Well, I hope everyone's excited tonight. I'm very excited. These two gentlemen, I am just so very, very privileged to have Dr. Phil Fernandez, Mr. Chris Comos here this evening and doing this debate. This actually was a vision of ours last year at the second annual speaking truth and love conference in Phoenix Arizona and we just felt we would love to have a debate for next year and we asked Dr. Phil Fernandez if that was possible and he said he really liked the idea and I'm glad I'm really glad he really put this together and basically I asked him I put it in his lap and he went ahead and put this together and I hope Really, everyone here enjoys the fruit of the labor that Dr. Phil Fernandez and Mr. Chris Comos has put into this evening's debate. I do have a few announcements before we get started. In the back, as you saw in the entrance there, we offered the program guide, we offered the handouts, but we also have audios. This has been a conference, a four-day conference, and if you would like any of the audio tapes from the previous sessions, they are available in the back. If we run out of copies, there are some sign-up sheets. Just put down your name and phone number and how many copies you would like, and we'll get those made for you. And so just do that. Also, we're asking for a $1 donation. Obviously, if you don't have a dollar, don't worry about it. We'll just go ahead and let you have them for free. We never want to put a hindrance to the Word of God. Tonight, this also is being audiotaped and videotaped. The videotapes, DVDs, will be $4, and that's just basically to cover the cost that the church puts into it, and they've done a wonderful, a great community has just been really gracious to us in providing all of this for us so that we can, in turn, provide it to you. Tonight, I am really privileged to have as our moderator a gentleman that I think is worthy of being a moderator. It's so worthy I want to make sure that I have everything down and I don't want to misrepresent anything in his bio here. Tonight's moderator will be Dr. Rick Walston. Dr. Rick Walston has been the president of the Columbia Evangelical Seminary since it was founded in 1991. He has also pastored for years in both Assemblies of God and independent churches. Columbia Evangelical is a distant learning seminary through which associates, bachelors, masters, and doctoral degrees are offered in such majors as apologetics, Bible, comparative religions, cults, men's ministry, pastoral ministry, philosophy, theology, and more. Rick is the author of seven books, two of the most well-known are, Walson's Guide to Christian Distant Learning, which I have, excellent book, and The Speaking in Tongues Controversy. And his most recent book is titled, Seeking to Divorce-Prove Your Marriage, A Guide for Men. Among his various degrees, Dr. Walson has a Doctor of Ministry and a PhD in New Testament Theology. He recently earned a Masters of Arts in Apologetics from Luther Rice University. Could you do me a favor and let's give a warm welcome to our moderator, Dr. Rick Walston. Thank you. First of all, I'd like to thank Eric Urabe for asking me to be the moderator tonight. This is going to be a great in-house debate. I say in-house because this is a debate between brothers in the Lord. It's an intramural debate, if you will, a discussion that will be earmarked by civility and love, one for another. The title tonight is, Are the Five Points of Calvinism Biblical? I'm going to give you a brief statement on Calvinism, quite brief, because I'll let the debaters give you the details. But the five points of Calvinism are typically thought of or depicted with the acrostic tulip, T-U-L-I-P. Tulip, which happens to be my favorite flower, by the way. I hope I didn't just give away my theology. Okay, T of the tulip, total depravity. Because of the fall, man is unable of himself to savingly believe the gospel. The sinner is dead, blind, and deaf to the things of God. His heart is deceitful and desperately corrupt. His will is not free, it is embodied to his evil nature. Therefore, he will not, indeed he cannot, choose good over evil in the spiritual realm. The U of the tulip stands for unconditional election. God's choice of certain individuals unto salvation before the foundation of the world rested solely in his own sovereign will. His choice of particular sinners was not based on any foreseen response by the sinners or obedience or faith on their part. On the contrary, God gives faith and repentance to each individual whom he selects. The L of TULIP is limited atonement. Christ's redeeming work was intended to save only the elect. His death was a substitutionary endurance of the penalty of sin in the place of certain specified sinners. The I stands for irresistible grace. The Holy Spirit extends to the elect a special inward call that inevitably brings them to salvation. This internal call, which is made only to the elect, cannot be rejected. It always results in conversion. And then finally, the P of TULIP is the perseverance of the saints. All who were chosen by God, redeemed by Christ, and given faith by the Spirit are eternally saved. They are kept in faith by the power of Almighty God and thus persevere to the end. Now, for my own benefit, I would like to ask two questions. The first question is, I want to know how