Lawson, Nichols, and Sproul: Questions and Answers #1

we are delighted that you're here that let me thank you in advance for submitting your questions there are some excellent questions here and let me apologize to you in advance because we will not be able to get to them all but you have asked some terrific questions and we keep those questions and we asked them that at future conferences so please don't be disappointed if we don't get to your question tonight or tomorrow we will hopefully get to it at another time and we also have our ask RC live events when we do that on streaming video and it's a lot of fun to do that so we'll hold it for those as well each afternoon and evening or morning whenever you listen to renewing and how many of you listen to renewing your mind on radio okay how many listen to renewing your mind on the internet just curious that okay good thank you at the end of that program I I always say thank you for listening and let me just tell you in person face to face I really mean that we are grateful that you listened to renewing your mind and we hope that your mind is being renewed as a result of listening to the solid biblical teaching as Chris Larson mentioned earlier this is always an exciting part of our conferences where we get to engage in question and answers and so let me begin dr. Sproul can you speak to the difference between the spiritual blessing of God found in the gospel and the material tangible curse or blessing from disobedience obedience that seems to be indicated in Deuteronomy and Israel's response to the law well we can distinguish between the spiritual and material dimensions of God's blessing but we really can't separate them because the blessing of God is a complete blessedness whereby he not only saves our souls but he promises the redeem our bodies and the whole creation which includes the material well-being of the earth and of people and and so in in the Deuteronomic promise of curse and blessing though the terms of the curse are articulated primarily there in material terms the clear implication is that that curse goes far beyond because you have to understand the concept of the curse as Steve was pointing out in terms of the whole biblical revelation of what it means when dr. Lawson spoke of the blessedness he went to the Hebrew gun addiction may the Lord bless you and keep you may the Lord make his face shine upon you and be gracious on you made it would have left up the light of his countenance and give you peace what you have there is a form of poetry in the Hebrew it's called parallelism where there are three lines may the Lord bless may the Lord lift up the light of his countenance may make his face shine upon you and let the polite accounts there's a parallel there if you want to understand what the Jew meant by blessedness as Steve pointed out blessing is totally related to God's making his face to shine upon you and to lift up the light of his countenance and conversely if that were the Hebrew curse it would made it would be may the Lord curse you may the Lord turn his face away from you may the Lord darken his countenance before you and rather than give you peace and keep you may he destroy you and so on and so again in that formula for blessedness and curse includes not just the material but the whole of our human experience ultimately with respect to our souls dr. Lawson first let me thank you for your wonderful message earlier and let me ask you as a follow-on to that question is is that the picture that that that is being painted when when the priest is laying his hands on that scapegoat that he is he's being separated and experiencing the cursing that a foreshadowing of what will take place one day at the cross there was no redemptive power it was simply an illustration of the reality of Christ Hebrews would call it a shadow but Christ would be the substance who would come and what that was picturing is as the priest laid his hands upon the head of the scapegoat was a transferring of the sins of the people to that scapegoat who is Christ and as Christ then as that scapegoat then was released into the wilderness that's John 1:29 the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world the first goat shed the blood and was a covering for our sins this second goat was a removal of the sin and it also pictured Christ being forsaken by the Father as well so that's Leviticus 16 the day of atonement and that is was really the high point in Israel on that day as they were previewing what would one day happen in the death of their Messiah on their behalf in addition to that where the scapegoat goes is of critical importance because during the one want wilderness wanderings when the Jews encamped they were camped by tribes and in the direct center of the encampment was the tabernacle and that's why they would say in the Psalms God is in the midst of her they were encamped God in the center they were in the presence of God when the scapegoat is sent into the wilderness he sent outside the camp outside the sphere of the presence of God into the outer darkness and it's significant in the New Testament with the cross crisis delivered into the hands of the Gentiles for judgment he sent outside the camp he's killed outside the city all of that fulfills the scapegoat