldn't possibly be sincere in His desire to save everyone unless He at the same time endeavours to regenerate everyone by the Holy Spirit working through the Word and sacraments (the means of grace). So given the fact that they believe that the Holy Spirit is always efficacious in the means of grace and the fact that not everyone is converted they have to conclude that conversion is resistible which means that those who are damned have caused their own damnation and God hasn't predestined anyone to be damned. However because they believe in total depravity and the fact that everyone is resistant to believing in Christ they can't account for how anyone is saved because in order for anyone to be saved it obviously requires conversion to be irresistible in order to overcome people's inbuilt resistance to believing in Christ. So their belief system is riddled with illogicality which is enough to drive those who seek clarity completely insane. This is where Luther rides to the rescue because in The Bondage of the Will he maintained that God has predestined people to be saved and damned, and that the Holy Spirit regenerates irresistibly only those the Father wills to draw to Christ (John 6:44), and that those who aren't regenerated are predestined to be damned as Romans 9 teaches. Luther explained that God only desires to save everyone in His revealed will because through His hidden omnipotent will He has willed and predestined everything that happens. What Luther teaches is balm to the soul. It's Scriptural and logical and even though it seems harsh on those who aren't predestined to be saved nevertheless those who are of the elect accept that He has just reasons for why He doesn't will to save everyone.
The trouble is that confessional Lutherans have been so heavily indoctrinated against the idea that Luther believed in Calvinist predestination that it's very difficult to get them to recognise that he did. And even if they do recognise this they're very likely to conclude that Luther was wrong. They're so in love with their belief system that the fact that it doesn't make logical sense is no hindrance to them believing it. They've been convinced by clever arguments that it doesn't need to make logical sense. So since they're not open to the truth that because it's illogical it's not true there’s no way of convincing them that they've misinterpreted Scripture and that they're believing falsehoods.
@@Edward-ng8oo I do agree that the FoC specifically added contradictions to the Lutheran understanding of election. Howbeit I would not say that Luther believed that people were specifically elected and reprobated. Luther was an Augustinian, so let us look at St. Augustine’s view. St. Augustine believed that God willed to save everyone, hence he makes his grace available at all times through the sacraments. St. Augustine’s believed that people could be regenerate with real faith, but that the faith was temporal and could be lost. He also believed that perseverance was a gift given to some and not others. This seems to paint this idea. Gods grace is available to all, in which is created faith and saves, in this will he wants all to be saved. God has decreed and gifted perseverance to certain people, and they will ultimately die within the faith, although they can whilst living fall out of a state of grace, ultimately the elect will be restored before death. Howbeit, unlike perseverance, God has not decreed to reprobate anyone, he simply overlooks some for perseverance, but not by a decree of such. Therefore the reprobate are left to their own. This is basically a moderate form of calvanism but I do not think he taught that reprobation was by a decree but more so passively
Mat 11:27:
²⁷ All things are delivered unto me of my Father: and no man knoweth the Son, but the Father; neither knoweth any man the Father, save the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son will reveal him.
John 6:36-37,44-45,63-65:
³⁶ But I said unto you, That ye also have seen me, and believe not.
³⁷ All that the Father giveth me shall come to me; and him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out.
…
⁴⁴ No man can come to me, except the Father which hath sent me draw him: and I will raise him up at the last day.
⁴⁵ It is written in the prophets, And they shall be all taught of God. Every man therefore that hath heard, and hath learned of the Father, cometh unto me.
…
⁶³ It is the spirit that quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing: the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life.
⁶⁴ But there are some of you that believe not. For Jesus knew from the beginning who they were that believed not, and who should betray him.
⁶⁵ And he said, Therefore said I unto you, that no man can come unto me, except it were given unto him of my Father.
As Calvinist attending a LCMS (as a non member), Dr. J has finally explained better than this Lutheran pastor, how Gods soteriology in election unto salvation is stated in the Book of Concord ch.11 vs some who profess salvation are not really of the elect… that only God sovereignly knows his true sheep from the goats !