many of you, by showing of the hands, how many of you have come in here tonight with your mind already settled on what the position is? You have a solid position that you walked in here with. I'm not asking what your position is, just whether or not you have a solid position, you know what you believe on this point. All right. Thank you. Second question. How many have walked in here tonight and you're not sure what you believe and you're looking forward to the information to help you one way or the other? All right. Thank you. Our debaters tonight are Mr. Chris Comas and Dr. Phil Fernandez. Mr. Comas has a B.A. in philosophy and criminal justice from the University of Washington. and he is completing his Master of Theology at Reformed Theological Seminary in Orlando, Florida. He also took his pastoral training with and has a ministerial letter of recommendation from Greyfriars Ministerial Hall based out of Christ Church in Moscow, Idaho. Chris is about to move to the Twin Cities of Minneapolis-St. Paul in order to pursue his dream of doing Calvinistic evangelism. And Chris is the founder of a recently launched evangelistic ministry called Zeit Christ Ministries. In fact, this is Chris's first debate under the banner of Zeit Christ Ministries. Dr. Phil Fernandes is the pastor of Trinity Bible Fellowship and the founder and president of the Institute of Biblical Defense. Among his various degrees, Phil has a Ph.D. in philosophy of religion from Greenwich University. the Doctor of Theological Studies from Columbia Evangelical Seminary, and a Master of Arts and Religion from Liberty University. Phil is also currently completing a Doctor of Ministry in Apologetics at Southern Evangelical Seminary. Presently, Phil teaches Philosophy and Apologetics for Columbia Evangelical Seminary and Crosspoint Academy. Dr. Fernandes is the author of numerous books, and his two most recent books are Evidence for Faith, Essays in Christian Apologetics, and The Atheist Delusion, a Christian Response to Christopher Hitchens and Richard Dawkins. Dr. Fernandes resides in Bremerton, Washington with his lovely wife, Kathy. Now, the format of tonight's debate will be this. Both men will give a 20-minute opening statement, then each will be given a 10-minute response time. Finally, each man will give a 5-minute closing lecture, or closing statement, I should say. Then we're going to take a 15-minute break and come back for a 45-minute question-and-answer period. So right now, since Chris is defending the affirmative, he will begin. Chris, you have 20 minutes for your opening statement. Thank you very much for having me. I appreciate you all inviting me here. Sorry for my tardiness, as one wit said. Narminian always shows up when he intends, and the Calvinist always shows up when God intends. I'm very thankful for this opportunity to defend what I consider to be five of the most important points that have ever been penned by the hands of men. I consider this a real privilege, getting to debate one of my first real mentors in the faith, Dr. Phil Fernandez. I hope that what I offer here tonight will be as helpful and challenging to you all as Dr. Phil's teachings have been to me over the years in refining my own thoughts on these matters. So I would like to begin by thanking Phil and all those who have labored mightily over these last few weeks to get this debate and conference going. Kudos to all of you. So I'm here to defend the five very glorious points of Calvinism. I accepted Calvin into my heart shortly after first meeting Dr. Phil, and consequently, shortly after accepting Phil's version of Molinism into my heart. I was a Molinist for about half an hour, but then moved on to bigger and better things after studying through the scriptures more carefully, as well as having Calvinistic books put into my possession by some friends of mine who were starting to doubt my salvation. But to be a consistent Calvinist, I have to cheerfully confess that ultimately, God made me a Calvinist. So no matter how hard I tried, I just couldn't convince anyone of what I thought Molinism was all about. I came to quickly realize that I was the one who was all confused and that Louis Molina didn't help matters much at all. I thought he would be able to help me find some kind of middle ground between what I then thought were the two extremes of Calvinism and Arminianism, but I was wrong. And I soon came to discover, and I'm still discovering, that historic Calvinism is, as Dr. Benjamin Warfield of Princeton Seminary used to say, Christianity come into its own. So I've been asked to defend here tonight all five points of historic Calvinism. I believe these points are the most faithful and fruitful expressions of what the Bible has to say concerning God's absolute, decretal sovereignty over our salvation. Having said that, I don't think we need to limit the five points of Calvinism to a discussion about God's involvement in our salvation. But this is typically where these five points get bandied about. In other words, I believe that we should seek to understand how to apply these same five points to all of life and all that God has created, whether in our families, our churches, our communities, our cities, our cultures, and out into the whole cosmos as far as the curse is found. This extension of Calvinism out the fingertips, so