The Doctrines of Grace - Total Depravity

Now that we have a bit of history under the belt, 
let's look at

Total Depravity

(Or sometimes known as Absolute Inability)

  

• The Bible says:
• Before Christ we are spiritually "dead in trespasses and sins." [Ephesians 2:1]
• Before Christ we were slaves to sin [Romans 6:16, 20; John 8:34]
• Before Christ we are "hostile toward God," we do not subject ourselves to the laws of God, we are "not even able to do so." [Romans 8:7]

Well! That settles it! We're done here!

If only it were that simple...

You see, improper hermeneutics (Bible interpretation) have plagued the church since the beginning. Even the very beginning, when there was no written word or law, the serpent came to Eve in the garden and asked "Indeed, has God said..." bringing the spoken word of God, which was plain, into question. [Genesis 3:1] Boy, we can surely complicate an easy thing!

[God:] Everything is yours... you can eat from any tree you want except that one *pointing*. Don't eat from it because in the day that you eat from it, you will surely die.

[Satan:] Did God really say that?! He didn't mean that, you won't really die, He just knows that when you eat from that tree, you'll be like Him, knowing good and evil.

[People:] Oh hey, that makes a lot of sense! Alright then!

Seriously!?

The doctrine of total depravity stems from that very moment,

the first sin of mankind.

Romans 5 explains it wonderfully in this way:

12 Therefore, just as through one man sin entered into the world, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men, because all sinned-- 13 for until the Law sin was in the world, but sin is not imputed when there is no law. 14 Nevertheless death reigned from Adam until Moses, even over those who had not sinned in the likeness of the offense of Adam, who is a type of Him who was to come.

 Then it says:

18 So then as through one transgression there resulted condemnation to all men [without exception (Rom 3:23)], even so through one act of righteousness there resulted justification of life to all men [without distinction]. 19 For as through the one man's disobedience the many were made sinners, even so through the obedience of the One the many will be made righteous. 20 The Law came in so that the transgression would increase; but where sin increased, grace abounded all the more, 21 so that, as sin reigned in death, even so grace would reign through righteousness to eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.

What's with the "without exception" and "without distinction?"

We will cover this when we get to Limited Atonement.

But for now, keep a mental note.

Everyone born after our natural representative head, Adam, is born under the curse. Adam and Eve may not have died physically that day, although they did start to die physically, but they did instantly die spiritually! "The wages of sin is death..." (Romans 6:23a) "The person that sins will die..." (Ezekiel 18:20a) 

~ Time for honesty ~

If Romans 8 says this: "5 For those who are according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who are according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit. 6 For the mind set on the flesh is death, but the mind set on the Spirit is life and peace, 7 because the mind set on the flesh is hostile toward God; for it does not subject itself to the law of God, for it is not even able to do so,"

And if 1 Corinthians 2:14 says this: But a natural man does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually appraised.

How then can we ever conclude, apart from the saving grace of God in the regeneration of the Holy Spirit, that anyone at anytime would/could ever come to Christ?! It's impossible! Man can not come to Christ because he will not come to Christ and he will never come to Christ until God imparts grace to him and brings his spiritually dead soul to life through the work of the Holy Spirit in regeneration!

I hope your imagination is working right now and you can 'hear' the excitement in my voice through this text!

This is the doctrine of Regeneration which has been lost in recent years due to perversion of the Scriptures and watering down the gospel of Jesus Christ!

As I said in my earlier post, a slow but steady leaving, this doctrine is found literally from cover to cover in our Bibles. Literally. We constantly see man's inclination to sin against God and God's mercy, patience and justice when we do because some are forgiven then some are righteously judged and punished. That's God's right, He is absolutely able to use that right and without exception, He is always perfectly just in His decision.

Many will say "that makes as much sense as a football bat!"

"That's fatalism"

"That kind of doctrine will kill evangelistic zeal!"

"What's the use in evangelism then?"

Romans 1:16 says "For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek." See? It's God's power to save! Not man's! And the God who saves has also ordained the means which He will use to do so! The Gospel!