imagery of the Old Testament was there a form of church discipline as well in the Old Testament where where sinners unrepentant centers were sent outside the camp as well yes is what is the correlation than a New Testament in the in the church church discipline then well that's what happens and in of the ultimate discipline of excommunication is to be expelled from the midst of the body of Christ and be delivered into the hands of Satan that's why it's such a serious thing well we would look look forward to message from dr. Stephen Nichols two messages for dr. Stephen Nichols tomorrow and we're delighted to have dr. Nichols as president of Reformation Bible College and the academic dean if Livia Ligonier ministries and dr. Nichols let me begin by asking you related to the doctrine of the Trinity which you help us understand how Jesus died on the cross yet God did not die this brings to mind a certain criticism that a good doctor has of a particular hem that we sing and can it be that thou my god should die for me that those words aren't always sung by a particular person up here I think we need to be careful when we look at Christ as the god man that we find ourselves well first of all we need to find ourselves in a mystery whenever we talk about the Trinity or we talk about the person of Christ and so that's where we need to begin and it should be that way it should not be something that's easy for us to parse out or God and his being would not be God so we need to bump recognize we're bumping into mystery at this point but part of what we find in the god-man is that there can be a distance as it were from God and the bearing of sin so that Christ as the god man is bearing sin while the god of the universe the Almighty God God the Father is then distance from sin and so the god man helps us understand how sin can be paid for by God but yet at this as the god man but yet at the same time we need to be careful in the language we use that this is not God the Father that's on the cross in fact we had an interesting heresy developed in the early church called patro passion ism which is just a fancy word to say that it recognizes it does not recognize the Trinity and it makes case instead that for the oneness of God and that God and his being is dying on the cross this was called patro passion as and recognized very early on in the church's heretical way to state this and so maybe what we can do is when we sing that we can all say that thou the God man to say it very quickly that the god man should die for us is that okay well yes but we distinguish we don't separate the divine nature from the human nature but we do distinguish them and when we see Jesus sweating or being hungry that's not a manifestation of His divine nature it's clearly a manifestation of his human nature when he dies on the cross he dies though it's the god man Union he dies touching his human nature not as divine nature because the divine nature is immutable the divine nature has all the qualities and attributes of God God can't die and the god man can I mean the person dies but he dies and his humanity not in his deity dr. Sproul how important is theology and him writing what how important is theology then in him right well theology really isn't important yes doctrine divides you know what we need are good relationships that's why God wrote one note instead of a whole big Bible because he doesn't care so much about truth and doctrine doctrine is our life it's like in the Reformation Erasmus wrote the Prince of folly and was highly critical of the immorality of the Pope's of the day and for their gluttony for example and then Luther wrote and Luther said Erasmus attacks the Pope in his belly I attack him in his doctrine and that's what the doctrine of the gospel was all about it's the truth of what saves us and is there anything in the universe more important than that when I hear Christians tell me that doctrine is not important I wonder if they're converted even in him writing okay dr. Watson you mentioned that imputation how should we answer critics who deny the active obedience of Christ imputed to the believer well that's a very serious error on their part a very serious error there's two things taking place one is the taking away of our sin through the death of Christ his blood shed upon the cross washes away our sin Isaiah 1:18 come let us reason together says the Lord though your sins be as scarlet shall be white as wool though they be red like crimson they shall be white as snow and so it's the blood of Christ that washes away sin but all that does is bring man back to a state of Ground Zero he needs positive righteousness in order to enter into the presence of God it's not enough that sin is removed there has to be the the acquiring of of righteousness before God and God does not just speak righteousness into existence out of nothing it is Jesus Christ who through his active obedience under the law has acquired this righteousness for us and it is that righteousness that God imputes to our account to now clothe us in the righteousness of Christ it is reckoned to our account in justification and so it is necessary in order to be received by God into heaven so to say to deny the active obedience of Christ is really to deny the positive acquisition of