by the Lord's grace that when
the time changes this Sunday, that we'll fill back up on Wednesday
nights. So, if not, we'll start having
some home Bible studies. We'll get into chapter 9 soon, and
then, there we go. And then after that, it's going
to start moving rapidly toward the end. I don't know how long
I'll be enrollments. But I think that I probably should
be able to get through by middle of the year with the rate we're
going. So, you know, 25 ish 30 weeks. And then after that, Lord
willing, Brother Trey is going to continue in his 70 part series
of Ephesians one, one. And we'll see what happens there.
We're going to let him teach for a couple of weeks, and then
we'll see where we go after Romans. And then hopefully after the
summer, we're going to get our Tuesday night classes, our theological
classes, started back up and get that moving pretty actively.
We do have a large number of people who are ready to be involved
in that. What we're doing in Romans 8
is we're walking through what theologians call the ordo salutis. We're taking it one bite at a
time and not using it as an order of salvation. But we are looking
at what the scripture is trying to teach in context. Several
things to keep in mind as we go tonight. Last week we looked
at the foreknowledge of God. We saw that the foreknowledge
of God in every aspect in Old Testament, which that word is
not used in the Old Testament, but knowledge is used. The idea
of God's knowledge of someone or knowledge for someone is a
direct indicator of His divine love for them. So then foreknowledge
also illustrates that in context in the New Testament. So those
whom God foreknows or foreknew are those whom He has loved.
We understand the eternal immutability of God. I know that seems a little
bit actively redundant to say, but God is immutable. He does
not change, so His love does not change. So in these things,
Paul is arguing now in this section that we call chapter 8, that
there is hope in the day of glory. that we are adopted as the beloved,
those whom God has foreknown. We have been given the Holy Spirit.
God will not destroy himself. He will not destroy his body.
He has already destroyed the judgment and the penalty of sin
for the elect. And so, therefore, we have confidence
to cry out to God, Daddy, whereby we enter into his presence through
the finished work of Christ. The Holy Spirit then testifies
to us that we are adopted as children. And the ultimate end
of salvation is that we await for the glorification of our
bodies. We await for that day when we will be made alive fully,
unchangeable, without sin, without depravity, without the opportunity
of temptation, etc. And we don't know what that's
like, but we know that through that journey that God the Holy
Spirit will help us in this present tense where not only are we fighting
the flesh, fighting temptation, fighting sin, fighting doubt,
but we're fighting all the elemental issues of a fallen world. And
on top of that, we are fighting the very persecution of the gospel
of grace, more so from those who claim to know it and believe
it than we do from the world who hates it boldly. So in that,
as we get here, let's look at Romans 8, in verse 28, and I'll
read through the end of this little phrase, and I'll pick
up from last week. And we know that for those who
love God, all things work together for good, for those who are called
according to His purpose. For those whom He foreknew, He
also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son, in order
that He might be the firstborn among many brothers. And those
whom He predestined, He also called. And those whom He called,
He also justified. And those whom He justified,
He also glorified. What shall we say to these things?
If God is for us, who could be against us? So, the foreknowledge
of God, as we look at this golden chain, verse 29, those whom He
foreknew, He also predestined. Tonight, we're going to deal
with that word and the idea of predestination. It is probably
one of the most attacked and hated words in New Testament
theology. It is probably one of the most
loathed concepts of evangelicalism in our day. We have a group of
so-called Baptists that call themselves traditionalists that
stand behind certain aspects of contemporary history, I don't
know if you know what that means, but that's what it is, who would
say that the idea of predestination and election has crept into,
as a cancer, the doctrine of salvation, to which I say, how
new is that when Paul wrote about it? Paul preferred to use the
idea of election and predestination above any other term that he
used to describe the work of God in salvation and also, you
know, in an adjective, an objective way of describing those people
for whom Christ died. And we see that many people try
to come to this idea and understanding of imposing a manifold definition
of the term predestined, that it is God's desire, but it's
not necessarily God's decree. It is something that God wishes,
but it's not something that God has determined. That does not
even make sense in the context of what we read here. It doesn't
make sense in the context of what we've already learned about
the nature of God. It makes no sense whatsoever.
