Leighton definitely owes me a steak dinner after using a pic of me in the thumbnail from a time when I was complaining about a bad haircut that made me look like a trendy youth pastor. [EDIT] They updated the thumbnail. Hurray!
This was so wonderful! I'm with you. Please provide Scripture which clearly teaches otherwise. I believe this happens to us when we become entrapped in a systematic rather than simply taking Scripture for what it says. I'll probably listen to this again. Blessings to both of you.
Yes Sharon, the problem with any systematic (and I'm just now realizing what that actually is!) limits God and scripture. You have to pile up and cast aside verses that "don't apply" to your systematic.
@@sunshinegirl1967 - no you have to harmonize them, that’s the hard part that many don’t do. They just pit scripture against scripture a lot of times, competing prooftexts, instead of putting in the hard work to figure out a harmonization of all the texts.
@@krissyyoung9264 - agreed, but at the same time, reading “whosoever will” doesn’t imply “everyone can”. We would have to derive that latter phrase from the harmonization of other passages which speak on the topic. And if it’s not there, then we would just be left with a belief without scriptural support.
Me: Hey Soteriology 101! Can I please have a three and a half hour video featuring guest Idol Killer? Soteriology 101: Do you even have to ask? P.S. do you mind if we go over 3 and a half hours? Me: Do you even have to ask?
To be honest for many many years I assumed I was an “Arminian” because I was not a Calvinist. Only after listening to S101 did I realize I wasn’t an Arminian and most of the Christians I knew were not either.
Remember, 35:34 Arminian theology includes conditional security, which is works based doctrine . Calvinist are works based as well based on proof where the former is maintainance based. Both doctrines are heretical!!!
@@kevinkleinhenz6511 No you are false. If you have never placed your faith in Jesus alone for your salvation then you are not in fact saved in the eternal sense!!! Prove me wrong and don't even try James 2 !!!
@@gregorylatta8159 Friend 2/3 of the NT is telling Christians how to live. We are justified by faith but are you saying that is salvation? Are you just punching a ticket to Heaven and that’s what you consider salvation? Are you unaware that the just LIVE by faith? Are you aware that those that say they know God and don’t keep His commandments are liars? (1 John 2:4) Faith is not a state of mind it is a way of living. Don’t be deceived.
The biggest shock to me was the Arminians inability to even evaluate scripture without the shadow of Total Inability hanging over them. They COULD NOT understand very simple ideas just as Calvinists. I was speechless at the amount of IQ points not understanding 1+1=2 and the unacceptability of being called a Pelagian. I just call myself a full Pelagian nowadays and ask to talk scripture as this is a stumbling block they cannot mentally assuage.
Correct. They still assert the false Augustinian philosophy and anthropology that Calvinists affirm. Total Depravity, “sin nature” and Original Sin are all false.
Could one say that Arminianism provides TULIP with a PG rating, that is, parental guidance is recommended when applying prevenient grace to the viewing of Calvinism, or is my understanding totally depraved since birth?
Maybe prevenient grace is not a special grace given with the presentation of the gospel, but the very fact that every human being is made in the image of God, and this gift of grace works, as it were, naturally in the human being.
I'm thinking, what is it that would cause them to hold on so tightly to this kind of teaching that is not taught in scripture? How does "the inability of the lost to come to Christ" help or comfort the saved? Hmmm...... what's in it for them? I can think of a few. But it ain't scriptural at all. Good discussion, men. ☝️
They also use where Jesus said all the father gives to me will come to me and that he who started a good work in you will complete it. To say if God is drawing everyone then everyone would be saved.
This hang up on prevenient grace seems to be that the Armenians want to hear you say that we have to have the Holy Spirit going out with the gospel. The problem is that the Bible is not a book that always describes what HAS to happen. Instead, it says what does happen. The Armenian gentlemen didn't want there to be any room to say it COULD have been another way. It seems that fear of slippery slope leads them to affirm prevenient grace and total depravity.
After being justified, we are to lead a righteous life by obeying love your neighbour. We do this by being born again in the Spirit. I am not sure what are all these intellectual talk, are they useful?
You analysed purely in canal spirit, Brian you will know what I am talking about!!!! Lord please bless them all. The scripture is inspired by the Holy Spirit, the Spirit live in us would review the scripture truth, the outer source is the percentage of Holy Ghost live in you! That is why, we pray daily ‘ Fill me in the Spirit, so that we may be strong in you !’ Amen.
One of the oversights of Provisionism is the presumption that Arminian salvation is dependent upon its doctrine in the way that Calvinist salvation is directly proportional to its doctrine of depravity. In Arminianism, salvation is by free will and personal faith in the gospel and is not dependent upon, or proportional to a view of human nature or a philosophical and universal view of man' sinfulness. In other words Arminianism doesn't demand that you believe in man's depravity in a certain way in order to receive salvation or fulfill any prerequisites for salvation. In Calvinism, salvation is conditional upon your belief in its doctrine of man's depravity. Therefore Provisionism isnt presenting any new type of salvation to Christianity that hasn't already been presented in free will Arminianism. Provisionism is simply Arminianism minus certain aspects or effects of original sin, but since Arminian salvation isn't proportional to its view of man then provisionism isn't anything new other than the absence or dismissal of certain details.
From what I’ve seen, the only difference between Calvinism and Arminianism is that those whom God predestined to give to the son in eternity past, in Arminianism is based up foreseen faith and on Calvinism it is based only upon God’s choice since no one would come to faith in him without his help. In Arminianism, there is still some sort of thing in man that contributes to God’s selection in eternity past and on Calvinism, the selection is unconditional. Granted there are more cogs to turn but I think the bottom line is the above.
@@ourgreathighpriest1601 Not true. Arminianism doesn't claim you can lose your salvation. Southern Baptists are one of the largest Arminian groups and they don't believe you can lose your salvation. Everyone thinks their doctrine is the most Biblical.
I am a Free Will Baptist, which is an Arminian denomination. We believe that a believer can choose to turn away from and reject his or her faith and thereby commit apostasy. We don’t believe that individual sins cause a believer to lose his or her salvation (sanctification is a process after all not an event). Salvation is 100% by grace through faith.
The problem doesn't start with Augustine. It goes back to Origen's adoption of Plato, and by implication, Parmenides idea of the "It Is" which is another God altogether. Western Christendom is stuck in a battle of false dichtomies based in the Greek Philosophers and not ignorant of the Old Testament.
I watched a audio in ‘U’ Tube, a woman declared that even Jesus came down from heaven right in front of her, she still were not belief! 🙂🙂🙂🙏🙏🙏Man has no fear of God, in fact, we deep down, in our human autonomy, we were God so to speak, blinded by the light! 🙏🤷🏻♂️
The fact that the word on his tongue was enough is PG because it occurred and occurred because God wanted it to occur. The word not read, and the verbal explanation of the gospel not spoken is useless to the person who has never heard it. The person who shared the gospel was led by the spirit to do so, and therefore God‘s PG.
I am so perplexed about your statement about the work of the Holy Spirit externally n internally😂 Holy Spirit is a gentleman, He will not force His way into you! Behold, I am standing by your door n locked, if you open the door 🚪 I will enter🙂If you don’t so be it! If you don’t open your heart, that is the end of the history, you are free to do what you like! You bear 🐻 your consequence embrace in your own autonomy! You don’t need God from your statement ‘ I don’t care’. Our God is not a God of confusion, He meant very word He said in the Bible🙏
Some long programs are boring, but yours are not. Where some others seem to drag out and be repetitive, your programs are always full of content. If I don't have the time, I pause and continue listening later.
The one passages that speaks directly against INABILITY is Romans 1:18-32. Paul says in multiple ways the God made Hims self know THROUGH CREATION, man grasped it, man willfully rejected it and God gave them over. Paul makes the case that the evidence God gives in creation is enough. Someone in a far off tribe can see this evidence.
"Come let us reason together." What happened to evidence as a requirement to support a claim? A claim of Total Depravity, Total Inability, or regeneration before a human can hear, see or believe, must have scripture evidence. Not only is there NO evidence, there is evidence of WHAT we are that we can derive from scripture based on the events. To claim that human nature changed after the "fall," requires evidence. So, to understand events, and the meaning of the events, the first question that must be answered is WHAT HAPPENED? I start with "what," creature did God create? What are the abilities and inabilities of God's human creation, including ALL God's creation (e.g., evidence proves a dog cannot fly, because that ability was not created in a dog, but a dog can run and bark) WHAT were Adam and Eve, as created creatures, "able," to do by God's design? To answer that, we have to examine the events in Genesis. The first thing we notice is that Adam and Eve are created as adults, not as babies. We read that God made one command to His creatures, that they could eat from all the trees, except one tree. And God revealed WHAT would happen to them, should they choose to eat from the (forbidden) tree. We observe that for a time, they walked with God, suggesting a cooperative relationship. We observe that Eden was perfect, in the sense that there was no conflict or suffering, or ANY difficulty. Total provision and harmony. A perfect environment. Then there appears a serpent, that the Omnipotent God allowed in Eden. Why? We do not know, but can only speculate because scripture doesn't tell us why, it only reveals WHAT. Then we read that Eve was presented with an option, with a choice; and choice suggests her human ability to choose to accept or reject this option. Eve accepted the serpents offer, and then Adam accepted it as well. Then God acted in response to their (rebellion) choice by enacting curses upon them and removing them from paradise. According to scripture, this is WHAT happened before and after Adam and Eve's choice. No where do we read that God changed the nature of the human creatures He designed. He designed creatures with desire and will, without any limitations on either desire or will. His creatures also were created with the ability to reason, to think. After their eviction, Adam and Eve produced 2 sons, Cain and Abel. Then WHAT happened? Abel made an obedient choice, and Cain, a rebellious choice. There is no evidence in scripture that God caused or even influence the choice of Abel or Cain. Nothing in scripture indicates that the nature (abilities) of Cain and Abel was any different than the abilities of their parents, Adam and Eve. WHAT significant change occured to humans after Adam and Eve rebelled and were removed from Eden? Living conditions changed....Not human nature. Abraham, Noah, Moses and others exercised their God given abilities, just as Adam and Eve, and Cain and Abel did. And WHAT are those abilities? Here are a few: To see and listen; to consider options and choose among options; to select which desires are pursued; to act on the desired choice. None of what I have presented suggests that " salvation," is our doing, but rather that our part in salvation, is no different than any living or dead human in history. WHAT is our part? Accepting the gift of salvation God offers, and repenting. WHAT ARE WE? We are Adam and Eve in our nature, except we are living in hostile conditions, certainly not paradise.
So you can read Romans 7 and specifically 7:15 and think I can choose between two choices? Which do we do? We don’t understand our own actions. How depraved do you think or not think we are?
@@jasonpage4717 Yes, some times we are perplexed by our choices, particularly when we have competing desires. We can want to do one thing, and have a desire for another thing at the same time. Scripture supports that humans have always been able to choose which direction to move to satisfy desire. There no evidence that they can only and consistently choose evil, or only and consistently choose good.
@@jasonpage4717 I have no interest in a scripture war with you. Read all of Romans, every chapter, every verse. Know the audience Paul is addressing. I will counter your Romans 5: 18. With Romans 5: 14. When reading notice all the qualifiers. "Many," is not "all." Verse 18: What does "condemnation," mean? Did Adam's sin cause God's curses, that men were condemned to labor and toil, women to child birth pains, and both (all humans) to physical death. Are these not condemnations? At any rate I stand by my evidence produced in my first post, and unless you can provide scripture evidence that events DID NOT happen, the way I described, I have nothing further to add.