I don't understand why since you believe in Calvinist double predestination you’re attending an LCMS church. The LCMS agrees with the teaching on predestination contained in the Formula of Concord (FC), and the FC condemns double predestination as false doctrine. Confessional Lutherans (so-called) hold to the universal operation of the Holy Spirit in the means of grace (Word and sacraments), and hold that people are damned because they've resisted the Holy Spirit’s regeneration, not because they've been predestined to be damned. They reject that the Holy Spirit irresistibly regenerates people, so if you're a Calvinist then you do believe that people are regenerated irresistibly.
If you've read The Bondage of the Will (TBOTW) you'll know that Luther affirmed double predestination and that the Holy Spirit irresistibly regenerates some so that they're saved and bypasses others so that they're damned, but confessional Lutherans reject this. They’ve been misled into thinking that Luther agreed with them when he didn't. Luther completely rejected single predestination and the universal operation of the Holy Spirit in the means of grace.
If Luther was alive now there's no way he would attend an LCMS church. The LCMS isn't a genuine Lutheran church. Those who call themselves confessional Lutherans are followers of Martin Chemnitz not Luther. Chemnitz was the chief author of the FC and he denied what Luther affirmed in TBOTW. Luther affirmed that God has willed and predestined everything that happens and that His foreknowledge necessitates what happens, whereas Chemnitz in the FC denied all this.
Luther strongly maintained in TBOTW that Scripture teaches that God has predestined everybody to be either saved or damned. In contrast to this I had one confessional Lutheran say to me recently that double predestination is the doctrine of demons, and I think that a lot of confessional Lutherans will probably agree with that. They are therefore without realising condemning the teaching of Scripture as Romans 9 teaches double predestination, which Luther also affirmed was the case in TBOTW. So by attending an LCMS church you’re allying yourself with those who condemn what Scripture teaches. I don't attend any church because I neither agree with confessional Lutherans (so-called) over predestination or Calvinists over the Lord's Supper. All the churches are heterodox and so I can't join any of them.
Are you a divine determinist?
In view of predestination unto salvation and universal atonement, how do you reconcile that with the geographic limitations of the Church. How would you explain why 0 peasants from the mountains of Western China are saved while presumably many peasants from Europe are saved. Or is there a possibility that salvation can be granted to those who live far beyond the reach of the visible church on Earth?
Nestorian missionaries went and preached in China in the 600s and the Church of the East survived there until the late 1300s. There were efforts from Franciscan missionaries to reach China in the 1300s, but they were mostly unsuccessful. Jesuit missionaries would lead a renewed missionary effort in the 1500s, and Christianity has not left China since, despite the best efforts of Imperial and later Communist governments.
Therefore are you making the distinction that the gospel is monergistic and salvation is synergistic as you persevere unto final glory…?!
11:59
Just one point of critique:
Contrary to the popular sentiment, this is not the case. Arminius did not teach that. I have immense respect for you, but that statement - though extremely prevalent - is inaccurate.
"Faith is a gracious and gratuitous gift of God, bestowed according to the administration of the means necessary to conduce to the end, that is, according to such an administration as the justice of God requires”
-Jacob Arminius
"So, as the rational creatures were wasting and such works in course of ruin, what was God in His goodness to do? Suffer corruption to prevail against them and death to hold them fast? And where were the profit of their having been made, to begin with? For better were they not made, than once made, left to neglect and ruin. 8. For neglect reveals weakness, and not goodness on God's part - if, that is, He allows His own work to be ruined when once He had made it - more so than if He had never made man at all. 9. For if He had not made them, none could impute weakness; but once He had made them, and created them out of nothing, it were most monstrous for the work to be ruined, and that before the eyes of the Maker. 10. It was, then, out of the question to leave men to the current of corruption; because this would be unseemly, and unworthy of God's goodness."
"Now in truth this great work was peculiarly suited to God's goodness. 1. For if a king, having founded a house or city, if it be beset by bandits from the carelessness of its inmates, does not by any means neglect it, but avenges and reclaims it as his own work, having regard not to the carelessness of the inhabitants, but to what beseems himself; much more did God the Word of the all-good Father not neglect the race of men, His work, going to corruption: but, while He blotted out the death which had ensued by the offering of His own body, He corrected their neglect by His own teaching, restoring all that was man's by His own power."
