Beyond the Walls with Jeremy Thomas
Jeremy approaches Bible teaching with a passion for getting the basic doctrines explained so that the individual can understand them and then apply them to circumstances in their life. These basic and important lessons are nestled in a framework of history and progression of revelation from the Bible so the whole of Scripture can be applied to your physical and spiritual life.
Beyond the Walls with Jeremy Thomas
NT Framework - LEAVES Part 1
An open mind, willingness to listen, consider, and learn; are these the prerequisites for salvation? They seem to be for other types of learning, so does this apply to learning about who God is, what He has done for you, and how to respond?
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This series included graphics to illustrate what is being taught, if you would like to watch the teachings you can do so on Rumble (https://rumble.com/user/SpokaneBibleChurch) or on YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLtV_KhFVZ_waBcnuywiRKIyEcDkiujRqP).
Jeremy Thomas is the pastor at Spokane Bible Church in Spokane, Washington and a professor at Chafer Theological Seminary. He has been teaching the Bible for over 20 years, always seeking to present its truths in a clear and understandable manner.
Welcome to Beyond the Walls with Jeremy Thomas and our series on the New Testament framework. Today, the full lesson from Jeremy Thomas. Here's a hint of what's to come.
SPEAKER_02:You know the saying, there's no atheists in foxholes. Oh, why? Because they feel the sense that, hey, I could die, like today. This could be it. So I better get what? I better get my relationship with God sorted out. So that's a pressure point in life, being in war, being in the trenches. Right. And God puts people in these situations for what purpose? To put pressure on them, to get them to realize their mortality and to consider their relationship with God. And so that's what I mean when I say God determines the situation in life, okay, in which a person finds themselves, which is to simulate them to believe.
SPEAKER_00:What does it take to be saved? Is it a particular prayer said in a particular way? Is it an act of faith entering into the lion's den? Is it picking up a servant thinking that you won't be stricken or die if you do? Is it a commitment to live your life in a perfect manner in every facet of your life? Although these things are interesting acts to contemplate, none of them are essential for salvation. You have heard it is by faith. You have heard that it is by grace through faith. And that is true. It is absolutely true. But that only comes if your mind is open to the truth. If you've hardened your mind through sin through deception, through arrogance, through seeking pride and fame and fortune for yourself. Do you really think that you would be open enough to receive the message of a free gift of salvation? Instead, if you are open-minded listening, considering what other people have to say, wondering about the state of the world, do you think that person would be open to receiving a gift without doing anything for it? See, the point here isn't that you need to be in a particular state or do a particular thing or achieve a result. It's just that you just need to be open enough to hear the message when it's preached. And then it's by grace through faith, not any work of your own. It's just by grace through faith. But is your heart and mind ready?
SPEAKER_02:We are working in a series called A New Testament Framework. We taught the Old Testament framework a few years ago. So it basically works your way through the whole Bible dealing with the 22 major events of the Bible, starting with creation, the fall, the flood, the Noahic covenant, the call of Abraham, the Exodus, right? Then you go into the conquest and settlement, the rise and reign of King David, the golden era of Solomon, the division of the kingdom, and so forth. It goes through the fall of those or decline of those kingdoms, the exile, the partial restoration, which prepares us for the intertestamental times in the New Testament when the birth of the king. And so we've gone through the birth of the king, the life of the king, and we're working now with the death of the king, and in particular what happened on the cross. And in the midst of that discussion, we had to deal with some of the doctrinal ramifications, which deal with the question, for whom did Christ die? Or, theologically put, the extent of the atonement, right? And I discussed this under the old rubric that we've now had for over 400 years in the church, and that's the discussion between Calvinism and Arminianism. And I went through the remonstrance, that's the Arminian point of view and the Calvinist view at Synod of Dort, and we went through this history, right? And talked about it and explored it. So in the midst of all this, uh what I basically tried to show is we looked at the passages that they are used by each camp and how they arrive at their ideas or understandings. I said, you know, I don't think that either one of these is correct. Sometimes there's a partial truth there, but when it's arranged with the other truths, it's they're incorrect. So these are systems, and I've tried to explain that, right? They're systems. So tulip, the Calvinist system, is a series of organized, logically organized beliefs. If you read true Calvinists, they'll say you have to be all five points. There's no such thing as a three-point or a four-point Calvinist or something like that, because they're logically interrelated. Uh Arminianism is essentially also logically interrelated, though that is not discussed as much. I don't think the issue is, you know, for us really searching for a logical system, although God is perfectly logical, but we're not trying to arrange things that way. That is, start with a certain presupposition and then build logical outworking from that. What we're trying to do is find out what the Bible teaches. Once we've isolated exactly what it teaches, guess what? It will be absolutely logically true because it will be God's mind. And God's mind is perfectly logical. So that's not really an issue. Okay? It will be logical, but what we have to do is search for the meaning of the text and then just orient the truths or arrange the truths in a particular way so that we are understanding uh the ref God's mind. So, in the midst of all this, you know, I went through Arminianism, Calvinism, and said, hey, after 400 years, basically modern-day Calvinism and modern-day Arminianism are highly evolved and what I would say hardened positions. And I think they hinder people from actually knowing the truth that's derived from the Bible because they put blinders on you so that when you read the text, you on the way you read it is the way that you think it says in your theology. And uh, I've been through this a lot, right? So I used to be a four-point Calvinist. Uh in fact, I decided before I even went to seminary in whatever 1999, um, I was told, hey, you need to decide if you're a four-point Calvinist or a five-point Calvinist. I'm just telling you my story briefly. Um, that wasn't really necessarily the perfect question to ask me to determine, but they said, hey, that will determine whether you go to a place like Westminster Theological Seminary or Dallas Theological Seminary. So, and there's a big difference, so you need to decide that. So, anyway, I sorted it out. I was like, well, I think that on the extent of the atonement, Christ died for the whole world without exception, so therefore I maybe I'm a four-point Calvinist, so I went to a seminary that reflected that. And for many years, several years, I believed in four-point Calvinism. So I believed the T, the U, the I, and the P. I skipped the L, right? And um, this was also historically known as Amiraldianism because it was named after a man named Moise Emirat. I sought this all out, 1634. Uh Moise Emirat was the one who really challenged the L in Tulip. And out of that came what was known as Amiraldianism. Now you probably don't, maybe you never even heard that. Uh, but that's the historical name of the four-point Calvinist position. And I held that for a number of years and taught that. But what happened in seminary, see, in seminary, if you go to a good seminary and you don't go to a cemetery, because there's a lot of cemeteries out there, but if you go to a good seminary, meaning one that actually