Wouldn't the parable of seed sown in different conditions of soil prove that man is not totally depraved? Doesn't it show that men are capable of believing the truth as far as they have conditioned their own heart toward God?
If the Word is not enough, and scripture tells us the Jesus is the Word (logos: everything God had to say to man) then by extension, Jesus is not enough.
Thank you Leighton and Warren! A well needed and good review. This really sheds some light on some views of Calvinism/Arminianism. The more I've learned about these theologies, the more I see an exhausting form of gatekeeping in Calvinism and Arminianism, that is more beholden to this Augustinian philosophy than the gospel.
l anyone that has come to Christ later in life and not through growing up in church, and being surrounded by Christian people in a denomination of some sort, will know that there is no Regeneration or this PG happening at all before salvation. The moment you believe is the moment God changes you. This is from personal experience. I was sticking needles in my arms before salvation. I really don’t think God was regenerating me before I believe. After through processes, and hearing the true gospel, I believed. And I literally became a new being. He has changed me Daily, and sometimes a minute by minute. This is what I think growing up with lots of different denominational presuppositions can be harmful.
I agree about the dangers of growing up in church! Calvinism is definitely rooted in infant baptism, and in telling the born-and-raised-in-church that they are already the obvious elect. Many times, churchgoers resist and scoff at being born again, assuming their supposed, elect status is good enough. They are often not too friendly to those of us who had trouble before we were saved, or became some kind of lost sheep, for awhile, afterwards. But there are true believing Christians among them, too. I agree: God was drawing you to regenerate you, but we aren't regenerated until we believe.
Praise God for you Brother! Just FYI, Calvinists believe regeneration (or being born again) precedes conversion. Arminians and the rest believe that being born again is posterior to conversion. But we are talking moments here, so the Calvinist would see you being giving a new birth, suffused with the Holy Spirit of power that enabled you to see the Cross as powerful and wisdom (see 1 Cor 1:30). Many see the same exact message you saw as futile and folly. But praise be to God that it became to you power and wisdom. May the Lord establish and keep you until the day he returns, when we can all marvel together!
It is great to remember that He said that He came for sinners, not the righteous. He came for those of us who have ruined our lives. I'd rather talk about that, and think on that, than argue or discuss these fine points of the meanings of words, especially when the intellectual pride gets too high flown. God bless you, and thank you for speaking up, Scotty.
As Warren said, Dr Heiser does not hold to total inability, and he has also written a series on his blog on Romans 5, against the idea of 'born guilty'. From everything I've heard and read from him (which is quite a lot 😅), it's clear he stands with you both on these subjects.
Romans 5:1-2 should end this. At about 1:10 they admit that the Word is the power unto salvation, but insist there must be something else to allow for/provide faith. Calvinists say you are regenerated, and these guys claim something else but it all revolves around faith being a gift by grace. The beginning of Romans 5 flat out states that faith leads to God’s grace, which is why they create a different grace.
Cain was born after Adam's fall. When Cain's sacrifice was not acceptable, he was warned, "If you do well, will you not be accepted? Sin is crouching at the door. It wants to master you, but you must master it." He does not say, "Sin has been in you since your conception. It has been your master, and you cannot master it." Also there was no cancelling of access to God through Adam's fall. God talked with Cain here and also after Cain had murdered Abel.
@@Mike65809 Are you being sarcastic? Or are you asserting that Cain was dead in trespasses and sins before he acted on his desires? And even from conception? I certainly don't see that anywhere in the Old Testament. Or for that matter, the New. The context has sin crouching at the door, not reigning in the house.
@@Mike65809 Eph 2:1¶And you hath he quickened, who were dead in trespasses and sins; 2Wherein in time past **ye walked** according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience: 3Among whom also we all had our conversation in times past in the lusts of our flesh, **fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind**; and were by nature the children of wrath, even as others. He meams that once we sin we become condemned; not that we sre condemned before we sin.
As a Free Will Baptist, we believe that the Holy Spirit works through the message of the Gospel to convict and prepare the heart to be able to accept the Gospel. We also don’t believe in Total Depravity in the way described in the video; we understand it in the same sense as Provisionalists - that we CANNOT do anything to earn God’s favor.
They don't give God more credibility, actually they make God blameworthy for making some people not believe... When people get to the judgement they can say it was God's fault they didn't believe, follow Jesus, or act in accordance with His will, because he didn't choose them. "It's God's fault because He caused me to follow Satan and fleshly things because he didn't choose me to be faithful and elect". That's just ridiculous!!! Also, if God forces/causes us to love Him it would not be true love... He only wants those who CHOOSE (of their own freewill/volition, not by involuntary force) to truly love Him, to enter and abide in His kingdom. I love John Lennox, what a beautiful man; a God sent instrument! 🙏
Consider the following from the Christian EAST! The MISSING DOCTRINE in the Protestant predestination debate is Eastern Biblical GRACE which is "God's love working in us" to enable ALL people to be free to receive or reject God's love! Philippians 2:12-13; Titus 2:11; 1 Timothy 2:3-6 The order is, Grace > Repentance/Faith > Life in Christ (regeneration) Jesus is truly God and truly man! The Bible is about the love of Jesus Christ for all! John 1:1-3, 14; 3:16; 1 John 4:8 It is by freely believing IN CHRIST by GRACE that we are chosen and elect IN Christ to be like Christ who is God's beloved Son and the only One chosen! Luke 9:35; Ephesians 4, 13; Romans 8:29 The riches in Christ are a result of our freely repenting and being faithful to Christ, which we can only do by the love and GRACE of God which is "God working in us!" 1 Corinthians 15:10 Apart from Jesus we can do nothing! John 15:5 But God loves His creation and loves all people and wants all to be saved! 1 Timothy 2:3-6 In love Jesus willingly died for all in order to raise from the dead to conquer death, sin, and the devil for all! This is Christus Victor! Hebrews 2:9, 2:14-15; 1 Corinthians 15:22; Colossians 1:20 God's loving Grace, which works in all who are dead in sin, enables ALL people to freely choose to love God and be saved! John 6:65; 12:32-33; Titus 2:11 But the choice to love God remains in all people! John 7:17; 11:35 The divine order is: 1) Loving Enabling Grace for all! John 6:65; 12:32-33; Titus 2:11 2) Our freedom to repent and be faithful to Christ! Acts 17:30-31 3) Being united and made alive with Christ (regeneration)! John 20:31 What the Calvinist system does not have is God's love and Grace "working in us to enable us" to be free to choose to be in Christ! Philippians 2:12-13; John 6:65, 12:32-33; Titus 2:11 The Calvinist system cannot explain why Adam was created very good, created in God's image and likeness, created with a mysterious free will, lived in a perfect environment, and had the Spirit of God, and yet, Adam chose to disobey God and fall from grace! Therefore, Christians can also freely fall from grace! Galatians 5:4 The Calvinist belief that God predestined most to go to hell, and that they are given no grace to freely believe is not the God of the Bible Who is Love! 1 John 4:8 God foreknew all those who would believe in His Son by God's Grace and God predestined them to be like Christ! Romans 8:28-30; Ephesians 1:4-5, 13 God did not determine who would believe in Him and who would not! God’s foreknowledge does not cause man’s choices! To choose Christ and receive Christ's love for us will be Heaven. To reject Christ and Christ's love for us will be the experience of Hell! The predestined reprobates in the Calvinist system never have a chance to experience the love of God! This is injustice! John 3:16 Calvinists believe that in the atonement God the Father poured out wrath and damned and cut off God His Son on the cross! This is a heresy condemned in the Ecumenical Councils because it splits the Eternal Holy Trinity! Christ died in order to raise from the dead and destroy death, sin, and the devil on behalf of us all! And now God commands everyone everywhere by the grace of God to repent! Acts 17:30-31; Romans 1:20
I believe in prevenient grace. It works externally and internally. Externally through nature and creation and other circumstances God chooses to use. Internally the of work of the Holy Spirit. It seems that John 6:44 has the trappings of PG.
@25:37 - - yeah. I see this all the time where I'm from. James White and John Mac are *notorious* for doing this... The pre-suppositional, "authoritative" fallacy of, "I don't have to supply the proof texts, because of who I am, whom I support, how I carry myself, and how dare you question me." Not even gentlemanly.
'Grace is undeserved favour, something not demanded by justice, that which under the circumstances might be withholden without injustice. It can never be just in any being to require that which under the circumstances is impossible.' ' A gracious ability to obey a command, is an absurdity and an impossibility.' (Charles Finney on Gracious Ability.)
14:20 how does this jive with what Romans 1 says... For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness, because that which is known about God is evident within them; for God made it evident to them. For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse. - Ro 1:18-20
Isn't John 16:7-11 the prevenient grace they are talking about? Isn't this work of the spirit that Jesus tells us about an extra work of grace, the Spirit, working alongside the grace of preaching of the gospel, and Jesus presents as something necessary or the person hearing won't respond positively? Or maybe John 16 is speaking, not of prevenient grace, but a necessary concurrent grace, that the spirit always goes forth with the word of God and it's preaching.
Nearly universally all the Arminians I encounter online don’t seem to realize they affirm the same false Augustinian axioms and philosophy that the Calvinists affirm. They only come to different conclusions. Arminianism is Calvinism, it’s the Arminius camp instead of the Beza camp. It’s still Augustinian Gnosticism.
John 12:35-37 shows we have free will . For a relationship to exist there always has to be a response. Grace through faith , can’t have one without the other . There is only one Holy Spirit so why is there so many different beliefs, and Denominations? Since there is seven different baptisms in the Bible could it be some people or not baptized in the Holy Spirit that brings understanding and trying to have understanding with their own intellect, then simply taking things out of context? We have so many different translations And changing words is causing us to take things out of context. Even the strongs concordance does not separate the Holy Spirit and the soul , talks as if they are one which is false.For example the disciples hung out with Jesus for a few years, Even though they were Christians they did not have understanding. And Paul who was on his own Wrote half the Bible , had understanding through the power of the Holy Spirit. That’s how it seems to me but I could be wrong .
I'd say you should leave immediately. Calvinism is a false gospel and according to the bible those who teach another gospel, which is no gospel, are accursed. The Gospel is the very foundation one builds on. Without a proper foundation, the house will fall. Even if you have the proper foundation, I can't believe you can successfully build on that foundation where the proper building tools and knowledge are false. Just my two cents. Also, even if you manage to do some building, I think your growth would be stunted.
"He that winneth souls is wise" has no meaning to a Calvinist since salvation is only by God sovereignly electing and moving upon any person he chooses to save, and said person has no choice. It has limited meaning, maybe, for an Arminian. But really, the statement in proverbs makes no sense unless it is possible for a person who is evangelizing to convince another person simply on the level of the ability to reason with superiority. A person who wins souls is wise because he tries to do so, and because he is wise because he has skills to affect the reasoning of the other person. In other words, this statement makes absolutely no sense if Arminian or Calvinist depravity/inability is true. If prevenient Grace is necessary, then it's not the winning of a soul that is effective, and therefore it is not wise in itself.
For me, God's general revelation IS the prevenient grace provided by God to all men that they are able to respond to. The very detailed revelation in the scripture goes far beyond the requirements of prevenient grace to prick a man's heart.
