Navigate Podcast
Welcome to Navigate. We got tired of the same ole answers when we started looking for help when it came to our walks with God. So together we go deeper than most would on topics that most people have heard or were taught but never fully understood. It is our way of simplifying concepts that we may have over complicated throughout our lives. Bringing theology and life experience into each episode. It is our hope and desire to help you Navigate your Christian walk.
Navigate Podcast
Calvinism Part One
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What if salvation begins with God moving toward us, not us inching toward Him? We take a straight path through TULIP—total depravity, unconditional election, definite atonement, irresistible grace, and the perseverance of the saints—and show how each point rises from Scripture and fits together as a coherent, hope-filled view of how God saves. No smoke, no inside baseball—just clear terms, honest pushback, and the verses that carry the weight.
We start by reframing human nature. Total depravity isn’t “as bad as possible,” it’s “every part affected,” which explains why the option to choose God exists but the desire does not. From there, election becomes mercy: if everyone runs from the light, God’s choice is rescue, not favoritism. Romans, Ephesians, and John set the anchor points, while we tackle common objections about fairness, foreknowledge, and God’s will. Along the way we keep the tone pastoral—humility over hot takes, clarity over tribal lines.
Then we ask what the cross actually accomplished. Definite atonement insists Christ’s death truly saves the people He came for; it’s sufficient for all, targeted to the elect, and never fails. Irresistible grace explains how dead hearts come alive—regeneration before faith—so belief is a Spirit-born response, not a self-started project. And perseverance closes the loop: those God calls, He keeps. Assurance shifts from fragile self-confidence to sturdy promises—no one can snatch us from His hand. Far from killing mission, this theology fuels it. God uses means—preaching, prayer, everyday conversations—so we step into evangelism with steel in our spine and love in our tone.
If Calvinism has felt like a trigger word or a maze of jargon, this walkthrough offers a reliable map, with Scripture at every turn and real-life implications for assurance, unity, and courage. Listen, reflect, and bring your hardest verses and questions. If this helped you think or breathe a little easier, follow the show, share it with a friend, and leave a review so more people can find it.
Hey guys, welcome to Navigate Podcast. I'm here with Justin. What's up, my brother? Not much. How are you doing?
SPEAKER_01:I am chilling. Chilling like a villain or chilling like a penguin and an igloo eating fud sickles. You're welcome.
SPEAKER_00:Thanks.
SPEAKER_01:I think that's actually from like an MM song years ago. But sometimes you don't listen to as a Christian. Which I wouldn't listen to anymore, but some, you know, some lines are just gonna stick with you. That's fair. Don't look that song up. I don't know what to tell you. I yeah, I've been saved by grace. Okay. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:It's a it's a good segue of uh of uh our topic here today.
SPEAKER_01:All right, what do we got?
SPEAKER_00:Um do you like flowers?
SPEAKER_01:Uh you know, how about hydrangeas? Um what about tulips? Uh yes.
SPEAKER_00:So for those uninformed, tulip is an acronym um for the tenants of Calvinism.
SPEAKER_01:Which we're going we're going for the throat today, I guess.
SPEAKER_00:We're we're going for the throat. Well, you know, a high-level throat punch.
SPEAKER_01:Like I wanna I wanna kind of maybe low-level throat punch, you know.
SPEAKER_00:Well, fair enough. I want to get um you know a high-level overview of all right, what is Calvinism actually, what isn't it? And boy, people often consider it like a bit of a boogeyman.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, Calvinism is one of those things that you can describe and explain, and everybody is okay with it until you say Calvinism, and then suddenly um, you know, your check engine light comes on and things blow up and and go crazy along the way. It is it has become um it has become like a trigger word for a lot of people, and I I kinda I kinda get why. Like it does seem to me that if somebody is a Calvinist, or particularly a young Calvinist, they're uh they tend to be uh incredibly combative and can be frustrating and uh what what um what we would recall refer to as cage stage Calvinism, which is basically like everything to me is this and I can't escape it and I can't get around it. And uh there's a there's a lot of um misconceptions about it, but man, if you're looking for good meme game, Calvinists got the best meme game. There's not a lot of there's not a lot of good Arminian meme game out there, no, in all fairness.
SPEAKER_00:So the best the best Calvinist meme I think I saw was a picture of Christ, and it said, uh, you know, I stand at the door and knock, and then it cuts to Grand from Two Towers.
SPEAKER_01:See, that's the kind of edgelord stuff that I'm looking for. Yeah, the the funny stuff for me is like um you have, you know what I mean, memes like uh uh free will, and it's like Jonah, and it's like here's Nineveh, and then the fish, and both just take you to the exact same place. Yeah, okay, right? But yeah, uh so Calvinism uh comes from obviously the guy named John Calvin, who penned a lot of this theology down in a more um uh a more precise way, but ultimately uh Calvinism before it was called Calvinism was probably best known as Augustinianism, yeah, which comes from Augustine, right? Not Augustine. Augustine. Take notes at home. Very important, very important. Anyways, so so these kind this kind of theology and thinking has been around for a very long time. Um and it is become in a lot of ways uh a no-no word for certain people, and for other people, it is the the hill that they will die on at all costs. And what I would say is, although I am definitely a Calvinist, I'm like a like a go ahead, break my arm, Calvinist. Uh my goal is not to unite people around Calvinism. My goal is to unite people around Christ. And for me, I have a really strong Christology and missiology. And if your Christology is good and your missiology is good, we can work in the gaps around stuff that we don't totally agree with in other areas, as long as you're not a straight, horrifying you know, heretic or something like that. Yeah, absolutely. So so Calvinism is ultimately um dealing with the question of I'm gonna say this who is the priority when we think about salvation itself? Is the priority or the emphasis on the man, or is the priority an emphasis on God? And from that perspective, and I realize for some people that might feel like a straw man, but really that that is kind of what we're talking about. Um, from from there, all the conversations ensue. Uh all the conversations about God's sovereignty, uh, free will, which I just I like, I almost hate bringing up the term free will at this point because it seems like a trunk card that like show me show me a verse where it really hammers like on on the words themselves, free will. Oh, we'll you know what I mean? And it's kind of yeah, it's just not really we're we're gonna get to that topic specifically. Well, I'm excited to jump in. So yeah, so maybe um would you like me to like lay out?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, so let's let's start with um let's go down this acronym of of tulip, the five points of Calvinism, and and kind of identify what they are, what they mean, where they are scripturally.
