In Romans 1:18 it says that God's wrath is revealed in heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who by their unrighteousness supresses the truth of God, which has been made plain to them because God reveals it to them... That which is made plain is of His Attribute and of His being, and of His divine Power. However, inspite of the Fact that God does not hide Himself to the creature, man because of his corruption of sin is at enmity against God by which even though God reveals Himself this light is suppress because of their hatred against God.
Romans 2:13-15 says that Everybody has this law. Now I am wanting to say this law is not an abstract thing that must be obeyed but it is God Himself. The ten Commandments and the summarization of the Ten Commandments say that man is a ethical being created by God to originally glorify God and enjoy Him Forever as their sole good and as He is truly worthy of such things for He is God and their creator. However, Adam rebelled against God and thus plummeting all of his posterity to total contempt. All men are idolaters by heart, mind, soul, and strength and all that they say and do proves this. Man by loving idols shows that they have the law written on his heart and thereby shows that he is without excuse.
Tuesday, February 12, 2013
Sunday, January 20, 2013
On the Love of God and Reprobation and Election
God does not love every single person on the face of the planet equally. But furthermore I would add that He does not love the Reprobates at all nor should we suggest that He loves them even though He is seemingly kind to them. The purpose in which God enacts His love and kindness towards the elect is not and should not be equated as the same in which He lavishes His goodness upon the Reprobate. For one God's end in lavishing His love and kindness and goodness on the particular elect chosen freely and soveriegnly is that they would be like Christ. And the end to which God continues to do good to the Reprobate is that they would continue to love their sin and thereby be decieved. This is best illustrated as a planter feeds the certian plants that he wants to grow and see come to maturity he feeds, but the other plants that he does not want he does things for the purpose that they would die off.
Sunday, December 23, 2012
purpose
Based upon the ontological and teleological purpose of Christ Jesus coming, being both fully divine and fully man, we can thereby say that man given his ontological and teleological purpose has not fulfilled his purpose to glorify God and enjoy Him forever.
Wednesday, December 5, 2012
Equal Ultimacy
I had written a few years back on what I had thought was then Equal Ultimacy. The idea is that God works evil in the reprobate the same way He works righteousness in the elect. Although I would not charge God for being evil, I will now give God more of a active role in hardening the reprobate. The text in Romans 1 depicts God giving man or handing man over to the lust of their own hearts. This is active and not passive. Where as in my previous post I had said that God gave passively men over to the lust of their own hearts. No. God first elects and reprobates and then ordains that the fall would occur and then gives the reprobate over to the lust of their own passion and lust and sin. This is very active and not passive.
Thursday, November 29, 2012
God's uncoerced choice
As God decreed before the foundations of the world in eternity past to glorify Himself - not because there was a need of God but because the glory of God is instrinsic to who He is and His nature so that what He does and how He reveals Himself cannot be seperated from His divine being. That God chose within Himself to Glorify Himself (Father, Son, and Holy Spirit and to make known His divine attributes) can only be but apart from any considerations of the creature or any other created thing. What God does is completely free and sovereign and is by His own free uncoercive choice and pleasure. What does this mean other than what happens in this world is already predetermined by the sovereign will of the triune God. That Christ was chosen to be the mediator of a particular persons and that His work was intended to bring about the sole redemption of those persons is based upon the choice of the whole person of who the mediator would be. That the relationship between the Head (Christ) and the Body (the Church was so natural that nothing was added to it or had to be touched upon later. That the Holy Spirit would honor the head by applying the redeming work of Christ to the Body of Christ.
Now If I might further say that God had also reprobated certians ones for the very purpose of bringout His divine pleasure in the making known who are the elect, and who is the Christ and His work.
Read: Abraham Kuyper, Herman Hoeksema, and Geerhardus Vos for more information and clarification
Now If I might further say that God had also reprobated certians ones for the very purpose of bringout His divine pleasure in the making known who are the elect, and who is the Christ and His work.
Read: Abraham Kuyper, Herman Hoeksema, and Geerhardus Vos for more information and clarification
Friday, September 21, 2012
On Salvation, Christian Living, and Holy Spirit
My thought is that we cannot truly understand the Holy Spirit's work in the Christian life without first understanding what is the salvation of the Christian. A.W. Pink talks about the work of the Holy Spirit and that essentially if we could somehow do it all by ourselves as if all we needed to do is to believe in the gospel of Jesus Christ and have our faith rest in Him in order to escape hell and to go to heaven then there is really no need of the Spirit (Pg. 45 in the baker edition of the Holy Spirit). I would also add that if all we needed is just a little push or prodding then there would still be no need of the Holy Spirit.
Christ did not die to save us from Hell, although that is not void from the gospel. However He died that we by faith may attain to His nature which is wrought in us by the Power of the Holy Spirit. Has Pink says, "If the salvation which He has provided is a deliverance from sin and self-pleasing, from worldliness and indulging the lust of the flesh, and the bestowing of a nature which desires and determines to live for God's glory and please Him in all the details of our present lives - then it is clear beyond dispute that none but the Spirit of God can impart a genuine desire for such a salvation." Again this alludes to the question what is true freedom? Is freedom a thing that says I can choose between two choices without any external pursausions (spelling?) or is freedom that scripture speaks of a freedom from the bondage of sin. Well if we say freedom is that I might choose between two equally uncoerced choices - then the question is is God free? I would argue no. However scripture does not state that is what true free-will (freedom) is. (Romans 5) Because Adam sinned all of his posterity(spelling) have been plunged into death and are now born naturally totally depraved (Psalm 51:5, 58:3). Jesus says that if you sin then you are a slave to sin. Romans 3 says that all men are hate God (paraphrased). Essentially the idea is that there is something wrong with our nature with our total being. In in Romans 5 we see the two covanental ideas that in Adam all die but in Christ recieved by grace through faith all are made righteous and are given life. So my point is that true freedom is not having the ability to choose between two choices but is freedom from the bondage of sin from a life that hates God and wants nothing to do with God to a life that loves God and longs to do His good work (Philippians 2:12-13). And by this we need the Holy Spirit to do. If we did not then it would be useless for us to say that the Holy Spirit in the life of the believer is necessary.