On the Incarnation by Saint Athanasius
Dr. Cooper... Mideviel Church history, liturgy.. Study of.. Wars.. Martyrs.. Stuff
Dr. Cooper, I love your content and think you covered this topic very thoroughly, however, I think you are not describing the overarching reason that Lutherans hold to what others consider an irrational idea of election. You describe how for Calvinists why some are saved and others aren’t is simplified down to God’s sovereign choice. Then you describe how for Arminians the answer is down to human decision, but when you discuss the view of Lutherans, you simply say there is no easy answer. Why not explain how both the aforementioned pat answers may sound logical, but are actually ways of explaining salvation without mentioning Jesus Christ crucified and Jesus Christ risen (yikes). Why not explain how Lutherans never talk about election outside of the cross and the empty tomb?
I listened to your Romans 9 commentary and found the same issue. You did a superb job explaining verse by verse why the Calvinist and Arminian views are simply wrong, but you don’t really talk to an overarching reason that drives Lutherans to see the verses and their meanings the way Lutherans do. I could go to a Calvinist video of the same topic and they will clearly explain how their high ground is the sovereignty of God. I think for people growing up in Calvinist America, this overarching articulation is extremely persuasive and sometimes people need someone to point out (which I think is obvious to Lutherans) that such a view makes the cross and empty tomb a sideshow.
I think your content is awesome and please don’t take my coment too hard. It just seems like when talking election you are doing it with one hand tied behind your back and I don’t understand why. Maybe it is too much off the top rope. Maybe there is something I don’t understand. I think that even with one hand tied behind your back you do a superb job that blows away the opposing arguments. I just think it’s good to always explain for folks how for Lutherans Jesus Christ crucified and Jesus Christ risen is the high ground. Just my two cents.
In my comments below this video I showed that Luther in The Bondage of the Will maintained that God has predestined people to both heaven and hell and that he rejected single predestination and the universal operation of the Holy Spirit in the means of grace as taught in the Formula of Concord (FC). He held rightly that regeneration is irresistible and that only those the Father wills to regenerate through the Holy Spirit are drawn to Christ and given faith (John 6:44). Luther was therefore a Calvinist with respect to predestination except that he rejected limited atonement and believed that Christ’s atonement is universal.
Although I reject the teaching of the FC as Luther did it does rightly teach that the elect have been predestined to be saved from before the creation of the world as Calvinism does. The fact that true Christians have been predestined to believe in Christ doesn't detract from the fact that they can only be saved through Christ's atonement and resurrection. So I don't follow why you think this makes the cross and empty tomb a sideshow.
By affirming single predestination you simply back handedly affirm double predestination. Just admit it Lutherans! It's OK! Come! Be with us!!!! Shall we goith out and call the elect unto the Father? I think we shall Lord willing. 🙏
Luther affirmed double predestination on the basis of Scripture and logic, but confessional Lutherans (so-called) completely reject that Scripture teaches it and reject that it's necessary to believe it because it's logical. They oppose Calvinist double predestination because they think Scripture only teaches predestination to heaven and not predestination to hell. Luther however in The Bondage of the Will disagreed and maintained rightly that Scripture teaches that God has predestined people to hell as well as heaven. He taught that everything that happens has been willed by God's hidden will in eternity and that His foreknowledge necessitates everything happening as it does, and everything is predestined to happen. Confessional Lutherans however subscribe to the teaching in the Formula of Concord (FC) which specifically denies that God has willed everything that happens, and denies that His foreknowledge necessitates what happens, and denies that everything is predestined to happen. So it’s a complete reversal of what Luther held to be true. But the crazy thing is that the majority of confessional Lutherans think that Luther was in agreement with them and rejected double predestination. They have a complete distaste for double predestination and regard those who agree with it as being slaves of logic whereas in contrast they believe only what Scripture teaches.