SPEAKER_01:So T would be Okay, so you want me to lay them all out or you want to hit one at a time? Let's hit one at a time. Okay, so the so the first um uh part of the acronym for tulip is total depravity. All right, total depravity is generally speaking, most people say the linchpin for the rest of the flower. Okay. All right. So what does total depravity mean? Total depravity, or if you're RC sproll, you'll call it radical corruption, is man's inability on their own, because of original sin, to choose God. All right. Uh this is like, I mean, Romans, uh Romans chapter three, I think makes this pretty clear. I'll go there real quick. Yeah. Uh Romans chapter three is pretty serious about this. Uh Ephesians 2 is pretty serious about this. This is um this is Romans 3, 10 through 18. There is none righteous, not even one. There is none who understands. Okay, so right off the bat, you have like the mind. There is no one who seeks God. Okay, so so what do we do about the seeker movement, right? Uh all have turned aside together, they have become useless. There is no one who does good, there is not even one. Their throat is an open grave, with their tongues, they keep deceiving, the poison of asps is under their lips, whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness, their feet are swift to shed blood, destruction and misery are in their paths, and the pass of path of peace they have not known. There is no fear of God before their eyes. Um, I mean, John, John chapter six makes it pretty clear. I think it's verse 44, that no one can come to God unless the Son draws them. Uh, the word there in the Greek is the same word used in James when he says people are dragged away by their lusts. Like it's not a word that's like gentle. It's it's uh it's a parent yanking their kid out of the street before a car hits them. That like that kind of mentality. So when we're looking at this idea of what is total depravity, total depravity uh is the reality that sin has affected man, um his mind, his will, his emotions, his affections, his body. It is uh radically corrupted the individual um and separated him from God in a way where on his own he is not capable of bridging that chasm. And what what's worse, uh, and and this might be the more important thing, is that he has no desire to. His desire is for evil, his desire is for wickedness. Your desire is not for righteousness or not for the things of God. And even your own um uh, let's say, righteous deeds or things that you know uh certain people do that would we would perceive as good are often done from a place of selfishness, right? So, like this benefits me to do the nice thing in this scenario, so I'll do the nice thing. But you can watch during any uh BLM protest or George Floyd thing or whatever, how quickly morals and how we treat people go out the window if it becomes okay to do so and it's no longer a social uh problem. Yeah, right. So uh totally total depravity does not mean you were depraved as far as you possibly could be. Yeah, total isn't means total isn't the end divine. It means that your full self, body, soul, and spirit is radically corrupted by sin, and your proclivities and your desires, apart from radical grace and transformation from God, are not towards God but away from God. Uh, you you don't want him, which means that your uh you can think about it this way the opportunity for choosing God is there, but not the volition to do so. Okay, like even if somebody had the, let's say the ability to choose God, they wouldn't have the um desire to choose God and would still be stuck in the stuck in the same place of choosing whatever their own depraved desires would be. Yeah, does this make sense? Yeah. So the natural state of man is in opposition to God, in rebellion to him, running away from him. And John Owen really makes this clear. It's not just that you are um, it's not just that you're touched by darkness, but you're literally in the realm of darkness. And I love what uh Ephesians 5 says about this. He says, You were formerly darkness, but now you are light. Not like you formerly participated in some darkness or you had a lot of darkness to you. It's like, no, buddy, like you were dead in your trespasses and sins in which you used to live. This is the Ephesians 2 language. I mean, if you get into Ephesians 2, it's pretty clear, bro. Like you you are not good, you don't have the ability to choose good. The the other side of this kind of coin for somebody who disagrees with these things is they would agree with original sin. They would say all of the same things, but they would end up saying something along the lines of unbelief. Um you could say unbelief is not a sin, but maybe maybe let me frame it a little bit differently. You have enough ability or goodness left in you to still choose God um whatever state you find yourself in. That would be the uh c what's called semi-Pelagian view if you're a if you're a uh cage stage Calvinist. What you could just say is that's the that's a predominant uh orthodox perspective that people have. And I would be fine if you land in that camp. Praise God. I'm gonna have a hard time understanding other portions of the Bible, but I pray that the Lord will eventually get you, you know what I mean, to where you should be.
SPEAKER_00:And I would say there's you know, there's looking at those oppositional viewpoints, um, there's an important distinction between someone, and you kind of touched on this earlier, but someone who disagrees and holds an opposing viewpoint versus somebody who disagrees and holds heresy in their heart.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, yeah. So so there's Orthodox positions that are not Calvinist positions, and that's fine, or Augustinian positions. Um the Arminian camp is not um is not in some kind of egregious heresy or apostate or something like that. However, I think it naturally leads you to open theism, which to me would be kind of an apostasy.