28:18 When you preach the Gospel and someone doesn't come to Jesus, is it because God didn't want them to believe and be saved? Or is it because you presented them with the means to be saved yet they themselves have decided not to believe? Same scenario but this time say you preach the Gospel and a person does come to Jesus, is it because God willed them to accept salvation?
I was in a group lately where they were using John 3 to claim that since Jesus said you cannot see the kingdom of God and you cannot discern spiritual things unless you're born again that you must be born again first to believe the gospel.
John 6:44 = prevenient grace, the grace that must come before. Jesus said that no man can come to Him, unless the Father draws him. That is the grace which the Bible says is necessary before we can believe and be saved. That is some kind of inability to do something. So it won't do to say that the Bible has nothing about a kind of grace that is necessary before we can believe and be saved. But it is not inability to hear and respond to God. We can't come to Jesus, unless/until the Father draws us, but we can respond to Him, positively or negatively, when He does. In John 5:24-25, Jesus said that the "dead" would hear the voice of the Son of God, and they that hear, shall live. Calvinists insert that the drawing is irresistible dragging, and of only a few. This is from a misuse of where Jesus said that all that the Father gives Him, will come to Him. But it doesn't say that all who are drawn to Jesus by the Father will come to Him. They will generally say that that theres no difference, and it's absurd NOT to read 'all who are drawn' into 'all who are given to Jesus by the Father'. But they can only say so, because they ignore John 12:32, where Jesus says that if He is lifted up, He will draw ALL men unto Himself. John 12:32 cannot mean irresistible dragging, because all men do not come to Jesus, and Jesus would not draw people insincerely. So the grace of 12:32 is not irresistible grace, but could it be some different kind of "drawing" than the drawing of John 6:44? The Father and the Son are not in disagreement; Jesus did not tell us about a drawing to Himself that is some trinitarian controversy. It is drawing to Jesus that the drawings of both verses are concerned with, and both verses are about salvation. And think about when Jesus said this, how the "prince of the world" approached, but especially how He made His drawing all men, contingent on His going to the cross! What Jesus said was seriously important, about how He would be toward all men, because of the cross He was headed to, very soon after He spoke. It should not be shrugged off as if it was just the Son indulging in some teenage rebellion, making Himself seem kinder (hence more popular!) than "the (Calvinist!) old man", while heading, of course, to the cross. I am not trying to be irreverent, but that is what it is like, when they disregard the really important things that Jesus said, because they are so "useless" to defend Calvinism. Mystical inner work? moral persuasion. "Come, let us reason together. ..." Inside or outside work? God is outside, speaking to people's inside. Then, when we have believed and been saved, the Holy Spirit indwells us. Yet we need to distinguish between Him and ourselves. "Inside" doesn't meant that He is us, after all. Partial regeneration? All that God does to bring us to salvation is intended to lead us to regeneration, to become born again. We might be part way to regeneration, but we're not regenerated until we believe in Jesus as our Savior, which is what the Holy Spirit is convicting us to believe.
Yes good analysis. I would point out the simple fact that two drawings are being spoken of, one before the cross and one after, " when I am lifted up from the earth." Whenever we have a scriptural contradiction like that we ought to take careful note and come up with some kind of reasonable explanation. What do you think?
@@nicholasgeorge7825 I don't see the contradiction. Jesus didn't say that everyone who was drawn would come to Him. He said everyone who was given to Him by the Father would come to Him. If all are drawn to Jesus now, do they now have responsibility? Does it matter whether we come to him now, but it was impossible then? Surely that is not true. And it is possible that God always drew every person who comes into the world to Christ, spiritually, seeing that He is said to be "slain from the foundations of the world". Those who are drawn would be everyone. All who respond positively to the Holy Spirit's drawing, would later receive Jesus: they would be the ones would come to Him, and would also would be the ones who are given to Him by the Father.
@@lindajohnson4204 - you are one step away from Calvinism! And here is the step: Did God predestine the people he gave the Son in eternity past? Yes or no? Because if God did so, if he chose us individually to be in Christ in eternity, then God’s intention with the gospel in Providence is to specifically seek out those people.
@@gregmahler9506 No, I am not. Or if I'm one step away, that last step is fatal, and completely unnecessary. Calvinism disagrees with the Bible, so why let it almost destroy my faith? Even worse, why let it do that to me again? I appreciate your friendliness, but I have hated Calvinism, since it first tried to destroy my faith, when I was 12, in 1964. I am definitely not going back, but I don't have to, because it isn't in agreement with the Bible! That's the main way we test the spirits, after all. And I know, from hard experience, that those gnostic spirits, that wanted to change the doctrine of predestination to fit the ancient pagan Fates and gods, are pretty mean, and do not have good intentions at heart. They want God's character to be slandered by a Christian doctrine! Works great, to tempt people to abandon Christianity.
*Righteousness through imputation:* Romans 4:16 *¶Therefore it is of faith, that it might be by grace; to the end the promise might be sure to all the seed; not to that only which is of the law, but to that also which is of the faith of Abraham; who is the father of us all,* 17 (As it is written, I have made thee a father of many nations,) before him whom he believed, even God, who quickeneth the dead, and calleth those things which be not as though they were. 18 *Who against hope believed in hope, that he might become the father of many nations, according to that which was spoken, So shall thy seed be.* 19 And being not weak in faith, he considered not his own body now dead, when he was about an hundred years old, neither yet the deadness of Sara's womb: 20 *He staggered not at the promise of God through unbelief; but was strong in faith, giving glory to God;* 21 *And being fully persuaded that, what he had promised, he was able also to perform.* 22 *And therefore it was imputed to him for righteousness.* 23 *¶Now it was not written for his sake alone, that it was imputed to him;* 24 *But for us also, to whom it shall be imputed, if we believe on him that raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead;* 25 Who was delivered for our offences, and was raised again for our justification.
Yeah, I was going to comment the same thing. I had the honor of being in a small group online with him in the last months of his life where he took Q&A-- where some of these newer clips are coming from-- and he was not on board with "original guilt"... he even had a book project on his radar. I mentioned Adam Harwood and this channel multiple times. He had no time for non academic TH-cam and writing. He had a lot of things left on his plate when he passed. He did believe apostasy for the believer was a real thing as the bible speaks to believers about the concern. I tend to agree with a lot of his views and have come out of the mindset that we have to 100% agree on everything to walk together. I am really happy for him being in the presence of the Lord as we await the new heaven and new earth. I learn so much from your videos, Leighton and Warren and enjoy the dialogue aspect. Building some cabinets today and it feels like friends are having coffee in the dining room and I get to overhear. Continued prayers and thank you for helping me leave some damaging beliefs behind. ❤ Angela
QUESTION: So from an Arminian perspective is PG just floating around in the air affecting everyone? Or is it more like pre-faith regeneration in Calvinism where God has hand selected some? See the discussion @3:05
One of the convoluted aspects to Provisionism is that they are confessing monergists whereas Arminians are confessing synergists who believe that the singular salvation of God is granted on condition, and effectually appropriated by the exercising of personal faith by free will. This is where Arminianism is far more non Calvinistic than Provisionism.
@@gregmahler9506 Yeah, they claim to be monergists in the sense that "salvation is of the Lord" alone (which we all believe). But monergism is an exclusive term which means that God does everything without you, despite you, or irrespective of you...which they conversely deny. According to Drew McLeod of the "Provisionist Perspective", he claims to be a monergist simply because he doesn't like the negativity that comes with the idea of synergism (conditional salvation). So Provisionist have a funny way of saying that salvation is a spiritual thing that's the work of God alone, but then they hold to a free will acceptance or rejection of conditional salvation. I'm not trying to hold them to any particular terminology but they're simply riding the fence of terminology and actual salvation mechanics.
Dr. 🌷, I love your humility to day, just ask God for the Holy Spirit to fill you, I think that you will be so great n powerful in God👍👍👍for you have the 🧠 n knowledge, I will also pray for you🙏🙏🙏
Provisionism doesn't deny grace people. It places grace in the Gospel, as well as in creation, and in the image of God which retains a knowledge of right and wrong even in a state of sin. You have to remember that the forbidden fruit was the knowledge of good and evil. So sin is not abjection in the sense of utter darkness. Evil is not meaninglessness but the failure of the good. No Jew would ever have affirmed abjection at least not for the Jew. Now whether the Gentle is abject or not is debatable, but probably profitless. He has made of the two one new man. The coming of Christ changes heaven and earth in some cosmic way.
I agree about you good and evil statement. I can't remember where I read this, as in the early 90s I thought by studying everything I could get my hands on would make me wise and mature, (I was wrong!), but I remember reading a Rabbi's take one the "evil" part of the tree. He said that evil in this case would better be thought of as wretchedness. I don't know if that is accurate or not, but it sure makes sense. Mankind in general has endured wretchedness, much of it by its own hand for millennia.
Thanks for that reply. There's still room for mystery. And I welcome revelation, having read many books myself and learned only that there's more to everything than meets the eye.
Isn't it essence? Like, an "ontological change" would signify a change of one's essence... such as from death to life; or as becoming "a new creation in Christ" ("Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new." 2 Cor. 5:17) Therefore, the man who becomes a new creature in Christ has undergone an ontological change.
I have a few questions for Provisionists: 1.) “The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned.” 1 Corinthians 2:14 ESV What is Paul saying here? Ontologically, what is the “natural” person and how does it differ from the “spiritual” person? Most of the time when I have asked this, Provisionists just move over to chapter 3 and talking about how Paul could not address some of the believers in Corinth as spiritual. But they don’t really address the “natural” person question. What is it that this “natural” person can’t do and why is that? Can the same person be both “natural” and “spiritual”? Where if they were acting “natural” they can’t understand some things but if they turned to the “spiritual” they could understand them? Can a person switch this on and off? Thanks! 2.) “For the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to God’s law; indeed, it cannot. Those who are in the flesh cannot please God. You, however, are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if in fact the Spirit of God dwells in you. Anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him. But if Christ is in you, although the body is dead because of sin, the Spirit is life because of righteousness.” Romans 8:7-10 ESV From the above, let’s say we have a person who does not have the Spirit of God (does not belong to Christ). Would they be able to please God without the spirit? Thanks again! I look forward to reading your replies!
"Would they be able to please God without the spirit? " Well no, but the question is, would they be able to respond at all? or are they put through however many steps it is in Calvinist dogma? Is the "natural" state a state of the will or is it congenital with every individual on the planet? Is there any passage that explicitly confirms the doctrine of "total depravity" from birth in the Calvinist sense? Not that we're merely sinners; but that every one of us is totally unable to respond in any way to the gospel. Is the Calvinist step of "regeneration" -- or even any of the Calvinist "ordo salutis" -- ever anywhere explicitly stated in the Bible?
@@ddr5138 - ok thanks for saying “no” to the question that asked if a person without the spirit could please God. “And without faith it is impossible to please him, for whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him.” Hebrews 11:6 ESV From the above we have that it’s impossible to please God without faith. Do you see the problem?
The problem I see is the idea that you to be given faith in order to have faith. But it absolutely does say that "without faith, it is impossible to please Him", no denying that.