righteousness that we need to be received by God the death of Christ the shedding of his blood simply removed sin but his act of obedience gave the addition of righteousness so to summarize it there had that there has to be more than just the negative there has to be the positive there has to be more than subtraction there has to be addition that's what summed up in 2nd Corinthians 5:21 that that double imputation exactly the great exchange of the cross all of my sin laid upon Christ his righteousness laid upon me the worst about me laid upon Christ the best of Christ laid upon me him who knew no sin God made to be sin for us that we might become the righteousness of God in him and so there has to be more than just my sin laid on Christ there has to be his righteousness laid on me I'd like to take issue with something to Steve just said as close as we are without the act of obedience to Christ you don't have imputation without imputation you don't have solo feeding without soul to feed a you don't have the gospel so this isn't just an error even a great error this is heresy because it fundamentally denies an essential truth of the gospel and this idea is running wild right now through professing evangelicals circles and it it I see is one of the most serious problems that the church faces right now at this time in the 21st century this wholesale attack on the act of obedience of Christ this is where the church has to stand up and say no no no we can't have this I want to go on record as saying I totally agree with you you can't take issue with me if I agree I want to go on record of saying I forgive you again I'm used to having his red pin marks on my papers that I would turn in so doc dr. Lawson will you remember to write that in his next sermon yes yes I [Laughter] know when he's laughing with me and I know when he's laughing at me that was the latter Oh dr. Nichols you have written a wonderful book on Dietrich Bonhoeffer and you write in that book that he believed that life was meant to be lived from the cross from the cross what did he mean by that well for him that took on a significant meaning and I think we need to recognize this we we find ourselves maybe in a new age I think especially as we think about that van Jellicle Church in America we may have appreciated a certain status or a certain posture as it were over the last few decades we might find ourselves coming into a new moment as the American Church well dietrich von from oment very very well very acutely in the 1930s so for him what it ended up meaning and I think this is true we we don't know the extent to which we suffer for the cause of the gospel or that we take a stand against culture for the sake of the gospel for him it initially meant that he lost his post at the University of Berlin then it meant that his books were banned and he was on the banned book list then it meant that he ended up in a 6x9 prison so and then it meant that he was hanged at flossenbürg concentration camp but he finds himself in this position where you could say you can give up on the world we were in a 6x9 Nazi prison cell and who knows how this war is going to end up and who knows where Hitler is going to go you could give a person a chance to say we'll let you write off this world and just long for the next but while he is in that position he says I am dead but Christ is risen and I am risen in Christ and I have hope and I think that what that's what it means to be under the cross that Paul says that we are dead but we are risen in Christ so what does it mean our new life in Christ I think we're going to find that out maybe in this next generation and I think we can look to folks from the past who can remind us that being the church under the cross is a good place for us to be you gentlemen have just completed a wonderful week long more than a week tour of New England to study the Puritan movement Jonathan Edwards George Whitfield and others and dr. Lawson you've written a wonderful book on the evangelistic zeal of George Whitfield and you mentioned that he believed Whitfield believe that he preached his best when he preached the glories of the cross do you have a favorite sermon or a sermon in which that is fully Illustrated well we have a number of Whitfield's sermons not as much as other men who are in one pulpit at one time because he was traveling around so much I have many favorite sermons of Whitfield the conversion of the kiyose what think he of Christ is another classic but I know you've got a copy of my yeah thank you very much that's very helpful here to serve yeah yeah yeah thank you for not taking issue with me when I'm actually agreeing with you okay dr. Sproul is disagree with you and with Charles Wesley let's see yeah yeah right well Whitfield because he was the gospel preacher par excellence he preached the cross he preached Christ and him crucified he was continually magnifying Christ exalting Christ and when you preach Christ you have to preach Christ and him crucified all the lines of Paul's theology intersected at the highest pinnacle and the person and work of of Christ and you know just maybe to read a portion just a few sentences here but just listen to Whitfield who came to Philadelphia here in 1740 it was called the greatest preaching journey of any