SPEAKER_00:Sure.
SPEAKER_01:But yeah, you know, that's that's me throwing a jab.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, I mean, you know, you uh you're gonna get a men known as a bigger one. We're gonna have to. You're gonna have to have to.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, so I mean, does that make sense what we're talking about with total depravity? Yeah, it's like the Bible's pretty clear. Um, I mean, Job says it's like men, you know, fly into sin like sparks from flames, like it's just, I mean, and if you look out at the world around, you know, the world around us in general, our natural desires are not for God. No. And even Thomas Aquinas was asked at one point, if nobody seeks God, according to Romans chapter three, why does it seem like some people are seeking God? And and people might be asking this question like, why is it does it seem like, okay, nobody seeks God? But I have several friends who seem like they're legitimately wanting to believe, like they really are trying to walk this direction. And it seems like they're interested in this stuff and and and want to take it more seriously, but aren't quite sure about this. One of two things is happening. Either they are legitimately coming to faith, which is great. But Thomas Aquinas, when he was asked this question, why does it seem like some people are seeking God? The Bible says they're not, as he said, they're not seeking God, they're seeking the gifts that God can give them without seeking God Himself. I I love grace, I love forgiveness. I I love the idea of being in heaven forever. I love being part of a good fellowship and community, but not if I actually have to submit to God. Yeah, not not if not if it gets hard. Right, exactly. I don't want to submit to God, I just want the stuff that He can give me.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, well, and and even like even an atheist will seek knowledge. Like, there's you have this idea that um people are going to seek after knowledge, they're going to seek after wisdom. The enemy is very good at giving men over to desires that are not godly but seem good.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, stuff, stuff to do to keep them busy that's not actually going anywhere. I like this because in first uh or 2 Timothy 3, it says um these kinds it's talking about these kinds of people, the people that would be around, and it says always learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth. Always learning, always more information for you, always cool ideas. We we have a uh mutual uh friend, in a sense, uh Sean. Oh, yes. All right, yeah, and and he every time I talk to this guy, you bring something up that's like, let's have this conversation. And that person's goal is to bury you in as much information about everything that he's been learning that doesn't take you anywhere at all. That's like let's information into oblivion, uh not so we can actually address what's going on, but so that I can hopefully create enough uncertainty about all these different topics in someone so that they don't feel like they'll push any harder on this particular actual subject. Absolutely.
SPEAKER_00:Well, you can get into a car and drive in a circle and put on miles in the car, but you're not gonna get anywhere.
SPEAKER_01:Right, right. And a lot of people are are always learning and never coming to anything solid in their thinking. This is kind of the deconstructionist, you know, movement in general. This is the postmodern thinking in general. Uh, I mean, it's it's I'm I'm deconstructing the ground that I land on ultimately to try to avoid God or the reality that is my own uh sin and my own fallenness and um the the state that we find ourselves in as humans. The most fascinating, one of the most fascinating topics that everybody is interested in is why are things broken and how do we fix them? Across every continent, across uh, you know, every field is this difficulty of people and why we don't seem to function right. Everything else seems to work fine. Uh the the rocks continue to obey God, the galaxy and you know, the the world that we live in continue to abide by the standards and the things that he spoke into existence, and they continue to obey him in an ongoing fashion. What is in rebellion to him? The only thing that disobeys God's command is us humans. Yeah. And we are broken. We're the we're the silent planet for you, uh, for you uh Paralander fans. Amen to that.
SPEAKER_00:All right. Well, that I would say is a is a good kickoff point for for the T in Tulip. Let's jump to let's jump to you.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. Okay. So this whole idea, uh the you is unconditional election. All right, unconditional election, which is maybe a a better way to say it would be sovereign election. Yeah. Which just means that ultimately God is the one who chooses the people that will be saved. And it's not conditional, as in it's not something that you did, or something that you accomplished, or something that you had taken care of. You're you're not the person who everybody else was doing the wrong things, but I chose the right thing. No, God did an amazing work and brought about regeneration in Europe. We can get into some of this stuff, but like the whole idea is God chose his people for salvation according to his will, according to who he wanted to choose, not based on a foreseen faith of men. And a lot of people have this idea like God looked down the corridor of time and he saw those that would choose him. And so then he chose them first. So because he knew that they would choose him later. And I'm like, so who is ultimately sovereign over their salvation?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, well, and they are. And even if you take that stance, it's just a really flowery way to try and say something different than reality, anyway. Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. So this is these are all the verses where it talks about um you being chosen before the foundation of the world, uh, Ephesians 1, uh, Romans 9 talks about God's purposes in election. It isn't the man who wills or the man who runs, but God, right? He's the one who ultimately did this. Uh, this is how Jesus talks too. Like all of those whom the Father has given me, I haven't lost any of them. Yeah. All of those whom the Father has ordained. I I I these are these are my people. Uh, we we learn about this in uh 2 Timothy 1.9, the grace that was given before time began. It was this, it's this idea that in eternity past, God sovereignly ordained those who would be saved. And it wasn't based on their unique works or their ability to get things done. It was his grace being poured out on these people because of what he wanted to do. And and this is uh, this is like hard to swallow, but I hope people get this. Like, we're not awesome. And if we concede the first point, which is we're corrupt, we're broken, we don't desire God. That's not the way we roll into things. We should be thanking the Lord that he chose us and did a work in our life and redeemed us from eternity past and brought us into everything that we have now. And I I laugh at this because a lot of people who have a problem with the idea of uh election or sovereign election or