As a matter of fact, Jesus himself would be called a fool. in his
teaching to the masses in John 3, just to the person of Nicodemus,
and then in John 6 where he teaches about this election, this giving
of those people to the Son, and that those who did not believe
on Him that day did not believe because they had not been given
to Him by the Father. So we see this particular idea
of the foreknowledge of God as a divine attribute or a divine
qualifier of His love. And we need to understand that
predestination is not only historically from the days of the apostles,
it's historically from the very beginning days of the writing
of Scripture. It is what Moses penned in the picture of the
very beginning of the foundation of the world. It's what Moses
penned in the garden in Genesis chapter 3. elected salvation
for His people. He elected glory. He chose not
only the means and the outcome, He chose them as objects of this
decree, of this plan. So the foreknowledge of God,
remember, is not something God knows, it's someone God loves. And nothing escapes from God's
eternal knowledge. There is nothing that God doesn't
know. There is nothing that God has
ever not known. Now you might find that odd for
me to reemphasize that. But there are people, there are
people who will listen to this sermon one day and they will
say, well I never thought about that. I thought God just has
the power to know all things. But he doesn't. There are people
in our day who actually conclude that God must not know all things
because if he did, logically speaking, they're right. If he
did, then man would not have free will. For that which God
foreknows and the essence of all that will take place does
not give liberty or libertarian free will to the creature. And
they're correct. So in that sense, because they
stand on their own sovereignty, then they have to subject God
to a humanistic illustration of His foreknowledge. Some people
say, well, God knows all the possible outcomes of anything
that possibly could take place. So therefore, He chooses the
path, etc., etc., based on the counsel of His will. Well, there
is but one path. Our own confession would talk
about the fact that in God's decrees, even if there were many,
many, many, many outcomes, I'll quote it, although God knows
whatsoever may come to pass upon all supposed conditions, He has
yet not decreed anything because He foresaw it or foreknew it
as a future or as that which would come to pass on such conditions.
In other words, God does all that He pleases. God does everything
and He never gains knowledge. God does not peek into my mind,
He knows my mind. Fully for eternity, He's always
known me. God's knowledge of all things
is certain and unchangeable. God cannot come to a place where
He does not know all things at all times, eternally. God's foreknowledge
concerning events and plans does not exclude. Also, people would
argue, it does not exclude the use of secondary means or secondary
causes. So some people say, well, God
didn't see that coming. I've had a man argue that with
me a few years ago, talking about 9-11. God didn't see that coming.
God didn't see the nuclear warhead coming. Oh, really? God not only
saw it coming, He decreed that it would be. He purposed it and
permitted it for the outcome of His sovereignty, and His will
was accomplished in the development of warheads and the launching
of any conflict. His will is accomplished in the
decree of 9-11. His will was accomplished in
the Holocaust of Nazi Germany. His decree and his purposes shall
stand, and no man shall stop them." No time in history has
God ever put His people in captivity apart from His will and desire
to do so. As a matter of fact, the prophets
even say, I will, God speaking, use these people as the rod of
my correction. And then what does he do after
those people beat up on his people for a while? He crushes them
for being used even by himself to do that which he purposed,
which was evil in the sight of men and in the sight of God.
But God purposed it and then God brings retribution on that
evil. That is what sovereignty is.
That is how supremacy should be understood. God's foreknowledge
and knowledge is the full source of all things happened or that
ever will happen. the reason the world is the way
it is today. People like to fuss and complain,
even bad circumstances. People like to fuss and complain,
well, the Lord's just not at work here, or we've lost the
blessings of God, or God's changed His mind about what He's going
to do. God hasn't changed His mind. God hasn't changed His
mind. God doesn't change His mind.
When we see those anthropomorphisms in Scripture, when we see these
human attributes applied to God in His nature and character,
It is to reveal to us something about God's will and something
about what God wants us to understand. Then we see the outcome. We see
the outcome sort of like Abraham. It was God's will that he kill
his son, but then it was ultimately God's will that his son would
not die. And that is equally the same
and is not contradictory. God uses all of these things. And the reason these things happen
the way they do it is because it is the will of God. And I
want to talk about the will of God. And I could talk the rest
of this hour about the will of God. And we could get into some
philosophy that could take us into a place that's not necessarily
important. But the reality of what I want
to get to tonight is dealing with this idea of being foreknown,
loved by God. Those whom He loved, He also
predestined. And in order to understand predestination,
we do need to understand the will of God. We would call it
in our reformed circles, the decrees of God. What is it that
God has decreed and purposed? There are things that we know
that God has purposed, and there are things that have not been
revealed to us as the purposes of God. But we know that every
outcome of every situation is indeed the will of God, and it
is indeed the purpose of God. People will argue, just yesterday,
well, does that make God the author of evil? Well, what does
the word author mean? Did he write the script? Absolutely,
he authored evil. He uses evil for his purposes.