preacher since the missionary journeys that the Apostle Paul as he went up and down the eastern sea coast in 1740 he came here to Philadelphia when Philadelphia was a city of about twelve to thirteen thousand people he preached to people that exceeded the population of Philadelphia he preached to double the population of Philadelphia when he came when he left Philadelphia a thousand men jumped on horses and followed Whitfield across the river into New Jersey a stampede was after him to hear him preach again but listen to Whitfield on Christ God the Father has laid the iniquities of all that shall believe on him I mean you hear definite atonement in that do you not particular Redemption Whitfield was a five-point Calvinist and yet he extended the free offer of the gospel and he called and summoned and pleaded with people to come to faith in Christ in his own body Christ bore them on the tree they they're by faith Oh mourners in Zion that you may see your Savior hanging with arms stretched out and hear him as it were thus speaking to your souls behold how I've loved you behold my hands in my feet look look into my wounded side and see a heart flaming with love stronger than death come into my arms those sinners come wash your spotted Souls in my heart's blood see here is a fountain opened up for all sin and all uncleanness c-e-o guilty Souls how the wrath of God is now abiding on you come haste away and hide yourself in the cleft of my wounds for I'm wounded for your transgressions I am dying that you may live forever behold as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness so am I here lifted up upon a tree see how I've become a curse for you the chastisement of your peace is upon me I am the scourge this wounded thus crucified that by my stripes you may be healed a look unto me all you trembling sinners even to the ends of the earth look and live look and be saved he just was passionately pleading with sinners to look to Christ and to be saved with the look of faith to look away from themselves in repentance and to lay hold of Christ by faith so that that was whitfill that me that's just one tiny example he preached thirty thousand sermons in a little over thirty years that's that's a thousand sermons a year that's three sermons a day that's being on horseback going up and down the Seacoast getting on ferries crossing rivers he spent three years on the Atlantic Ocean crossing the ocean but when he would step off he would be full of energy and passion to proclaim Christ yeah every pastor here tonight needs to be a passionate preacher of Jesus Christ and every one of us who are believers here tonight and our witness for we set forth the person and work of Christ this is the book by the way it's available in the book sport bookstore it's the evangelistic zeal of George Whitfield and your book dr. Nichols on Dietrich Bonhoeffer is available back there as well dr. Sproul speaking of the tour the new england study tour that you just completed what was the the highlight for you I don't have one there were so many it was just marvelous now these two men just did an incredible job of speaking and preaching and teaching those of us who were on that tour Steve had Steve lost and had the opportunity of preaching on the inerrancy of scripture in Miller Chapel it's Princeton Theological Seminary and that was something typical it really was and and Steve Nichols is an expert on Jonathan Edwards and we heard all of those lectures and we visited all those different places I had the opportunity to speak from the pulpit over which George Whitfield is laid to rest up a Newburyport Massachusetts to see the house where Edwards died there at Princeton the rare book room Princeton original copy of George Whitefield journal and there's watching Steve lost and weep while he's reading that and there were just so many high points I can't just select one the Apostle Paul said that we preach Christ and him crucified I'll ask this of all of you is should every sermon from every pulpit include that Christ and him crucified even in the old Old Testament passages he said all well I'll go first on that [Music] aspersion said every road in England leads to London and I think every text in one way or another points us to Christ I don't think Christ is in every text but I think we can get to Christ from every text we're we're ministers of the New Covenant it is my desire that's the best I can by God's grace to mention Christ and the gospel and also encourage people to be converted to Christ every time I preach that's why at the end of this message which certainly was so full of Christ but for there to be the gospel and in Spurgeon said a sermon without Christ is an awful thing he said it's like the day without the Sun it's like the night without the moon it's like the ocean without water it's like a well that mocks the traveler it's like a cloud that never rains it's like the fall without the harvest to have a sermon without Christ and so we must be preaching Christ and we're not Old Testament rabbis we're ministers the New Covenant even when we preach the Old Testament and if Christ is the only way of salvation then no one can be saved unless Christ is preached and obviously we gather to worship and we scatter to witness nevertheless we want to magnify