There's a good answer to your good question. Natural is really soulical to use a word coined by the Chinese martyr Watchman Nee. Its the man of the soul who cannot receive the things of the spirit. This doesn't make the problem any easier for the man but it clarifies Paul from Calvinist crust. I'm of the belief that the regenerative seed of the Spirit is probably unlimited. If we take the Parable of the Seed as our proof text we see no shortage on the words end but the problem to be the heart of man which is represented by soil and what quality it is. Now it could be argued that hard rocky soil can't be rich loamy soil and vice versa and that's true. But were not speaking strictly literally. Hearts can change. And the word is continually being planted. I think this is the key. All the mistakes of Calvinism come from limiting God. Thinking backwards they start with the premise that some (or most!) people won't be saved, now what can we say about God? But start with God and his character and then move forward as we find in Genesis 1!
@@ddr5138 - amen, so we see the tension here! On one hand (Romans 8:7-10), we can’t please God without the Spirit and on the other hand (Hebrews 11:6) we can’t please God without faith. By logic, necessarily we would need to be given the Spirit *prior* to coming to faith in order to harmonize these passages.
Now I know, you two totally have no Holy Spirit concept, that is why you could not see deep into the truth, my God , we need to pray for you two!!! The Holy Spirit at work all the time, Oh no🙏🙏🙏🙏🙏🙏That is what you n Calvinists lacking, you will not able to see the depth of the scripture without him, Oh no your answer is so pitiful, I am right about you for no Spirit in you. I pray Spirit of the living God, please come and bless these two brothers, open their Spirit eyes, so that they can see!!!!😭😭😭🔥🔥🔥🙏🙏🙏
Trust Dr. 🌹, you will be so great in the kingdom of God, go for the Holy Spirit ask Him to well up in you🤣🤣🤣🙏🙏🙏you will have so much fun n happiness 👍👍👍🔥🔥🔥
The Spirit of the living God can instantly hit us liked He stroke Paul! The Holy Spirit can touch anyone like He reacted instantly to the word of the Father, ‘Let there be light, n there was light’ And yet, Dr 🌷asked how? Hardening was for specific purposes, dead on! At those days, the spirit of the living God was not lived in our heart, the Holy Spirit only came as a special anointing to give them the power, like Moses battled withe the Egyptian pharaoh, it would be gone after the event. When Jesus died on the cross, the Holy Spirit would come to the believers’ heart, to teach us all thing about the Bible, that is different from special anointing case! It is the Holy Spirit live in us Not Jesus, the Holy Spirit will always magnify Jesus, that is how we discern the spirit whether is it the evil spirit or Holy Spirit comes in, evil spirit would only feel good for yourself pleasure n the Holy Spirit comes in will make you want to worship Jesus n He would be magnify beyond comprehension 🙏🙏🙏oh no, you have no idea about Holy Spirit, there will many things you will not understand🙏🙏🙏
Seems the only practical difference is that they think the “natural” person without the Spirit of God (who does not belong to Christ) can please God by having faith in the gospel. But this is contrary to scripture, which is the most clear here: “For to set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace. For the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to God’s law; indeed, it cannot. Those who are in the flesh cannot please God. You, however, are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if in fact the Spirit of God dwells in you. Anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him. But if Christ is in you, although the body is dead because of sin, the Spirit is life because of righteousness.” Romans 8:6-10 ESV Here we see that *without the Spirit of God in us* , we are hostile to God, unable to submit to God’s law, and unable to please God. This is why both Arminians and Calvinists believe that the Holy Spirit must work within a “natural” person to help them understand the spiritual truths in the Gospel and to please God by having faith in his son. Provisionists do not believe Romans 8:6-10 says that but also don’t have any exegesis to counter it (just a bunch of philosophy and “nuh uh’s”).
@@Dizerner Thank you, that was complicated so I'm not sure I noticed every detail, but I didn't see much about practical distinctions. I'm thinking about practical differences regarding our own behavior, in case that wasn't clear. It doesn't seem to matter how things work from God's perspective if the result is indistinguishable to us. Is it that an arminian would pray for God to open people's minds, but a provisionist wouldn't think that could matter?
@@a.k.7840 - ok argue it! I’m all ears. How would you exclude that from “pleasing God”. “And without faith it is impossible to please him, for whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him.” Hebrews 11:6 ESV Especially since the above.
@@gregmahler9506 Is God pleased by some one coming to faith in Christ? Of course! But this is not what Paul is talking about when he says "without faith it is impossible to please God." Paul is saying that obedience without faith cannot please God. Notice he says that they "must believe He exists."
In the name of Christianity, I am perplexed by Dr. Flowers 🌺 n Dr. McGrew🙂The Bible can not be more specific everywhere🤣You go against the Bible principal. We are at the best ‘filthy rag’ with not even match the cockroach 🪳 nature, at least a cockroach would not deliberately do evil. But we do! You are so humanistic, so far , at this stage of my understanding from this originally stage😂I could understand you do not like the ‘U’ unconditional election, but ‘T’👍🤷🏻No one church has complete correct interpretation but the mission must be concurrent which must Christians have👍👍👍🙏🙏🙏I think that you are at the slippery slope simply from your statement ‘I don’t care’ 🤷🏻♂️
PG is God working in our lives. It’s how we receive the gospel is by his grace. It’s how God works in our life before we are saved to bring about salvation. It’s merely how God makes himself known to us in a meaningful relational persuasive way that will either lead to us, hardening our hearts, or excepting his free gift of salvation. It’s God doing that through man through nature, the bible, the word of God etc..
The understanding of PG as you have described is in agreement with the many means of grace that Provisionists acknowledge. But what you are describing is NOT the "Classical Arminian" definition of PG that is asserted to be required to overcome Total Inability.
I am not sure why they are so hung up about terminologies. We are to be led by the Spirit. If indeed the Spirit is in us. We will love Christ and obey him. And by loving one another in Christ, others will know we are one body. Paul warned us in engaging in fruitless talk.
I was always taught, and I was just talking to my pastor the other day, that PG is for lack of a better term provision. However, God makes his provision to make his best case to each individual man to persuade him to come and have faith in him, so that he may be saved. you say provision, you could say P G. Because outside of his provision, no one is getting saved. Furthermore, it is more than just the word of God its relationships, it’s friendships. It’s getting to know people because God put those people in their lives because the leading of the spirit ect. Outside of that, you have no ability to know God unless God makes himself known. In whatever way God makes himself known in a relational way is PG. PG is external working to convict the heart. No regeneration only persuasion.
Dude by grace are we saved and that goes for in Noah's day as well as it goes for today. Now do yourself a big favor and go back into Genesis and see yourself the determining factor as to why Noah was saved and the world perished and I'll bet you'll see that it was Noah and only Noah who found grace in the eyes of the Lord and that is the only reason why Noah preached the gospel for 120 years and no-one but his family heard the message. I mean just try to connect the dots in this that only by grace which is being drawn by God's Spirit can one ever be saved and it is nothing of ourselves, it is the gift of God, and that the choice was not given to either Noah or the rest of the world to be either saved or lost, but it was all God's election who is the Potter and we are only the clay who are made exactly how he chooses to make us.
As I said in the live chat, Provisionists are becoming Pelagians who deny any metaphysics concerning sin and salvation. Biblical Psychology by Osward Chambers, The Normal Christian Life by Watchman Nee, and The Spiritual Man by Watchman Nee are towering and enduring testaments of the Biblically factual reality of deep metaphysics concerning sin and salvation. Trying to dismiss certain aspects of original sin and its effects it's not a smart way to counter Calvinism. Provisionists have fallen for the trap, and instead of countering Calvinism with what God has resolved concerning depravity...the Provisionists has simply decided to dismiss depravity. This is a great disservice to Christianity because it never investigates what God has done through Christ in response to depravity. That's how you combat Calvinism.
CHRIST (Matthew 15:24) I am NOT sent but unto the Lost sheep of the house of ISRAEL PAUL (Romans 9:3-5) For I could wish that myself were accursed from Christ for MY BRETHREN, my kinsmen according to the "FLESH" who are ISRAELITES; to whom pertaineth the ADOPTION, and the GLORY, and the "COVENANTS" and the giving of the LAW, and the service of God, and the "PROMISES" whose are the fathers, and of WHOM AS CONCERNING THE "FLESH" CHRIST CAME ☝️ According to scripture Calvinist have it correct - they've simply inserted themselves rather than the ethnic Israelites - which is the false theme of modern Christianity regardless of denomination
No, how depravity is viewed is an issue of paramount importance; the issue is Calvinists believe and preach the man-made theory of the Calvinist God being the sole chooser and predestiner of who will and who will not be one of the elect; by definition, this, along with the rest of Reformed Theology's apologetic, paints the Calvinist God as an *impersonal, whimsical, hateful, discriminatory, unjust, merciless, selfish, sadistic, monster of mindless robots; who barbecues "Totally Depraved", invincibly ignorant, innocent people in Hell for no known plausible reason, other than his own good selfish glory and his own good sadistic pleasure, by denying them, love, grace and regeneration he never gives the non-elect goat people a single hope or a chance or a prayer;* which any child can see is blaspheme. What Christ has done and what Provisionism preaches is that Salvation has been made available to *EVERYBODY!*
Leighton definitely owes me a steak dinner after using a pic of me in the thumbnail from a time when I was complaining about a bad haircut that made me look like a trendy youth pastor.
[EDIT]
They updated the thumbnail. Hurray!
This was so wonderful! I'm with you. Please provide Scripture which clearly teaches otherwise. I believe this happens to us when we become entrapped in a systematic rather than simply taking Scripture for what it says. I'll probably listen to this again. Blessings to both of you.
Yes Sharon, the problem with any systematic (and I'm just now realizing what that actually is!) limits God and scripture. You have to pile up and cast aside verses that "don't apply" to your systematic.
@@sunshinegirl1967 - no you have to harmonize them, that’s the hard part that many don’t do. They just pit scripture against scripture a lot of times, competing prooftexts, instead of putting in the hard work to figure out a harmonization of all the texts.
@@gregmahler9506But you have to harmonize without changing the meaning of words, such as, “whosoever”.
@@krissyyoung9264 - agreed, but at the same time, reading “whosoever will” doesn’t imply “everyone can”. We would have to derive that latter phrase from the harmonization of other passages which speak on the topic. And if it’s not there, then we would just be left with a belief without scriptural support.
What about 'whosoever will' verses whosoever won't (not can't)
Me: Hey Soteriology 101! Can I please have a three and a half hour video featuring guest Idol Killer?
Soteriology 101: Do you even have to ask? P.S. do you mind if we go over 3 and a half hours?
Me: Do you even have to ask?
To be honest for many many years I assumed I was an “Arminian” because I was not a Calvinist. Only after listening to S101 did I realize I wasn’t an Arminian and most of the Christians I knew were not either.
Same here. I just found out there are 5 points to Arminianism to counter tulip. I don't even want to know what they are.
Remember, 35:34 Arminian theology includes conditional security, which is works based doctrine . Calvinist are works based as well based on proof where the former is maintainance based. Both doctrines are heretical!!!
@@gregorylatta8159 If your salvation experience doesn’t include works it’s false.
@@kevinkleinhenz6511 No you are false. If you have never placed your faith in Jesus alone for your salvation then you are not in fact saved in the eternal sense!!! Prove me wrong and don't even try James 2 !!!
@@gregorylatta8159 Friend 2/3 of the NT is telling Christians how to live. We are justified by faith but are you saying that is salvation? Are you just punching a ticket to Heaven and that’s what you consider salvation? Are you unaware that the just LIVE by faith? Are you aware that those that say they know God and don’t keep His commandments are liars? (1 John 2:4)
Faith is not a state of mind it is a way of living. Don’t be deceived.
