Why are so many against reformed theology?

perform theology and Calvinism most certainly are considered a minority viewpoint why are so many Christians against and actively against these concepts they don't know the Bible it's not because they know too much of the Bible that they have come to this position is because they know too little of the Bible that they have come to this conclusion and it's really their lack of knowledge of the full counsel of God as taught in the scripture it allows them to continue to rebel against the truth that is presented in the doctrines of grace that there are no truths that glorify God more than are what are succinctly stated in the doctrines of grace and so it's not a secondary issue it's it's not a minor point in the Bible it's it's it's literally in the heart of God as John just said he is a saving God it's the very nature of God to be a saving God and the doctrines of grace I believe bring in two clearest focus in most vivid detail the purity of sovereign saving grace and so those who resist I grew up in an Arminian Church I know this personally and experientially no one ever hit the brick wall of Calvinism harder than I hit it and bounced off that wall and got up and ran at it again and just kept bouncing off and once you begin to see the the pure unvarnished truth of the sovereign saving grace of God once you begin to see it in certain text Ephesians 1 Romans 9 John 10 John 6 John 17 pretty sentences 1 Genesis 2 Genesis 3 right yeah exactly the the point that I was going to make is you see it everywhere I mean these verses begin to multiply everywhere before your eyes and it's almost like every day as you're in this discovery period you wake up to new wonders in the Word of God and you you wonder how did I ever miss this how did I swim over this this this treasure that was lying beneath the surface as I was just speed reading over these texts and then once your eye sees it it's like you're breathing Heaven's air and and you come to a greater realization and understanding of what God has done for us in Christ and how special his particular grace is and so to answer the question why do so many resist it's it's a lack of knowledge of Scripture and it's also pride and arrogance and these truths are the great pride crushers that leave all of us on our knees before the throne of grace and saying why me Lord and so I know because my pride needed to be crushed and my arrogance needed to be crushed and I thought I was doing God a wild favor by leaving the bank and going to seminary as though I was doing something that God needed and that I was doing God a favor and when I got to school and these truths overwhelmed me I realized it was the total other way around I was not doing God any favors God had showed sovereign unconditional unmerited eternal favor and mercy and grace towards me so I feel very deeply about this and that really and I even go through Genesis 1 in Genesis 2 in Genesis 3 in foundations of grace and begin at the beginning of the Bible and go all the way through and it's it's it's everywhere every author of scripture virtually weighs in on this and and magnified this sovereign saving grace of God so you find yourself really being on the other end of the rope from all of the biblical authors and and really in need of spiritual enlightenment and illumination and being taught the height and the depth and the breadth and the length of the love of God and so in Christ so I mean that that is my response and that that really is true I think that there are two things that we need I agree with everything Steve just said it is a lack of understanding of the Bible and it's everywhere in the Bible I don't know how Paul the Apostle Paul could possibly made sovereign election more clear than he does in Romans nine but in any case there are two fundamental things I think that people find it very hard to leave semi-pelagianism and read and embrace augustinianism the first is that they sense in the doctrines of grace that that theology of Calvinism teachers a corrupt view of God a God who is not good a God who may be sovereign but he's not fair because he the idea that people have is that he arbitrarily chooses to save some but not others and that puts a shadow on the integrity of God and people really struggle with that and it takes a board over the head and the Bible to get you to see that your view of God is not high enough it's not you haven't really really understood how right you see is how holy is I've had I don't know how many people say to me that of the books I've written the two that they've read that were the holiness of God and chosen by God and they say I loved the holiness of God I dated chosen by God and I'm saying well that tells me you either didn't understand the holiness of God or he didn't understand chosen by God and I think the one that didn't understand was the holiness of God because if you really understand the holiness of God then you understand if you understand who God is and you understand who you are you know your only hope under heaven is the sovereign grace of God to save you that the second problem that people have is they believe that reformed theology extinguishes free will and not only hurts our view of God but hurts the view that we have of humanity and the big problem I see there is that the vast majority of people have an understanding of free will that is pagan and humanistic not biblical the Bible teaches that we have free will in the sense that we have the ability to choose what we want but it's very clear that there's a problem with our want to that the desires and inclination of the hearts are only wicked continually and that we are not free in our sin we're dead in our sin we're in bondage to sin and this free will that we celebrate is one that is in prison by sin it's not anything like what the secular world is teaching people from the day they go into kindergarten and so people have been in the word brainwashed with a humanistic view of humanity rather than a biblical view of humanity and consequently a humanistic and Pagan view of God and so we have to it takes really getting immersed in the scripture to