Evil could not exist without God's will and decree after the
counsel of his own pleasure. Evil exists for the sole purpose
of God and his purposes in this world for his own glory and his
own name. And everything that happened from the fall of man
to the expulsion of Satan or Lucifer from the heavenlies is
in the hand of God's absolute decree and God is the author
of it all. Every stitch of suffering that
Job experienced was written before the foundations of the world
by God in the pen of His decree. And God established as the author
all of Job's suffering. And then God used the enemy.
Satan, the devil, to bring about that suffering in the life of
Job. So Satan is the agent of God who sent him to do all that
he did. And I think that's why we have
that letter in the Holy Writ today, so that we can see the
nature of God's sovereignty and supremacy over all things especially
and awesomely evil. But God does all that He wants
to. His will is always accomplished. Everything that we see, Isaiah
46 says, My counsel shall stand, no one shall thwart me, all that
I decree shall come to pass. So if God has decreed there shall
be no war and there is war, what's happened? God's a failure. If God has decreed there will
be no evil and there is evil, then what's happened? God is
weak. But God is omnipotent. God does all that He chooses
to do with whom He chooses to do it, and no one can call God
unfair, and no one can call foul or evil or maniacal, for God
is sovereign over all things. I teach this very thing to preschoolers
when I teach in certain circles, when I have that opportunity
to teach in chapels or preschools. elementary kids, and I will take
a crayon and I will draw a picture of a cat. It's my crayon. It's my picture. It's my paper. And I have the decision of what
I draw, and I'm going to draw a cat. And when I start to draw
this, the crayon sort of takes over and draws a kite. Very close. Sounds sort of the same. If you
were a northern guy, you might say kite. I got a kitty kite.
I don't know. You know? I'm like, will I throw
that piece of paper in the trash? I try a cat one more time and
the crayon draws a kite. And I ask, what are we going
to do with the crayon that won't do what the master wants it to do?
Crush it! So I break it into pieces. We
go to another one. We keep breaking them and everybody gets excited.
And the teachers are like, you're getting too excited. The same
thing is true with God who is the creator and the owner of
all humans, all creatures. He will do with us as He pleases,
and when He does what He does, it is righteous and just and
good. God's will is revealed outwardly. How do we see it?
We see it outwardly in the decrees of Scripture. We see God's will.
has no influence. There's nothing in this world
that takes and changes God's plans. God's will outwardly revealed
through His decrees establishes also secretly the will that will
come to pass. The example of Abraham, the will
of God according to the revelation to Abraham was that Isaac would
die. But the will of God that was
not revealed to him was revealed to him through the coming of
the events whereby God spared Isaac. So we saw this will revealed
and then we saw the secret will of God. What is God's ultimate
will in this killing of Isaac is that He would spare Isaac.
But we see the writer, we see Paul writing to the Hebrews where
he says that Abraham by faith believed that God was even able
to raise the dead. Abraham would have slit the throat
of his son without hesitation. The Scripture says after getting
the command of God to kill his most precious child, he got up
early the next morning and prepared himself a caravan, prepared himself
the wood, prepared himself the elements of a burnt offering,
and into the mountains they went. He was confident that if he took
the life of his son, that God had the power to raise him from
the dead. He knew that God had promised Isaac would be the father
of many, and that through Isaac, Through Abraham, the world will
be blessed. So he knew that even if his son
did die, God would not let him stay dead. Because God's promises
are yea and amen and they will come to pass. So even in these
elemental hiccups and these stressful life situations that we think
Oh no, my ministry's done, my life is done, my marriage is
done, everything's done. No, no, no, it is not. It is
exactly where God has scripted it. It is exactly where God has
decreed it. And it is a beautiful thing,
even in the midst of uncertainty, that we can hold fast to know
the sovereignty of God in the midst of these things. Especially
when we see the context in which we're coming to the end of this
text right here, that it says, all things work together for
good for those who love Him and are called according to His purpose.