to speak, is exactly what I will try to accomplish throughout this debate. But one other caveat needs to be made here before I jump into my main thesis, and that is that Calvinism has had better and worse defenders over the centuries. Even the likes of men as notoriously and gloriously Calvinistic as Dr. Benjamin Morefield, who was, in my estimation, one of the greatest defenders of historic Calvinism. He was also not as consistently Calvinistic in some areas as he ought to have been. I think this was especially true in his approach to apologetics. But I say this even with regards to some of his teachings on the doctrine of salvation. So although Calvinism made Christianity come into its own, Christendom still has a long way to go to work out some of the kinks and wrinkles that we have inherited from our Calvinistic forefathers. This is why I'm a firm believer in the motto, Ecclesia Reformata, Semper Reformanda Est, Secundum Verbum Dei, which means the Reformed Church is always reforming according to the word of God. So here is my humble and meager attempt at working out some of what I consider to be the Kingston wrinkles of the Calvinistic system of thought and practice. And just to alleviate any fears of anyone who might be seeing little red flags going up in their head, saying to themselves, this is no Calvinist, but a son of Billy Al, I fully and completely affirm all five points of Calvinism. Every morning I wake up and count all five fingers on one of my hands to remind me of the five points, and then I count the other five fingers just to remind me again. I love the five points of Calvinism because I believe them to be the most faithful expression of what the Bible has to say about God's eternal love and salvation for his people. But I have also become convinced over the years that Five-Point Calvinism, as it is typically presented, has not fully embraced all the covenantal aspects of God's relationship with the whole world, elect and reprobate included. In other words, the five points of Calvinism tend to focus solely on the decretal grace of God and the direct salvation of individual sinners, while neglecting the covenantal grace of God and the indirect salvation of corporate realities. So what I want to attempt to do tonight, in the remaining 15 minutes I have here, is to defend a covenantal approach to the five points of Calvinism. But of course, I leave it to God to decide if He wants to use my arguments to persuade your hearts and minds in the same direction. So the five points of Calvinism are neatly summed up in the acrostic tulip. This stands for T, total depravity, U, unmerited election, L, limited atonement, I, irresistible grace, and P. Perseverance of the Saints. Let's begin with the T. Total depravity or inability, as some have called it. Adam, as the federal head of the whole human race, was told by God in the garden that if he ate of the tree of judgment, that is the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, that he shall surely die. This happened in Genesis 2, verse 17. Literally, in the Hebrew, this phrase means to die, you will die, or being dead, you will die. But what kind of death was this? Was it a physical death, a spiritual death? It encompassed both of these, of course, but also included the death of excommunication. In 3, verse 23 to 24, it says that God drove the man out of the garden. And this was after God had symbolically atoned for their sins by clothing them with the tunics of skin. In chapter 3, verse 21, this was also after God had declared openly and publicly that man had become more like God, not less, more like God in his ability to judge between good and evil. As we're told in chapter 3, verse 22. So in what sense was man totally depraved after the fall? In some sense, he was physically fallen. So he's dying physically. And in some sense, he was spiritually fallen. He was unclean in his heart and mind. But in a more basic sense, he was totally unable to get back into the garden where he could have inner sanctuary access to God's very presence. He could no longer commune with God as he could before he was excommunicated. That's the big fall. So the first point of Calvinism has everything to do with the fact that all men have died in the sense that we are prevented by our sin from entering into God's presence in order to commune with him and have fellowship with him. Access to the tree of life has been blocked to each and every one of us. This is why Paul says in Romans chapter 5 that justice through one man's sin entered the world and death through sin. So death spread to all men because all sinned. The implication there is that all sinned in Adam. We've all seen in all fallen in Adam's all of us have been prevented from having access to the tree of life, which as we see in the book of Revelation is still in the presence of God and of the land says Johnson's vision there in Revelation 22 says, Then he showed me a river of the water of life. which harkens back to the garden, clear as crystal, coming from the throne of God and of the Lamb, in the middle of its tree. On either side of the river was the tree of life, bearing twelve kinds of fruit, yielding its fruit every month. And the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations." Revelation 22, verses 1-2. So practically speaking, the doctrine of total