believes in the authority, the inspiration, the inerrancy of the original text. And um if you go to these types of seminaries, uh, what they train you to do is use the original languages if you take those courses. So this is really the key to everything, that and hermeneutics. You need to have a grasp on the original languages and you need to have a good understanding of how to interpret the Bible. Uh, context, context, context, various rules of interpretation, single meaning, multiple application. There's lots of rules. Okay, and there are rules that come out of grammar. We have rules in grammar, you know, in English, right? I hope we do. Um so they're built into the language which God originated, in which he wrote the Bible in Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek, mainly Hebrew and Greek. So in the midst of that, I'm I began to use the tools. I mean, once you get out of seminary or cemetery, you went to one of those, you don't know a lot. Okay, you think you know a lot. But what actually happens, it's just like going to a school to become a carpenter. Once you finish that school, you know about carpentry, but you really don't know how to do it because you have not done used those skills for years and years and years. So over the next 10, 20, 30 years, what you do is you begin to exercise the skills that you learned and learn to use the tools that you were taught about. But it takes time to gain, you know, a good grasp of how to use those tools accurately. I'm building some stuff right now, and it's always like a challenge, you know, because I don't do these things all the time. So it takes me a lot longer than it would take a normal carpenter. But the point is that you have to hone and sharpen those skills. Same thing with the your tools that you learn in seminary, the languages. So for over 10 years, I wrote every single verse in every single book that I taught, word for word. I could show you these books. I've got volumes of these. And I put every part of speech. Is this a present active participle? Is it a conjunction? Is it a preposition? What's the syntax? Is this accusative singular, you know, uh neuter? What is this? And so I would go through and name every part of speech. And as I did this, what happened was I began to let my own theology build out of the text itself. So I knew these other theologies, but it was like, okay, now comes the corrective, right? The corrective is when the text is telling you what it means, not what your theology is saying it means. So out of that, I over the years have held all these beliefs, but I've never put them all together. So what I'm presenting today is what I call leaves. You know, they the Calvinists have an acronym TULIP, that's a flower. Some of the free graze people have a new acronym that came out in January of this year called LOTUS. They took another flower called LOTUS and they made an acronym out of that, and they've got their five points. And since all the flowers are being taken up, I decided to do the leaves. Um, I was a biologist before this, so I did take botany in courses like that, plant tax. And, you know, you can't get flowers, by the way, unless you have leaves. So if you really want to see the plant blossom, I think we have to back up and we'll just use my acronym leaves today because that's what I came up with. So each of these is is there's five points. It's an acronym again. I'll just put it up. So the L and Leaves stands for limited depravity. And I'll have to define all these things. You may not like the term, but let me define it. That will be at least fair. Uh, section second, the E is for election status. What I'm going to argue for is that election is a status. It's not something that God has predecided who will believe and who will not, or who will be saved and who will not, but it's an actual status that all believers hold, like the word saint. Uh are all believers saints? Yes.
unknown:Okay.
SPEAKER_02:It's a status description, and I'll talk about that. Uh the A stands for available or accessible, whichever word you like, accessible or available atonement. It's there for people to partake of. And veritable grace, which is another way of saying true grace, right? And I'll talk about that. And then eternal security. That's the E and the S and leave. So that's where we're going. Let's start with limited depravity and talk about this. First thing I mean is that all people have sinned in Adam. Romans 5.12. So that all people are legally condemned as sinners. That is a truth. Okay. And this sin is imputed when they are conceived as persons. Psalm 51.5. Remember where David says, in sin my mother conceived me? Okay, that's where I'm coming up with that concept. In sin, my mother conceived me. Now you don't exist before your conception. I mean, you do in the mind of God. Everybody knows that, right? But you don't exist as a person before your conception. But at conception, you do exist as a person.
SPEAKER_01:When the egg and the sperm unite, there is a person.
SPEAKER_02:And this person is conceived in sin and is legally condemned by the imputation of sin at that point in time. Okay, because of our association with Adam, being a member of the human race, we all come from Adam. The human race, every one of us can trace ourselves back to Adam, including Eve. She was even made out of Adam. So there is a solitary origin of the human race. It's in Adam. But you don't come into technically into existence until your conception. It's at that point that the imputation occurs and you're legally condemned. Now, this brings us into a whole issue that is related to this, and that's the issue of infant salvation. What about infants? If infants are conceived in the womb with legal sin, and then they're born into this world, obviously, sinners, what about their salvation? Yeah, I talk about that in the notes if you want the notes, but the long of the short of it is Romans 4 talks about the idea that is not the judge of the earth, will he not do right? Will God not do right? That's my final answer for what he will do about infant salvation. Now, I would say also that because we have an atonement that is available to all, an available atonement, the A and Leaves, that Christ did pay the sin penalty for every single person, including all infants, right? Or babies in the womb. And that thereby makes it possible that he applies that atonement to them and to those who cannot understand the gospel so as to believe, which would include people that are retarded, mentally retarded, things of that nature. So it's obvious, you know, a three-month-old cannot understand the gospel. So if you cannot understand the gospel, which is what he says you have to believe in order to be saved, and then this this little baby dies, but they were not able to believe the gospel, then what is God going to do about that? See? How does that situation get arrived resolved? I think personally that he applies the atonement to all who cannot meet the condition, which would also include mentally retarded people who cannot meet the condition. But if someone wants to quibble about that, I'm fine, and I will just say, will not the judge of the earth do what is right? In the end, he will always do what is right, and we do not have to worry about that. But my personal position is that he will, in fact, save all who could not meet the condition that he sets forth as a requirement, which is to believe the gospel. Um, but we do have that concept of imputation of sin and we being legally condemned, so that they are affected by sin in their entire being. Now, this condition, however, and this is why I call it limited, this condition does not make a person incapable of believing under the conditions which God determines. In other words, the situation in life, which God determines the situations that we find ourselves in in life. I mean, who decided where you were going to be born and who your parents were? It certainly wasn't your parents. They didn't decide to have you, they decided to have a kid, but it was you, and that's God determined it would be you, your parents decided they would have a baby. Or maybe they didn't, and it just happened. They call that an accident, but we know there are no accidents in that sense, right? So God sets up the conditions in life inside of which a person who is depraved is capable of believing under these types of situations. So let's take a look at Matthew 11, 20 to 24.