and that nothing shall separate us from the love of God which
is found in Christ Jesus our Lord. So we are victors and we
are more than victorious. God's will, as we saw even in
Peter, it was God's will. It was God's will that Peter
deny Christ. But Peter's denial of Christ
was not a permanent thing. It was not God's will that Peter
become apostate. How about Pharaoh? We can see
in the Scripture it was not God's will that Pharaoh keep the children
of Abraham in captivity. He said, let them go. But it
was God's will that he would let them go. And it was God's
will that he would not let them go. And it was God's will that
he let them go. And then he changed his mind
again. Why? So that I, God says, might show my power against Pharaoh. That's why I raised him up for
the purpose of destroying him and revealing my power. The will
of God is immutable. It does not change, it is not
subject to change, even though it appears that way in the context
of what we call permissiveness for the purpose of His ultimate
counsel. My counsel shall stand. In Ephesians 1 it says, He does
all things by the counsel of His own will. That means that
God looks and thinks of no one when He does, when He has decreed
His decisions when He's decreed His will. God doesn't make new
decisions, by the way. These are eternal decrees. God
never changes. This is hard for us to imagine,
for we change what we're going to wear from day to day. We might
get up and have a pair of slacks and decide before we leave the
house to change them, because they just don't feel right or
look right or we see a spot on them or something. We're so fickle,
we don't even know where our keys are some days, or if we
put gas in the car, or where are my glasses? You never know. how it's going to turn out in
our own lives. But God is not that way. God
is unchangeable. He permits and purposes, that
means He desires and wills that which would seem to be contrary
to His nature or to uphold His will. For example, even like
the death of Jesus Christ. Those people there, the disciples,
Lord, you don't have to die, Peter says. The doubting Thomas,
let's go die with Him. Judas, I can't wait to get paid,
and so on and so forth. But these are all part of how
God brought about His ultimate will. They could not fail. They
would not change. Even the heart of man and the
decisions of man can be changed by the decree of God. God can
put words in the mouth of human beings that they freely speak
of their own volition, but their volition is bound by the sovereign
rule of God. It is not free in the way we
think freedom is. So God upholds His will. Even
in matters of reprobation and acts of evil, this does not make
God copable of these things for God is sovereign over them. God uses them to bring about
His purposes. What has the Scripture already
told us about, and what we'll see in chapter 9, about God's
use and purpose of evil? Why did God decree and purpose
evil? So that He might be just and
righteous in His wrath and judgment against it. So that through even
evil, God might use the wicked of the world to bring about the
purposes of His divine justice. We can look and dig into that
in every aspect of Pauline writing, even the words of Christ. We
can see Jesus in John 5 talking about the judgment, in John 8
and 9 talking about the judgment, and His judgment is the reason
He came into the world. God's will then must take place,
and God's will then will take place, and everything that He
has willed will come to pass. So that means everything that
has happened are the will of God. Now let me give a little
misapplication here that a lot of people take from that. I've
had people say to me in regard to their own decisions that are
sinful, listen to how silly this is. People specifically saying,
well, I'm no longer going to be in fellowship with a local
assembly because this, that, and the other. No biblical reason,
no biblical instruction, no biblical adherence to anything, just I
refuse, I'm obstinate, and I'm right, and God has willed it. Now, they're right and they're
wrong. They're right in the fact that God has willed it, but they're
wrong in the idea that because God has willed it, they're right
in the action. If I take a man's life in anger, God has willed
it, but it doesn't make it right. And the consequences thereof
will be played out by the will of God. The sword that God has
given the government will take my life if so they please. And
not only that, the consequences of my freedom will be taken,
and so forth. So all these things that happen
are the will of God. No free will of any man can change
or attack God's will. The scripture, as I've already
said, says all things were created for God, by God and for his pleasure
and for the purposes in which he has decreed. So God then,
and the cause of this is the, as we'd say in the apologetics
realm, is the cause, caused cause. He causes all things, not just
in ontology. not just in what we see in the
world that has been created and that exists, but in the things
that take place. God is the cause of all things
and is without cause in Himself. His will has no cause except
the pleasure thereof, so that God is the one who causes all
things. And in that, God acknowledges
no one else. The Scripture says, Who shall
I seek to give me counsel? Who shall I listen to as Job
approaches God? Shall I talk to you? Shall I
ask you? No one. God seeks after no one. So in
that, God is unchangeable in all His ways and especially in
His justice and His power. So now brings us to the term
predestination. Predestination, what does it
mean? Well, as we've said, God's foreknowledge
is an illustration of His love His effectual love toward a specific
people and persons. The object of God's four knowledges
are the object of His love. So, predestination can be seen
in four different ways in Scripture. The first way is this. God, in
His eternal decree and the acts thereof, save a particular people
unconditionally through the work of redemption. or something of
that nature. That is the predominant definition
seen contextually in the scripture. God unconditionally elects and
predestines a people for salvation. Another way that it's seen in
the scripture, very rare, is that I have chosen you out of
the world, like Jesus prays. I've elected you, I've chosen
you out of the world. So there is a sanctifying, a
setting apart of an elect people through a divine call to not
be of the world. Those two things are interchangeable
in that one is referring to the other, the second referring to
the first. But there are two other ways in which predestination
is mentioned in the Bible and they are not redemptive. is to reveal to and elect people
His will. I've chosen to tell you what
I'm going to do." Who did He do that to? He did it to Moses. He did it to Abraham. And of
course He saved them, but He told them His plans. He revealed
to them. He chose them. He predestined them to be a part.