depravity means that every part of us is unclean, and so is unworthy of coming into God's presence. and therefore keeps us from access to the tree of life. This would necessarily include our wills and decisions as much as it includes everything else that we say, think, or do. It doesn't mean that we are as bad as we possibly could be. This would be utter depravity. It only means that everything we are as creatures creating the image and likeness of God is unclean and therefore unfit for coming into God's holy presence. So the tea and tulip could be better expressed in terms of total uncleanness. There is not one square inch of our fleshly being, personality, constitution, or charisma that God looks at and says, oh yeah, I like the sight and smell of that. That looks good. Apart from the grace of God and Christ, we are totally unclean in his sight. So the question is, how do we get back into God's presence without him destroying us for our sin? How do we get back into the garden and have access to the tree of life? This is where the next three points of Calvinism are so important. The next point, unmerited election or calling, unmerited calling. Because we can't do anything to get past the cherubim with the flaming sword turning every which way, God must call us out of the domain of darkness and into his marvelous presence. God must both initiate and consummate this whole process of getting us back into the garden so that we can commune and have fellowship with him. No one can work or earn their way back into his holy presence. Not even faith earns us a ticket into God's presence. When God calls us to come back into his presence, he bids us to come freely by his grace alone. And this is why Paul says in Ephesians chapter 2, and you were dead in your trespasses and sins. exactly what was said of Adam when he ate of the tree of judgment, in which you formerly walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air and of the spirit that is now working in the sons of disobedience. Among them, we too, Paul includes himself in this list, all formerly lived in the lusts of our flesh, indulging the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest. But God, being rich in mercy, because of his great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our transgressions, made us alive together with Christ. By grace you have been saved and raised up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the ages to come he might show the surpassing riches of his grace and kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. For by grace you've been saved through faith, and that not of yourself. It is the gift of God, not as a result of work, so that no one may boast. So getting back to the book of Genesis, we can see an example of unmerited calling or election with Adam in the garden. I do take calling election to be somewhat synonymous in the scriptures, just as Adam Just after Adam had sinned by eating of the forbidden fruit, God shows up and the text literally says, called to Adam and said to him, where are you? This is the first calling we have in the Bible. And obviously this occurred before God drove the man out of the garden. What's even more amazing about this calling is that it's not only unmerited and undeserved, but it is now demerited. That is, not only does Adam not deserve to be called by God, But at this point in the story, he actually deserved to be put to death by God. If anything, he had earned death because of his high-handed rebellion against the Lord God. But God graciously and undeservedly called upon Adam nonetheless. And God's call upon Adam was a call for Adam to come into his holy presence. That's why he says to Adam, where are you? Why aren't you here in my presence worshipping me now? Where was Adam? He was hiding. Hiding in the bushes because he was ashamed of his nakedness. But nonetheless, God still called him into his presence. Another example of this is seen with God's call of Abram out of the land of Ur and into the land of Canaan. God didn't tell Abram didn't call a brown because of something great and special. God called him a brown was a seventy five year old man with no children. This is not a sign of greatness, especially in that day and time. But my point here is that all this began with the Lord calling a brown and not with a brown calling on the name of the Lord. A brown did eventually return the blessing by calling on the name of the Lord. You see this in Genesis twelve verse eight. But the initial call was from God to a brown since the twelve verse one. So Abraham was called by God and not for anything great or glorious that God saw in him. Practically speaking, unmerited election would be better defined in terms of demerited election. As I mentioned earlier, we all deserve to die. As Paul says in Romans 6, 23, for the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus, our Lord. Sin merits or deserves death. And since we have all died in Adam and have inherited his death nature, we all deserve to die. But the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus, our Lord. If this is free, then it can't be earned, merited, deserved, or whatever else we might try to slip in here to make salvation something God owes us. In Romans 11-6, Paul tells us exactly what election by grace means. He says, And if by grace, then it is no