So many people these days have an "if only" mentality when it comes to the Christian life, especially in the realm of salvation.

• If only I could preach like Billy Sunday or Billy Graham or John MacArthur or George Whitefield... then those people would surely be saved!
• If only I had said [this] or [that] in our conversation, maybe that person would've accepted Jesus right then!
• If only they'd use this type of evangelical presentation, more people would come to Christ!
• If we play the right kind of music and leave the confrontational passages about sin and judgment out of our sermons, then more people will come to church and have a better chance of being saved!

On and on, etcetera etcetera...

I for one have fallen prey to the 2nd idea, several times! I'll get down the road feeling bad about how a witnessing conversation went and a passage of Scripture will come to mind and I think "MAN! Why didn't I think of that then!? Surely that would've won (him/her) over!"

But this mentality is faulty and man-centered. Why?

One plants, another waters, but it is God that causes growth! [1 Corinthians 3]

Ever read the parable of the soils in Matthew 13? If Jeremiah 17:9 says "The heart is more deceitful than all else And is desperately sick; Who can understand it?" And if Ezekiel 36:26 says our hearts are stone; who do you think it is that makes our hearts into the good soil that accepts the seed of the word and brings forth fruit?

God does.

Salvation is God's work!

The doctrines of grace don't kill evangelistic zeal at all for the one who rightly understands them, in fact, they will boost the zeal to get out and witness for Christ because we know from Romans 10 "13 for "WHOEVER WILL CALL ON THE NAME OF THE LORD WILL BE SAVED." 14 How then will they call on Him in whom they have not believed? How will they believe in Him whom they have not heard? And how will they hear without a preacher? 15 How will they preach unless they are sent? Just as it is written, "HOW BEAUTIFUL ARE THE FEET OF THOSE WHO BRING GOOD NEWS OF GOOD THINGS!" If we have a passion for souls to be saved, we must be about spreading the gospel because without it, there can be no salvation!

"And there is salvation in no one else; for there is no other name under heaven that has been given among men by which we must be saved." (Acts 4:12)

This is what the Lord Jesus came for! He came to redeem!

To actually redeem, not just make redemption possible with man's help!

(More on that also when we get to Limited Atonement)

Galatians 4 says "4 But when the fullness of the time came, God sent forth His Son, born of a woman, born under the Law, 5 so that He might redeem those who were under the Law, that we might receive the adoption as sons."

Luke 4 says "18 "THE SPIRIT OF THE LORD IS UPON ME, BECAUSE HE ANOINTED ME TO PREACH THE GOSPEL TO THE POOR. HE HAS SENT ME TO PROCLAIM RELEASE TO THE CAPTIVES, AND RECOVERY OF SIGHT TO THE BLIND, TO SET FREE THOSE WHO ARE OPPRESSED, 19 TO PROCLAIM THE FAVORABLE YEAR OF THE LORD." 20 And He closed the book, gave it back to the attendant and sat down; and the eyes of all in the synagogue were fixed on Him. 21 And He began to say to them, "Today this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing." 
--The Son of the living God, Jesus Christ, accomplished what He came to do!

This is why it is recorded in the gospel of John, chapter 6, Jesus said "33 For the bread of God is that which comes down out of heaven, and gives life to the world." 34 Then they said to Him, "Lord, always give us this bread." 35 Jesus said to them, "I am the bread of life; he who comes to Me will not hunger, and he who believes in Me will never thirst. 36 But I said to you that you have seen Me, and yet do not believe. 37 All that the Father gives Me will come to Me, and the one who comes to Me I will certainly not cast out."

This is why we boldly proclaim Christ, His perfect life, His atoning death and His justifying, bodily resurrection from the dead 3 days later because all who have been regenerated by the Holy Spirit or even those who will be in the future, will surely be saved by the free, gracious act of God through faith!

And so we, like Ezekiel in chapter 37, preach the word of God to valleys of dry bones,

We, like the apostle Paul in 2 Corinthians 5, "11 knowing the terror of the Lord, we persuade men..." and "we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were making an appeal through us; we beg you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. 21 He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him."

