In this sermon, the speaker emphasizes the importance of active witnessing in the Christian life. He compares not actively witnessing to neglecting other essential aspects of the Christian faith, such as reading the Bible and praying. The speaker uses a metaphor of someone trying to swim across the English Channel but getting overwhelmed by the storm and drowning. In the metaphor, Jesus appears in a helicopter to save the person, but instead of simply rescuing them, Jesus gives them a white jacket and tells them to hold on. The speaker explains that this represents the tension between faith and works, highlighting the need for both trust in Jesus and active obedience in the Christian life. The sermon references the book of Philippians, specifically chapter 2 verse 12, which encourages believers to work out their salvation with fear and trembling, emphasizing the connection between obedience and salvation.

Once saved, always saved, with a question mark. You know, I get a lot of letters, and no matter what people may think, I would say for every negative letter we get, I get them more we don't get. For every negative one, I suppose there's about a dozen good ones. But this week is not unusual in that I got a few letters from people who really like the fact that we don't agree with ecumenical movement, or they really like the fact that, you know, we will stand against certain kinds of Aversive Deception. But then they come out that you don't read the King James Bible, or you don't believe once saved, always saved, or you don't have a high view of the Reformation and the Reformers. This becomes a barrier for them. Now, for me and for most of us, I don't like to think in those things. I have a King James Bible, I read it. It's not the only one, but I read it. But for me, it's bioscriptures of the original Greek, Hebrew, and Aramaic. It's not any translation. I always emphasize it's probably the original language. Now, if somebody wants to read the King James, there's no problem. If somebody sees things differently on certain issues in me, that's no problem to me. For me, baptizing babies is crazy, totally un-difficult. But I know people who love Jesus who don't think so. I'm pre-millennial. I cannot understand how anybody looking at the scriptures from a Jewish perspective could be anything other than pre-millennial. Yet, I know people who don't see it that way. Martin Lloyd Young didn't see it that way, and he was a tremendous expository teacher. These things are not problems for me. As long as the essentials of the faith are in no way impacted, I have no problem. As I've said many times, there's four issues that we divide. One, do they have a wrong view of Jesus or the trinity of the Godhead? Two, is it irrepentant immorality? Three, is there another way of salvation other than the gospel, such as doctrinal similarities? And four, do they have another basis of authority, doctrinal authority, other than scripture? If it's not one of those four things, I can fellowship with them. I can cooperate with them in the gospel. But some people don't see it that way. I have something here, and I almost couldn't believe it was sent to me by one of these people who otherwise liked me. The Christ of Arminianism. Freewillism. Listen to this. The Christ of Arminianism. Arminianism means that you don't believe in an unconditional once-saved-always-saved, that you don't believe that Jesus only died for certain people, but he's willing to receive all. That's Arminianism in a nutshell. The Christ of Arminianism loves every individual person in the world and sincerely desires their salvation. That's true. I believe that Christ loves every single person in the world and he sincerely desires their salvation. The Christ of the Bible loves and desires the salvation of only those citing the verses which would support that, but ignoring the verses which would balance it. The Christ of Arminianism offers salvation to every sinner and does all in his power to bring them to salvation. His offer and work are often frustrated, for many refuse to come. That sounds scriptural to me. But the Christ of the Bible, he says, especially calls to himself only the elect and sovereignly brings them to salvation. None of them will be lost. And again, he suits the verses which support his point of view, but not the ones which balance it. The Christ of Arminianism cannot regenerate and save a sinner who does not first choose Christ with his own free will, by which they can accept or reject Christ. That free will may not be violated by Christ. Well, Arminians, true Arminians, don't believe that. We believe you can accept Christ, but you have to give up the power to do it. But, so we think. The Christ of the Bible, however, sovereignly regenerates the elect sinner apart from his choice. You have no choice. The Christ of Arminianism died on the cross for every individual person, and therefore made it possible for everyone to be saved. The Christ of the Bible died only