NT Framework 42: LEAVES - Part 3

SBC Family,

I hope you’re doing well spiritually. This year our theme is prayer, and I’m really trying to focus on taking everything to Him in prayer. I hope you are too. Prayer is a discipline. Jesus’s disciples could not discipline themselves to pray for one hour. We are to pray without ceasing, which is a way of saying to pray intermittently throughout the day. Paul requested prayer for himself and told others he was praying for them and what he was praying for them, which can be an encouragement. We all need prayer and to pray for others. We don’t have because we don’t ask, and when we do ask we sometimes ask with wrong motives. When we are abiding in Him and He in us, ask whatever you wish and it will be given. Perseverance in prayer is another condition for answered prayer. There is a lot about prayer in the Bible, but at the heart of all prayer is DEPENDENCE. Every time we pray we are DEPENDING on HIM and not on ourselves. He must become MORE. I must become LESS. I pray that you will DEPEND on HIM MORE and MORE and on yourself less and less.

Tomorrow we’re going to finish LEAVES, the acronym I developed to help remember the five counterpoints to Arminianism and Calvinism:

Limited depravity
Election status
Accomplished atonement
Veritable grace
Eternal Security.

You don’t have to be an Arminian or a Calvinist. These are positions that hardened up in the 17th century, particularly in various creeds and are still with us today in most denominations that line up on one side or the other. I’m usually discussing Calvinism, so that’s where I’m focusing my counterpoints tomorrow.

Calvinist's repeat in many books that it is essentially another way of saying “biblical.” For example, in Steele and Thomas’s book The Five Points of Calvinism, they assert,

“Calvinism is a whole worldview, stemming from a clear vision of God as the whole world’s Maker and King. Calvinism is the consistent endeavour (sic) to acknowledge the Creator as Lord, working all things after the counsel of His will. Calvinism is a theocentric way of thinking about all life under the direction and control of God’s own Word. Calvinism, in other words, is the theology of the Bible viewed from the perspective of the Bible—the God centered outlook which sees the Creator as the source, and means, and end, of everything that is, both in nature and in grace.”

While there is nothing wrong and everything right with a theocentric outlook, statements like that can easily lead one to think they are saying things like;

God is the author of evil
If I’m not a Calvinist I’m not biblical

They seem to be more careful at other times, but it is not wrong to conclude from their words these kind of things that are definitely not theocentric or biblical.

Remember that Calvinism is a logical system. One of the most prized works among Calvinists is Loraine Boettner’s book, The Reformed Doctrine of Predestination. In that book he says of Perseverance of the Saints, “This doctrine does not stand alone but is a necessary part of the Calvinistic system of theology. The doctrines of Election and Efficacious Grace logically imply the certain salvation of those who receive these blessings.” This is just too highlight that it’s not possible to maintain the Calvinist’s definition of each point without holding to all five points. I was once a 4-point Calvinist, till I realized this after reading many of their authors. From their point of view I was not a Calvinist in any sense. It was then that I admitted I had already modified some of the other points already. Now that I know more Bible I have modified them much more.

Tomorrow I will contrast Veritable (true) Grace with Irresistible Grace and Eternal Security with Perseverance of the Saints. Calvinism is saying that since man is Totally depraved he is unable and unwilling to believe, so God has elected certain individuals unconditionally. These are the individuals for whom Christ died in order to secure their salvation. The Spirit does an irresistible work of regenerating them so they are alive to God and can then exercise their freed will to believe in Him. Since God has started this work He will ensure that they persevere in good works to the end. It is these works that we are told we can evaluate to ensure that we are one of the elect.

The rest of this description is an attachment.

Love,
Jeremy

Attachments:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1XnneOGY3amJN0CHyb5IuJwnukFP4SaLQ/view?usp=drive_link

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1xBslo8PH4ltDYJ-NGyjNgRf4BwaEyO_U/view?usp=drive_link