longer of works. Otherwise, grace is no longer grace. But if it is of works, it is no longer grace. Otherwise, work is no longer work. So to sum up the second point of Calvinism for you, God's election and calling are not only undeserved, but they are also anti-deserved. Because of our total uncleanness, it's not just that we don't deserve to come into God's holy presence, we actually deserve to be driven from his presence and cast into outer darkness and separation from God. So now that we know that God has to graciously call us back into his presence, what else has to happen in order for us to be able to come into his holy presence without us getting burned up and cut up by the flaming sword of the cherubim? There needs to be a second Adam who can endure the flaming sword of God's wrath on our behalf. And that's exactly where Christ comes in. This is where the L in TULIP fits in nicely into the system. Hell is all about Jesus. So how are we going to make it back into the garden where the tree of life and the river of life and the very presence of God himself is found? Well, as I think we've seen from the first few points of Calvinism, there's nothing we can offer to God, nothing we can bring to him, nothing we can do for him, nothing that would satisfy his unwillingness to let us into his presence dressed in the stinky, filthy rags that we've inherited from our first covenant head, Adam. So, we need a second covenant head, along with the second set of new, clean clothing. And this second covenant head is Jesus Christ, as Paul says in 1 Corinthians 15, 47. And the new clothing he gives us is the clothing we receive in baptism, as Paul says in Galatians 3, 27. Jesus Christ was the only one who actually endured the fiery sword of God's judgment and not only endured the fiery judgment of God, but did so in a way that made him triumphant and victorious over the judgment wrath of God. This is why James can say in the book of James that mercy triumphs over judgment, James 1.13. In the death of Christ, the mercy of God triumphed over the judgment of God. So Jesus is the second Adam, and as the second Adam, he is the one who had to endure the fiery sword of God's judgment and wrath against us. In other words, unlike the first Adam, who could not pass under the fiery sword and the fiery judgment in order to get back into God's holy dwelling place, the second Adam did. After Christ triumphed over sin and death on the cross, he proved that he was victorious by being resurrected and then ascending to the right hand of the Father in the highest heavens. So now Christ is seated at the right hand of the Father. He is back now in the inner sanctuary and has total and complete access to all the power and glory and authority of his Father. This is why Christ could tell his disciples at the Great Commission, all authority has been given to me in heaven and on earth, in Matthew 28, 18. So what does this mean for the rest of the elect of God? What does this mean for the rest of us? All those who have been called by the Father are now seated with Christ in the heavenly places. This is what Paul is getting at in Ephesians 1, verses 3-6. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ. Just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before Him in love, having predestined us to adoption as sons by Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the good pleasure of His will, to the praise of the glory of His grace, by which He has made us accepted in the Beloved. So all those who have been chosen and called by the Father are also seated with Christ in the new Garden of Eden at the Father's right hand. So what does all this have to do with limiting or particularizing the Atonement? The Atonement is limited in the sense that not all who are covenantally chosen are eternally chosen, and not all who are covenantally called are eternally called. Or as Paul puts it in Romans 9.6, they are not all Israel who are of Israel. So although the Atonement is unlimited in its power and efficacy to save all those whom the Father has chosen in His Son, it is not unlimited in how the Father applies this efficacy to all men. In other words, the Father only applies the saving effects of the Atonement to all those whom he has predestined to eternal life in his Son. But this should not be taken to mean that there is no application of the same death on the cross to those whom he has predestined to eternal death in his Son. And this is the place where I would disagree a bit with some of my Calvinistic comrades. I do believe that the Atonement has a dual effect and application. The same God and Father uses the same death and resurrection of a son to affect both the salvation of the decreedly elect and the damnation of the decreedly reprobate. In other words, I want to argue that the atonement has both a limited application and an unlimited application. But regardless of which application we make use of, the atonement always has particular application to each and every individual who's ever lived. That is, the atonement will either give us eternal life or eternal death. Just as the resurrection of Christ will be applied to all men without exception, so will the death of Christ be applied to all men without exception. But the eternal saving benefits of the atonement can only be applied to those from the Father's