for God's elect people. In other words, the others were created to go to hell forever, despite some overstated chance redestination. Now, the Bible does say God created all things for a purpose, even the wicked for the day of judgment, but he'd rather they be saved. The Christ of Arminianism loses many who he has saved, which even said many would fall away. Even if he does give them eternal security of some state, that security is not based on his will or his work, but the choice of his own. The Christ of the Bible deserves his chosen people. And we conclude by saying that people like most Pentecostals, people like John Wesley, we don't have the same Jesus. Now, George Whitfield was a Calvinist, John Wesley was not, but they never had this kind of determination where they said each other had a separate Jesus, two different Jesus types. Actually, it goes so far as to say, if you believe that Jesus died for everybody and is willing to receive everybody, that you have a different Jesus. That's how far some people will go. This is known as extreme Calvinism, hyper-Calvinism, and these people can go so far with it that if you don't go along with it, there can be no fellowship. Very often, they're the same kinds of people given to other such things about the authorized version. If you read another version, that's the same thing, there can be no fellowship. And these groups tend to be very into this, and they get into something the Bible calls party-steering. We've got it right, and others got it wrong. Now, I get accused of that, but in fact it's not true. Again, I always stand by the basis to think basic things in the Bible. If you depart from the basic truth, if you go into things the Word of God says are wrong, well, okay, I'll take the stand. But to divide over these other issues, I think it's wrong. Nonetheless, let's understand the nature of the division. Not personal division. On this extreme, we have something known as we are born with sin, therefore we're born with sin, therefore a saluted form of belief. Just to the left, Phinemism, things that were seen to be supernatural manifestations. In the middle, there are, there's something known as Westphalianism. This view believes, this view also believes. However, what happens is this. We are dead because we cannot choose the Lord Jesus, we cannot give up. When you convict somebody of sin, in a classical form, says, an unfaithful person has no choice about sinning. They must sin, because they can choose about sin. We, as believers, because God's Spirit is in us, God gives us back our choice of the spirit or the flesh. God does give us back. That is Westphalianism. Then you have a more moderate form of Calvinism. This moderate form of Calvinism is known as, and beyond that, is which, similar to Thinianism, on the opposite extreme, Bordas Omni, and Five Points. There's debate among Church historians. It was Calvin, but by something known as the reasons we know it. Classical Calvinism, which came out of the three monsters of thought, we call the tulips. Tulips, each one sort of an acronym, or an acrostic. He is totally depraved. Calvinism and Arminianism believe we are totally depraved. What does that mean? It does not mean we are as bad as we think. We are totally fallen. We're fallen in body, mind, and spirit. We're totally fallen. He's fallen psychologically. Even his bodily members are tainted with sin. He's totally depraved. Calvinists and Arminianists both believe we're totally fallen. The next is to use undeserved grace. Well, I totally agree, and Wesley would have totally agreed. We all agree that God's grace is undeserved. Christ died for the ungodly, while we have sinners Christ died for. We can't do anything to earn salvation. To think we even can. This is the rudiment of Calvinistic thought, which I'll explain more in a moment. It was reacting. John Calvin, none of his ideas were real. It is in some way, man was a Christian humanist, but he was still a humanist. What happened in the Middle Ages, during the Renaissance, was a heresy known as, well, we call them Thomas, people influenced by Thomas Aquinas. It was known as medieval scholasticism. Francis Schaefer explained it very well. What it virtually came to mean in the Renaissance was that, although man is fallen, his intellect wasn't. You see how man-centric he gets? After all this religious art begins revolving around man, his intellect does not form, only his spirit. Now, even the Reformers never totally rejected scholasticism, but the humanist scholars who influenced Calvin, and Calvin himself was a humanist, set out to correct this error in medieval scholasticism, and they got into all this monstrous trouble. So, he was reacting against Roman Catholicism in the Renaissance and in the Middle Ages, which said man was not totally deframed. Secondly, with undeserved praise, the Roman Catholic Church and selling indulgences. That's how St. Peter's in the Vatican was built. That's what triggered the