He also did it to Pharaoh. He predestined him to be used
in some sense. And that's the fourth way in
which predestination is revealed. elected to reveal Himself to
the nation of Israel. But not all the nation of Israel
are the elect. Not all of the nation of Israel
will be redeemed. They received the Word, but they
weren't all to be redeemed. We see that very clearly in John
10 and all the way through. But in John 12, Jesus says that.
Quoting Isaiah chapter 6, Today the words have been fulfilled
in your hearing. Though they will see, they will not perceive.
Though they will hear, they will not understand. They will not
believe, lest they turn. and I heal them. I will not let
that take place. So just because there is a people
that God chose to use and a people that God chose to reveal to,
those things are not necessarily, well, they're not ever to be
confused with God's electing salvation and the redemption
and the redemptive plan of God. The final way that we see predestination
is God predestined David to be king. God predestined Saul to
be king in a historical sense. But for the majority, especially
the New Testament, it is always dealing, predominantly rather,
not always, it is predominantly dealing with God's redemptive
choosing of a people because of his love for them, which we
know is foreknowledge. So God then foreknows. He foreknows
all the elect intimately. He loves them intimately. And
then on the loose side of foreknowledge, He has the understanding, He
has the full knowledge of, because He decreed it, all the working
and all the things that He has willed to take place. He has
knowledge intimately in His divine love for the elect who He has
willed to save, and He has full knowledge of all the ins and
outs on this issue and in this plan, and contrarily He has willed
eternally, all those He has are and will condemn." So God has
predestined those to eternal life, and He has reprobated those
to eternal death. Predestination thus results in
the will of God. to do particular things with
particular people. So God has willed, according
to Himself and His own counsel, to redeem and reprobate people
accordingly. And this is not something that
is open as a possibility. Some people like to use the gospel
as a possibility. But why do we preach the gospel?
You know what I've come to find in my conversations with people?
A lot of people don't preach the gospel. A lot of people don't
proclaim the gospel. A lot of people proclaim an opportunity
for you to come and be a part of something. A lot of people
proclaim an option. A lot of people proclaim a multiple
choice. So what would prohibit you today,
I heard a man say, from accepting Jesus Christ? To do what? To paint my walls? To select
the bid? Are we taking bids now for flooring?
If Jesus is a carpenter, maybe He's going to hang some shrubbery. He's going to hang some, whatever
they call them things, winded treatments, and He's going to
plant some shrubbery. I've accepted Christ for that. That's what
I want Him to do for me. What does it mean to accept Christ?
Nobody knows what it means to accept Christ. That language
is so foreign from the Scripture, no one can find it even in an
inference. It's not there. No one says to ask and believe
and confess. There's none of that there. But
yet that is the prescriptive element of salvation and effectual
salvation for our culture. And most people give that as
their gospel testimony. Well, I accepted Jesus to do
what? That's what I asked him to do. What? What did you accept
him to do? What was he offering? What was
salvation? I said, no, He already provided
salvation. Salvation is a provision that Jesus finished. Salvation
is a plan that Jesus accomplished. It is a finished work. It is
finished, He says. We're just getting started. Come
and get it. Ding-a-ding-a-ding like a dinner bell. This is not
what Christ did. This is foolishness. This type
of thinking is foolishness. And it's not because people are
so adamantly angry against the gospel. It's because in our culture,
many people have been taught that there is a universalistic
love that God has for all men. And if that's the truth, then
what is happening with the decree of God? What is happening with
the will of God? God desires all men to be saved? People say that, well, 2 Peter
3, listen to the context of 2 Peter 3. He's talking about scoffers.
He's talking about people who come in and disrupt the body
of Christ and those Jews who are being just inundated with
persecution and aggravation and all these things with these people
who mock the very nature of God's saving grace. And Paul says,
God has condemned them and they cannot be saved. But for you,
beloved, be patient. Just hold on, for God does not
desire any of you to perish, but for all of you to come to
the knowledge of the truth. Concerning what? The false teaching
of the scoffers. It's called context, folks. It's
one letter. It's a letter. It fits on half a page. That's
what happens when we pretext ourselves into a false God and
a false gospel. We have people who create all
sorts of conditions that one must come. Another one is that
you must turn from your sins in order to be saved. Where is
that found? Well, the word repent. Where
is that found? Jesus uses that six times in
the New Testament. The apostles use it a couple
of times. We see that this is something that God has granted,
which is a change of disposition. It's a change from a state of
depravity in the mind to a state of regeneration. It's a state
where by God grants a new mind to be able to see and understand.