And as we preach and tell all people, "flee the wrath to come, flee to Christ," we know that "Salvation is from the Lord!" (Jonah 2:9)

Praise God! He alone is worthy!

Thanks for reading, I hope it was a blessing to you!

Next up, Unconditional Election.

That'll be up asap, until then, don't forget the mental notes; pray... read... ask God for understanding and wisdom!

The Doctrines of Grace - Introduction, History and Defense

As of late, I have been questioned about my beliefs by some. I've been told my beliefs don't line up with scripture and I've even been told that reformed theology as a whole is a cult. (Smh)

So... I believe it is of great necessity to take some time here to arrange some outlines of the doctrines of grace, aka. the 5 points of Calvinism.

But first, by way of introduction...

Reformation History

&

A Defense of the Reformed Faith

It is important to remember that I have not yet been blessed of God to attend any Bible college or seminary. As a result, for the historical section of this post, I'll be taking excerpts from an article by a trusted and beloved teacher, who I only disagree with in the area of baptism (as far as I know), but he has been a tremendous instrument in the hands of God through my short walk Christ, Dr. Joel Beeke.
The article is called "The Origins of Calvinism" and you can go right to that page by clicking here.
(I've honestly not found a better work on the history of the reformation than this article by Dr. Beeke. He gives a very thorough work with resources and further helps are noted... it has been a phenomenal help to me!)

Buckle up...

It must be this way.

It was Martin Luther, a German monk, a couple years prior to the most popular event that sparked the protestant reformation when he nailed his 95 theses to the door of the church at Wittenberg on October 31, 1517, who came to grasp the great doctrine of justification by gracious faith alone.
Dr. Beeke notes that it wasn't only Luther, but many before him simply lacked a full understanding of that doctrine.

We must understand what reform actually is... let's look at some definitions.
Reform - "make changes in (something, typically a social, political, or economic institution or practice) in order to improve it."
Reformation - "the action or process of reforming an institution or practice."

OK, so what the reformers did was stand in opposition against the Roman Catholic Church doctrines.
What doctrines did they stand against?
Directly from Dr. Beeke's article, here are some:

• Papal abuses. The medieval papacy was rife with abuses in theology and practice. Immoral conduct was lived out and condoned even by the popes, and grace became a cheap, commercialized religion throughout the church via a complex system of vows, fasts, pilgrimages, masses, relics, recitations, rosaries, and other works. The papal imperative was “do penance” (as translated in the Vulgate) rather than “be penitent,” or “repent,” as Jesus commanded.
• Papal pretentiousness. Biblical and historical study by the Protestant forerunners led them to question papal claims to apostolic authority as head of the church. For example, the Reformers concluded that the rock on which the church was built (Matt. 16:18) was the content of Peter’s faith rather than Peter himself, which meant that the bishop of Rome possessed no more than a position of honor. Though the Protestants initially were willing to accept a Reformed papacy that would honorably serve the church, the cruel opposition of the popes to reform eventually persuaded many of them to regard the pope of Rome as Antichrist (cf. Westminster Confession of Faith, 25.6).
• Captivity of the Word. Protestants taught that the Roman Catholic Church held Scripture captive, withholding it from the laypeople and thus keeping them in bondage to church councils, bishops, schoolmen, canonists, and allegorists for interpretation. The Protestants worked hard to deliver the Bible from this hierarchical captivity. As Malcolm Watts writes:

The Church of Rome degraded the Holy Scriptures by alloying the purity of the Canon with her apocryphal additions, by supplementing the inspired records with an enormous mass of spurious traditions, by admitting only that interpretation which is according to “the unanimous consent of the Fathers” and “the Holy Mother Church,” and, particularly by diminishing the role of preaching as their “priests” busied themselves with miraculous stories about Mary, the saints and the images, and magnified the importance of the Mass, with its elaborate and multiplied ceremonies and rituals. It was thus that preaching deteriorated and, in fact, almost disappeared. The Reformers vigorously protested against this and contended with all their might for the recovery of God’s Holy Word.