SPEAKER_01:Now, everybody has revelation from God in the sense of creation, right?
SPEAKER_02:I mean, everybody has that. The heavens declare the glory of God. So there's a sense in which God has revealed himself to everyone. Now that's non-verbal, that's just creation, right? But there are also more intense pockets of revelation. Like you've also got verbal revelation. Who was given in the scriptures in the Old Testament? Who had the scriptures? Who was responsible for taking care of the scriptures? What nation on earth? Israel. So it's it's very obvious that it wasn't the Moabites. Uh it's very obvious that it wasn't whoever lived in the East at that time, or um uh Indians who went out after the flood and ended up in North America, like the Spokane tribe. Um, they would have revelation up through Genesis 9, right? They would have revelation of creation, the fall, and the flood in their, and it might be in their tribal folklore and things like that. And we do find that uh here in North American Indians and tribes and so forth. But they did not have the intensity of revelation that Israel had, which they were receiving the Torah, the first five books, then Joshua judges, Ruth, okay, and so forth. They were getting much more revelation, verbal revelation from God. And then, of course, when Christ came, which is what we're looking at here in Matthew 11, we have even more intense revelation in that he is very God of God, right? He is the very light of light, and he's doing miracles that demonstrate the power of God. So, in that context, Matthew 11, verse 20, he began to denounce the cities in which most of his miracles were done. Miracles are a very intense form of revelation of God. Because these cities did not repent when they saw the miracles. Okay, so he says, Woe to you, Corsan, woe to you, Bethsida. These are two two cities that had a lot of Christ's miracles done up in the northern portion of the Galilee. He says, For if the miracles had occurred in Tyrant Sidon, now those are two different cities. Up on the up in Phoenicia, modern-day Lebanon. Okay, if the miracles had occurred in Tyrant Sidon, which occurred in you, if they'd seen the same miracles, right, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes. Now, first of all, the Lord Jesus Christ has omniscience, right? He knew that if he'd done those miracles up in these two cities on the Phoenician coastline, the exact same miracles he did in Bethsida and Khoruson, they would have repented. But Bethsida and Khoruson didn't repent. And of course he's denouncing them for not responding positively to this revelation. Now, there but there are a question that kind of arises here is well, why didn't you go up there and do them there then?
SPEAKER_01:If they would have repented, right? If he knew that, and he did, then why didn't he go up there and do that? Because then those people would have been, we would say, saved. But he didn't go there. He didn't go there. See, God determines the situation in life in which people are found so that they can believe.
SPEAKER_02:Now I will tell you somewhat of the rest of this story, just out of interest. And that is if you study the book of Acts, you see Paul moves through this area on his way up to Antioch, and there were believers in that area. So somehow this word actually did get there, and people did believe at a later point. So maybe they listened to what he said here. Maybe Peter's there, John's there, Simon's there. They're all there. Maybe after the Acts 7 incident was the stoning of Stephen, and they went out. We know they went out at that point from Jerusalem. Maybe they remember what Christ said here, that these people would have repented and they went there. It's just an interesting story that honestly, I've never ever seen anybody talk about this. Doesn't mean nobody has, hasn't talked about it. I'm sure maybe somebody has. But this is there in the text, and what I'm trying to show with this text is that there are conditions that God determines, like life points where we live, or situations in life. And he somehow gets the revelation there through various people so that people there can believe, and so forth. Um yet, uh I want to bring up more of these passages. What I mean by the situation or conditions under which a person will believe. Zechariah 12 through 14, uh, and Matthew 24, 4 to 29, and the whole book of Revelation, well, chapters 4 to 19, those main chapters that deal with judgment. Um, these are all three parallel passages. They're all dealing with the conditions that God puts Israel in to bring them to salvation.
SPEAKER_01:In other words, he brings pressure in life.
SPEAKER_02:Well, you know, you know the saying, there's no atheists in foxholes. Oh, why? Because they feel the sense that, hey, I could die like today. This could be it. So I better get what? I better get my relationship with God sorted out. So that's a pressure point in life, being in war, being in the trenches, right? And God puts people in these situations for what purpose? To put pressure on them, to get them to realize their mortality and to consider their relationship with God. And so that's what I mean when I say God determines the situation in life, okay, in which a person finds themselves, which is to stimulate them to believe. Okay? And God will do that with Israel. Yet, as people commit personal sin, they become more hardened to the truth. Okay, so what have I said so far? I've said when a person is conceived, they're conceived in sin, they're born in sin, right? They're legally condemned as sinners. But that doesn't mean make them incapable of believing. If God puts them in the right situation in life and they hear, then they can believe. Okay, unless they have become hardened to the truth to the point that they can't believe. So Ephesians chapter 4, 17. So you can worsen your condition. So you come into this world with the imputed sin. But that that's not, then we talk about personal sin on top of that. So what I'm saying is you've got this problem, imputed sin. Now, when we commit personal sin, and that starts very early, right? Uh never had to teach some kid how to say no. No, mom, no. Uh yes. We're gonna change that real quick if you're a good parent, right? But as you sin more and more, growing up from little boy to a young man or woman, a teenager to a young woman or a young man, an adult, uh, you you've committed more and more sin over the course of your life. What does sin do every time we do it? It hardens us, it callouses us, it makes us blind, it sears our conscience. And that's what Paul's talking about here as he talks to the Ephesians 4.17. He says, So this I say and affirm together with the Lord that you walk no longer just as the Gentiles also walk. Contextually, there's unbelievers. He's saying, as a believer, you shouldn't walk like an unbeliever, which is to walk in the futility of their mind, being darkened in their understanding, excluded from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, because of the hardness of their heart, and they have become, having become callous, how do you see they weren't callous to begin with? Do you see that? But they became callous. They have given themselves over to sensuality for the practice of every kind of impurity with greediness. I mean, how do you get in that condition? I mean, we look at the world today, we say, oh my gosh, the things that are going on, the things that our people are doing, which you don't even want to think about, right?
SPEAKER_01:But how did they get to that point? Were they just born with that? No.