unconditional election, like have no problem with the fact that God chose Abraham and that he chose Israel and the people of Israel, and these are his people, and it's not because of anything that they did, it's because of what he wanted to do. But the second we get down to you as an individual, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. Don't that that can't be the case. Um, and even even in the story, man, of the covenant that God makes with Abraham, I love it. He has them do something super weird for us today. He has them take a couple of animals and they cut them in half and they split them and put them on either side. And it's this idea of covenant. Um, people who are going to get married or coming to a promise together would kill animals, spread them on certain sides, and you would walk through the center of those animals together as a way of saying through blood, we're going to make sure we see this through. I will do this, you will hold up your part of the bargain, we're going to make this happen. And what God does to Abraham is has him set up the covenant um ritual, if you want to put it that way. Kills the animals, separates them. They they're supposed to walk through the blood together. And what what God does is he puts Abraham to sleep and he walks through it by himself. No. Like the whole picture is I'm going to be the one that accomplishes this because I have chosen you. I'm I'm taking care of this. You didn't pick me. I came to you. Yeah, you didn't decide because you're a genius to come to Jesus. Christ came and got you, and you were running the opposite direction. You were a hellbound hater of God, walking the opposite direction from him, and God lovingly uh predestined you before the foundation of the world to be holy and blameless before him. And so um I want to say here, like we could get into the whole conversation about um hardness of heart and like, you know, Pharaoh in Egypt. We could talk about like uh, you know, this the how does this functionally go down? And and I I think it's just important to see here, God doesn't have to put evil into somebody's heart for them to go the wrong way.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:All God has to do for them to go all the way is remove his restraining hand.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:So I think if uh think about it this way, God is always restraining how wicked we would naturally be. God is is actually holding that back. More people would do more horrible, ungodly things. And the more reprobate a culture gets and the more opposed they get to him, the more he backs off and lets them have their way. This is Romans 1, all right? Like the wrath of God is God giving people their way. And so when we think about um, you know, the heart condition and uh sovereign election or unconditional election, what I want you to see is everyone is racing to hell. Everybody is getting free will, if you want to think about it that way. Uh, C. S. Lewis says. The longest standing monument to free will is hell, and that hell is locked from the inside. Yeah. Right? Like they don't want God. The only people who didn't get their way were Christians. Those were those were the people who did not get their way. Because if they got their way, they would be in hell. We would be in hell.
SPEAKER_00:Which that entire argument puts to bed the the countervailing point that says unconditional election is just God limiting who gets to heaven. It's exactly the opposite.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, I mean, and and that that might fall more into the limited atonement conversation, which is the big uh scary, terrifying thing for most people. Um, but but yeah, ultimately, if everyone is running the opposite direction, um, God choosing who he's going to save and bringing them into covenant with himself uh is this beautiful thing where we should recognize it was not me. It's not because of the man who wills or the man who runs. It wasn't something that I did. And if God looks down the corridor of time to see who would choose him, nobody is saved. Everybody is dead, everybody's in hell. That's that's the story, that's the picture with that we see in scripture. And again, it's not just that God didn't give them an option. You your option is there. The ability to choose that is there. The desire and volition to choose that is simply not. Why? Because you do not love God and you're not seeking him. So there's a difference there between uh having the uh you know the the ability to choose something, like the option is there, and and you actually wanting that thing. So I I hope that makes sense a little bit of um the whole free will idea. What a lot of people are like, what about free will? If you got free will, you'd get hell. Like that's that's how that works. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:And I think that's a grand scheme answer to that. I still think uh there's some little micro things about free will that I definitely want to cover later and some spicier questions. But that'll that'll come after we hit it a little bit more. I want I want to give our our listeners the opportunity to see it holistically before we before we let the picks come get into the nitty-gritty. Exactly. Okay, so and you brought up limited atonement. Let's go ahead and hit the L.
SPEAKER_01:So a lot of people, especially if you're a dispensationalist, uh, most of them will say they're a four-point Calvinist or a 3.5 point Calvinist, which to me is just saying Arminian. I said it. Deal with it. Um it's it's one of those things where it's like, we'll take all the rest. We don't like this one. Yeah. All right. I prefer definite atonement for this, for this particular idea. So it's not that God So define it first. Yeah. So it it is ultimately the idea that if we're all running towards hell and we're all pursuing iniquity, and we don't love God, and we don't, dead people don't make decisions to choose God. Dead people don't do anything. God has to resurrect that person for it to actually happen. God has to bring that person back to life, and it's not going to be anything a dead person did because they don't do anything. It's going to be a work of God, and he's choosing the people that he is going to save. Before the foundation of the world, there is a there is a amount of people that God has chosen, and there is an amount of people who are going to display the justice of God and the wrath that happens for those who choose sin and run the opposite direction. This is pretty basic. Um, but like think about it this way. We're not universalists. If you're a universalist, we're on totally different planets right now. Um, there are people who are going to hell. Absolutely. Uh there's a lot of people that are going to hell. There are some people who are going to heaven. So why I like the term definite atonement is because what we're saying is those people that Jesus died for are in fact saved. Okay. Okay. It's definite. If he died for them, they are going to heaven. All right. Does this make sense? So, like I'm I'm trying to put it as clearly as I can. Although for a lot of people, this might be like a yeah, I'm on board. I agree with that. Right. Okay. But most people want to teach this idea that Jesus died for the sins of the entire world.