Christ and I think the hearts of God's people are encouraged and they are enlarged as Christ is preached and just even going back into the bookstore the book room during the break and people coming up who are saved who are already converted but coming up and affirming my message in thanking me for preaching Christ in the the gospel it causes the hearts of God's people to be encouraged and when and when the preacher preaches Christ and him crucified it encourages God's people to invite unbelievers to church to either bring the word to unbelievers or we bring unbelievers to the word and when they know their pastor is going to be preaching Christ and him crucified it gives them encouragement in hope to invite work associates and neighbors and classmates and unsaved in-laws to come to church because they know they're going to hear the gospel truth it may be a text that focuses upon Christian living are the attributes of God but nevertheless Christ I think should be presented I mean there's a reason why Paul said we preach Christ and him crucified I mean he's he steps out of the book the entire book is about him that's why it's called a hymn book the entire Bible is about the Lord Jesus the father says this is my beloved son hear ye him the Spirit has come to bring to our remembrance the things of Christ so dr. Nichols I think three things I think one you talked about the sermons of Whitfield you could find the same things than the sermons of Edwards who did itinerate a little bit up and down the Connecticut River Valley but he was primarily at the pulpit at Northampton and he was preaching these kind of sermons weekend week out and so we go back to the 1740s and see this was an incredible time of awakening not just in New England but up and down the coast and through the American colonies and so preaching Christ in him crucified is the way the gospel is proclaimed and I think we can look at these moments in church history and when we see consistent preaching in that vein we see things happening I think secondly as you say the gospel is a great comfort for Christians we forget this idea of Christ crucified as Christians and so we sort of white-knuckle it through the Christian life and so we need to be reminded as Christians of the truth of the gospel and then thirdly I think one of the things as the pulpit is the best way to teach folks how to read their Bible as the pastor stands up weekend week out x+ the word for those in the pew the pastor is showing his floc how to read the Bible and this is a great way to read the Bible all roads do lead to London and all roads do lead to Christ and to be trained in that and to see that modeled from the pulpit that then over time a congregation can mature and read their Bible in that way I think that is when you begin to see things happening in a church I think it also models for the church how to witness as they hear their pastor proclaiming the gospel and setting forth the gospel with the rich variety in the different portions of Scripture and different passages even how Christ witnessed to different people throughout the four Gospels and it models for I think the congregation how they can present Christ as their pastor is presenting Christ okay this question was originally began with the word if and I've learned from asking dr. Sproul questions that we don't begin questions with that so I'll say I'll begin it this way since man is totally depraved [Laughter] since man is totally depraved why did God have to blind their eyes and hardened their hearts in John chapter 12 verse 40 lest they see with their eyes and understand with their heart what why why was it necessary for him to blind their eyes and hardened their hearts was not necessary okay Stevo let's give him that microphone there because here we go you know it pleased God to do that because that's a punishment what God does when he punishes sin is he gives people over to sin and part of the punishment of the depravity that's there is you know at the end that the final judgment let him who is evil be evil still this is what you might call poetic justice people don't want to have God in their minds he says okay I'll close your minds to me you don't want to hear my word I'll plug up your ears you don't want to listen to me I'll harden your heart he just gives them over to their own sinful inclinations as Luther said he doesn't have to create fresh evil in them all he has to do is remove the gracious restraints that he has had upon them and give them over to their own evil inclinations and by that means he keeps them from the truth as judgment on them related to that why did God permit evil he didn't just permit it he ordained it didn't he God ordains everything that comes to pass but but as Agustin said in a certain sense as the Westminster Confession says but not in such a way as to do violence to the will of the creature or to do away with secondary causes keep in mind that evil would not be if God and his omnipotence did not ordain it because whatever sin was committed by Adam and Eve for which they were responsible God knew before they did it that they would do it and he could have stopped it but he didn't and insofar as he didn't stop what he could have stopped and that's the sense at least so far he ordained it now evil is evil