SPEAKER_02:You're born in a fallen condition, yes. But the more you sin over your life, what happens is you become darkened in your understanding, you become callous in your heart, and you begin to be able to do things that are you know unthinkable. Wicked, wicked, wickedness, right? It doesn't just start that way. So you have the imputed sin, but then you have the personal sin that piles up over your life, which puts you in a condition of darkness and callousness and hardness toward the things of God. That's what really happens. Now, by the way, uh as a brief aside, when do most people become believers? In their, I'll just give you some categories.
SPEAKER_01:Between zero and twenty, twenty and forty, between forty and sixty, or sixty to a hundred. Which which age? Zero to twenty. Why? Because they haven't committed so many sins that they've become so hardened to the gospel and to the truth.
SPEAKER_02:In fact, when people are little kids, a lot of times they uh they're wondering about the truth. They'll ask you questions.
SPEAKER_01:They'll ask questions that you know a lot of adults can't answer. It's funny. Who's God? Where did God come from? You know, and and adults are like, they don't even want to deal with it, right?
SPEAKER_02:Most of them don't want to deal with it. But they're asking those types of questions because God has made it abundantly clear that He's there and they want to know. They they want to know. And so it's in those early years, those formative years, that's when most people believe the gospel. Yeah, they can they can believe it because they haven't committed so much sin that they've become hardened and callous and blind. Okay. Another good example, just an illustration of someone who believed. Think of Adam. I I've I've thought of this. Okay, Adam is created on the sixth day, right? Um how old was he on the sixth day? He was just in his first day. Uh was he a baby or was he uh appear as a mature adult? He appeared as a mature adult, but as far as personal sin is concerned, he has none. The first day is created. Sometime thereafter we don't know. He does sin, right? He eats the fruit that he was told not to eat. On that day, he was imputed a s uh sin. He had a sin nature, right? And then God comes to him in the garden. So he's in a condition, we would say he's in a fallen condition. I don't know if he has much more personal sin after that. Uh probably some, but not a lot. I mean, God came to him the day they ate, so it's not gonna be a lot of personal sin. Was he responsive to God when God said, Where are you? Finally, he does. He says, Well, okay, we're you know, we're hiding over here, we've made fig leaves, we've solved our problem or whatever. Um so could he respond to God? See? Yes, yes, he had limited depravity, and he did not have a lot of personal sin weighing on him, so that when God confronted him with this sin, he did step into the light.
SPEAKER_01:Sort of this woman you gave me. It's her fault.
SPEAKER_02:And this woman says, Oh, it's the serpent. So they you can see the blame shifting happening. But God makes atonement for them, right? In the in the Lamb. This is the picture where atonement begins. So, just continuing with these statements, this idea becoming more and more hardened. And this can result in some being unwilling and unable to believe when confronted with the gospel. So turn to John 5. Now, this is the condition that Calvinists say everyone is born in. I'm saying they're not born in that condition, but if they commit so much sin in their life, they can work themselves into a situation where they're not willing or capable of believing.
SPEAKER_01:John 5 39 through 47. Speaking to the Jews, specifically the Pharisees.
SPEAKER_02:You search the scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life. I mean, did the Pharisees study the Bible? Oh, sure. They love the Bible, right? Not really, but they did study it. They memorized lots of it, huge portions. He says of this eternal life, it is it is these scriptures that testify about me, namely that, of course, he is eternal life. And you are, there's the word, unwilling to come to me. To come in, John is a uh a synonym for believe. John 6 35. He who comes to me will not thirst, he who believes with me will never hunger. Coming and believing are the same thing in the Gospel of John. He says, You're unwilling to come to me, so they don't want to, right? So that you may have life. He says, I do not receive glory from men, but I know you that you do not have the love of God in yourselves. I have come in my father's name and you do not receive me. If another comes in his own name, you will receive him. How can you believe? There's the word can. How can you believe? Ability. This is from the Greek word dunymus, which means power or belief. How how can you you have the ability? How can you believe when you receive glory from one another and you do not seek the glory that is from the one and only God?
SPEAKER_01:Is it sinful to desire and want glory and receive glory from men? Yes. Yes, God alone is to be glorified.
SPEAKER_02:And if we are to be glorified in any respect, we want it only to come from Him. But they wanted it from men. They wanted recognition, they wanted acknowledgement, they wanted to be put on a pedestal. That's all sinful. So what had happened? They had worked themselves into a situation where they were unwilling to believe the one that the scriptures spoke of, the Messiah, and they were unable to believe. So people can work themselves into that situation by repetitively sinning, in this case, seeking the glory of men rather than seeking the glory of God. Just an example, right? But it does say this. Yeah, let's go on. 48.4. How can you believe when you seek glory from one another? You do not seek it from the one and only God? Do not think that I will accuse you before the Father. The one who accuses you is Moses, in whom you set your hope. I mean, who's greater than Moses for the Pharisees in the Old Testament? Nobody. He says, For if you believed Moses, you would believe me. Why? Because he wrote about me. But if you do not believe his writings, how will you believe my words?
SPEAKER_01:Did the Pharisees believe Moses' words? Not for one second. Not for one second. They read it every synagogue, right? Throughout the land of Israel.
SPEAKER_02:But as they read it, they had pre-interpreted it and turned it into the traditions of men. What did it mean to murder someone? For them it just meant you know you don't actually go and murder them physically by strangling or beating or stabbing or whatever.
SPEAKER_01:What did Jesus say it meant in the Sermon on the Mount? Hating your brother. It was internal.
SPEAKER_02:They had made it all external, you know, actually killing them. He says, no, no, no, hatred, uh, murder starts in the heart. He's talking about premeditation, right? You you hate someone, and because you hate them, the best thing would be to get rid of them. That way you don't ever have to be around them. But murder is starts in the heart. And that's the real problem, is the heart. And that's what the law was about. It was supposed to show Israel that internally they had a problem. And they therefore could not be righteous in themselves, keeping the law, but they needed to look for a faith type of righteousness that comes through faith in the becoming Messiah. And if they believe Moses, he says, you would believe in me. Why? Because Moses spoke about me. I'm right there on the pages of the text. I'm the greater than Moses in Deuteronomy 18, right? So this is just an example of the way that a person can work themselves into a situation where they're unwilling and unable to believe. And you meet these people all the time. You try to talk about anything about God or the Bible or Jesus, and they're immediately, you know, reject all of that. Which means they're rejecting what? Truth. Truth. If you reject truth, reject truth, reject truth, guess what happens? You become blind, you become callous, you become hardened to truth.