Luther, if he was alive today, would regard confessional Lutherans as having been misled by illogical unscriptural teaching. He would have rejected single predestination on the basis that not only does Scripture teach double predestination but also because single predestination is illogical and therefore can't be true. However confessional Lutherans have been misled into thinking that what they believe doesn't need to be logical.
Their false belief that the Holy Spirit is universally efficacious in the Word and sacraments is why they reject predestination to hell as they believe that those who are damned are responsible for their damnation through having resisted being regenerated by the Holy Spirit. Luther rejected this and affirmed that the Holy Spirit is only efficacious in the Gospel and sacraments for those who the Father draws to Christ (John 6:44) and that the Holy Spirit works irresistibly to regenerate people. Also given the fact that everyone is depraved and an enemy of God it’s necessary that regeneration is irresistible or else no one would be converted. Also in order for God to predestine the elect to be saved it’s necessary that they be irresistibly converted. So nothing that confessional Lutherans believe about predestination and regeneration makes any sense. It's just an unscriptural and illogical mess.
I didn't mean to make this reply so long but I’m motivated to argue against what the FC teaches because it’s responsible for destroying genuine Lutheranism through misleading many thousands of people from the 1580’s onwards.
Clear as sewage
The truth is the idea of single predestination to heaven with no corresponding predestination to hell is an unscriptural and illogical idea which makes any attempt to explain it in rational terms impossible. It’s not capable of being understood because it doesn't make logical sense so it needs to be mentally flushed away. But confessional Lutherans (so-called) have been mentally captured by single predestination because of their belief in the universal operation of the Holy Spirit in the means of grace. They believe that the Holy spirit is always efficacious in the Gospel and sacraments so that if anyone is not saved that's because they've resisted being regenerated by the Holy Spirit and not because they've been predestined to be damned. Luther however rightly rejected that the Holy Spirit is always efficacious through the Gospel and sacraments, and held that the Holy Spirit is only efficacious with those who the Father wills to draw to Christ (John 6:44), and that the Holy Spirit irresistibly converts them. He held that God has predestined all people to be either saved or damned, and that everything that God foreknows is predestined to happen. Those who call themselves confessional Lutherans aren't in reality Lutherans. They're followers of Martin Chemnitz who was the main author of the Formula of Concord. This document contradicted Luther's teaching in The Bondage of the Will, but confessional Lutherans (so-called) have been misled into believing that Luther was in agreement with single predestination when he absolutely wasn't. It’s one big deception that's been going on for nearly 450 years. Luther was right in holding that scripture teaches double predestination, and the FC is wrong in teaching that God has only predestined people to be saved and not damned.
@@Edward-ng8oo thanks for the 'clarification' from sewage to street run-off
Since Satan’s fall with other angels (now demons) and Adam & Eves fall into sin for all mankind, all we deserve is GODs wrath and eternal damnation !
That he saves any is Amazing Grace unto eternal salvation !!
Walther said the elect can not fall away, so how does apostasy happen ?
Not all people who are regenerate are elect, Ala Hebrews 6 and 10
Hope Dr. J responds with a theological y !
I think like Judas they’re really not of the elect unto salvation; like in the sower parable respond to the gospel message for a season but will eventually fall away in apostasy of Jesus general gospel preaching message…what do you think ?
Dr. J later referenced to search for his other YT vids on apostasy…
@@claytongellerman8787 yes there is the elect, whom do not fall away, and the non elect whom can hold temporal faith. Howbeit if faith is a gift and Lutheran’s are Monergistic then that means the Holy Spirit works irresistibly during the conversion of the will. And then later cooperation is what? If it is resistible then the elect can fall, which they can’t. The Spirit would have to operate irresistibly in the elect and resistibly in the non elect. Unless God only elects in view of cooperation and hence the irresistible grace is in accordance with our freewill side he knows we cooperate after initial conversion
@WaterMelon-Cat The elect can and do resist after conversion, like King David. Yet they don't fall away at the end. We know that salvation is a gift of God's Perseverance but we don't know why some persevere and others don't
Luther in The Bondage of the Will (TBOTW) maintained that everything that happens has been willed to happen by God's hidden will, and that since He foreknows what He has willed His foreknowledge necessitates what happens and everything is predestined to happen. Luther argued that God’s foreknowledge is synonymous with His predestination and he didn't agree with the teaching that predestination isn't coextensive with His foreknowledge. Luther maintained that Scripture teaches that everything is predestined to happen and people are predestined to both heaven and hell.