Reformation, the abuses. Luther reacted against Testo, the Dominican, when a coin into a box rings, a falsehood charges on his face. You can somehow earn your salvation by buying it, or by good work, trying to go up the stairs, scholar Schaefer, on your knees, praying with rosary beads, trying to get their mother out of purgatory, or something like this. You can earn your salvation. Calvin was reacting to everybody. The teen and the youth, we say, well, maybe he tried, but he's not intending to save the future, only the predestined. God is omnipotent. He's all-knowing. Of course, he knows. His four elections, he chooses the ones he knew. Calvinists say no. The ones that caused the most mental illness, higher mental illness, mainstream illness. What is Roman Catholicism? The high instances of child abuse and homosexual pedophilia, all of that kind of stuff. Oedipus C, because of marriage, Augustine, Manxianism. I went to Bible college with children, it seems, to give a real assurance of salvation. It seems to give the people psychology. Now, the moderate forms of Calvinism don't have a mother who's Irish Catholic, I can tell you. I've seen both, close up. If you don't know her own background, my family's seen both of them. But let's look further. Limited atonement. If God put your name in the book of life before the foundation of the world, you have to be saved. You have to show that he's ordained to respond. And finally, there's perseverance. One saves, untraditionally always, and one saves all we save. But it's conditional. That is Calvinism. The moderate Calvinists will hold to poverty, poverty, undeserved grace, irresistible grace, and perseverance. Even moderate Calvinists will not hold to limited atonement, because Jesus only died for certain people, and the others were created for better health. Five-point Calvinists would hold to all of it. Now, even going further, there's a form of Calvinism which is heretical. It's as heretical on one extreme as Fallasianism is on the other. It's hyper-Calvinism, in the sense of not just being five-point, but by saying, because God has already foreordained the elect, the Church does not have to. We laugh at it now. That was the predominant thinking among the Baptists in this country, until William Carey stood up and challenged it in the Baptist Convention. He wanted to send missionaries to the East to convert the heathen, the pagan, and he was told, Brother Carey, sit down and be quiet. If God is the heathen, he'll do it without your help or mine. Another form of heretical extreme Calvinism is licentiousness, because somebody went out and made a procession of faith at some point, or they went up under the crown and got to the crown. Now, most Calvinists would say, well, if they're going to do that, that proves they were never saved to begin with. But there are others who would say, even if somebody backslides to that degree, if they really made the procession, it doesn't matter. They're still going to be saved, even if their works will be burned up. This is heretical. Our works being burned up means that the things we do in the flesh are not ordained by God, but the things that we do not because we've been saved, not to get saved, but because we've been saved. When a Christian is saved, we don't work to get saved. We're worldly and temporal. These extreme forms of Calvinism can be quite brutal. Any time you had a hyper-Calvinist hallmark was not only terrible social injustice, but the social injustice we see examples of a hyper-Calvinist hallmark. One being the American South, these three Southern Baptists. They believe in slavery. The Baptist church split between the American and Southern Baptists, opening it to enslavement. God elected them to Northern Ireland. Nobody hates the Roman Catholic church, but I love Roman Catholic people. If I did not love Roman Catholic people, however, hatred of Catholicism is one thing. Oppression of Catholics. If you look what the strict Presbyterians did, however, there is still a whole history in fact of what the extreme form of Calvinism is. Serving the Apartheid in South Africa. Whenever you find Calvin had a virtual police state, which he theologically designed to deny the people were burned alive. Reformed church in Zurich, founded by a Jew. Baptized as a believer? Well, baptized, they cut a hole in the ice and they brought oppression. In this country, there was a terrible war between the church in Massachusetts that burned people as witches. Whenever you find an extreme Calvinism, an extreme, you have a more moderate form of Calvinism, even some of the fights at the extremes of Calvinism, but I will also speak co-equally against the extremes of Ammonianism and what's beyond it, such as the idea of Athenian Pelagius on the other. The truth is in the middle. Open with me, please, to the Book of Romans, chapter nine. Let's begin in verse one. I am telling the truth in Christ and in the Messiah. I'm not lying. My conscience be witnessed in the