SPEAKER_00:Well, a a layman reading certain scriptures would see that. Sure.
SPEAKER_01:But yeah, there's going to be some different texts, right? Like um, oh man, I'm trying to think of all the ones. You got the one in uh, is it Second Peter? God's not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:Right. Um, I would say the the antecedent there is really important. The context he's talking about is is Christians. He's talking about the this letter to the church and these people that are part of the church, and he's saying God isn't willing that any should perish of you, but that all should come to repentance. Not saying the whole world is going to be saved. And and here's here's why this is important. If God actually did die for those people, uh and and and it even says, like, um, let me go here real quick. So like Isaiah 53 is a fun one for me that I I like to go to. Sorry, I'm fine real quick. You're good. Sword drill.
SPEAKER_00:No, and so while you're looking at that, it I would I would use the example of if you get a fine for a crime you commit, and somebody comes along and pays that fine, you can't just say, No, I don't accept it, and still try to pay the fine. It's already been paid for. Yeah, the court exactly. The court isn't going to take your money to uh uh to repay for that fine.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, okay, okay, so check this out. As a result of the anguish of his soul, this is Isaiah 53, 11, he will see it and be satisfied by his knowledge, the righteous one, my servant, will justify the many, as he will bear their iniquities. Okay, so he's saying those who he is dying for will be justified. That they're going, they're going to be justified. Like, so so is there somebody that Jesus died for that is not justified? Did it not work? Did it only go halfway? I mean, this is this is the whole chain in in Romans 8. Uh, if you go to Romans 8, it's like those whom he uh foreknew, he also predestined, those whom he predestined, you know, called, justified, glorified. It's this idea that you have this chain of events that's that's happening. And I should just go to it and read it real quick because I think it's it's probably helpful that we um get plenty of scripture into this particular passage. Agreed, for sure. Uh Romans 8. All right, so in the same let me see. All right. For those whom he foreknew, okay, he also predestined to become conformed to the image of his son, so that he we would be the first he would be the firstborn uh among many brethren, and these whom he predestined, he also called, and these whom he called, he also justified, and these whom he justified, he also glorified. So you have this idea of predestined uh from his foreknowledge. What does that mean? His will, his desire, not yours. And then he's picking these people, he's calling these people, he's justifying these people, he's glorifying these people. That's the that's the picture. So, like, was Christ's sacrifice uh sufficient for the entire world? Absolutely. If God wanted to save everybody, I think he absolutely could. It's not a knock on uh the cross, it's not a knock on um like the the value of God's blood. It's not like there wasn't enough to go around. The question is, was God's plan actually to save every single person on the planet? And if that was the case, did he fail? Um and and I would say no. And you run into simple problems with this. Like, okay, so if God died for everyone, the sin of the world, or the whole world, if you want to put it that way, um, how come people are going to hell and paying for judgment, paying paying the price for sin if it's already been paid for on the cross? And a lot of people, to your point, would say something like, Well, right, so he paid this, but I haven't received it. And I'm like, No, no, no, if it's paid for, they're literally kicking you out of the prison. Like if you're redeemed, you're no longer, it's not just a personal thing. It's I'm out of darkness and I'm into light. And I no longer belong to this side of things. I belong to that side of things. And it wasn't even necessarily my decision. This is a Jonah moment. Then the Lord sent the fish and I got spat up where I was supposed to be. I was running toward the street, I'm going the wrong way, and God is ultimately the one that that brought this about, if if that makes sense. So Christ gives himself, uh, you see in Ephesians 5 for the church. I think um uh in John 10, the good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. Uh, Matthew 121 even says that he will save his people. And I think um, again, going back to this idea in John where he talks about um uh this uh, you know, the none of whom the Father has given to me, I won't lose any of them. Or in John 17, he talks about, and it's funny, even in John 17, he says this thing that is pretty hilarious. He's like, uh, I'm not praying this for the whole world. I'm praying this for those that you've given to me. I'm not, I'm not asking for the whole world in this sense. I'm asking for those that you gave to me. And so you have some different problem texts. Uh John 3 16 is the fun one that everybody loves that God so loved the world uh that he gave his only begotten son that whosoever would believe in him shouldn't perish but have everlasting life. And somebody wants to say, Whosoever, whosoever. And I'm like, I agree. Yeah, I whosoever would believe in him wouldn't perish. Right. Those whom who would turn and believe in Christ are going to be saved. That doesn't mean the same uh grace is available to every single person. It means those who actually do turn and trust in him, and we know how that happens at this point, yeah, will actually in fact be saved. And I I would even say this the the the thrust of this in John, I brought this up on past past podcasts, but the way that John uses the word world in his literature is usually not talking about the globe or the flat earth wherever you land. Um uh God is God's not talking about the the amount of people that are on the planet. When John uses the word world, he's actually juxtaposing it with darkness or um uh light. Like you have worldliness and godliness. And so when he says God so loved the world, he's not just making a statement that God just loved everybody on the planet so much that he gave his whole life for them. It's it's actually the point he's making is God came for the worst, for the broken, for the messiest. He's going to redeem