The biggest shock to me was the Arminians inability to even evaluate scripture without the shadow of Total Inability hanging over them. They COULD NOT understand very simple ideas just as Calvinists.
I was speechless at the amount of IQ points not understanding 1+1=2 and the unacceptability of being called a Pelagian. I just call myself a full Pelagian nowadays and ask to talk scripture as this is a stumbling block they cannot mentally assuage.
So they have a "total inability" to evaluate scripture without the presumption of total inability?
Well said. Seems like total inability is everyone's default.
Correct. They still assert the false Augustinian philosophy and anthropology that Calvinists affirm. Total Depravity, “sin nature” and Original Sin are all false.
Could one say that Arminianism provides TULIP with a PG rating, that is, parental guidance is recommended when applying prevenient grace to the viewing of Calvinism, or is my understanding totally depraved since birth?
Maybe prevenient grace is not a special grace given with the presentation of the gospel, but the very fact that every human being is made in the image of God, and this gift of grace works, as it were, naturally in the human being.
I'm thinking, what is it that would cause them to hold on so tightly to this kind of teaching that is not taught in scripture?
How does "the inability of the lost to come to Christ" help or comfort the saved? Hmmm...... what's in it for them?
I can think of a few. But it ain't scriptural at all. Good discussion, men. ☝️
They also use where Jesus said all the father gives to me will come to me and that he who started a good work in you will complete it. To say if God is drawing everyone then everyone would be saved.
This hang up on prevenient grace seems to be that the Armenians want to hear you say that we have to have the Holy Spirit going out with the gospel. The problem is that the Bible is not a book that always describes what HAS to happen. Instead, it says what does happen.
The Armenian gentlemen didn't want there to be any room to say it COULD have been another way. It seems that fear of slippery slope leads them to affirm prevenient grace and total depravity.
After being justified, we are to lead a righteous life by obeying love your neighbour. We do this by being born again in the Spirit. I am not sure what are all these intellectual talk, are they useful?
You analysed purely in canal spirit, Brian you will know what I am talking about!!!! Lord please bless them all. The scripture is inspired by the Holy Spirit, the Spirit live in us would review the scripture truth, the outer source is the percentage of Holy Ghost live in you! That is why, we pray daily ‘ Fill me in the Spirit, so that we may be strong in you !’ Amen.
One of the oversights of Provisionism is the presumption that Arminian salvation is dependent upon its doctrine in the way that Calvinist salvation is directly proportional to its doctrine of depravity. In Arminianism, salvation is by free will and personal faith in the gospel and is not dependent upon, or proportional to a view of human nature or a philosophical and universal view of man' sinfulness. In other words Arminianism doesn't demand that you believe in man's depravity in a certain way in order to receive salvation or fulfill any prerequisites for salvation. In Calvinism, salvation is conditional upon your belief in its doctrine of man's depravity. Therefore Provisionism isnt presenting any new type of salvation to Christianity that hasn't already been presented in free will Arminianism. Provisionism is simply Arminianism minus certain aspects or effects of original sin, but since Arminian salvation isn't proportional to its view of man then provisionism isn't anything new other than the absence or dismissal of certain details.
From what I’ve seen, the only difference between Calvinism and Arminianism is that those whom God predestined to give to the son in eternity past, in Arminianism is based up foreseen faith and on Calvinism it is based only upon God’s choice since no one would come to faith in him without his help. In Arminianism, there is still some sort of thing in man that contributes to God’s selection in eternity past and on Calvinism, the selection is unconditional. Granted there are more cogs to turn but I think the bottom line is the above.
No so Arminianism say you can lose your salvation. Provisioning is just putting a name to a more traditional or I would say biblical view
@@ourgreathighpriest1601 Not true. Arminianism doesn't claim you can lose your salvation. Southern Baptists are one of the largest Arminian groups and they don't believe you can lose your salvation. Everyone thinks their doctrine is the most Biblical.
I am a Free Will Baptist, which is an Arminian denomination. We believe that a believer can choose to turn away from and reject his or her faith and thereby commit apostasy. We don’t believe that individual sins cause a believer to lose his or her salvation (sanctification is a process after all not an event). Salvation is 100% by grace through faith.
@@heyman5525Many Southern Baptists are 4 or 5 point Calvinists.
Question: do you believe that a ‘gracious’ act on God’s part is grace? IOW, does ‘gracious’ act = grace?
The problem doesn't start with Augustine. It goes back to Origen's adoption of Plato, and by implication, Parmenides idea of the "It Is" which is another God altogether. Western Christendom is stuck in a battle of false dichtomies based in the Greek Philosophers and not ignorant of the Old Testament.
Those dichotomies aren't all false. Plato seems to have understood heaven and earth, the basic dichotomy of Genesis 1:1.
I watched a audio in ‘U’ Tube, a woman declared that even Jesus came down from heaven right in front of her, she still were not belief! 🙂🙂🙂🙏🙏🙏Man has no fear of God, in fact, we deep down, in our human autonomy, we were God so to speak, blinded by the light! 🙏🤷🏻♂️
The fact that the word on his tongue was enough is PG because it occurred and occurred because God wanted it to occur. The word not read, and the verbal explanation of the gospel not spoken is useless to the person who has never heard it. The person who shared the gospel was led by the spirit to do so, and therefore God‘s PG.
Do we need to be led by the Spirit to witness to others?
I am so perplexed about your statement about the work of the Holy Spirit externally n internally😂 Holy Spirit is a gentleman, He will not force His way into you! Behold, I am standing by your door n locked, if you open the door 🚪 I will enter🙂If you don’t so be it! If you don’t open your heart, that is the end of the history, you are free to do what you like! You bear 🐻 your consequence embrace in your own autonomy! You don’t need God from your statement ‘ I don’t care’. Our God is not a God of confusion, He meant very word He said in the Bible🙏
This is a lot of double talk. Calvinism in a prettier package.
3 hours and 37 minutes… holy sweet baby Jesus! 😂
Lol
Please be respectful with our savior’s name.
Provisionist study bible !!!
Some long programs are boring, but yours are not. Where some others seem to drag out and be repetitive, your programs are always full of content. If I don't have the time, I pause and continue listening later.
The one passages that speaks directly against INABILITY is Romans 1:18-32. Paul says in multiple ways the God made Hims self know THROUGH CREATION, man grasped it, man willfully rejected it and God gave them over.
Paul makes the case that the evidence God gives in creation is enough. Someone in a far off tribe can see this evidence.
What’s the point of teaching children the Bible if it doesn’t work until pg 13?
"Come let us reason together."
What happened to evidence as a requirement to support a claim?
A claim of Total Depravity, Total Inability, or regeneration before a human can hear, see or believe, must have scripture evidence. Not only is there NO evidence, there is evidence of WHAT we are that we can derive from scripture based on the events.
To claim that human nature changed after the "fall," requires evidence.
So, to understand events, and the meaning of the events, the first question that must be answered is WHAT HAPPENED?
I start with "what," creature did God create? What are the abilities and inabilities of God's human creation, including ALL God's creation (e.g., evidence proves a dog cannot fly, because that ability was not created in a dog, but a dog can run and bark)
WHAT were Adam and Eve, as created creatures, "able," to do by God's design? To answer that, we have to examine the events in Genesis.
The first thing we notice is that Adam and Eve are created as adults, not as babies. We read that God made one command to His creatures, that they could eat from all the trees, except one tree. And God revealed WHAT would happen to them, should they choose to eat from the (forbidden) tree. We observe that for a time, they walked with God, suggesting a cooperative relationship. We observe that Eden was perfect, in the sense that there was no conflict or suffering, or ANY difficulty. Total provision and harmony. A perfect environment.
Then there appears a serpent, that the Omnipotent God allowed in Eden. Why? We do not know, but
can only speculate because scripture doesn't tell us why, it only reveals WHAT.
Then we read that Eve was presented with an option, with a choice; and choice suggests her human ability to choose to accept or reject this option.
Eve accepted the serpents offer, and then Adam accepted it as well.
Then God acted in response to their (rebellion) choice by enacting curses upon them and removing them from paradise.
According to scripture, this is WHAT happened before and after Adam and Eve's choice.
No where do we read that God changed the nature of the human creatures He designed.
He designed creatures with desire and will, without any limitations on either desire or will. His creatures also were created with the ability to reason, to think.
After their eviction, Adam and Eve produced 2 sons, Cain and Abel.
Then WHAT happened? Abel made an obedient choice, and Cain, a rebellious choice. There is no evidence in scripture that God caused or even influence the choice of Abel or Cain. Nothing in scripture indicates that the nature
(abilities) of Cain and Abel was any different than the abilities of their parents, Adam and Eve.
WHAT significant change occured to humans after Adam and Eve rebelled and were removed from Eden?
Living conditions changed....Not human nature.
Abraham, Noah, Moses and others exercised their God given abilities, just as Adam and Eve, and Cain and Abel did. And WHAT are those abilities? Here are a few:
To see and listen; to consider options and choose among options; to select which desires are pursued; to act on the desired choice.
None of what I have presented suggests that " salvation," is our doing, but rather that our part in salvation, is no different than any living or dead human in history.
WHAT is our part? Accepting the gift of salvation God offers, and repenting.
WHAT ARE WE? We are Adam and Eve in our nature, except we are living in hostile conditions, certainly not paradise.
So you can read Romans 7 and specifically 7:15 and think I can choose between two choices? Which do we do? We don’t understand our own actions. How depraved do you think or not think we are?
@@jasonpage4717 Yes, some times we are perplexed by our choices, particularly when we have competing desires. We can want to do one thing, and have a desire for another thing at the same time.
Scripture supports that humans have always been able to choose which direction to move to satisfy desire. There no evidence that they can only and consistently choose evil, or only and consistently choose good.
@@sheilasmith7779 except verse 18 of Romans 7. (Corrected to Romans 7)
@@jasonpage4717
I have no interest in a scripture war with you. Read all of Romans, every chapter, every verse. Know the audience Paul is addressing.
I will counter your Romans 5: 18.
With Romans 5: 14.
When reading notice all the qualifiers.
"Many," is not "all."
Verse 18: What does "condemnation," mean?
Did Adam's sin cause God's curses, that men were condemned to labor and toil, women to child birth pains, and both (all humans) to physical death.
Are these not condemnations?
At any rate I stand by my evidence produced in my first post, and unless you can provide scripture evidence that events DID NOT happen, the way I described, I have nothing further to add.
Provenient Grace? Sure. It’s called sending Jesus!
Wouldn't the parable of seed sown in different conditions of soil prove that man is not totally depraved? Doesn't it show that men are capable of believing the truth as far as they have conditioned their own heart toward God?
You might be on to something
We accept God's help because he gave us the free will to do so!!!
If the Word is not enough, and scripture tells us the Jesus is the Word (logos: everything God had to say to man) then by extension, Jesus is not enough.
Thank you Leighton and Warren!
A well needed and good review.
This really sheds some light on some views of Calvinism/Arminianism.
The more I've learned about these theologies, the more I see an exhausting form of gatekeeping in Calvinism and Arminianism, that is more beholden to this Augustinian philosophy than the gospel.
l anyone that has come to Christ later in life and not through growing up in church, and being surrounded by Christian people in a denomination of some sort, will know that there is no Regeneration or this PG happening at all before salvation. The moment you believe is the moment God changes you. This is from personal experience. I was sticking needles in my arms before salvation. I really don’t think God was regenerating me before I believe. After through processes, and hearing the true gospel, I believed. And I literally became a new being. He has changed me Daily, and sometimes a minute by minute. This is what I think growing up with lots of different denominational presuppositions can be harmful.