SPEAKER_01:2 Thessalonians 2 talks about believing the lie. I mean, if you don't believe the truth, what do you believe? You believe a set of lies. Well, let's go on in this.
SPEAKER_02:Um, some more on this. If not so hardened. If a person is not in such a hardened state, when the gospel is preached, which is the power of God into salvation, right? And here I'm emphasizing the power of the word, it's the spoken word, which is the means by which God accomplishes things. We don't have this capability. We can influence people with our words, but we do not have the type of power that God's word itself has. So if a person is in not such a hardened state, when the gospel is preached, which is the power of God into salvation, a person can actually arrange themselves toward being receptive to the message of salvation. They can arrange themselves, Acts 13, 46. This Greek word tasso, very interesting word.
SPEAKER_01:Paul and his first missionary journey here in a pretty large city. Um Pisidian, Antioch. Or is he at Iconium? I can't remember.
SPEAKER_02:I'd have to go back up to verse. Yeah, he's in Pisidian, Antioch, there on verse 14. So he's giving this big address in the synagogue, and there are mostly Jews, of course, and then there are some God-fearing Gentiles present. And as he goes through, you know, here in verse 32 or so, we preach to you the good news. You see that, verse 32? The gospel. The gospel of the promise made to the fathers, that's Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, that God has fulfilled this promise to our children, that's Israel, in that he raised up Jesus, as it is also written in the second Psalm, You are my son, today I've begotten you. As for the fact that he raised him up. So we've got the death and the resurrection. He raised him up from the dead. That's the central work of Christ. That's the centerpiece of the gospel, his death and resurrection. No longer to return to decay, he has spoken in this way, I will give you the holy and sure blessings of David. Therefore, he also says in another Psalm, You will not allow your holy one to undergo decay, which was David, but speaking of the Messiah that comes from David. For David, after he had served the purpose of God in his own generation, he fell asleep, and he was laid among his fathers and underwent decay. So the Psalm couldn't be talking about David, right? David did undergo decay. But he whom God raised did not undergo decay. Therefore, Paul says, Let it be known to you, brethren, that through him, that is through the Messiah, forgiveness of sins is proclaimed to you. And through him, everyone who believes is freed from all things. But that's the Greek word dica, is the word justified. The doctrine of justification by faith, right there in verse 39. Through him, everyone who believes is justified from all things, which you could not be justified through the law of Moses. The law of Moses couldn't justify anybody, right? Couldn't then, can't now, or never. It can show you your sin and your need for faith righteousness, faith justification, but it can justify you. Therefore, take heed so that the things spoken of in the prophets may not come upon you. Speaking mainly to the Jews, but also Gentiles in the background. Behold, you scoffers and marvel and perish, for I am accomplishing a work in your days, a work which you will never believe, though someone should describe it to you. As Paul and Barnabas are going out of the synagogue, the people kept begging that these things might be spoken to them the next Sabbath. When the meeting of the synagogue had broken up, many of the Jews and of the God-fearing proselytes, those are Gentiles who proselytes to Judaism, followed Paul and Barnabas, who were speaking to them, were urging them to continue in the grace of God. And the next Sabbath, here we go, the whole city, nearly the whole city assembled to hear the word of the Lord. But when the Jews saw the crowds, they were filled with what? Jealousy. By the way, in the book of Acts, if you read it, you will look for two types of filling. Those who are filled by the Spirit, also sometimes called wisdom, and so forth, and then those feared full of envy or jealousy. And it's an interesting contrast throughout the book. Filled with jealousy, they began contradicting the things spoken by Paul, in other words, speaking lies, just Paul speaking truth, and they're blaspheming. And Paul and Barnabas spoke out boldly and said, It was necessary the word of God be spoken to you, that's the Jews, first. Since you repudiate it and you judge yourselves unworthy of eternal life, behold, we're turning to the Gentiles. They did not, okay, what I'm going to end up saying is they did not arrange themselves positively toward the message which Paul had concerning justification by faith in the Messiah who died and rose for them, which is the message he preached the previous Sabbath, right? They did not consider themselves or judge themselves worthy of eternal life. It was a self-judgment. God didn't say, you know, I didn't elect you guys before the foundation of the world, and that's why you're not going to believe. No. It's you didn't judge yourselves worthy of it. You did not arrange yourselves properly toward the message. And therefore, I'm turning to the Gentiles. So he says, For so the Lord has commanded, I have placed you, that's Israel, as a light for the Gentiles, that you may bring salvation to the ends of the earth. This is why Paul, every time in the book of Acts, he goes to the synagogue first. Why? Because Isaiah talks about this. Isaiah 40s talk about God setting up Israel to be a light to the nations. And so in the book of Acts, Paul says, Every time I go to a city, I go to the synagogue first because I'm giving the Jews the opportunity to believe first and become a light to the Gentiles in their area. That's why he's doing that. But, verse 48, when the Gentiles heard this, they began rejoicing and glorifying the word of the Lord. Why? Well, Paul's coming to them. He's turning to the Gentiles. It says, and as many as had been appointed to eternal life believed. Is that what it says in your version? If you have new New American Standard, that's what it says. Any other versions?
SPEAKER_01:Anyone want to volunteer anything? Another translation there. And all who were appointed for eternal life believed. This word appointed is the Greek word tasso. It's in the middle voice. It's kind of important. And this this verse is a contrast to verse 46.
SPEAKER_02:In verse 46, the judges, the Jews did not judge themselves worthy of eternal life, did they?
SPEAKER_01:In other words, it was their fault.
SPEAKER_02:If they'd been judging some themselves worthy of eternal life, arranging themselves toward that, they would have believed. This is the contra response of the Gentiles. And the translation says in most of them, those who appointed themselves to eternal life believed. In other words, this is the idea that people get from this verse is that God chose certain people at Poseidon Antioch among the Gentiles to believe, and he didn't choose anybody else.
SPEAKER_01:There's the problem that's a middle voice. That's a middle voice. Now look, if I'm playing baseball, I'm going to tell you how the middle voice works. And I hit the ball. That's an active voice. I hit the ball. Now, if the pitcher pitches and the ball hits me, so I gotta walk to first base.
SPEAKER_02:That's a passive voice, right?