his people who have been walking into darkness. And and the whole idea of limited atonement or definite atonement is did God's uh did the did the crucifix, did Christ finish work when he said it is finished, was it actually finished? Did he actually accomplish what he said he was coming to do? And um again, there's some different passages and and um texts that you could go to where he's talking about different things, or it seems like in this passage, no, he's not not just for us, but the sins of the whole world. And I would say, man, you got to look at those texts, look at the context, look at the antecedents of all, look at the antecedents of us or these groups that he's talking about. I think you'll find frequently um there are great explanations for why some of those things are there. And and I get it, there's some things in the Bible that when we read them, they seem super clear the first time you read them. And the more you read the Bible, you're like, oh man, okay, I have to put some other stuff together. I need to make sense of what's ultimately being said here. But God is not gonna lose any of those that he was sent to get.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:And and people who don't hold a limited atonement are gonna say, no, God ultimately came for everybody, but he's gonna lose a bunch of them because it's just not in his control. They don't choose. He just doesn't have the ability to do it. And I'm like, I don't think that's the biblical narrative at all. Yeah. The father ordained beforehand who would be saved. He sends his son to go get them, and everyone that he sent his son to go get will be saved. Absolutely. And that should be like a man, breathe out. Like, okay, it's not on me. If you have received Christ, your sins are paid for, they are atoned for, and you can't like walk in the front door and walk out the back door. There's no back door with this. It's I I have been saved, and his atonement is more than enough. It is totally sufficient to cover my sins, but that doesn't mean that everybody in the world is going to be saved. And if you read it that way, you end up with way more problems than if you understand God had a rescue mission for people that he elected before the foundation of the world, and none of them would be lost because Christ's atonement was definite for everyone that he came to save. It's almost like these points interlock together. Every one of them correlates with another one and uh and and kind of connects this chain of ideas that we see throughout scripture, um, but but can be difficult. There's some ideas around provenient grace. Like I said, I think uh our the Arminian view on this tends to lead to open theism because it's it's more like God doesn't totally know uh until the end. There's some stuff like Romans 9. I mean, we haven't even gone to Romans 9, but it's a pretty it's a pretty salty passage where he makes this very, very clear that God is ultimately the one who's deciding and choosing. And um the the argument that Paul throws forward is something like um, you know, uh the hypothetical argument is, well, then it's it's God's fault for doing this to me, uh, you know, because it's what he set up in the first place, anticipating every Arminian's argument that has ever come up. And he says, Who are you to talk back to the potter? You know what I mean? Who are you, oh man, to talk back to God? He doesn't even he doesn't even answer the question. He goes right to you're thinking about yourself and you don't have a big enough view of who God is.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:And again, is salvation about God or is it about man primarily? And wherever you place the emphasis is going to shape your theology. And I don't think the Bible's about you. Correct. I think it's about I think it's about that.
SPEAKER_00:So two quick points before we move on to the to the next uh Yeah. Just for for those at home who maybe aren't as biblically scholared, um define antecedent.
SPEAKER_01:Antecedent would be the previous information, the the previous stuff that's that's coming up before you get to the thing that you're reading in that area. So antecedent is just what what's coming before that's related to it.
SPEAKER_00:So a fancy, a fancy way to say make sure you're looking at the context.
SPEAKER_01:Yes, yeah. Sorry. No, you're good. Antecedent.
SPEAKER_00:I didn't even think about it.
SPEAKER_01:Thank you for bringing me back down to earth.
SPEAKER_00:No, no, the the the point is that you're you're able to give these ideas, you know, the weight they deserve. Yeah. Um the second point uh to the John 3.16 argument of God so loved the world, uh, just a quip on that would be if you're a parent, you know that loving something and punishing it are not mutually exclusive. Yeah. Because uh you can love your children and recognize that there needs to be discipline, there needs to be punishment for wicked deeds.
SPEAKER_01:Well, and there's there's um anthropomorphic language in a lot of this too. So God is not willing that any should perish but all should come to repentance. Okay, well, we know that God's will gets done. So what happened? Right? Yeah. So if you read the word will the same in every single text, you're going to be very confused. Right. So the word will, uh, we would say God has several wills, if you think about it this way. Like one is his uh perceptive or prescriptive will, which is the like the law, don't kill someone, right? Is that his desire for you? Yes. Do you still break that? Yes. All right. He has his emotive will, which is his disposition or will of disposition towards the people, right? But he also has his efficacious or sovereign will, which is I'm going to bring this about whether you like it or not. Yeah. And so we read that God is not willing that any should perish, but all should come to repentance. I want us to see exactly your point. The heart of a father, um, uh, and I think Sproll was the one who said this first, but he said sentencing his own, uh, sentencing his son to death with tears in his eyes because his son is a murderer and whatever on top of that. And it's not something that he loves to do. God is not relishing in that kind of wrath, but it is absolutely just and right that he do so given the circumstances. Absolutely.
SPEAKER_00:So I hope that helps. Absolutely. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:All right.
SPEAKER_00:Irresistible grace.