and good is good and it's a sin to call good evil or evil good that even having said that that evil is evil it's good that there is evil because God ordained it or else evil couldn't possibly have entered into the universe and so even the fall of man was to the glory of God if for no other reason that the show both is justice and his mercy what would you say to a Roman Catholic friend who seems to have a high view of Scripture and a personal faith in Jesus Christ yet feels compelled to remain in the Roman Catholic Church and tell him to run for his life and I tell him that he needs to understand what Rome teaches not what his friendly priest on the corner teaches because there's a giant split in Rome right now between the tale of he Nouvel the new theology and the Roman theology and the division is pretty much between the Western Church and the Latin Church but the Roman Catholic Church is controlled by Rome it's not called the Washington Catholic Church or the st. Louis Catholic Church it's the Roman Catholic Church and the Roman Catholic Church though it affirms many of the essential truths of the Christian faith has categorically condemned the biblical gospel and replaced it with the gospel that is not a gospel and to be remaining that environment is that the peril of your own soul I don't think that Rome is a church I speak of the Roman Catholic Communion because once it condemned categorically the gospel at the Council of Trent in the 16th century and repeated that condemnation is read most recently as the Catholic catechism of the 1990s that Rome is no longer a church and so I would try to help people understand what the Roman Catholic Church I've done this with many people I had a friend back in Orlando and I was talking to him about the doctrine of the mass and I told him I couldn't possibly participate in the mass because Rome teaches that though it's unbloody it is a true sacrifice of Christ anew which to me is utter blasphemy and I told him that the Roman Catholic Church taught that the VAS was a real sacrifice of Christ so he runs their doctors priests and he said my friend said that we believe that you're in Rome that the bass is a sacrifice and the priests told him he says well your friend Pro doesn't know Latin because we don't really believe that or teach that and so he came back told me that and I said we'll go ask your priest what the Latin word sacrificio means in English and I showed them in Trent in the Latin version of Trent where the term sacrifice is clearly used to describe what's going on in the mass I mean how can you participate in that for heaven's sakes if people don't understand it they don't know what's going on they don't understand a theology of it and it's it's such an affront to the New Testament gospel that I'm serious when I say to my friends I because I believe there are true Christians in the Roman Catholic Church but they need to get out of there as fast as they possibly can [Laughter] it was a question here about Arminian theology and the question is are our minions saved are they Christians well I don't even think all Calvinists are saved so I mean we're saved by the gospel and there are in some are many and presentations of the gospel enough gospel to be saved so we cannot say that an Arminian is not a believer I think that there are just like RC just said that there are people who are saved in the Roman Catholic Church as by that in spite of the Roman Catholic Church there there are some Armenians who are saved but as Whitfield said Arminianism is a plague yeah and whitfill said we're all born Arminians and we we are saved and mature into Calvinists our minions don't go to the logical conclusion of their theology if they did they wouldn't be saved yeah it's not that night they don't go there most of them won't go there if I ask them are you saved because you're more righteous than your brother so no no I'm saved by grace I'm saved by Christ that's they wait a minute you were offered the gospel and you had the opportunity to say yes or no your next-door neighbor said no was that a good thing or a bad thing well that's a bad thing I said you said yes is that a good thing or a bad thing it's a good thing I said you did a good thing he did the bad thing you get saved he doesn't but you don't believe that you're being saved by your works oh no I don't let's say why don't you you're the you've done the necessarily good response by which you have eternal life now but you know but but that was by grace you know but I said well why did you did you have more grace than here next-door-neighbor head now you're talking like a Calvinist but I mean that mean the theology is so poor it's it's impoverished and the shortest book in the Bible and books ever published was great or many in theologians a very very small book seriously as a follow-on to that is it is it possible for are many in a level of Arminian theology to cross over into heresy you can't cross over into heresy from heresy [Applause] okay dr. niccole's dr. Lawson secured I had well let me say this also I I did not grow up in a church like this that preach preach the sovereignty of God and salvation that preached the doctrines of grace I grew up in an Arminian church my parents led me to faith in Christ when I was a young boy I knew