SPEAKER_01:I got hit by the ball. Passive. I was passive. I got hit. What if I hit myself with the ball? That's the middle voice. It's an action that you do to yourself. I brush my teeth. Type of middle voice.
SPEAKER_02:It's active, but anyway. It's the idea that you do something to yourself, though. Middle voice. Now, what this Greek word means, if you look at it and study this word very carefully, is it's talking, it's a word that means to arrange something.
SPEAKER_01:Now, since it's middle voice, they arrange themselves toward eternal life.
SPEAKER_02:In other words, they predispose themselves to the message. In fact, they're excited about it. It says when they heard this and began to rejoice and they're glorifying the word of the Lord. What are they glorifying? The word of God. They are predisposing themselves toward the message. It's not that they were appointed to eternal life, it's that they appointed themselves or arranged themselves toward it. Now, you say, I'm just not sure about you. You know, you're going against my the New American Standard Bible translators. That's fine, okay, whatever. Um, have you ever heard of the parable of the four soils?
SPEAKER_01:Did seed fall on all four soils? Yes or no?
SPEAKER_02:Did the first one receive it, or was it too hard because it had been trampled down? You know, if you if you've been a farmer, you know, there's this thing called a road, you know, on the side of the field, usually for your tractor, your truck, or whatever. It's hard ground. I mean, is that where you want to put your seed? No, but something's gonna fall over there, right? It usually doesn't sprout up. Why? Because the birds come along and eat it up or something like that. It's too hard. The ground's not. Guess what? The ground in all four of those four soils is a picture of people's hearts and how responsive they are to the seed. And you ask yourself as you go through the parable, which of the which of the soils received the seed, right? It's talking about four different conditions of the human heart. One was so hard that it didn't receive the seed at all. They said the birds came along and picked it up, and when Jesus explains it, he says that's Satan. He, as they hear it, he steals it away, and they never hear it. They never get it, they never receive it, they don't take that message in. In other words, they don't believe. Then you've got three more. Now, the other three soils that all receive it, right? One among the rocky soil, one among the thorns, and the other on good soil, it says. It doesn't say good seed, it says it was good what? Soil. It's talking about a receptive heart. A receptive heart. The other two in the middle, they also received it, but it didn't last, right? It kind of grew up, but one didn't have enough water because it was rocky soil, so they withered. Another one grew up among the thorns and got choked out. But at least those soils did receive it. They just didn't do anything with it. It's like somebody who believes the gospel and then what? After a while they're like, eh, that was Christianity, I did that. Now I've grown up, I've figured more things out. Go on their merry way. They get carried away by the lusts of their flesh or the temptations of the world, right?
SPEAKER_01:By the way, you have the world, the flesh, and the devil in that parable. That's on purpose. But the point is to show that the human heart can be in a in different preparation states.
SPEAKER_02:What happens if we as parents take our children and we mold and fashion their hearts to be receptive to the gospel? Versus if we're parents that don't do that and just train them in the ways of the world.
SPEAKER_01:See, is there gonna be a difference in how those kids respond, young kids?
SPEAKER_02:Typically, in general, we would say, yeah, there's gonna be a difference. It's not gonna get the same response. Because there's a heart preparation that goes on. Parents, this is a part of our role. Uh, over in 1 Corinthians 7, we're there on Wednesday nights, it's very interesting. It confirms this whole scenario. It says, if you're a believer and you're married to an unbeliever, you should remain married to the unbeliever unless the unbeliever decides to leave. Now, why does it say this? It says, because how do you know that God is not going to use you to save the unbelieving mate? And he says further, your children are set apart for a special place of blessing by God. Why? Because at least one of the parents is a believer and can work the soil of the child's heart to prepare them for what?
SPEAKER_01:To prepare them to receive the gospel. See?
SPEAKER_02:So hearts can be in different places. It's not that everybody is born so condemned and so dead, like the Calvinist says, that nobody can respond, so God has to regenerate the elect first. This is this has nothing to do with reality. That is a total figment of people's imagination. And what I'm telling you, I think, actually smacks of reality. You're like, yeah, that's really the way it is. We can either work with our children and make their little hearts receptive, you know, people can sin and harden their hearts. This all rings up truth, does it not? But this other stuff doesn't ring up truth at all. And that's why I call it the error of reductionism. Calvinism and Armenianism are both committing the error of reductionism. That is to take something that's complicated and you try to explain it in simple, simpler ways. But the simpler ways just can't simply can't explain it. So I'm taking you through some of the details, but as you go through the details, you go, well, yeah, this makes sense. Or you disagree with me, and that's okay. That's okay. Um, that's okay. So a person can arrange themselves toward being receptive to the message of salvation, and here's how they do it. Okay, Acts 16, 14, a couple pages over to the right, a little gal named uh Lydia, the dire of purple fabrics, Acts 16.14. So these are good illustrations. You kind of see it in action, right? A woman named Lydia from the city of Thyatira, a seller of purple fabrics, a worshiper of God. So she is uh a Gentile, but she was worshiping the Jewish God, Yahweh, right? Doing here by the uh riverside.
SPEAKER_01:And it says, what was she doing? She was listening. I mean, doesn't a person have to hear? I mean, can people believe if they don't hear? No, you can't believe unless you hear. You have to hear. Faith comes by hearing.
SPEAKER_02:Okay, so but so she's hearing, and it says, the Lord opened her heart. That's the second thing that happened. Okay. The Lord opened her heart. So as she's listening, she's being attentive to the word. What is the Lord doing? He's opening her heart. He's working with this woman.
SPEAKER_01:And to respond to the things spoken of by Paul, obviously respond positively. So that's just an illustration. Okay.
SPEAKER_02:Let's look at this concept of learning. As she's listening, she's obviously, what do you do when you listen? Typically, you learn, hopefully. If you're really paying attention to the teacher, you're you're learning something. So let's go to John 6.45.
SPEAKER_01:John 6.45. In this one passage, the Calvinists use this all the time. They go 637 and 644.
SPEAKER_02:And I'm like, what about all the other verses? What about all the others? You can't just do 637, 644. I took Greek from S. Lewis Johnson. It's one of the greatest Greek scholars ever. And he he was a five-point Calvinist and he used this because we did the upper, we did uh several passages in John for our advanced exegesis courses. 637, 644. All the father gives me will come to me, the one who comes to me is a certain not cast out. Skip to verse 44. No one can come to me unless the father sent me draws him. He says, see, draws, see, see? Okay. He said, God has to draw or pull. You can't just come, nobody can come. So God has to drag them. He says this word is helko, draw, and it means drag.