Holy Spirit. But I have great sorrow and unceasing grief in my heart, for I could wish that I myself were accursed, separated from the Messiah for the sake of my brethren and my kinsmen, according to the flesh. This introduces the section of Romans, chapters nine, ten, and eleven, dealing with the superior logical, the salvistic and prophetic purposes of God for Israel and the Jews. That's the purpose. God's continuing love for Israel, despite their popular rejection of the Messiah by what became the majority of them. Whoever is real life, to whom belongs the present continuous active, not God's finish with the Jews. In the Greek tense, it's present continuous active. Who belongs to them? The adoption of sons, and the glory of the covenant, and the giving of the law, and the temple service, and the promises, indicating that it was written before 70 A.D., of course. Who are the fathers, and from whom is the Messiah, according to the flesh, who is over all God, blessed forever. Amen. Deity of the Messiah. But it is not as though the word of God has failed, meaning the Torah, for they're not all Israels who are descendants of Israel. In other words, being a physical Jew is, unless you accept the Messiah. Neither are they all children, because they are Abraham's children. To Isaac your descendants will be named. Now he begins doing a Midrashic exposition of the book of Genesis. That is, not of the children of the flesh who are children of God, but the children of promise are regarded as descendants. For this is a word of promise. At this time I will come, and Sarah shall have a son. And not only this, but there was Rebekah, Rebekah also, when she conceived by one man, our father Isaac. For though the twins were not yet born, and had not done anything good or bad, in order that God's purpose, according to His choice, might stand, not because of works, but because of him who calls, it was said to her, the older will serve the younger. Just as it is written, Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated. What shall we say then? There is no injustice with God, and there may it never be. For he says to Moses, I will have mercy in whom I will have mercy, and will have compassion in whom I will have compassion. So then, it does not depend on the man who wills or the man who runs, but on God who has mercy. For the scripture says to Pharaoh, for this very purpose I raise you up to demonstrate my power in you, that my name might be proclaimed throughout the whole earth. So then, he has mercy in whom he desires, and hardens whom he desires. He will say then to me, why does he so find fault? Who can resist his will? On the contrary, who are you, O man, who answers back to God? The thing molded will not say to the molder, why would you make me like this, will it? Does the potter not have the right over the clay to make from the same lump one vessel for honorable use and another for commons? What if God, although willing to demonstrate his wrath and make his power known, endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction, and he did so in order that he might make known the riches of his glory upon vessels of mercy which he prepared beforehand? Based on this, Calvinists will say, God is the potter, we are the clay, who are we to argue with God? He chooses who's going to go to heaven, he chooses who's left, the others are going to go to hell, that's it, shaken by love, he thought I hated. And of course, they've even taken us in some cases. The white people I love, the black people I hated, the Protestant people I loved, the Catholic people I hated, etc. Remember, John Wesley's revivals were an immediate reaction against the social injustices bred by a dead church that was permeated with Calvinistic thought. So they say then, therefore, how can we argue with God? You can't argue with God, he can do what he wants, he's sovereign, he makes one son this way and one son that way. Well, the first mistake these people are making is the text out of its context becomes a pretext. The context of Romans 9, 10, and 11 is predominantly dealing with nations, not individuals. It's dealing with nations, not individuals. It's dealing with the Jews and the Gentiles. He quotes about the two twins. Let's read what he's commenting on in Genesis 25, 23. And the Lord said to her, two nations are in your womb, and two people shall be separated from your body, and one people shall be stronger than the other, and the older serve the younger. What these people do is take something talking about nations and apply it to people. Now, there is a principle in Midrash called Kalahoma, light to heavy. You can say that what applies in a specific situation also applies in a heavy, but before you do that, you first have to look at the context. It's not talking about God creating some people for this purpose and others for that purpose. It's talking about his election of nations. Moreover, we have something called corporate solidarity. Corporate