You're right brother. There is no regeneration before faith.
I agree about the dangers of growing up in church! Calvinism is definitely rooted in infant baptism, and in telling the born-and-raised-in-church that they are already the obvious elect. Many times, churchgoers resist and scoff at being born again, assuming their supposed, elect status is good enough. They are often not too friendly to those of us who had trouble before we were saved, or became some kind of lost sheep, for awhile, afterwards. But there are true believing Christians among them, too.
I agree: God was drawing you to regenerate you, but we aren't regenerated until we believe.
Praise God for you Brother! Just FYI, Calvinists believe regeneration (or being born again) precedes conversion.
Arminians and the rest believe that being born again is posterior to conversion.
But we are talking moments here, so the Calvinist would see you being giving a new birth, suffused with the Holy Spirit of power that enabled you to see the Cross as powerful and wisdom (see 1 Cor 1:30).
Many see the same exact message you saw as futile and folly. But praise be to God that it became to you power and wisdom. May the Lord establish and keep you until the day he returns, when we can all marvel together!
It is great to remember that He said that He came for sinners, not the righteous. He came for those of us who have ruined our lives. I'd rather talk about that, and think on that, than argue or discuss these fine points of the meanings of words, especially when the intellectual pride gets too high flown. God bless you, and thank you for speaking up, Scotty.
@@lindajohnson4204 amen to that Linda! And thank you 🙏
Thankyou dr Flowers , you conduct yourself like a true gentleman !
As Warren said, Dr Heiser does not hold to total inability, and he has also written a series on his blog on Romans 5, against the idea of 'born guilty'. From everything I've heard and read from him (which is quite a lot 😅), it's clear he stands with you both on these subjects.
Romans 5:1-2 should end this. At about 1:10 they admit that the Word is the power unto salvation, but insist there must be something else to allow for/provide faith. Calvinists say you are regenerated, and these guys claim something else but it all revolves around faith being a gift by grace. The beginning of Romans 5 flat out states that faith leads to God’s grace, which is why they create a different grace.
This teaching was predestined from all eternity, 😜
Cain was born after Adam's fall. When Cain's sacrifice was not acceptable, he was warned, "If you do well, will you not be accepted? Sin is crouching at the door. It wants to master you, but you must master it."
He does not say, "Sin has been in you since your conception. It has been your master, and you cannot master it."
Also there was no cancelling of access to God through Adam's fall. God talked with Cain here and also after Cain had murdered Abel.
Well said. Yet they were dead in their trespasses and sins the whole time. Probably they had polluted consciences.
@@Mike65809 Are you being sarcastic? Or are you asserting that Cain was dead in trespasses and sins before he acted on his desires? And even from conception? I certainly don't see that anywhere in the Old Testament. Or for that matter, the New. The context has sin crouching at the door, not reigning in the house.
@@paulthomson8798 Then what did Paul mean when he said we were all dead in our trespasses and sins?
@@Mike65809 Eph 2:1¶And you hath he quickened, who were dead in trespasses and sins;
2Wherein in time past **ye walked** according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience:
3Among whom also we all had our conversation in times past in the lusts of our flesh, **fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind**; and were by nature the children of wrath, even as others.
He meams that once we sin we become condemned; not that we sre condemned before we sin.
@@paulthomson8798 Well would not assume Cain never sinned before that in thought or desire, either. Would you?
As a Free Will Baptist, we believe that the Holy Spirit works through the message of the Gospel to convict and prepare the heart to be able to accept the Gospel. We also don’t believe in Total Depravity in the way described in the video; we understand it in the same sense as Provisionalists - that we CANNOT do anything to earn God’s favor.
What they are saying is Atheism is the default Position. But there are no Atheists in the Bible
Are there churches that claim to be Provisionists? How can I find a Protestant church that is not influenced by Calvinism or Arminianism?
How did Augustine go from debating Fortinatus to suddenly arguing FOR positions that were held by Fortinatus?
It wasn’t sudden. There were years between the two events.
Warren! Hahhaha "Good news... Just for you david, not those other two guys".... 😂 that was classic
One of the best discussions of all time. Thank you for all your efforts towards TRUTH!!
That would be one awesome steak dinner. Watching Warren and James White eat steak together 😆😉
Or crow.
They don't give God more credibility, actually they make God blameworthy for making some people not believe... When people get to the judgement they can say it was God's fault they didn't believe, follow Jesus, or act in accordance with His will, because he didn't choose them. "It's God's fault because He caused me to follow Satan and fleshly things because he didn't choose me to be faithful and elect". That's just ridiculous!!! Also, if God forces/causes us to love Him it would not be true love... He only wants those who CHOOSE (of their own freewill/volition, not by involuntary force) to truly love Him, to enter and abide in His kingdom. I love John Lennox, what a beautiful man; a God sent instrument! 🙏
Consider the following from the Christian EAST!
The MISSING DOCTRINE in the Protestant predestination debate is Eastern Biblical GRACE which is "God's love working in us" to enable ALL people to be free to receive or reject God's love!
Philippians 2:12-13;
Titus 2:11;
1 Timothy 2:3-6
The order is,
Grace > Repentance/Faith > Life in Christ (regeneration)
Jesus is truly God and truly man! The Bible is about the love of Jesus Christ for all!
John 1:1-3, 14; 3:16; 1 John 4:8
It is by freely believing IN CHRIST by GRACE that we are chosen and elect IN Christ to be like Christ who is God's beloved Son and the only One chosen!
Luke 9:35;
Ephesians 4, 13;
Romans 8:29
The riches in Christ are a result of our freely repenting and being faithful to Christ, which we can only do by the love and GRACE of God which is "God working in us!"
1 Corinthians 15:10
Apart from Jesus we can do nothing! John 15:5
But God loves His creation and loves all people and wants all to be saved!
1 Timothy 2:3-6
In love Jesus willingly died for all in order to raise from the dead to conquer death, sin, and the devil for all!
This is Christus Victor!
Hebrews 2:9, 2:14-15;
1 Corinthians 15:22;
Colossians 1:20
God's loving Grace, which works in all who are dead in sin, enables ALL people to freely choose to love God and be saved!
John 6:65; 12:32-33;
Titus 2:11
But the choice to love God remains in all people!
John 7:17; 11:35
The divine order is:
1) Loving Enabling Grace for all!
John 6:65; 12:32-33; Titus 2:11
2) Our freedom to repent and be faithful to Christ! Acts 17:30-31
3) Being united and made alive with Christ (regeneration)!
John 20:31
What the Calvinist system does not have is God's love and Grace "working in us to enable us" to be free to choose to be in Christ!
Philippians 2:12-13;
John 6:65, 12:32-33;
Titus 2:11
The Calvinist system cannot explain why Adam was created very good, created in God's image and likeness, created with a mysterious free will, lived in a perfect environment, and had the Spirit of God, and yet, Adam chose to disobey God and fall from grace!
Therefore, Christians can also freely fall from grace!
Galatians 5:4
The Calvinist belief that God predestined most to go to hell, and that they are given no grace to freely believe is not the God of the Bible Who is Love!
1 John 4:8
God foreknew all those who would believe in His Son by God's Grace and God predestined them to be like Christ!
Romans 8:28-30;
Ephesians 1:4-5, 13
God did not determine who would believe in Him and who would not! God’s foreknowledge does not cause man’s choices!
To choose Christ and receive Christ's love for us will be Heaven.
To reject Christ and Christ's love for us will be the experience of Hell!
The predestined reprobates in the Calvinist system never have a chance to experience the love of God! This is injustice!
John 3:16
Calvinists believe that in the atonement God the Father poured out wrath and damned and cut off God His Son on the cross! This is a heresy condemned in the Ecumenical Councils because it splits the Eternal Holy Trinity!
Christ died in order to raise from the dead and destroy death, sin, and the devil on behalf of us all!
And now God commands everyone everywhere by the grace of God to repent!
Acts 17:30-31;
Romans 1:20
I believe in prevenient grace. It works externally and internally. Externally through nature and creation and other circumstances God chooses to use. Internally the of work of the Holy Spirit.
It seems that John 6:44 has the trappings of PG.
@25:37 - - yeah. I see this all the time where I'm from. James White and John Mac are *notorious* for doing this... The pre-suppositional, "authoritative" fallacy of, "I don't have to supply the proof texts, because of who I am, whom I support, how I carry myself, and how dare you question me." Not even gentlemanly.
'Grace is undeserved favour, something not demanded by justice, that which under the circumstances might be withholden without injustice. It can never be just in any being to require that which under the circumstances is impossible.' ' A gracious ability to obey a command, is an absurdity and an impossibility.' (Charles Finney on Gracious Ability.)
14:20 how does this jive with what Romans 1 says...
For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness, because that which is known about God is evident within them; for God made it evident to them. For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse.
- Ro 1:18-20
Isn't John 16:7-11 the prevenient grace they are talking about? Isn't this work of the spirit that Jesus tells us about an extra work of grace, the Spirit, working alongside the grace of preaching of the gospel, and Jesus presents as something necessary or the person hearing won't respond positively?
Or maybe John 16 is speaking, not of prevenient grace, but a necessary concurrent grace, that the spirit always goes forth with the word of God and it's preaching.
Nearly universally all the Arminians I encounter online don’t seem to realize they affirm the same false Augustinian axioms and philosophy that the Calvinists affirm. They only come to different conclusions. Arminianism is Calvinism, it’s the Arminius camp instead of the Beza camp. It’s still Augustinian Gnosticism.
John 12:35-37 shows we have free will . For a relationship to exist there always has to be a response. Grace through faith , can’t have one without the other . There is only one Holy Spirit so why is there so many different beliefs, and Denominations? Since there is seven different baptisms in the Bible could it be some people or not baptized in the Holy Spirit that brings understanding and trying to have understanding with their own intellect, then simply taking things out of context? We have so many different translations And changing words is causing us to take things out of context. Even the strongs concordance does not separate the Holy Spirit and the soul , talks as if they are one which is false.For example the disciples hung out with Jesus for a few years, Even though they were Christians they did not have understanding. And Paul who was on his own Wrote half the Bible , had understanding through the power of the Holy Spirit. That’s how it seems to me but I could be wrong .
I've always heard the T identified as Total depravity... not Total inability. Very different.
Also, does he mean Pelagian was maligned?
I would be very happy if debating false Calvinist doctrines was never referred to as “splitting hairs.” Thank you.
What would you say to someone who’s newly a non Calvinist and goes to a Calvinistic church ? Should that person change churches lovingly
I'd say you should leave immediately. Calvinism is a false gospel and according to the bible those who teach another gospel, which is no gospel, are accursed. The Gospel is the very foundation one builds on. Without a proper foundation, the house will fall. Even if you have the proper foundation, I can't believe you can successfully build on that foundation where the proper building tools and knowledge are false. Just my two cents.
Also, even if you manage to do some building, I think your growth would be stunted.
"He that winneth souls is wise" has no meaning to a Calvinist since salvation is only by God sovereignly electing and moving upon any person he chooses to save, and said person has no choice. It has limited meaning, maybe, for an Arminian. But really, the statement in proverbs makes no sense unless it is possible for a person who is evangelizing to convince another person simply on the level of the ability to reason with superiority. A person who wins souls is wise because he tries to do so, and because he is wise because he has skills to affect the reasoning of the other person. In other words, this statement makes absolutely no sense if Arminian or Calvinist depravity/inability is true. If prevenient Grace is necessary, then it's not the winning of a soul that is effective, and therefore it is not wise in itself.