SPEAKER_01:I'm going to argue that God, God does not treat humans like he treats rocks. You have a different constitution than a rock. You have a different constitution than an animal.
SPEAKER_02:And God works his sovereignty relative to the constitution of the thing that his sovereignty is being exercised upon. Humans have to be made in the image of God. And so he works in harmony with the constitution with which he has constructed us. We're not like a star or an atom or a river. God's sovereign over those things, but in a totally different way than he's sovereign over us, who have a constitution that's reflective of his, made in his own image. So we don't want to skip all the verses. Here's one of the verses, verse 45. It's written in the prophets, and they shall all be taught of God. Everyone who has what?
SPEAKER_01:Heard. So you're listening, right? And learned from the Father does what? Comes to me. And comes again, verse 35.
SPEAKER_02:Comes is parallel to believes. He who comes will not hunger. He who believes will never thirst. To come to him is to believe in him. Who are the ones who come to him by believing in him? The ones who hear the word of God, who hear the gospel message, right? And they learn, they're understanding it. And as that's happening, they come to him.
SPEAKER_01:Why?
SPEAKER_02:Because that's the context in which the Father's doing his drawing work from the previous verse. He's drawing them as he's doing that, just like he did with Lydia.
SPEAKER_01:She was listening, and the Lord opened her heart to respond. She did. That's how it happens. But a person does have to give their attention and listen and learn.
SPEAKER_02:And the Spirit convicts, John 16, 8 through 11, right? He will convict the world of sin, righteousness, and judgment. He's in the midst of this too. I would say the whole process is Trinitarian. Is that biblical? Is that orthodoxy? The Trinitarian idea. Christ is the one who died. The Father is the one who is doing what as a person listens. He's drawing, and the Spirit is there convicting.
SPEAKER_01:All three are involved. So there it is, John 16, 8 through 11. And the result is belief and salvation. So let's turn to the final one, Romans 10. Romans 10, 14 through 15 and 17. Looks like we're only going to get through this point, but that's okay.
SPEAKER_02:These five points are basically related to a doctrine of salvation. So they don't deal with every topic, but obviously one that's very important to humans is the doctrine of salvation. If we get this right, I think what ends up happening is it when we get through all this, the end product, just so you realize there's a goal to this. It's not just to say these people are wrong and these people are wrong, it has nothing to do with that. It has to do with knowing what God says. And then if we know what God says, I think that understanding things this way actually spurs evangelism and missions. That's the heart of what comes out of this as far as application. So let's look at uh Romans 10, 14 and 15. How, here's a sequence. How then will they call on him in whom they have not believed?
SPEAKER_01:In other words, if you haven't believed on him, can you call on him? No, you have to believe first, then after you believe, you can call.
SPEAKER_02:How will they call on him unless they believe? Okay, so you have to believe first, then you can call. The question becomes, well, what in the context, what are they calling on him for? Calling on him for deliverance. Believers being delivered. Do you ever need to be delivered from anything? Anybody ever have any hard situations in life? You need to be delivered, you call on the Lord to help you, to deliver you? Yeah, that's what he's talking about. But you you have to be a believer before you can make that request, right? So then he goes on. Well, how are they gonna believe in who if if they have in whom they've not heard? I mean, does a person have to hear before they can believe?
SPEAKER_01:Of course. You can't get saved by the stars. I know people have said that, but anyway. Um you have to hear if you're gonna believe. We just saw it with Lydia. He was listening. I mean, it was hearing, right?
SPEAKER_02:John 6. He who has heard and learned from the Father is the one who comes to you. It's always you gotta hear. I mean, why is Paul going out in the book of Acts? Why is Peter going out? Why aren't they going and preaching to people? If you don't have to hear, what's the point? You're a waste of time.
SPEAKER_01:Go ride your motorcycle. I don't know. Do whatever you love, right?
SPEAKER_02:Who cares about people hearing if they can just be saved without hearing? See, but obviously you can't. You have to hear. Now, and then he goes off and he backs off further.
SPEAKER_01:And he says, And how will they hear without a preacher? Right now I get to be the preacher. But you're all preachers in this sense, right? I mean, how are people gonna hear the gospel if you don't preach it? Right? And then he says, How will they preach unless they're sent? Is the missions type idea? How will they preach unless they're sent?
SPEAKER_02:If people aren't sent out to preach, then other people won't hear. And those people won't believe. And then once they're believers, they can't call on him for deliverance in their life from difficulties. Just as it is written, how beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news of good things. I mean, it is, right? You look back to somebody at some point who preached to you the gospel. Could have been your mom, could have been your dad, could have been your pastor, could have been a friend, could have been a coworker, could have been anybody. But the point is, if that person hadn't preached the gospel, you wouldn't have heard it, and you wouldn't have believed it, and you wouldn't have been saved, and you couldn't call on him to be delivered from difficulties, could you? But they did do that. This is the chain, right? It's the chain. Somebody has to be sent, somebody has to preach, you have to hear, you have to believe, and then you can call. Verse 17, just kind of as a summary of it, and a shortened summary. So faith comes from hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ. So the point is that, see, people under limited depravity, people are born in a condition where if God sets the stage around their life in a certain way, then they are capable of believing given a certain set of conditions.
SPEAKER_01:Somebody sent, somebody preaches, you hear, you're listening, you're learning.
SPEAKER_02:The father is drawing, he's teaching you. You're learning from him, he's drawing you. The Spirit is convicting you, you believe. Okay, do you see how that works? It's a little more complicated than just saying God has chosen certain people to be saved, and the rest he just sent to hell.
SPEAKER_01:Which one is true? Which one is real? Which one fits not only the Bible, but the real world?
SPEAKER_02:Do you see now that that first point on total depravity isn't even in our in Calvinism isn't even close to reality? It's not even close to the Bible.
SPEAKER_01:Not even close. Next week I'll do a lection. It doesn't look like I have time. I would encourage you to look at the Bauer Danker Art Ingrich lexicon, which is the most highly esteemed Greek lexicon in the entire world. For this word, I want you to I know the resource cost$120.