When the Formula of Concord (FC) states that there’s been no public debate amongst Lutherans over election and predestination that's a misleading statement because those who agreed with Luther's teaching were labelled as Calvinists and not true Lutherans, and those who rejected predestination to hell were wrongly regarded as true Lutherans.
Luther denied that the Holy Spirit is always efficacious through the means of grace (the Gospel and sacraments). He argued from John 6:44 that only those drawn by the Father are regenerated by the Holy Spirit, and that the Holy Spirit works irresistibly in the hearts of the elect so that they can't fail to come to faith. If the Holy Spirit tries to work in the hearts of everyone through the Gospel and He can be resisted as Lutherans believe then no one could come to faith as everyone is naturally resistant to God through being depraved. We're all born in a sinful state because of original sin and are unable to come to Christ unless we're regenerated irresistibly by the Holy Spirit, and therefore those the Holy Spirit doesn't irresistibly regenerate are predestined to be damned as they're passed over by the Holy Spirit. This is what Luther teaches in The Bondage of the Will. He taught that Scripture teaches double predestination not single predestination.
Although Luther held that Christ’s atonement is universal and that God desires everyone's salvation through the Gospel, he made a sharp distinction between God’s revealed and hidden wills and maintained that even though God has a general desire to save everyone in His revealed will He nevertheless in His hidden will has predestined some to be damned.
I believe that what Luther taught in TBOTW is the truth as taught in Scripture, and I also agree with him that what is taught on predestination must be logical. I therefore don't accept that the FC doctrine of single predestination is Scriptural and true. The idea that predestination to heaven can exist on its own without predestination to hell I don't accept is a paradox. It's rather a logical contradiction for which there's no possible logical explanation, which means it isn't true. Scripture and logic teach double predestination not single predestination.
I'll stick with Jesus on this. He said, "that whoever believes in him should not* perish but have eternal life." God's will is for us to be his sons. What was predestined is that this would be accomplished through Christ.
@@tedroybal5231It sounds like you're in agreement with Leighton Flowers in believing that we're not individually predestined to be saved but that those who through free will believe in Christ will be saved because God has promised to save everyone who believes in Christ. Is this your view? I don't agree because I believe that those who believe in Christ have been individually elected and predestined to have faith in Christ from before the foundation of the world as Paul teaches in Ephesians 1.
So of course it's true that whoever believes in Christ will be saved and obtain eternal life. There's no dispute over that. The dispute is over whether we're predestined before creation to believe in Christ, and that in time the Holy Spirit irresistibly regenerates the elect so that they come to faith in Christ. This was Luther's position and is my position.
Dr. Cooper, can one be a Molinist AND a Confessional Lutheran?
@@TheSpider-hs4jo Honestly my only problem with the Lutheran confessions are their immense lack of clarity on the doctrine of election. Walther argued that election is a source of salvation, the Wisconsin scholastics argued differently and maintained a sacremental intuitu fide. I think there is room for different predestinstion views. I just wish the Lutheran magisterium would convene globally and make a ruling on this.
@@WaterMelon-CatThe idea of a Lutheran magisterium is in principle a return to Rome. It's the Holy Spirit who leads Christians into the truth, and He doesn't tolerate a range of beliefs on predestination. It’s necessary to believe that God has predestined people to both heaven and hell as Paul teaches in Romans 9 if one is to be saved.
Luther was right when he said that it's necessary to believe only the truth because if one believes false doctrine then one won't be saved. The only exceptions are those who are unaware of the truth and who believe false doctrine through lack of proper instruction, but they must be open to correction otherwise their faith is false.