For me, God's general revelation IS the prevenient grace provided by God to all men that they are able to respond to. The very detailed revelation in the scripture goes far beyond the requirements of prevenient grace to prick a man's heart.
28:18 When you preach the Gospel and someone doesn't come to Jesus, is it because God didn't want them to believe and be saved? Or is it because you presented them with the means to be saved yet they themselves have decided not to believe?
Same scenario but this time say you preach the Gospel and a person does come to Jesus, is it because God willed them to accept salvation?
I was in a group lately where they were using John 3 to claim that since Jesus said you cannot see the kingdom of God and you cannot discern spiritual things unless you're born again that you must be born again first to believe the gospel.
if a child dies is it called ,previnient grace ? if not where do they go when they die,,, or what is applicable to them...
Yeah but even if someone hears or understands the gospel they reject it because they’re born sinners
John 6:44 = prevenient grace, the grace that must come before.
Jesus said that no man can come to Him, unless the Father draws him. That is the grace which the Bible says is necessary before we can believe and be saved. That is some kind of inability to do something. So it won't do to say that the Bible has nothing about a kind of grace that is necessary before we can believe and be saved. But it is not inability to hear and respond to God. We can't come to Jesus, unless/until the Father draws us, but we can respond to Him, positively or negatively, when He does. In John 5:24-25, Jesus said that the "dead" would hear the voice of the Son of God, and they that hear, shall live.
Calvinists insert that the drawing is irresistible dragging, and of only a few. This is from a misuse of where Jesus said that all that the Father gives Him, will come to Him. But it doesn't say that all who are drawn to Jesus by the Father will come to Him. They will generally say that that theres no difference, and it's absurd NOT to read 'all who are drawn' into 'all who are given to Jesus by the Father'.
But they can only say so, because they ignore John 12:32, where Jesus says that if He is lifted up, He will draw ALL men unto Himself. John 12:32 cannot mean irresistible dragging, because all men do not come to Jesus, and Jesus would not draw people insincerely. So the grace of 12:32 is not irresistible grace, but could it be some different kind of "drawing" than the drawing of John 6:44? The Father and the Son are not in disagreement; Jesus did not tell us about a drawing to Himself that is some trinitarian controversy. It is drawing to Jesus that the drawings of both verses are concerned with, and both verses are about salvation. And think about when Jesus said this, how the "prince of the world" approached, but especially how He made His drawing all men, contingent on His going to the cross! What Jesus said was seriously important, about how He would be toward all men, because of the cross He was headed to, very soon after He spoke. It should not be shrugged off as if it was just the Son indulging in some teenage rebellion, making Himself seem kinder (hence more popular!) than "the (Calvinist!) old man", while heading, of course, to the cross. I am not trying to be irreverent, but that is what it is like, when they disregard the really important things that Jesus said, because they are so "useless" to defend Calvinism.
Mystical inner work? moral persuasion. "Come, let us reason together. ..."
Inside or outside work? God is outside, speaking to people's inside.
Then, when we have believed and been saved, the Holy Spirit indwells us. Yet we need to distinguish between Him and ourselves. "Inside" doesn't meant that He is us, after all.
Partial regeneration? All that God does to bring us to salvation is intended to lead us to regeneration, to become born again. We might be part way to regeneration, but we're not regenerated until we believe in Jesus as our Savior, which is what the Holy Spirit is convicting us to believe.
Yes good analysis. I would point out the simple fact that two drawings are being spoken of, one before the cross and one after, " when I am lifted up from the earth." Whenever we have a scriptural contradiction like that we ought to take careful note and come up with some kind of reasonable explanation. What do you think?
@@nicholasgeorge7825 I don't see the contradiction. Jesus didn't say that everyone who was drawn would come to Him. He said everyone who was given to Him by the Father would come to Him. If all are drawn to Jesus now, do they now have responsibility? Does it matter whether we come to him now, but it was impossible then? Surely that is not true. And it is possible that God always drew every person who comes into the world to Christ, spiritually, seeing that He is said to be "slain from the foundations of the world". Those who are drawn would be everyone. All who respond positively to the Holy Spirit's drawing, would later receive Jesus: they would be the ones would come to Him, and would also would be the ones who are given to Him by the Father.
The first verse comes during His ministry to Israel. The second verse looks forward to after the cross: *all* people.
@@lindajohnson4204 - you are one step away from Calvinism! And here is the step: Did God predestine the people he gave the Son in eternity past? Yes or no? Because if God did so, if he chose us individually to be in Christ in eternity, then God’s intention with the gospel in Providence is to specifically seek out those people.
@@gregmahler9506 No, I am not. Or if I'm one step away, that last step is fatal, and completely unnecessary. Calvinism disagrees with the Bible, so why let it almost destroy my faith? Even worse, why let it do that to me again? I appreciate your friendliness, but I have hated Calvinism, since it first tried to destroy my faith, when I was 12, in 1964. I am definitely not going back, but I don't have to, because it isn't in agreement with the Bible! That's the main way we test the spirits, after all.
And I know, from hard experience, that those gnostic spirits, that wanted to change the doctrine of predestination to fit the ancient pagan Fates and gods, are pretty mean, and do not have good intentions at heart. They want God's character to be slandered by a Christian doctrine! Works great, to tempt people to abandon Christianity.
I personally appreciate that you are interacting with "the other side"
Guys... you are spot on!
*Righteousness through imputation:*
Romans 4:16 *¶Therefore it is of faith, that it might be by grace; to the end the promise might be sure to all the seed; not to that only which is of the law, but to that also which is of the faith of Abraham; who is the father of us all,*
17 (As it is written, I have made thee a father of many nations,) before him whom he believed, even God, who quickeneth the dead, and calleth those things which be not as though they were.
18 *Who against hope believed in hope, that he might become the father of many nations, according to that which was spoken, So shall thy seed be.*
19 And being not weak in faith, he considered not his own body now dead, when he was about an hundred years old, neither yet the deadness of Sara's womb:
20 *He staggered not at the promise of God through unbelief; but was strong in faith, giving glory to God;*
21 *And being fully persuaded that, what he had promised, he was able also to perform.*
22 *And therefore it was imputed to him for righteousness.*
23 *¶Now it was not written for his sake alone, that it was imputed to him;*
24 *But for us also, to whom it shall be imputed, if we believe on him that raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead;*
25 Who was delivered for our offences, and was raised again for our justification.
Yeah, I was going to comment the same thing. I had the honor of being in a small group online with him in the last months of his life where he took Q&A-- where some of these newer clips are coming from-- and he was not on board with "original guilt"... he even had a book project on his radar. I mentioned Adam Harwood and this channel multiple times. He had no time for non academic TH-cam and writing. He had a lot of things left on his plate when he passed. He did believe apostasy for the believer was a real thing as the bible speaks to believers about the concern. I tend to agree with a lot of his views and have come out of the mindset that we have to 100% agree on everything to walk together. I am really happy for him being in the presence of the Lord as we await the new heaven and new earth. I learn so much from your videos, Leighton and Warren and enjoy the dialogue aspect. Building some cabinets today and it feels like friends are having coffee in the dining room and I get to overhear. Continued prayers and thank you for helping me leave some damaging beliefs behind. ❤ Angela
QUESTION: So from an Arminian perspective is PG just floating around in the air affecting everyone? Or is it more like pre-faith regeneration in Calvinism where God has hand selected some?
See the discussion @3:05
It would be very helpful for you to have these same discussions at length with Matthew Pinson.
One of the convoluted aspects to Provisionism is that they are confessing monergists whereas Arminians are confessing synergists who believe that the singular salvation of God is granted on condition, and effectually appropriated by the exercising of personal faith by free will. This is where Arminianism is far more non Calvinistic than Provisionism.
Can you clarify why you say that Provs are confessing monergists?
@@gregmahler9506 Yeah, they claim to be monergists in the sense that "salvation is of the Lord" alone (which we all believe). But monergism is an exclusive term which means that God does everything without you, despite you, or irrespective of you...which they conversely deny. According to Drew McLeod of the "Provisionist Perspective", he claims to be a monergist simply because he doesn't like the negativity that comes with the idea of synergism (conditional salvation). So Provisionist have a funny way of saying that salvation is a spiritual thing that's the work of God alone, but then they hold to a free will acceptance or rejection of conditional salvation. I'm not trying to hold them to any particular terminology but they're simply riding the fence of terminology and actual salvation mechanics.
Nice a long video I been waiting for something to watch
Dr. 🌷, I love your humility to day, just ask God for the Holy Spirit to fill you, I think that you will be so great n powerful in God👍👍👍for you have the 🧠 n knowledge, I will also pray for you🙏🙏🙏
Provisionism doesn't deny grace people. It places grace in the Gospel, as well as in creation, and in the image of God which retains a knowledge of right and wrong even in a state of sin. You have to remember that the forbidden fruit was the knowledge of good and evil. So sin is not abjection in the sense of utter darkness. Evil is not meaninglessness but the failure of the good. No Jew would ever have affirmed abjection at least not for the Jew. Now whether the Gentle is abject or not is debatable, but probably profitless. He has made of the two one new man. The coming of Christ changes heaven and earth in some cosmic way.
I agree about you good and evil statement.
I can't remember where I read this, as in the early 90s I thought by studying everything I could get my hands on would make me wise and mature, (I was wrong!), but I remember reading a Rabbi's take one the "evil" part of the tree.
He said that evil in this case would better be thought of as wretchedness.
I don't know if that is accurate or not, but it sure makes sense.
Mankind in general has endured wretchedness, much of it by its own hand for millennia.
Thanks for that reply. There's still room for mystery. And I welcome revelation, having read many books myself and learned only that there's more to everything than meets the eye.
QUESTION: I get confused over what Ontological means. Can some explain and how its used differently in this discussion.
Isn't it essence? Like, an "ontological change" would signify a change of one's essence... such as from death to life; or as becoming "a new creation in Christ" ("Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new." 2 Cor. 5:17) Therefore, the man who becomes a new creature in Christ has undergone an ontological change.
@SisterBaby Thank you yes, that is exactly it😁
59:16 🤔
🤭
This conversation has been very enlightening in regards to Total depravity and PG vs. Effectual calling. Thank you for this Dr. Flowers.
I have a few questions for Provisionists:
1.) “The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned.”
1 Corinthians 2:14 ESV
What is Paul saying here? Ontologically, what is the “natural” person and how does it differ from the “spiritual” person? Most of the time when I have asked this, Provisionists just move over to chapter 3 and talking about how Paul could not address some of the believers in Corinth as spiritual. But they don’t really address the “natural” person question. What is it that this “natural” person can’t do and why is that? Can the same person be both “natural” and “spiritual”? Where if they were acting “natural” they can’t understand some things but if they turned to the “spiritual” they could understand them? Can a person switch this on and off? Thanks!
2.) “For the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to God’s law; indeed, it cannot. Those who are in the flesh cannot please God. You, however, are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if in fact the Spirit of God dwells in you. Anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him. But if Christ is in you, although the body is dead because of sin, the Spirit is life because of righteousness.”