SPEAKER_02:So I could cut and paste and send it to you or something like that. But I really encourage you to do this yourself so you see how distorted this has become. I'm just saying that all words have to be carefully analyzed. I mean, why why would I be a preacher? Why do you need you know somebody who studies the original languages if I'm not supposed to get up here and go a little bit further than what the English says? See? This word or words, eclectae, eclectomy, eclecta, uh, eclec eclecomy, these words, as I'll show you, in the majority of uses refer to something that is choice, premier, or distinguished. Even says in the gospels, it says of Christ, it says uh that he in our translations it'll say the he's cho the chosen one. If you a if you just stop for just a minute and ask yourself, was Jesus really chosen?
SPEAKER_01:You'll you'll realize very quickly that's a that's that's a that's a silly question. What what were the alternatives? I mean, like yeah, you're right. Exactly.
SPEAKER_02:But you'll say, Well, there wasn't anybody else to choose from. He's the second person of the Trinity. You couldn't choose, I mean, who else is in the lot from which you're you're saying you chose Jesus? No, the choice one, the premier one, the distinguished one. Another Greek word, uh monogones, which means the unique one. It's in John 3 16. For God so loved the world that he gave his unique one.
SPEAKER_01:Why is he unique? Because he's the only person who was ever God and man in one person.
SPEAKER_02:He's totally unique. But in these other passages, he's the choice one, he's the premier one, he's the distinguished one, he's the one who God is interested in, right? Because God is looking at his work on the cross. So that what happens when we believe in him? We become choice in him.
SPEAKER_01:We become premier, we become distinguished. What? Because of something we've done? No. No. It's because our faith is not a work.
SPEAKER_02:And when we put our faith in him, his righteousness is imputed to us. That's why we become choice or premier or distinguished in God's sight. It's not a word that God says, you know, before the foundation of the world, what I decided to do was select these certain people, they'd be saved, and let these other and select these people to go to hell, or just pass them over. It doesn't have anything to do with that. Most of these are adjectives, by the way, in most of the uses. They're adjectives. They're descriptions of who you are, like choice, not chosen. And these adjectives can be substance can function as substantives. I'm very well aware of that in Greek grammar by uh Dan Wallace. But you go from context to determine which is it being used as. I'll take you through a parable next week. Matthew 22, the marriage feast of the king, where he sends out the invitation, they reject. He sends out the invitation again, they reject, they kill his servants. And then he sends it out to everybody and anybody, and so forth. He destroys those first people's city. And then at the end it says, Many are called, but few are chosen. Almost every translation says that. Just read it. Just read it and ask yourself should it really be translated chosen, or should it be translated choice? See, there are certain people that get into the wedding banquet, right? They all have a specific clothing, right? Remember? And this one guy shows up in there and he doesn't have the right clothes on. He's like Like, how did you get in here? Cast them into the outer darkness. And then it says, For many are called you are what? Okay, we have to have a certain type of wedding garment on.
SPEAKER_01:What do you think the wedding garment is? It's the righteousness of Jesus Christ. If you have that on, your choice.
SPEAKER_02:It's not chosen. He sent an invitation to all these people. Are you telling me he sent an invitation to all these people? And then the ones that you rejected, he said, I'm going to destroy your city because you'd have rejected, even though I didn't choose you from before the foundation of the world. See, it doesn't make any sense. It makes it nonsense. Just in reading, just in reading, let the context tell you. And if you if you knew ahead of time that the word could mean choice or chosen, you might be more open to reading it and saying, now, wait a minute, that doesn't sound right. It probably should be choice here. The ones who have the wedding garments on, they're choice because they responded to the invitation. And that in fact is the truth. Everybody here, if you have responded to the salvation offer, you are choice. You are premier. You are distinguished in God's sight. Why? Because you're so wonderful? No, because Jesus Christ is so wonderful, he's the choice one of God, and you believed in him, and at that moment he put his clothes on you. And so when God looks at you, who does he see? Jesus Christ. This is the whole point of the gospel. This has nothing to do in the Bible about God selecting who would be saved and who would not. That is absolutely outside the total confines. God says to Israel, I've stretched out to you all day long and you were not willing.
SPEAKER_01:How does that fit with eternal election? It doesn't fit at all.
SPEAKER_02:Why was God stretching out to them if he knew from eternity past and chose them never to respond to him? It doesn't make any sense at all. He says, You're a disobedient and obstinate people. It didn't have anything to do with him, it had everything to do with them. They were rejecting. Why were they rejecting? Because they did not arrange themselves toward the message of God in the scriptures. They didn't believe Moses, they didn't believe the prophets, and therefore they didn't believe in Jesus Christ. And it's very obvious from the pages of scripture. If anybody knows this story and really loves God, they know this is exactly the story the Bible tells us. The end of Romans 9, what does it say? You were looking for a righteousness that comes from the law and not a righteousness that comes by faith. Romans 9, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34. It's right there. It's in black and white.
SPEAKER_01:What are we gonna do? Just smudge all these off the pages of our Bible? What did Jesus say in Matthew 23, 37?
SPEAKER_02:O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, how I wanted to gather you as a hen gathers chicks under her wings, but you were unwilling. Did Jesus Christ want them to come to him?
SPEAKER_01:100% if we know how to read English. But they were unwilling.
SPEAKER_02:It had nothing to do with what Jesus had done or God had decided before the foundation of the world. It had to do with their rejection.
SPEAKER_01:Plain and simple. It's not that complicated. And obviously the application out of this is what should we do with our little ones?
SPEAKER_02:What should we do with everyone? Try to prepare their hearts to be receptive to the seed so that when it falls on their hearts, it receives it. That's what we should be doing. I should be loving you. You should be loving me. Why? Because that's how I make your heart receptive to the things of the Word of God. That's how you make my heart receptive to the things of the Word of God. We love one another. Jesus said they will know you because of your love for one another. What if we don't love one another? We won't be preparing their hearts to be receptive to the message that we have, will we? No. It is so important to love one another.
SPEAKER_01:See, this is very evangelistic, very missions-oriented. Next week I'll do a little bit more with the election thing.
SPEAKER_00:If you would like to see the visuals that went along with today's sermon, you can find those on Rumble and on YouTube under Spokane Bible Church. That is where Jeremy is the pastor and teacher. We hope you found today's lesson productive and useful in growing closer to God and walking more obediently with Him. If you found this podcast to be useful and helpful, then please consider rating us in your favorite podcast app. And until next time, we hope you have a blessed and wonderful day.