predestined to eternal life. Otherwise, all men would be going to heaven, and there would be no need for the second death. Skipping ahead a little bit to irresistible grace. This is the eye and tulip. This is where the Holy Spirit comes into play. So now we get to the point of Calvinism where the Holy Spirit is most concerned. We've looked at how the Father is predestined and called us to come back into his presence and the Son has fulfilled everything that needed to be fulfilled in order for us to now have the right to come into the Father's presence. But now we need to look at what the role of the Holy Spirit plays in our redemption. The Holy Spirit is the one who applies all that the Father has decided on and all that the Son has worked for to each and every individual who has ever lived. The Holy Spirit is that person of the Trinity who gives both life and death, and this is on a daily basis. So this isn't just the case with regards to eternal life and death, but also temporal life and death. This is why every Christian affirms, at some level, some notion of irresistible grace. No baby was ever born into this world because they made a self-conscious decision to be born. Every baby has been born into this world by the irresistible grace of God. God has determined the time and place that each baby in this world is to be born. And likewise, God has determined the time and place that each person is to be reborn after the likeness of His Son, Jesus Christ. So it is the Holy Spirit who must give us the power and grace to actually die the kind of death that Christ died, and to live the kind of resurrection life that Christ now lives. And it is the power of the Holy Spirit that gives us the ability to come back into God's presence with full confidence and boldness to enter the holiest of holies by the blood of Jesus. So that's the role of the Holy Spirit in our salvation. All of that comes down to perseverance of the saints. The final point of Calvinism and perseverance of the Saints flows naturally out of those first four points. Obviously, if we're totally depraved, we can't pull ourselves up by our bootstraps and choose God or save ourselves or earn God's grace. God has to call us. God the Father has to call us and choose us. God the Son has to die for us and has to redeem us. And the Holy Spirit has to apply all of that to our lives individually in order to give us the power to actually come into God's presence without being destroyed by God. God cannot God will not put up with any sin. So the Holy Spirit renews us and changes us and cleanses us. And that's his job. And all of that works towards perseverance, preservation of the faith. All those whom God has called and eternally decreed to be saved will, in fact, be saved at the last day. God knows all the elect and all the reprobate. God has determined all the elect and the reprobate. God will not be surprised at the last day by anyone who's either in heaven or in hell. He's planned it all and he's got it all written down. in his secret council. That's it. Amen. Tonight we are here to debate the question, is five-point Calvinism biblical? My opponent would say yes. I say yes. I actually accept total depravity, but with prevenient grace. And then I say yes to the fifth point, perseverance of the saints. Though I do not believe that a true Christian can lose their salvation, I reject the way the Calvinists spell out the first four points if you take prevenient grace from total depravity. and I reject it as contrary to biblical teaching. As I said, I do accept total depravity, but believe God frees our will through prevenient, enabling grace. I recognize Calvinists as my brothers in Christ, but I believe the Bible teaches that Jesus desires all mankind to be saved, and that he died for every person. However, God will not regenerate people against their will. God enables sinners to believe, but we sinners retain the ability to reject God's grace and remain lost. I believe God chose the elect because he foreknew that we would believe, given prevenient enabling grace. He did not choose us to believe. I stand with non-Calvinists like Jacob Arminius, who did not oppose Calvinism to promote or exalt human free will. Instead, he opposed Calvinism to defend the goodness and justice of God. Arminius opposed the notion of an arbitrary God who unconditionally elects some to be saved and unconditionally passes over others, leading them to suffer eternal damnation without ever having any chance of salvation. Now, the Calvinist doctrine of total depravity teaches that man has been so corrupted by the fall that no one would ever accept he is a savior. I agree that all humans are sinful and cannot save themselves, and I believe we are totally depraved. But I also believe that through prevenient grace, God enabled sinners to trust in Jesus for salvation. I do not believe in free will. Jesus said without him, we can do nothing. John 15 5. But I believe that God sets the human will free to accept his salvation offer. Still, man retains the ability to resist God's grace. The Calvinist doctrine of total depravity teaches that fallen man is so corrupt that God must regenerate, make a person born again, must regenerate a person first before a person can believe. This regeneration precedes faith defines true Calvinism. I believe the Bible teaches