When Jesus spoke to the masses and he says, come all who are
thirsty and drink of me and eat of me, you will never hunger
or thirst again. And the people are like, what are you talking
about? What are you doing? My body, you must drink of my
blood and eat of my flesh. And they're like, this guy's
crazy. And he has 5,000 men plus and they all run away because
they can't see. Now, we know what those illustrations
mean. Believe in me. They needed repentance. They needed a change of mind
to stop thinking about the salvation could come through any work of
their own, through any decision of their own, through any will
of their own. That's what repentance is. It's
God granting the ability to see that there is nothing in us,
in our choices, in our actions, in our morality, etc. I find
it very interesting that everywhere repentance is spoken of, it's
always in front of people during a festival whereby the Jews that
are being described there have an impeccable moral life that
Jesus says to the masses, unless your self-personal moral standards,
and he uses the idea of righteousness, unless your righteousness is
greater than the Pharisees, you are dead in your sins. You cannot
have eternal life. You will never enter into the
Kingdom of Heaven. To which everybody there took a gasp and went, what
now? These are the most holy people
we've ever met. They're set apart beyond what we could ever do.
We don't even have the authority to be set apart like they are
in their lives. How are we going to survive? Oh, what wretched
man am I? What's going to save me from
this body of death? It's funny that Paul was one
time and one day blind in his self-righteousness. Then when
God made him alive, the law came alive and he died. And then he
saw all sorts of covetousness. And at one time, he was one who
could not see, who needed no salvation from sin, had a perfect
moral righteousness. And then when God saved him,
he became just like the common man of Israel, thinking, oh,
how wicked am I. Who will save me? Christ will
save me. He has finished the work. He
has done the work. For God has called me out before
the foundations of the world, Paul would argue. Before I was,
God predestined me. He predestined me unto election,
unto salvation, unto redemption through the finished work of
Christ. So predestination, the will of
God to do particular things with particular people, He wills to
save His own. It reveals this eternal and immutable
love toward His people. And Romans 9 will explain this
in great detail when we get there. Hard for me not just go there
right now, but see, Paul, you have to, and I really encourage
you, church, if you don't have a reader's Bible, get one. And
that's one with no numbers in it. Get it. It'll make more sense
to you in one reading than it's made sense to you in ten years.
Because you won't be sectioning things off, going, oh, I know
what this is. You won't come preconceived knowing, oh, that's going to
be this, now it's going to be this, now it's going to be this. And all these things were more
than conquerors through Him who loved us, who foreknew us, who
predestined us. See, that's what Paul says at
the close of this argument. So then, for I'm certain, I'm
convinced of these things in neither height nor depth, nor
what? What does he say? Angels nor rulers nor principalities
or powers or present things to come or height or depth or anything
else in all of creation shall be able to separate us from the
love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. And I'm speaking
the truth, he says, in Christ. I'm not lying. My conscience
bears witness in the Holy Spirit. What I just said and what I'm
saying now that I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish
in my heart for my kinsmen in the flesh. I wish myself were
only cut off from Christ and accursed. Anathema. for the sake
of my brothers, my kinsmen, according to the flesh, they are Israelites,
and to them belong the adoption, and the glory, and the covenants,
and the giving of the law, and the worship, and the promises.
To them belong the patriarchs, and from their race, according
to the flesh, is Jesus Christ, who is God, over all, blessed
forever. Amen. This is the next breath
of Paul, because he's telling these people, he's telling these
Roman Christians, who are also some Jews, himself included in
this number, about God's electing love and
God's predestination of His people. And the first thing that pops
in their mind, then why did the Jews reject them if they were
supposedly predestined? And Paul explains that. So election
needs to be understood. Predestination needs to be understood
as an effectual act of God's effectual decrees. And so when
we put it all together, we realize this should not be looked at
as a list of sequences, as a order of events. It's supposed to be
looked at in context that God, those whom He loved, He elected. And what is this election for?
We know it's unto salvation. Those whom He foreknew, those
whom He loved, He predestined, He elected to be conformed to
the image of His Son. That is what? Glorification.
That is what? Redeemed. That is what? Sinless. Has God made you sinless yet?