the Lord I was aware of my classmates did not know the Lord but I was aware that I knew the Lord it wasn't until I was age 28 that I came to an understanding of the sovereignty of God in salvation and came to an understanding of the doctrines of grace and it was like being saved all over again but I was truly saved before I became a Calvinist and so you know God was very patient with me and I did not realize you know the arrogance and the pride within my own heart I also didn't did not know the Bible well enough to be able to interact with these great doctrines it's not that I knew the Bible too too too much it was that I knew it too little to be a Calvinist and so but I was genuinely saved and knew the Lord in fact I was already preaching people were coming to faith in Christ I was being used by the Lord those were joyful days but I was shallow in my ministry and I I had kind of a 1 edged sword and it wasn't until I came to a full understanding of the scripture and became reformed but that was when I was 28 years old and after I had been a Christian for some time so I think that there can be people who know the Lord and who are Arminian but I will agree with RC they have a very shallow understanding of Scripture and I've written a book back here called foundations of grace I start in Genesis I go to Revelation and I interact with virtually every Bible every verse in the Bible on the sovereignty of God it's a 600 page book and it's the the vast teaching of Scripture but before that I just didn't know the Bible well enough and I think that's representative of many people they just don't know the scripture seriously when you ask the but can it lead to heresy well arminianism I believe is a heresy but it's not as an egregious heresy as open theism which has come out of of arminianism and as in theirs in one sense the logical conclusion of arminianism and that's been a bane on the church in the last couple of decades and that's really serious aresty stuff dr. Nichols if we go back to the original I think maybe some of the intention of behind some of that question there is a sense in which I think would you meet some folks with resistance to the doctrines of grace or to Calvinism the way I try to approach it a little bit as along the lines of the ground roll here is that we're all after a theology of salvation that reserves and gives the most glory to God so if we come at this I think from that perspective that we're after thinking through these doctrines of grace from a perspective of which view is that which gives the most glory to God at every stage of this I think you come down on the Calvinist side of the doctrines of grace there are serious problems that people struggle with at that very point because many people perceive the Reformed faith is to teach a God who is unjust who's unfair and it doesn't glorify to God who has a limited expression of his saving grace and they also to think that the the Reformed faith does away with human responsibility and the freedom of people although usually they're operating with a humanistic understanding of freedom Calvinism does teach that man retains a volitional power he still has a will it's free to do what he wants to do but that will is enslave to his evil desires and inclinations and it doesn't have the power that the humanist view of the will publicizes that the will is indifferent and there's equal power to go to a little after to go to the right but in any case people really struggle with these ideas because they think either one of those casts a shadow over the integrity of God and so I mean I could I agree with you Steve that we do have to come to it from that point of the glory of God the soul of day of glory which is the conclusion of the soleus but we have to cut through a lot of the misunderstanding and confusion that attends it just curious how many of you here tonight share a similar testimony to dr. Lawson's thoughts so me as well we are going to gather again tomorrow at the bookstore opens at 8 o'clock and we will convene back here at 8:30 tomorrow morning to sing another great hymn of the faith Oh God our help in ages past there's a real encouragement to hear all of you singing so loudly and zealously tonight before we leave I just wanted to read from one of my favorite books and this is the valley of vision this is the this is a prayer called the precious blood blessed Lord Jesus before thy cross I kneel and see the heinous nasai sin my iniquity that cause thee to be made a curse the evil that excites the severity of divine wrath show me the enormity of my guilt by the crown of thorns like the Pierce at hands and feet the bruised body the dying the blood is the blood of incarnate God it's worth infinite its value beyond all thought infinite must be the evil and guilt that demands such a price but it concludes with this yet thy Compassion's yearn over me thy heart hastens to my rescue thy love endured my cross by mercy bore my deserved stripes let me walk humbly in the lowest depths of humiliation bathe in thy blood tender of conscience triumphing gloriously as an air of salvation Lord bless you and I trust that you'll have a good night's rest we'll see you tomorrow morning thank you you

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Published: Tue Aug 18 2015