SPEAKER_01:Irresistible grace. Since we're, yeah. Okay, so so the question here to ask is ultimately um does genera or does regeneration precede justification? Just does regeneration precede salvation, or is it post-salvation? Do I repent and believe and then I'm regenerated? Or am I regenerated and that is what enables me to repent and believe? Christ's atonement was designed to actually save the elect, not merely make salvation possible. All right. So think about it this way. Uh, those people who are hellbound haters of God, who are running the opposite direction, who are using their free will to go straight to hell, God, in his grace and mercy, by the Spirit, changes their hearts. God is the one who reaches down, and those whom he has elected, he transforms their heart of stone and he turns it into a heart of flesh so that they could actually cry out and repent and trust God. All right. So it's not a complicated thing. It's saying that ultimately, if God elects someone, if he foreknows, predestines, calls, justifies, glorifies this kind of golden chain we see in Romans 8. Yep, the way that he is going to do that is by transforming somebody's heart. He's going to bring a dead person back to life. Uh, Ezekiel uh 37 is such a cool picture of this. And it's attached to Ezekiel 36. I will remove your heart of stone, I will give you a heart of flesh, I will give you a new spirit, and I will cause my spirit to dwell within you. And then the next passage you see is Ezekiel preaching to this valley of dry bones. He was like, What can these bones live, son of man? You know, he's like, You alone know, Lord. And he says, preach to the wind, which is interesting because the the word for wind and spirit in the Greek. Oh, yeah, same word, right? So, so this idea of pneuma. So he's like, preach to the wind, and the wind comes and blows, and there's a rattling, and then flesh and sinew and muscle comes and is put on him, and and then fresh wind breathes into them, and then they become living uh beings. And the idea is like a lot of people want to say, Oh, that's the nation of Israel that he's like resurrecting. And I would say, no, no, those are the elect. God is bringing dead people who cannot make decisions for themselves who are gone, and he's giving them uh a new life, a new way to do things, and he's placed his his own spirit within them and given them a new spirit and a new heart so that they would cry out to God and actually desire something that apart from the grace of God, they wouldn't be able to desire uh on their own. So it's not a it's not a uh difficult concept, I guess I I would say. It's just it's a simple, you don't repent and then God gives you a new heart. It's you repented because God gave you a new heart. Yeah. Um, and I think it's it's it's pretty clear. Like the the new birth is ultimately what allows this kind of thing to happen. Um, I'm trying to think of like man, um, James chapter one talks about him bringing this about by his own will. We were brought forth by his own will. Um uh Titus 3 5 makes it pretty clear. Let me see. I'm gonna go to Titus real quick.
SPEAKER_00:We're doing a lot of sword drills today, keeping you on your toes.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, I should I should be more ready for these things. Uh he saved us not on the basis of deeds which we have done in righteousness, but according to his mercy by the washing of regeneration and renewing by the Holy Spirit. Okay, so that that's pretty freaking clear. Yeah. How did how did he do this? By the regeneration of the Holy Spirit, by the washing by giving us a new heart. So we are not um new beings that love the Lord and have been created or born again because of what we have done, but because God made us a new being that would actually desire him and want him uh in the first place. So when Nicodemus meets Jesus in the night and is like, hey, talk to me, bro. You know, and Jesus is like, you know, since you met me in the night here, we should talk about how men love darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil. But in this whole passage, he talks about being born again, and he basically tells him it's by the water and by the spirit. And he's like, the spirit goes to and fro. You don't you don't understand what it's doing. But like ultimately, that's how it's happening. The Holy Spirit is the one that's regenerating people and washing them and giving them a new heart so that they would cry out and actually have a desire for God in the first place. So irresistible grace is that God gives specific grace to those that he has called, um, justified, glorified, that transforms their hearts so that they would repent and trust him and ultimately be saved.
SPEAKER_00:So it's not it's not being an evil man choosing to change your ways, it's being a dead man being brought to life.
SPEAKER_01:This is this is why I was saying before the idea of uh the the rest of the the flower really hangs on what you believe about total depravity. So most people, if you start with total depravity, will agree with you through the entire thing. Then they see how it connects to irresistible grace or limited atonement or unconditional election, and suddenly they're like, Oh, I gotta go back. Well, maybe it's not quite that, you know what I mean, to try to rework it and make it not uh as bad as it seems. But the reality is this is this is how these things happen.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:Um, and this shouldn't, for the record, this shouldn't stop you from evangelism. This shouldn't stop you from like uh going out and doing the things that Christ has called you to do. It should actually put like some steel in your back to go and do this. It should put some Confidence in you. Because if God wants to save somebody, he's going to do it. Yeah. And he's going to use me as part of the process of seeing this person regenerated and brought back into the fellowship. And I think sometimes we have this idea, like, well, if God's going to save them, it's not up to me to do it. No, no, no. You are the method by which the church is the method, and the individuals that are part of the church are the method by which God is bringing about that redemption across all of time. And I would say this a lot of the texts in scripture about God saving the whole world, because I am post-millennial, I believe that is the case. I believe the whole world will be saved at one point. I believe it will be done, it will be redeemed, it will be made new. And when I read those verses, that is for me part of the post-millennial hope is that God is not punting on the world and it will not all be damned and burned and totally destroyed. It will actually be made new. And eventually, at some point, everything will be beautiful and perfect and totally redeemed the way that God has uh called it to be. But that's another episode where we can get into some of that.
SPEAKER_00:Oh, and we we've got that scam. We've got that planned. I'm sure.
SPEAKER_01:Um we got that scammed.
SPEAKER_00:We got that I said scammed, but we got that planned. No, so go ahead and go ahead and hit me with that C.S. Lewis quote. Which how does he how does he end the Lord's prayer?
SPEAKER_01:Oh, by me, right now. By me, right now. Your kingdom come, your will be done by me, right now. We are the method that God is using. We are the the church is the is the vehicle that God is using to bring about the redemption of all things. He is the head, we are the body, and together we're bringing about uh everything that Christ died for. And we are um we are the body doing work, and Christ is uh sitting in uh with his um, gosh, I'm trying to think of the exact word, until his enemies will be made a footstool for his feet. He is reigning until his enemies will be made a footstool for his feet, which means he's in charge right now, he's kicking butt right now, and he's waiting for all of his enemies to fall as the body of Christ goes forth and does what it's supposed to do for the final uh the final elapse of all things.