solidarity means when one person represents a nation. Esau and Jacob, respectively, represent what becomes the Israelites and the Arab nations. And God goes on, and Esau is reconciled to Jacob, and God has prophetic purposes in Genesis for the Arab people, the same as he does the Jews. His election here had to do with his calling for service, not to do with salvation in the primary sense that these people are making it. This is same in the book of Obadiah. The name of the patriarch becomes a metaphor or a general term for the nation descended from him. So, before we go any further, we have to realize that these people are taking something talking about nations and applying it to individuals when that is not mainly what the text is even talking about. Now, it can apply to individuals in some degree, as the text goes on to describe about Pharaoh. But when the New Testament interprets the Old Testament, you have to go back to the Old Testament context. Pharaoh hardened his own heart, didn't he? Repeatedly hardened his own heart. Only after he repeatedly hardened his own heart did God harden his heart. God raised him up and used him. He let the guy get away with murder, he let the guy get away with this, that, the other thing, thinking he was the big cheese. He was deified, of course, by the Egyptians, worshipped as God, and God used him for his purpose only to bring him down. But it does not say God hardened Pharaoh's heart until he repeatedly hardened his own. Look very briefly at John, chapter 12. I don't want to go into this much. It's on a different page, but in verse 37, though he performed so many signs before them, yet they were not believing. Would not. Verse 38, that the word of Isaiah the prophet might be fulfilled which he spoke, Lord whose believeth thou report, to whom have the arm of the Lord been revealed? Has the arm of the Lord been revealed? For this cause they could not. Would not, could not. For this cause they could not believe, for Isaiah also said, he's blinded their eyes and hardened their heart, lest they should see with their eyes, and perceive with their heart, and be converted, and I heal them. Would not, could not, should not. God's hardening of the heart is always in response to their own actions. It was not something God just hardened their heart, their own actions. Even Calvin admitted that, that it worked that particular way according to that kind of dynamic. Now, what this does is it does not quote from the Hebrew text, it quotes from the Septuagint, the Greek Old Testament, where the subjunctive, the subjunctive mood in Greek implies doubt, yet allows for the possibility, lest, lest they see with their eyes and perceive with their heart, the possibility of their Greek subjunctive. More than that, the idea of being converted. Again, the Septuagint takes Hebrew and translates it into Greek. Converted to Hebrew is teshuvah. The Hebrew word for retent and convert is the same thing. It means to turn away from sin towards God. This idea that he just arbitrarily, or his own sovereign grace, or his own sovereign will arbitrarily decides who's going to do this or that, they're only giving one side of the story. But the Bible shows something very different. When he hardened heart, it's because he repeatedly hardened their own. How many times did he send Moses back to Pharaoh? But now let's look even further. God is the father, we are the clay. This comes from the book of Jeremiah, Yirmeyahu Hanadi, chapter 18 and 19. Let's read the Old Testament text in its context to see what Paul is talking about. The word of the Lord came to Jeremiah from the Lord, saying... Now, when you see the word of the Lord, it's the modern Hebrew. The Greek would be logos, it's Jesus. It's Jesus himself coming to Jeremiah in some kind of revelation. It's not like a message came, it's like a person came. It has to do with a personal encounter with what the rabbis call the Logos or the Mamre, I'm sorry, with the Zohar or the Mamre, what the New Testament calls the Logos. A personal encounter with Christ. When we read the Bible in this period, it's not simply an encounter with the text, it's an encounter with the person. What we get from the text derives from the encounter with the person. If you're just getting information today, you're not hearing from Jesus, you're hearing from me. The question today is, are you encountering Jesus? Are you encountering the word, or just the word? If you have the word, the word will be crystal clear. The word came to Jeremiah from the Lord, saying, Arise, go down to the potter's house, and there I will announce my word to you. He had it go somewhere. God was going to show him, from the illustration of a potter, how to understand something. God didn't say, I'm just going to tell you now, I'm going to show you something that will explain it as an object lesson. Then I went down to the potter's house, and there he was. He was making something on the wheel, but the vessel that he was making of