• Elevation of monasticism. Protestants opposed the Roman Catholic concept of the superiority of the so-called religious life. They did not believe that monasticism was the only way to spirituality or even the best way. By stressing the priesthood of all believers, they worked hard to eliminate the Roman Catholic distinction between the “inferior” life of the Christian involved in a secular calling and the “higher” religious world of monks and nuns.
• Usurped mediation. Protestants also rejected the Roman Catholic ideas of mediation by Mary and the intercession of saints, as well as the automatic transfusion of grace in the sacraments. They opposed all forms of mediation with God except through Christ. They reduced the sacraments to two, baptism and the Lord’s Supper, thereby stripping priests and the church of mediating power and the sacramental dispensation of salvation.
• The role of good works. Protestants rejected the ideas of Semi-Pelagianism, which says that both grace and works are necessary for salvation. This theological difference was at the heart of Protestant opposition to Roman Catholicism, though it was largely through moral and practical corruption that the issue came to the fore.
The Protestant response to Roman Catholic abuses gradually settled into five Reformation watchwords or battle cries, centered on the Latin word solus, meaning “alone.” These battle cries, expounded in chapter 10, served to contrast Protestant teaching with Roman Catholic tenets as follows:

Protestant	Roman Catholic
Scripture alone (sola Scriptura)	Scripture and tradition
Faith alone (sola fide)	Faith and works
Grace alone (sola gratia)	Grace and merit
Christ alone (solus Christus)	Christ, Mary, and intercession of saints
Glory to God alone (soli Deo gloria)	God, saints, and church hierarchy

So the reformation "fixed" the doctrines of the Roman Catholic Church. It was an act of protest for the right interpretation of God's Word.

At the beginning of his article, Dr. Beeke quotes Charles Miller - "The spread of Calvinism was unusual. In contrast to Catholicism, which had been maintained by civil and military force, and Lutheranism, which survived in becoming a religion of politics, Calvinism had, for the most part, only its consistent logic and its fidelity to the Scriptures. Within a generation it spread across Europe."

That's what reformed theology is about. Consistent hermeneutics and faithfulness to the Scriptures! 

Reformed theology has its earliest roots in Switzerland with reformers Ulrich Zwingli and Heinrich Bullinger.

Dr. Beeke notes "Calvin himself preferred Reformed because he was opposed to having the movement called by his name."

I thank God for that little note because as I said in my post about leaving much of the traditions I've been taught my whole life due to their error, I said and still proclaim that reformed theology isn't about John Calvin, it's about his interpretation of Scripture and builds upon much of what he left behind. 

He let be God be God and believed that man is a creature created by God who is subject to Him in every way. Well, before I ever read anything about John Calvin, that's what I gathered from Scripture. 

This theology spread more throughout the mid 1500's and early 1600's. To Germany, Hungary, Poland and the Netherlands. 

In 1618 the Synod of Dordt came together for 7 months to settle the conflict between Calvinism and Arminianism because they had the Netherlands on the brink of civil war. 

This is also where the 5 points came from.

These 5 points are often known today by the acronym TULIP:

T - Total Depravity

U - Unconditional Election

L - Limited Atonement

I - Irresistible Grace

P - Perseverance of the Saints

Aso stated in the Canons of Dordt (with info, from prts.edu), page 1, "Though these points do not embrace the full scope of Calvinism and are better regarded as 

Calvinism's five answers to the five errors of Arminianism, they certainly lie at the heart of the Reformed faith, 

particularly Reformed soteriology, for they flow out of the principle of absolute divine sovereignty."

I went through these points very briefly in my 2nd video, attempting to lay a foundation for my channel, but in this series we'll take a much more in depth look at each point. 

You can get a PDF version of the Canons of Dordt, from the Puritan Reformed Theological Seminary by clicking here.

Stay with me! 

History is important since some people think reformed theology is some kind of cult! 

Seriously...

(Even though most cults are usually saturated with overt ritualistic satanism with sex as it's usual medium... but I guess that doesn't matter.)