In your flesh? Has God made anyone you know
sinless? If you ask them and they say yes, it proves they're
not. For John to say anyone who said they have no sin is a liar,
and the truth is not in them. As a matter of fact, those who
think they have no sin in their flesh actually refute the very
voice of God. There are some who would say,
oh yeah, you're just still depraved. We do live in a state where our
flesh, in its fallenness, fights against the Spirit of life. Because if we still did not have
the fallen nature in our flesh, we would not sin. But redemption
is not about saving people to become perfect in this life. It's about the perfection of
Christ who took our place. He died in our place. And He lived in our place. And He rose again in our place.
And we will be like Him. God has predestined those He
has foreknown and loved, same thing, to be conformed to the
image of His Son. in order that He, the Son, might
be the firstborn among many brothers." Jesus' glorified self and all
of its glory, we will share. That's what Paul's already talked
about. Verse 17 closes out that, or not closes, segues this section. For I do not consider the preface
sufferings. For that, before that, he says,
we suffer with Him, if we suffer with Him, provided we suffer
with Him. Where fellow heirs with Christ, and children, provided
we suffer with Him, in order that we may also be glorified
with Him. This is the work of the Holy
Spirit. May 18th, we'll learn more about this in detail. That's our conference time. I'm
just going to keep plugging it every time I get an opportunity.
Keep it in your mind. So, this predestination, election,
what's the outcome of it? In the time I have left, let
me just give you some things. I mean, we're gonna talk about it a lot
when we get into chapter nine. We're gonna really start to look
at predestination. But right now, as we close this
moving next week into into, um, the calling the effectual call
predestination establishes much more than I can go through right
now, but it escapes the judicial fruit of the fall predestination
or election. in every real and certain way,
causes those whom God loves to escape the consequences of sin. Jesus doesn't provide an opportunity
to escape it. He finished the work. Election
provides the escape of the consequences of sin. It is God's judicial
decree. And God will judicially justify
all the elect. in the finished work of Jesus
Christ. Election is the only means to which any man will ever
see eternal life. You cannot have faith if you
have not been elected by God. Election is the only means to
which any man will have life. Election is the vital reality
that all who are elected will certainly come to faith, certainly
come to faith. You will come to faith. God put
forth Christ as propitiation. That very word means that when
Jesus died, God was satisfied eternally. And God was satisfied
eternally, listen to this, because He decreed to justify His elect. And it would be just through
the death of Jesus. So no elect person has ever been
under the wrath of God. because Jesus would and has paid
the penalty for their sins. We're not going to conflate evangelism
and gospel proclamation and this theological teaching. We'll talk
about that at a Q&A in a couple of weeks because I know you're
going to have questions on these things for clarity. We'll get through all
these, then we'll have a Q&A. Election is the good news of
God's mercy toward His people. The gospel, in a nutshell, is
who Jesus Christ is according to the scripture, what Jesus
Christ actually accomplished effectually according to the
scripture, and for whom Jesus Christ accomplished it according
to the scripture. That is the gospel. Anything more or less
than that is not the gospel. Anytime something comes into
the idea of what man will do with what he's been told is not
the gospel. It is an addendum to the gospel,
an addition to the gospel. The people of Galatia had the
gospel very right. They got it straight from the
mouth of apostles. And the Judaizers did not disrupt that perfection. They just added a little sprinkle
on top called circumcision. And Paul says, if you sprinkle
the gospel with anything extra, you are cut off from Christ.
Adding to or taking away. Hiding election, hiding predestination
from a gospel proclamation is no gospel. It is the good news of God's
mercy toward his own people. So election must be preached
and proclaimed as the only good and hopeful promise to the elect.
What's your hope, beloved? What was Paul's hope? I was in
the right place at the right time, made the right choice.
I heard something and it made sense to me, so I came to my
senses. No, Paul said, God in His mercy saved me from the foundation
of the world. He chose me in Christ. That is
a gospel testimony. Revealed to me through the scripture.
Illuminated by the Spirit. Regenerated by His power. I can
believe now by the gift of God. By grace you have been saved,
you see. Election must be preached. And
when it's not preached, the gospel is compromised. So election is that real and
effectual established first cause. Election is the first cause.
Predestination is the first cause from God's decrees that the believer
can rest in the unconditional love that God has for them. Election
reduces boasting and gives glory to God. So Paul's already argued. in Romans 3. He's already argued
this. This is just for us to keep in
mind because, you know, 50-something weeks goes by as we go through
these letters and we're not reading them every day. Not all of us.