grow in our understanding of who we are and our understanding of who God is if we learn those two things and reformed theology is easy but in the big picture and I agree with all that now I'll even talk a little bit about that later in the big sense of things I go back to when I was a seminary student I met a Calvinist I met him actually a living Calvinist who was part of a group of 30 people that sat around every week in a tiny little church in Southern California and contemplated their reformed navel they were just this tiny eye that was the only Calvinist guy I ever knew I didn't know any when I went to seminary nobody taught me reformed theology the best of my professors were proud to say there were three and a half point Calvinists and I wasn't sure what all that meant as you know it was basically a football player who ended up in seminary trying to figure it out another way to approach life and and look at now 3,000 people here conferences like this all over the place people consuming volumes of books on reformed theology both now current books and all the way back in history there is a massive massive movement that has occurred in the last 20 years as people dig into the Word of God it's you know you can look at the history of this as people began to study the Bible you had more books being published more publishers coming online you had more Bible translations Bibles being produced study Bibles that throws people into the Word of God and the result along with some very key people that God has used like RC sproule in monumental ways and even going back to a book by J I Packer that nobody really knew called evangelism and the sovereignty of God that popped up in college students hands and then he wrote a book on the nature of God and it started something that I don't think we've seen the ends of this yet so you're living in a real revival of reformed theology and I we were talking about this the other day the preachers who didn't get on board are fading fast they really will they really are in this young generation you have it together for the gospel recently how many did they have at that covered eight thousand young men who were there to hear reformed guys preach that that was absolutely amazing when compared with when I was a student that it didn't exist for all intents and purposes it didn't exist so your you're living the reality of this great great revival and you want to make sure you understand it you can articulate it you can defend it you could pass it on to the next generation the great first great revival after the new testament of reformed theology was the reformation and at the original Lutheran's and the end of reformed in Switzerland and the Scotland John Knox account and even the original Baptists all their confessions and creeds were reformed in their soteriology and their in their approach to these things and historic Protestantism and evangelicalism reform thinking was not in the minority it was the overwhelming majority until guys like what's-his-name in the 19th century Charles any penny came along you know guys like that that we're attacking the very roots of even justification by faith alone yeah you can even go back into the original documents of Southern Baptist Convention and it's just it's just Calvinistic its reformed the professors went to Princeton and sat under Warfield and Hodge and they were trained in reformed truth and out of that gave birth to the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary to the Southern Baptist Convention for the first 50 years the the presidents of the Southern Baptist Convention held to the doctrines of grace and it wasn't until the start of the 19th century that they turned into pragmatism and what works will drive the Train of ministry not what is true and so there is a new resurgence and not just amongst Southern Baptists but among independents and and I think even among Presbyterian churches as funny as it sounds but when I graduated from seminary I believe more Presbyterian doctrine than the Presbyterian smelly Presbyterian doctrine you still do yeah I still do and I've been told that on a fairly regular basis but but again it's only because we're biblical I mean we're rooted and grounded in the soil of Scripture it's a Spurgeon says that reformed theology is just a nickname for biblical Christianity I believe that absolutely did absolutely yeah he said the old truth that Paul preached that that Agustin wrote and that Knox proclaim must Thunder through England again and we must go back to old paths and if it's new it's not true and we must go back to these old truths and that's what must happen today as well last question what method or strategy would you employ in order to stir them in up in your church to serve the Lord a high view of God the glory of God the greatness of God I don't think they need a you know a male chest bumping club you know that that meets on Friday morning and we have a group hug and I'll throw up on you and you throw up on me and and we'll just be transparent open our kimono with one another and I just wish you would close your come out a really so I mean that doesn't really help me I don't think it helps you I mean there's only one thing that helps me and is God and and God pouring through your life into my life and so we just need a high view of the triune God Father Son and Holy Spirit and be overwhelmed with the glory of God and he does once that is in place in a man's life it does wonders for his being a husband it does wonders for him being a father it does wonders for him going to work it does wonders for him serving the Lord in the church because men are on fire for God and so that's what has to be recovered I mean they don't need a series of sermons on how to have a happy vacation and and just little pragmatic tips on how to love your wife and and this and that they need to be red-hot for God and and that puts everything in right place how do you really feel about this thank you so much gentlemen let's thank our speakers with us this weekend

Channel: M R

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Length: 15min 32sec (932 seconds)

Published: Mon Feb 18 2019