Romans 8:7-10 ESV
From the above, let’s say we have a person who does not have the Spirit of God (does not belong to Christ). Would they be able to please God without the spirit? Thanks again!
I look forward to reading your replies!
"Would they be able to please God without the spirit? "
Well no, but the question is, would they be able to respond at all? or are they put through however many steps it is in Calvinist dogma?
Is the "natural" state a state of the will or is it congenital with every individual on the planet? Is there any passage that explicitly confirms the doctrine of "total depravity" from birth in the Calvinist sense? Not that we're merely sinners; but that every one of us is totally unable to respond in any way to the gospel. Is the Calvinist step of "regeneration" -- or even any of the Calvinist "ordo salutis" -- ever anywhere explicitly stated in the Bible?
@@ddr5138 - ok thanks for saying “no” to the question that asked if a person without the spirit could please God.
“And without faith it is impossible to please him, for whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him.”
Hebrews 11:6 ESV
From the above we have that it’s impossible to please God without faith.
Do you see the problem?
The problem I see is the idea that you to be given faith in order to have faith. But it absolutely does say that "without faith, it is impossible to please Him", no denying that.
There's a good answer to your good question. Natural is really soulical to use a word coined by the Chinese martyr Watchman Nee. Its the man of the soul who cannot receive the things of the spirit. This doesn't make the problem any easier for the man but it clarifies Paul from Calvinist crust. I'm of the belief that the regenerative seed of the Spirit is probably unlimited. If we take the Parable of the Seed as our proof text we see no shortage on the words end but the problem to be the heart of man which is represented by soil and what quality it is. Now it could be argued that hard rocky soil can't be rich loamy soil and vice versa and that's true. But were not speaking strictly literally. Hearts can change. And the word is continually being planted. I think this is the key. All the mistakes of Calvinism come from limiting God. Thinking backwards they start with the premise that some (or most!) people won't be saved, now what can we say about God? But start with God and his character and then move forward as we find in Genesis 1!
@@ddr5138 - amen, so we see the tension here! On one hand (Romans 8:7-10), we can’t please God without the Spirit and on the other hand (Hebrews 11:6) we can’t please God without faith.
By logic, necessarily we would need to be given the Spirit *prior* to coming to faith in order to harmonize these passages.
Pure madness
Now I know, you two totally have no Holy Spirit concept, that is why you could not see deep into the truth, my God , we need to pray for you two!!! The Holy Spirit at work all the time, Oh no🙏🙏🙏🙏🙏🙏That is what you n Calvinists lacking, you will not able to see the depth of the scripture without him, Oh no your answer is so pitiful, I am right about you for no Spirit in you. I pray Spirit of the living God, please come and bless these two brothers, open their Spirit eyes, so that they can see!!!!😭😭😭🔥🔥🔥🙏🙏🙏
Trust Dr. 🌹, you will be so great in the kingdom of God, go for the Holy Spirit ask Him to well up in you🤣🤣🤣🙏🙏🙏you will have so much fun n happiness 👍👍👍🔥🔥🔥
The Spirit of the living God can instantly hit us liked He stroke Paul! The Holy Spirit can touch anyone like He reacted instantly to the word of the Father, ‘Let there be light, n there was light’ And yet, Dr 🌷asked how? Hardening was for specific purposes, dead on! At those days, the spirit of the living God was not lived in our heart, the Holy Spirit only came as a special anointing to give them the power, like Moses battled withe the Egyptian pharaoh, it would be gone after the event. When Jesus died on the cross, the Holy Spirit would come to the believers’ heart, to teach us all thing about the Bible, that is different from special anointing case! It is the Holy Spirit live in us Not Jesus, the Holy Spirit will always magnify Jesus, that is how we discern the spirit whether is it the evil spirit or Holy Spirit comes in, evil spirit would only feel good for yourself pleasure n the Holy Spirit comes in will make you want to worship Jesus n He would be magnify beyond comprehension 🙏🙏🙏oh no, you have no idea about Holy Spirit, there will many things you will not understand🙏🙏🙏
Is there any practical difference between provisionism and arminianism?
Seems the only practical difference is that they think the “natural” person without the Spirit of God (who does not belong to Christ) can please God by having faith in the gospel. But this is contrary to scripture, which is the most clear here:
“For to set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace. For the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to God’s law; indeed, it cannot. Those who are in the flesh cannot please God. You, however, are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if in fact the Spirit of God dwells in you. Anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him. But if Christ is in you, although the body is dead because of sin, the Spirit is life because of righteousness.”
Romans 8:6-10 ESV
Here we see that *without the Spirit of God in us* , we are hostile to God, unable to submit to God’s law, and unable to please God.
This is why both Arminians and Calvinists believe that the Holy Spirit must work within a “natural” person to help them understand the spiritual truths in the Gospel and to please God by having faith in his son. Provisionists do not believe Romans 8:6-10 says that but also don’t have any exegesis to counter it (just a bunch of philosophy and “nuh uh’s”).
@@Dizerner Thank you, that was complicated so I'm not sure I noticed every detail, but I didn't see much about practical distinctions. I'm thinking about practical differences regarding our own behavior, in case that wasn't clear. It doesn't seem to matter how things work from God's perspective if the result is indistinguishable to us. Is it that an arminian would pray for God to open people's minds, but a provisionist wouldn't think that could matter?
@@gregmahler9506 I would argue that Paul does not have believing the gospel message in mind when he talks about pleasing God.
@@a.k.7840 - ok argue it! I’m all ears. How would you exclude that from “pleasing God”.
“And without faith it is impossible to please him, for whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him.”
Hebrews 11:6 ESV
Especially since the above.
@@gregmahler9506 Is God pleased by some one coming to faith in Christ? Of course! But this is not what Paul is talking about when he says "without faith it is impossible to please God." Paul is saying that obedience without faith cannot please God. Notice he says that they "must believe He exists."
Do you loose your free will after you get saved Because if you don't then you must be able to loose your salvation. Ex Arminian Calvinist.
Hi no, totally humanistic discussion for the heavenly thing!
In the name of Christianity, I am perplexed by Dr. Flowers 🌺 n Dr. McGrew🙂The Bible can not be more specific everywhere🤣You go against the Bible principal. We are at the best ‘filthy rag’ with not even match the cockroach 🪳 nature, at least a cockroach would not deliberately do evil. But we do! You are so humanistic, so far , at this stage of my understanding from this originally stage😂I could understand you do not like the ‘U’ unconditional election, but ‘T’👍🤷🏻No one church has complete correct interpretation but the mission must be concurrent which must Christians have👍👍👍🙏🙏🙏I think that you are at the slippery slope simply from your statement ‘I don’t care’ 🤷🏻♂️
I meant Mission Staememt. 1) 3:1 God 2) Jesus died n rose again 3) The blood of Jesus cleans clean us of all sins 4) Salvation is by faith along 🙏
PG is God working in our lives. It’s how we receive the gospel is by his grace. It’s how God works in our life before we are saved to bring about salvation. It’s merely how God makes himself known to us in a meaningful relational persuasive way that will either lead to us, hardening our hearts, or excepting his free gift of salvation. It’s God doing that through man through nature, the bible, the word of God etc..
The understanding of PG as you have described is in agreement with the many means of grace that Provisionists acknowledge. But what you are describing is NOT the "Classical Arminian" definition of PG that is asserted to be required to overcome Total Inability.
Without the Holy Spirit of God is in us, we are as good as a corpse 🧟♀️ 🧟♂️
I am not sure why they are so hung up about terminologies. We are to be led by the Spirit. If indeed the Spirit is in us. We will love Christ and obey him. And by loving one another in Christ, others will know we are one body. Paul warned us in engaging in fruitless talk.
I was always taught, and I was just talking to my pastor the other day, that PG is for lack of a better term provision. However, God makes his provision to make his best case to each individual man to persuade him to come and have faith in him, so that he may be saved. you say provision, you could say P G. Because outside of his provision, no one is getting saved. Furthermore, it is more than just the word of God its relationships, it’s friendships. It’s getting to know people because God put those people in their lives because the leading of the spirit ect. Outside of that, you have no ability to know God unless God makes himself known. In whatever way God makes himself known in a relational way is PG. PG is external working to convict the heart. No regeneration only persuasion.
Freewill of man would lead us to disaster for sure, trust me, just like. To the world to day🔥🔥🔥👻👻👻
Dude by grace are we saved and that goes for in Noah's day as well as it goes for today.
Now do yourself a big favor and go back into Genesis and see yourself the determining factor as to why Noah was saved and the world perished and I'll bet you'll see that it was Noah and only Noah who found grace in the eyes of the Lord and that is the only reason why Noah preached the gospel for 120 years and no-one but his family heard the message.
I mean just try to connect the dots in this that only by grace which is being drawn by God's Spirit can one ever be saved and it is nothing of ourselves, it is the gift of God, and that the choice was not given to either Noah or the rest of the world to be either saved or lost, but it was all God's election who is the Potter and we are only the clay who are made exactly how he chooses to make us.
A man without Holy Spirit in him can not see the spiritual thing, his knowledge is so limited in scriptural truth, Brian you are dead on🙏🙏🙏🙏
As I said in the live chat, Provisionists are becoming Pelagians who deny any metaphysics concerning sin and salvation.
Biblical Psychology by Osward Chambers, The Normal Christian Life by Watchman Nee, and The Spiritual Man by Watchman Nee are towering and enduring testaments of the Biblically factual reality of deep metaphysics concerning sin and salvation. Trying to dismiss certain aspects of original sin and its effects it's not a smart way to counter Calvinism. Provisionists have fallen for the trap, and instead of countering Calvinism with what God has resolved concerning depravity...the Provisionists has simply decided to dismiss depravity. This is a great disservice to Christianity because it never investigates what God has done through Christ in response to depravity. That's how you combat Calvinism.
CHRIST
(Matthew 15:24) I am NOT sent but unto the Lost sheep of the house of ISRAEL
PAUL
(Romans 9:3-5) For I could wish that myself were accursed from Christ for MY BRETHREN, my kinsmen according to the "FLESH" who are ISRAELITES; to whom pertaineth the ADOPTION, and the GLORY, and the "COVENANTS" and the giving of the LAW, and the service of God, and the "PROMISES" whose are the fathers, and of WHOM AS CONCERNING THE "FLESH" CHRIST CAME
☝️ According to scripture Calvinist have it correct - they've simply inserted themselves rather than the ethnic Israelites - which is the false theme of modern Christianity regardless of denomination
You either don't know the unique claims of Pelagianism per Augustine or are intentionally being dishonest.
@@IdolKiller
One must be dishonest in order to be a modern day Christian
@@IdolKiller I do. I've spent many years studying and debating these points. I've also written extensive theology concerning them.
No, how depravity is viewed is an issue of paramount importance; the issue is Calvinists believe and preach the man-made theory of the Calvinist God being the sole chooser and predestiner of who will and who will not be one of the elect; by definition, this, along with the rest of Reformed Theology's apologetic, paints the Calvinist God as an *impersonal, whimsical, hateful, discriminatory, unjust, merciless, selfish, sadistic, monster of mindless robots; who barbecues "Totally Depraved", invincibly ignorant, innocent people in Hell for no known plausible reason, other than his own good selfish glory and his own good sadistic pleasure, by denying them, love, grace and regeneration he never gives the non-elect goat people a single hope or a chance or a prayer;* which any child can see is blaspheme. What Christ has done and what Provisionism preaches is that Salvation has been made available to *EVERYBODY!*