So, after the Synod of Dordt which ruled in the reformed favor and deemed Arminianism as heretical, pointed out the 5 points of Arminianism and the 5 reformed answers against those 5 errors, what happened next?

The Reformed faith then made its way to France! "By the time Calvin died in 1564, 20 percent of the French population—some two million people—confessed the Reformed faith."

"The Reformation spread rapidly to Scotland, largely under the leadership of John Knox (1513–1572). In 1560, the Scottish Parliament rejected papal authority, and the following year, the Scottish Reformed “Kirk,” or church, was reorganized."

Through the persecution of "bloody" Mary Tudor (1553 - 1558) and her half sister Elizabeth (1533 - 1603), a more thorough version of Calvinism was born, called Puritanism.

"Puritanism lasted from the 1560s to the early 1700s."

"Eventually, Calvinism made it to North America. "The Puritans who settled in the Massachusetts Bay Colony continued to sanction the Church of England to some degree, whereas the Pilgrims who sailed to America in the Mayflower and settled in Plymouth (1620) were separatists. 27 Despite these differences, all Puritans were zealous Calvinists. As John Gerstner observes, “New England, from the founding of Plymouth in 1620 to the end of the 18th century, was predominantly Calvinistic.”

From the 1620s - 1777, with the settlement of the pilgrims and colonies, Calvinism was the main interpretation of the time. 

“As a consequence of this extensive immigration and internal growth it is estimated that of the total population of three million in this country in 1776, two-thirds of them were at least nominally Calvinistic,” John Bratt concludes."

"It is noteworthy that all of these Reformed bodies shared the conviction that Christianity in many parts of Europe prior to the Reformation was little more than a veneer. As these Reformed believers surveyed Europe, they saw what they could regard only as large swaths of paganism. The planting of solidly biblical churches was desperately needed. This explains in large measure the Reformers’ missionary focus on Europe." 
That's a very sad conclusion... and it's one that could easily be made from today's so-called Christian movements.

"Calvinism Today

Calvinism has stood the test of time. Most Protestant denominations that originated in the Reformation were founded on Calvinistic confessions of faith, such as the Thirty-nine Articles (Anglicanism), the Canons of Dort (Reformed), the Westminster Standards (Presbyterianism), the Savoy Declaration (Congregationalism), and the Baptist Confession of 1689 (Baptist). All of these confessions essentially agree, with the major point of disagreement being the doctrine of infant baptism.

Reformation theology prevailed, for the most part, in Protestant evangelicalism for many decades, but was diluted in the nineteenth century because of several influences, such as the Enlightenment in Europe and Finneyism in America. By the mid-twentieth century, Calvinistic theology had declined dramatically in the Western world, having been assaulted by nineteenth-century liberal theology and revived Arminianism."

Reformed theology has been the main theology of the Christian faith for the majority part of the last 499 years! Arminianism and Dispensationalism has only recently began to dig back into the scene in the past 150 years, tops! 

"Today, Reformed churches exist in the Netherlands, Germany, Hungary, Poland, Italy, the United Kingdom, North America, Brazil, South Africa, Australia, New Zealand, Singapore, South Korea, China, the Philippines, Russia, Egypt, Pakistan, India, Israel, and various additional African and Asian countries. Also, since the 1960s, there has been a resurgence of interest in Calvinistic literature. Calvinistic conferences are being offered in numerous countries; in many of these nations, the number of Calvinists is steadily growing in our new millennium."

History backs reformed theology! 

Not just history, but an honest look at the Bible, in its proper context, will lead us to a reformed interpretation. 

So, unless you want to call the majority of Christian forefathers, martyrs, evangelists and theologians cultists, let's do some research before we make such arrogant and in most cases ignorant accusations.

So begins this series! 

As we continue, let's be praying for hearts and minds submissive to the Word of God.

The next outline on "The Doctrine of Total Depravity" will be up asap as I don't want to take too much time between each one for better fluidity.

May God bless the reading and meditation of His precious Word.