clay was spoiled in the hands of the potter, so he remade it into another vessel, and it pleased the potter to make. Then the word of the Lord came to me again, saying... Now, you can almost say this means Jesus said to him, Can I not, O Israel, O house of Israel, deal with you as this potter does? declares the Lord. Behold, like the clay in the potter's hands, so are you in my hand, O Israel. Can I not deal with you as the potter does? Once again, who's he saying it to? A person or a nation? They're taking something that predominantly applies to a corporate group of people, a nation, and over-applying it to individuals. Their second mistake is they don't look at how the potter works. When we take our study course to Israel, the next one will be, Lord willing, in September, October, we show people very frequently in a Talmudic village in Galilee how the potter made earthenware vessels from clay. If it doesn't turn out right, the potter smashes it into a mortar, lubricates it, and begins over. And if it's not happy with that one, smashes that one. And if it's not happy with that, re-smashes it. But it's the same material. A potter in biblical times would normally not give up until they've at least remade the thing a dozen times. Jesus doesn't save people to lose them. When we drop our cross, we pick it up, we goof up, we mess our lives up. He's not going to give up. He may have to break us and remake us time and time again, but it takes a long time for the potter to give up the material. Well, so it is with us. People who are always worrying about their salvation, thinking that they could be lost any minute, the potter's not like that. That's not the way the potter works. That is just as neurotic on one hand. Just as neurotic on one hand as any other extremist on the other. However, there comes a time when the potter, of course, does give up. At one moment, I might speak concerning an individual, concerning a nation. The text of Romans 9-11 is a nation, not primarily people. Or concerning a kingdom, to uproot, to pull down, or to destroy it. If that nation, against which I've spoken, turns from its evil, I will relent concerning the calamity I plan to bring on it. Or at another moment, I might speak concerning a nation, or concerning a kingdom, to build up, or to plant it. If it does evil in my sight by not obeying my voice, then I think better of the good with which I promised to bless it. So now, then, speak to the men of Judah and against the inhabitants of Jerusalem, saying, I am fashioning calamity against you. O, turn back from this evil way, and reform your ways and deeds. Close away, God will raise up another nation, he says. But if they repent, he'll take them back. That's what Jeremiah 18 says, and that is exactly what Paul is talking about in Romans 9-11. Look at it. Chapter 11, verse 22, Behold, then, the kindness and severity of God to those who sell severity, but to you God's kindness, that is to the mainly Gentile church. If you continue in his kindness, otherwise you shall be cut off. What does Jeremiah say? If this other pot that God made, or that the potter makes, doesn't work out good, he'll get rid of that one. But then what does he say? And if they also do not continue in their unbelief, we'll be grafted in again. What does Jeremiah 18 say? The same thing. If it repents, then I will think better of the good. It's not just trotter-crazing in the way they're saying it. I wish they would read the text in its context, but they don't. Let's go further. You'll notice extreme Calvinists will always, always, only use the verses that support their point. I guess Jehovah's Witnesses do the same thing, and if we're not careful, we can do the same thing. But we have to be careful. The crisis of immunism loves every individual person in the world and sincerely desires their salvation. He goes on to say that the crisis of the Bible is not like this. It's only the elect who is unconditionally chosen. Well, let's look at some of the verses he does not cite. Turn with me, please, to 2 Peter chapter 3, verse 10. I'm sorry, verse 9. The Lord is not slow about his promise, as some count slowness, but is patient towards you, not wishing for any to perish, but for all to come to repentance. Now, I've had Calvinists try to suggest to me, well, that only means Christians. Well, first of all, even if you're right, even if it only means Christians, then how could Christians perish if they're ones they've always made? I haven't gotten our answer to that yet. But then it says, but the day of the war will come like the heavens will pass away with the noise. The context is talking about the end of the world for everybody. He's wanting none to perish, but that all should reach repentance. Jesus doesn't want to lose anybody. Let's look further. 