And so we get lost in this little small spot that we're looking
at right now. We start thinking of Lorraine Bettner and Charles
Hodge and all these other theologians of antiquity and we think, well,
I know they wrote a thousand pages on this stuff. Let me think
about what they said. How about we just look at the
several hundred words that Paul wrote? And we know exactly what
God wants us to know because God has revealed the doctrine
of election, predestination. I'm using that synonymously.
God has used this doctrine or the scripture to teach us everything
we need to know about it in context. And I'm not saying there's anything
wrong with good historical writing. I read a lot of it. Matter of
fact, I've been reading some today. But it just sort of, I don't
know, it takes me away from the sublime. It's like going to a
five star restaurant and asking to see a menu, taking a picture
of it, walking outside and going home. And every now and then
you look at the menu, but you never really tasted the food.
I like to read the word of God. So when we see Paul say that
the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ, we're
all believed. All have sin and are justified by His grace as
a gift. How are we justified? Because we've been elected and
we've been redeemed through Jesus Christ whom God put forth as
propitiation by His blood to be received by faith. This act
of redemption is to show God's righteousness so that He could
be righteous in the forgiving of wicked people. Those whom
He had already forgiven. For He forgave many in the antiquity
before Christ ever died. So they were justified. How?
They were justified because they were the elect. And Christ settled
the record of debt by dying. And now we who are on this side
of the cross, we're justified because Christ has already done
the work. But we're justified by grace. And the grace of God
is established in the decree of predestination and election. It reduces. It eliminates. It
doesn't reduce. Paul says, "...and it was to
show his righteousness at the present time, so that he might
be the just and justifier of the one who has faith in Christ."
You know, the faith is not the effectual agent of redemption.
Christ is the effectual agent of redemption. And moreover,
election is the effectual agent of redemption. It's God's decree
is the effectual agent of redemption. And faith is that time and space
and this temporal sense where God, the Holy Spirit, reveals
that to His people. Because then Paul asks the question,
what becomes of our boasting? He says it is deleted. It is
gone. It doesn't exist. It's excluded. There's no law by which we can
boast. There's no law of works. There's no law whatsoever whereby
we can sit and say, well, and some people say, well, the law
of faith, because that's what Paul says, faith is a work. No, faith is
just trusting in the work. And faith, he's already said,
is a what? Gift! He says it not only to the people
of Rome, he says it to the people of Galatia, he says it to the
people of Ephesus, he says it all over. It's a gift! It's a
gift. It's something that's real and
certain in the life of the believer. Just like the foreknowledge of
God. Just like the predestination
of God. Just like the calling of God. Just like the redemption
of God and the sanctification of God and the glorification
of God, it is an established certainty for the people of God.
So election, is that real? I've already said this, an established
first cause that we can rest in. We know that we are in Christ,
for the Holy Spirit has told us and taught us through the
Scripture that God has decreed that we would be saved for the
foundation of the world. So this, therefore this election secures
a certainty of salvation. You want certainty of salvation?
That's it. The certainty of salvation is
that God has chosen to put forth Christ's propitiation for you,
beloved. For you, beloved. And the only
difference I'd make in that statement, if I was talking to the masses
in the world, is I would say, for His people. Or for His own. Or for His sheep. Or for those
that belong to Him. But now that you profess to be
in Christ, and by faith you see and believe, I can say for you.
It secures the certainty of salvation. And no other ideal in this world,
no other religious philosophy can offer a true and eternal
love that is secure. Have you ever thought about that?
Election is something that's guaranteed. The decree of God
will come to pass. You will not be lost, beloved.
You cannot be lost. You cannot be saved apart from God's saving
grace. And you cannot be lost because
of God's saving grace. So then election comes with all
the privileges of redemption. And that's what this quote Golden
Chain teaches us. All the privileges of redemption
is that we have been foreknown and loved by our father. We've
been predestined to be conformed to the image of his son. That
is ultimate and absolute salvation. We have been predestined, we
are certain. It comes with the privilege of
being called to faith, of being reborn. It comes with the privilege
of being justified and redeemed. and sanctified and glorified.
It is going to take place. We can rest. That's the context
in which it's being written right here in this, in the midst of
a suffering saints who have no hope in this life. Paul says
you have hope because you've been predestined. And you will
be just like Christ one day, and you will be where Christ
is one day. So this privilege of redemption unto glory eternally,
which is a true and perfect holiness, that is ours in Christ Jesus,
And one day it will be revealed in reality and established forever. So much so that as we'll notice
as we keep going, Paul uses all of these terms in a past tense.
They are certain. So with that, let's go to the
Lord in prayer.