SPEAKER_00:Absolutely. And I would say, Christian, if you hold to the tenets of Calvinism and you're out there right now and you have this belief that, well, God's gonna do it anyway, so he doesn't need me to go evangelize or go do these things, take a step back, dig back into the word.
SPEAKER_01:Not not only are you being disobedient to the word of God and what Christ has called you to do, but you're not understanding the viewpoint. You need to flip that on its head. Exactly.
SPEAKER_00:Go go dig back into what you actually believe because you're missing the plot.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, absolutely. Okay, so the the last one and everybody's favorite perseverance of the saints. Okay, perseverance of the saints. Uh, I'm not gonna change this one. It's pretty clear. What it means is that um those who are in fact saved will stay saved. You're not gonna, you're not gonna accidentally fall out of salvation. Why? Because if God foreknew and predestined and called and justified and glorified, and Ephesians makes it clear that we're already seated with Christ in heavenly places, like it's already actually done. It's sealed, it's accomplished, it is finished to telestine. To tell us that you're in, you're good. No one can snatch us out of the hand of God, is what John 10 tells us. That that golden chain that we see in Romans 8 reminds us of no, no, no, it's literally already accomplished. And Philippians 1 6 says, He who began a good work and you will be faithful to bring it about to completion. Like he's the one who's going to accomplish it. Jude makes it very clear that to him who is able to present you faultless before the Father, like who is going to finish this out for you? You're not great. It's not like God saved you and is like, good luck from here. Hope you don't cannonball your faith. It's no, I I'm going to be the one that actually accomplishes this with you and through you. And ultimately it's it's it's good. First Peter 3 tells us that we're kept by God's power. Um, Hebrews 11 uh tells us that, uh, or Hebrews 12 tells us that God disciplines those that he loves. Like there's um you it doesn't mean you're not gonna go through things or you're not gonna have to walk through the whole sanctification process. Yeah, it does, however, mean that you don't have to worry about that meaning somehow I've lost my faith, or I'm uh sudden suddenly I'm no longer part of the elect or not saved.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. No, it it reminds me of the uh the line from in Christ alone. Yeah, no power of hell, no scheme of man can ever pluck me from his hand. Yes, not hell, not man, yeah, it's God alone.
SPEAKER_01:Nothing, nothing can do that. Yep. Yeah, and and uh some Arminian believers, um, some different denominations really believe heavily that you can lose your salvation. And again, I would say I would go back to some of those texts and try to understand maybe a little bit more of the context and what's actually being said, especially in the context of what we know about salvation and how those things work and what the rest of the Bible says about these things, and just draw a logical line from A to B. It's not uh it's not crazy confusing when you just take the texts and read them and get after it. And then, okay, if I have a problem text, goal would be to not have any problem text. Understand it, get into it. And if it changes your perspective on something, praise God. You should fix the things that are broken or not working the way that they should be. There's been times in my life where I've read through the Bible and I've hit something and I'm like, holy crap, this doesn't line up with what I believe right now. Help me understand. I've had to shift a lot of things in my theology and in my journey. And none of those things meant I'm not saved anymore. It meant, okay, this is an opportunity to grow in my knowledge and understanding of who Christ is and what He is uh what He's ultimately called us to. And if um somebody is falling away from the faith, you know, first John, I think it's chapter two, makes it pretty clear that if that person goes out from us, it was because they were never a part of us in the first place. And for those of you wondering about the the um the book of Hebrews, specifically chapter 10, chapter six, I would say consider the fact that he's writing to uh a group of Christians who are there at the church, assuming that they are all saved, even though we know ultimately that not everyone that is there is saved. On a Sunday morning, I'm gonna preach to everybody like you get this and you're in. That doesn't mean that everybody there gets this and they're in. Yeah. And so the the way that we communicate some of these things has more to do with the flock that's in front of us than the than the absolute theological truth that has to do with the the golden chains that can't be broken. Does that make sense? Absolutely. So um ultimately tulip is a is just a uh the in my opinion, and the opinion of a lot of other godly men who are far smarter than I am, um, the way that salvation functionally takes place and helps us understand the fullness of or or uh the counsel of God with regard to salvation in general. And it should be a great relief to a believer. This should be the kind of thing where I get to breathe out and realize like, man, it's not me. And it's never been me. It's always been God. And the grace that I have, uh the faith that I have uh because of the grace of God that he has enabled me to have is ultimately the thing that I get to rest in, knowing that he's going to accomplish and his work in me and get these things done. And it also means I don't get to look down on anybody else because I am not any better. And apart from the grace of God, there go I. This is this is the story of salvation. So sometimes this is called reformed theology, but really it's not um reformed theology. This is it's the soteriology of reformed theology. So a lot of reformers believed this, and that was at very much at the heart of a ton of their teaching. So I get that you could say it's reformed theology. Yeah, that's fine, but ultimately it's a reformed soteriology. This is how God brings it. Define soteriology. Soteriology would be how somebody gets saved, or the the topic or study of salvation itself. Perfect. Hope that makes sense. Absolutely. Man, I had fun. Yeah. What do we do? 50 minutes, Fred? I think we survive. I think so.
SPEAKER_00:And I uh I think my uh my thought that this was going to be a two parter to get into the harder, uh, harder questions was correct.
SPEAKER_01:Okay, good. So well, we'll uh we'll knock out maybe some trouble passages here in a little bit and have some fun with it. Absolutely. All right, guys, you have an amazing week and looking forward for round two here in a little bit.