1 Timothy chapter 6, verse 12. Fight the good fight of faith. Take hold of the eternal life. It's something which must be apprehended. It's not just something up there, it's something which must be apprehended. Now, he says even something further in Timothy. The Lord says that he doesn't want anyone to go to hell. He takes no joy in people going to hell. He takes joy in people being saved. But when Paul writes about this, he's drawing on a number of Old Testament context. Old Testament context, one of which, of course, is in the book of Ezekiel. Turn with me, please, to the book of Ezekiel, chapter 3. Ezekiel is prophesying in a very bad time when judgment is well underway, and God tells Ezekiel this in verse 18. When I say to the wicked, you shall die, and you do not warn him or seek out to warn the wicked from his wicked way that he may live, that wicked man shall die in his iniquity, for his blood I will require of your hands. Yet if you have warned the wicked and he does not turn from his wickedness or his wicked way, he shall die in his iniquity, but you have delivered yourself. Again, when a righteous man turns from his righteousness and commits iniquity, and I place an obstacle before him, he shall die, since you have not warned him. He shall die in his sin and his righteous deeds which he has done shall not be remembered, but his blood I will require of your hands. God is telling Ezekiel here, and in Ezekiel 33, where he states directly he takes no pleasure when the wicked perish, but he would rather they repent. Warn them so they won't perish. He wants everybody to repent. Now, our Calvinistic friends will say, well, that only means that's the old covenant. Now we're under a new law, a new law of grace. That's some idea of grace they have. Look at 1 Timothy chapter 2, verse 4. God, who desires all men to be saved, is to come to the knowledge of the truth. He desires all men to be saved. He knows not all men are going to be saved. He knows the ones who will reject his offer of salvation to his son Jesus, and he knows the ones who will accept. Before he ordains it, he knows how it's going to turn out, but he wants everyone to be saved. Ideally, he wants them all to be saved. You have to look at what the Bible says on a subject, on a topic, the full weight of Scripture. There's a balance. A major part of the problem, again, comes from the fact that we are looking back to the 16th century and the Reformers, instead of back to the first century. We have to put ourselves in a situation that the first century Christians were in to understand what's the cause of the writing. But that principle is no less true when we look at Reformed or Calvinistic theology. What was Calvin up against? Why was he writing the way he does? Well, obviously, he was trying to teach. The Roman Catholic Church was teaching people ridden with guilt and fear. And he was trying to tell them, well, once saved, always saved, to keep them free of this oppression. There are so many verses. I will show all men. God is the salvation of all men. Warn them so they won't perish. It was something that later emerged in Western rationalism. Whenever you have a change in science, in scientific thought, that changes technology, okay? And when technology changes, it changes the economy. And when the economy changes, it changes the culture and the political situation, and people's worldview begins to change. Out of the Renaissance, Greek and Roman learning was rediscovered, and ideas came from the East. Under medieval Roman Catholicism, Western Europe went into the dark ages. If you want to know what a Roman Catholic world would look like, you want to know what the Pope would say. But now let's understand what was going on. At one time, physics, for instance, with Newton and Tony, but since Einstein and relativity, we don't think about physics. In the old physics, matter was matter, and energy was energy, okay? The two were mutually exclusive. Matter was matter, and energy was energy. But there was a born-again Christian from New Zealand called Rutherford who moved to England, and he began doing experiments with photons, right? Now, a light particle, it's a wave. In old physics, matter and energy were mutually exclusive. The worldview of Calvin couldn't grasp things being mutually exclusive, being held in attention. In the new physics, particle physicists today talk about a critical universe, which is like... Now, what's emerging in the world of physics is, in fact, in many ways closer to the worldview of the Bible than the one that was the worldview of Calvin. Calvin was black and white. You were once saved, always saved. Well, you weren't saved to begin with. It was, you were elected, you earned the right. He couldn't keep things in. This does not begin with Calvin. Calvin simply amplified it for his time, and we've been stuck with it ever since. It does not go back to Augustine and Pelagius. It goes back to the Sadducees. The Sadducees were determinists. They were fatalists. The Fadducees were not. Jesus, as a rabbi, Jesus, Yeshua, usually agreed to be seen to the Jews, but the Pharisees were much closer to the truth of the Sadducees. Jesus