I think Herman Hoeksema says this very well in his work "The Wonder of Grace." He says, "Saved by grace! Delivered from wrath, guilt, damnation, corruption, and death - all by grace! Clothed with righteousness, holiness, life, and glory - by grace only! Translated into light, from death into life, from shame into glory, from hell into heaven - all by the power of God's wondrous grace! And all because of the eternal, sovereign love of Him Who chose the things that are not to bring to nought the things that are; that no flesh should glory in His presence!" (Pg. 15)
Christ did not die to save us from Hell, although that is not void from the gospel. However He died that we by faith may attain to His nature which is wrought in us by the Power of the Holy Spirit. Has Pink says, "If the salvation which He has provided is a deliverance from sin and self-pleasing, from worldliness and indulging the lust of the flesh, and the bestowing of a nature which desires and determines to live for God's glory and please Him in all the details of our present lives - then it is clear beyond dispute that none but the Spirit of God can impart a genuine desire for such a salvation." Again this alludes to the question what is true freedom? Is freedom a thing that says I can choose between two choices without any external pursausions (spelling?) or is freedom that scripture speaks of a freedom from the bondage of sin. Well if we say freedom is that I might choose between two equally uncoerced choices - then the question is is God free? I would argue no. However scripture does not state that is what true free-will (freedom) is. (Romans 5) Because Adam sinned all of his posterity(spelling) have been plunged into death and are now born naturally totally depraved (Psalm 51:5, 58:3). Jesus says that if you sin then you are a slave to sin. Romans 3 says that all men are hate God (paraphrased). Essentially the idea is that there is something wrong with our nature with our total being. In in Romans 5 we see the two covanental ideas that in Adam all die but in Christ recieved by grace through faith all are made righteous and are given life. So my point is that true freedom is not having the ability to choose between two choices but is freedom from the bondage of sin from a life that hates God and wants nothing to do with God to a life that loves God and longs to do His good work (Philippians 2:12-13). And by this we need the Holy Spirit to do. If we did not then it would be useless for us to say that the Holy Spirit in the life of the believer is necessary.
I think Herman Hoeksema says this very well in his work "The Wonder of Grace." He says, "Saved by grace! Delivered from wrath, guilt, damnation, corruption, and death - all by grace! Clothed with righteousness, holiness, life, and glory - by grace only! Translated into light, from death into life, from shame into glory, from hell into heaven - all by the power of God's wondrous grace! And all because of the eternal, sovereign love of Him Who chose the things that are not to bring to nought the things that are; that no flesh should glory in His presence!" (Pg. 15)
Friday, August 31, 2012
Jesus Christ's Soveriegnty in His Passion
Scripture says: "No man taketh it from me, but I lay it down of myself." (John 10:18)
A.W. Pink says, "When Christ died, He did so of His own voluntary will. This is a point of vital importance. We must never give a place to the dishonoring thought that the Lord Jesus was powerless to prevent His sufferings, that when He endured such indignities and cruel treatment at the hands of His enemies, it was because He was unable to avoid them. Nothing could be farther from the truth. The treachery of Judas, the arrest in the Garden, the arraignment before Caiaphas, the insults from the soldiers, the trial before Pilate, the submission to the unjust sentence, the journey to Calvary, the being nailed to the cruel tree - all of these were voluntarily endured. Without His own consent none could have harmed a hair of His head. A beautiful type of this is furnished in Gen. 22:13, where we read that the ram, which was placed on the altar as a substitute for Isaac, was 'caught in a thicket by his horns.' The 'horns' speak of strength and power (see Hab 3:4, etc.). Typically they tell us that the Saviour did not succumb to death through weakness, but that He gave up His strength. It was not the nails, but the strength of His love to the Father and to His elect, which held Him to the Cross."
Philippians 2:5-11 also speaks of Christ humbling Himself.
A.W. Pink says, "When Christ died, He did so of His own voluntary will. This is a point of vital importance. We must never give a place to the dishonoring thought that the Lord Jesus was powerless to prevent His sufferings, that when He endured such indignities and cruel treatment at the hands of His enemies, it was because He was unable to avoid them. Nothing could be farther from the truth. The treachery of Judas, the arrest in the Garden, the arraignment before Caiaphas, the insults from the soldiers, the trial before Pilate, the submission to the unjust sentence, the journey to Calvary, the being nailed to the cruel tree - all of these were voluntarily endured. Without His own consent none could have harmed a hair of His head. A beautiful type of this is furnished in Gen. 22:13, where we read that the ram, which was placed on the altar as a substitute for Isaac, was 'caught in a thicket by his horns.' The 'horns' speak of strength and power (see Hab 3:4, etc.). Typically they tell us that the Saviour did not succumb to death through weakness, but that He gave up His strength. It was not the nails, but the strength of His love to the Father and to His elect, which held Him to the Cross."
Philippians 2:5-11 also speaks of Christ humbling Himself.
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