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 - Salvation for Man or Glory for God (Covenant Theology misses the point)
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Covenant Theology supposes that the salvation of man is the key theme of the Bible and this perverts their entire interpretation. But is this accurate? Is the Bible about Man or God? An honest reading reveals it is all about God and His glory, which includes how He redeems His fallen creation.
More information about Beyond the Walls, including additional resources can be found at www.beyondthewalls-ministry.com
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 And Lesson Setup
SPEAKER_00Welcome to Beyond the Walls with Jeremy Thomas and our series on the New Testament framework. Today, a smaller, bite-sized piece from the larger lesson. We hope you enjoy
Covenants Under The Covenant Of Grace
SPEAKER_00it.
SPEAKER_01Covenant of Grace, okay, and we're just going to put it at the top, and underneath it, see, you can put the Noahic, the Abrahamic. So again, I'm just trying to express to you the prevailing thing in their mind is the covenant of grace, right? Mosaic, Davidic, and the New Covenants. So they're just viewing these as outworkings of the covenant of grace. That's all they're doing. Okay. Everything, and since this the covenant of grace, which I'm now going to define carefully, since it's salvific, all these other covenants are salvific. Everything basically has to do with salvation.
Covenant Of Works Versus Grace
SPEAKER_01Now, covenant of grace. Covenant of grace basically is this. Well, how how maybe I should define the covenant of works? Because they've got a covenant of works, too. The covenant of works, they claim, was made between God and Adam. And the covenant was this if you and Eve will obey me perfectly, I'll give you eternal life. So it's a covenant of works. If you you and Eve obey me perfectly, I will give you eternal life. Now, of course, they failed. Everybody knows this. They know this. They agree with this. Genesis 3, the fall. Right? So, in the wake of the fall, then God made a second covenant, the covenant of grace. And in the covenant of grace, God made a covenant with Adam and all his elect offspring to give them eternal life. God made a covenant with Adam and all his elect offspring to give them eternal life.
Why The Cross Becomes Elect Only
SPEAKER_01So, since the whole focus of the covenant of grace is on salvation, you know, having eternal life, especially just for the elect, then obviously this sets up the cross. They're thinking that when Christ is on the cross, the only people he's dying for are the elect. I mean, that's why they believe this. You say it's, well, no, they cite verses. No, they cite verses after the fact to try to prove it. It's not, it's not going from the verses. It's going from the covenant of grace and saying God made a covenant with Adam and all of his elect offspring that he would give them eternal life. Therefore, the only people that Jesus dies for on the cross are the elect. Like, this is the theological structure that's controlling how they interpret everything. Okay, look, what I'm trying to tell you is don't talk to these people about verses because it has nothing to do with the verses. It has everything to do with this idea. Okay, and it is a theological idea. Okay, it is not explicitly found in the Bible, it is a grid through which they are reading the Bible. As I said before, they will tell you it is their hermeneutic. It is how they read everything in the Bible. Now, this may all sound surprising to you, but hopefully not. But if you haven't been around covenant theology, then you probably wouldn't. But I mean, I teach this stuff all the time for years and years in dispensationalism course at the seminary, so I'm quite familiar with
A Hermeneutic That Overrides Verses
SPEAKER_01it. Now let's look at some of the let's say repercussions of this. Um the first of which is let me go back to my PowerPoint.
Salvation Focus And One People
SPEAKER_01The first repercussion is there's only one people of God. Well, no, let's do this one. Um that's the second one. The first one is the ultimate purpose of God is soteriological, meaning that's a word for salvation. Okay, everything's about salvation. So every passage is viewed through the lens of the covenant of grace, it's salvific, so all the passages in the Bible are about how God saves the elect. Okay. And we've we've kind of been through this. Now, the second big implication of this is that there's only one people of God. These aren't the people known as the elect. Meaning there's no distinction between the church and Israel. The church has either superseded Israel or they have replaced Israel in God's uh purpose. Okay. So this is because they're viewing the entire human race as either the elect, you're either elect or you're non-elect. And so there's one people of God, the elect. Now that's not complicated logic. It's super easy. This is super, super simple to understand. Um so those in the nation Israel who believe, people like Abraham, they were elect. When the nation Israel rejected their Messiah and he was crucified, the church replaced or superseded the nation Israel in the covenant purpose of God. Which means what? What does that mean about Israel in the future? There is none. God is done with the nation Israel. He's not, you say, well, what's going on in the Middle East then? What what is this nation Israel? 1948, 1967, Jerusalem becomes the capital. What's going on? It's just another nation like any nation on earth. And they're thinking. Okay? It's just another nation. There's nothing special happening over there. Okay. So God has no longer a purpose for Israel. Okay.
Israel Replaced And No Future
SPEAKER_01In fact, most of these theologians are pro-Palestinian, and they claim that Israel are occup, you know, they're the occupation, they have the occupation of the land that really belongs to the so-called Palestinians, and they enter into the political sphere to advance BDS, right? Which is boycott Israel, divest, you know, take your investments out of Israeli companies, and put sanctions on Israel. Now, this is what we would call people in the evangelical Christian church. This is what I'm telling you.
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BDS Politics In Evangelical Churches
SPEAKER_01Why there are in Protestant evangelical churches a mass of churches who want to boycott Israel, want to divest of them, you know, in their investments, and sanction, put sanctions on them. Um and they claim that Israel is at fault because they're occupying a land that doesn't really belong to them, because God's done with Israel.
Holocaust Story And Theology’s End
SPEAKER_01Um this year, earlier, sometime I don't know, a few months ago, I was reading a another book this year on uh the Holocaust, and this one was by a little girl named uh Anita Dittmann. She was a messianic Jew in Germany. Um she was young, you know, even before things really got underway in 1939. I mean things were underway, but when they really got underway and she um went to a Lutheran, she had a Lutheran pastor there in Germany, and he didn't really follow all the Lutheran typical Lutheran stuff. I mean he actually believed that you know there was a future for Israel and God loved the Jewish people. Um but he was out of step with the vast majority of the Lutheran church in in Germany, of which many, many Germans were were Lutheran. I mean, who is Luther? Well, he was a German, you know. So uh many of them were, but she was befuddled. I mean, she was confused. I mean, she was only like 13, 14. She's growing up through this, through the Holocaust period, as a messianic Jew, so she believed in the Messiahship of Jesus. And um when she didn't understand though, like how could she so many Lutherans in our country be against Jews? Like she didn't understand it because the Bible, God loves the Jewish people, they're the apple of his eye, he's made covenant promises to them. Like it didn't make any sense to her, right? But see, in Lutheran theology, when you've got the covenant of grace controlling everything and God is through with the Jewish people, then Nazi Germany is the logical end of that theology in that nation. It's to get rid of the Jewish people.
Where To Find Visuals And Closing
SPEAKER_00Thank you for joining us on Beyond the Walls with Jeremy Thomas. 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.