agreed to the Pharisees. Jesus said, the Son of Man must be betrayed, but woe unto him by whom he is betrayed. He must be betrayed for it is written, but woe unto him by whom he is betrayed. The Pharisees, the Pharisees, they said, all is foreseen, all is ordained of choice. They agreed with Jesus, for Jesus agreed with them. It was the Sadducees who were the determinists. Calvinism is close to the Sadducees. Jesus held it to intention. He just let it stand. The way a physicist today can let the fact that right particles have mass. A physicist today in university, in Imperial College London, or MIT in America, he can accept that. A hundred years ago, a physicist couldn't have accepted that. Well, Calvin couldn't accept it because of his worldview. We have to accept it, because it was the worldview of the Bible, and in fact it's our worldview today. Think about human immersion. Because of the fall of man, there's a curse on human relationships, including the relationship between men and women. A marriage is a love-hate relationship, isn't it? I don't mean hate-hate, but there's always this, I can't live with her, I can't live without her. There's always that constant. You've got this. The human brain is the only computer in the world which can hold two mutually points of view. I'm from New York City. New York is like London. You talk to people who are city people, big city people, they'll tell you. Because we're emotional, they're going to press on a bit further. For every verse someone can give you showing election and the sense that Calvinist interpret it, I can produce another verse showing he wants all to be saved. Let's take this even a bit. So, what is not being saved? What is the next basis of argumentation? It's not limited atonement, it becomes perseverance. It is wrong to say that Wesleyan Arminianism cannot give people the assurance of salvation, it can. You can be sure of your salvation, right before your salvation, right before it is. I can show you extreme Calvinists who can. They're always working, working, and you can be sure of your salvation. And, you can be sure of it tomorrow. This is the example I always use. Turn with me, please, to the book of Philippians, chapter 2, verse 12. Now, we deal with this more extensively on the Philippians page, which are now available. Four hours of teaching on Philippians. So then, my beloved, just as you've always obeyed not only in my presence, but now much more in my absence, work out your salvation with fear and trembling. He begins by talking about obedience in connection with salvation. Why? John 3, 36. He who believes in the Son has eternal life. He who does not obey the Son shall not be saved. Work out your salvation. It does not say, work for. It says, work out. Kepha Gezomai, in Greek. Once upon a time, there was a little boy named Thomas Phillips. Or, Tommy Phillips. Or, little Tommy Phillips. He was only ten years old. His father decides for his birthday, and Tommy opens the gift box, and inside of it is a box with the model athlete in the box. Little Tommy Phillips now was given something he never could have possibly expected. There was no way he could have gotten that athlete. It was just well beyond the bounds of his capabilities. So he has a choice. He could open the box and build the athlete, right? And put it on the mantelpiece. Or, he can take the box and put the box on the mantelpiece. And everybody can come and look at the picture. Kepha Gezomai does not mean work for. His father gave him something he couldn't have gotten on his own. But he still had to act on what was given him. He had to open the box, assemble it, and put it on the mantelpiece. This idea that we possess faith in Christ, and we take it and put it on the mantelpiece, that's crazy. That's absurd. Jesus says, Prove that ye might be faithful and bear much fruit. It's not to do with words simply being burned up. It's talking about people who make good possessions and change themselves indeed. Now, fruit is the fruit of the Spirit. Hence, Little Tommy worked out. Another way to look at it? Someone is trying to swim. And the wind begins to pull. So he says, There! So he's turning. And it begins to rain. And he says, Jesus! And he says, Oh my God! Okay, Jesus, I got it out! The Lord made it possible for him to do something in Jesus' faith in him. Jesus did something. He gets tired and he stops along the way. And tries to go back to faith. What Jesus does in salvation is make it possible. He makes it possible for us to make a choice. He restores enough of our free will. There's a balance. Once I accepted the Lord Jesus, although I get tired, I drop my clothes. As long as I keep that jacket on, nobody can fasten out of my Father's hands. That's true! Nobody's taking that jacket off with me. But I can take it off. I'm not going to. God forbid. I'd rather drown to sea with the jacket than be so full to the brim with one of these. As long as I leave the jacket on, I am eternally secure.