the opposite. God regenerates us because we believe, hence faith logically precedes regeneration. Romans 5, 1 and 2 tell us that we have been justified by faith and that it is through faith that we have access into God's grace. Romans 6, 17 and 18 tell us that we accepted the gospel while still slaves to sin. and that we then became slaves of righteousness. Ephesians 1, 13 and 14 declares that having believed, we were sealed with the Holy Spirit. The Bible clearly teaches that belief in Jesus brings salvation, Acts 2.38 and 16.31. The Lord says through Ezekiel the prophet that we are to repent and turn from our sins to receive a new heart and new spirit, so we are to turn and repent to be regenerated. That's Ezekiel 18, 30-32. The Apostle John states that a person does not receive the right to become a children of God and be regenerated until they receive Jesus and believe in Him. John chapter 1 verse 12. So in all these passages it seems that faith precedes the things that we would call regeneration. Faith precedes regeneration. Calvinism is wrong. Regeneration is the start of new life in Christ. Yet the Bible clearly teaches that a person must first believe to receive this eternal life. John 3.16, 6.35, chapter 6, verse 47. He who believes in Jesus has passed out of death into life. John 5.24, by believing we have life in his name. John 20, verse 31. The Calvinist reverses that. God gives us life so that we can believe. The Bible teaches we believe to receive life in his name. Now I find it hard to see how regeneration, the new birth, logically leads to faith when the Bible clearly says that faith leads to justification, access into God's grace, becoming a slave of righteousness, being sealed with the Holy Spirit, salvation itself, and receiving of a new heart and spirit. God's Word teaches that regeneration, salvation, a new heart, becoming a slave to righteousness, receiving God's grace, becoming a child of God, and being sealed with the Holy Spirit are blessings given to those who believe. Hence, the Bible unambiguously teaches that God regenerates and saves those who believe. Regeneration does not precede faith. Instead, faith precedes regeneration. Faith is the instrument through which we receive God's saving grace and are born again. Faith does not merit or earn salvation, but it does accept the free gift of salvation. Now, biblical reputation of unconditional election Calvinism teaches that God did not choose to save those who would freely believe in Jesus. Instead, He chose to elect some to believe, while choosing to leave the rest of humanity in its lost state. In short, Calvinists teach that God elected people to be saved based on no condition, not even foreseen faith. However, this makes God's election rather arbitrary. He chose to save some for no apparent reason. He chose to reject others for no apparent reason. If I am picking apples and all the apples are the same to me, then my choice of which apples to select is arbitrary. Non-Calvinists like Jacob Arminius believe this does damage to God's justice and goodness, and that it also calls into question God's love for mankind. In my opinion, the Bible teaches that God chose to save those he foreknew would freely accept Christ, given the assistance of prevenient grace. This does not mean that we earn our salvation. It does mean we freely accept the salvation Jesus earned for us. We accept God's saving grace through faith. Peter tells us that we are elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father. 1 Peter 1, verses 1 and 2. This is why Jesus wept over Jerusalem. Not because he did not choose them, but because they were not willing to come to him. Matthew 23, 37. God's election is based upon one condition, faith in Christ. This faith does not earn or merit our salvation. It merely accepts God's saving grace. Consistent Calvinists teach that Jesus died on the cross only for the sins of the elect. He did not die for all mankind. If Calvinism is true, we are being deceptive if we tell our unbelieving neighbors that Jesus died for their sins. We do not know if they are of the elect. In fact, since Jesus has no intention of saving the non-elect, if Calvinism is true, it is misleading to even tell people that God loves them. If Calvinism is true, we do not know this. The Bible clearly teaches that God loves all mankind. John 3, 16-18. Matthew 5, 43-48. He desires that all be saved. 2 Peter 3, 9. 1 Timothy 2, 1-6. Luke 19, 10. Scripture declares that Jesus died for all mankind. John 1.29, 2 Peter 2.1, there Jesus even bought and paid the price for the false teachers who are obviously non-elect. Jesus paid the price for them. Also, other passages that teach that Jesus died for all mankind, 2 Corinthians 5, 15 and 19, 1 John 2, 1 and 2, Hebrews 2, 9, that he would taste death for every man, Romans 11, 32, Titus 2, 11, 1 Timothy 2, 1 through 6, 1 Timothy 4, 10, and the list goes on and on. God draws all people to himself. He has said, if I be crucified, if I be lifted up from the earth, I will draw all men unto myself, in John 12, 32. And God convicts even the non-elect of their unbelief, John 16, 7-11. Still, God will only save those who respond in faith to his drawing. Jeremiah 29, 13, Joel 2, 12, and 13, Hebrews 11, 6, James 4, 6 through 8, and the list goes on as well. It is also interesting to note that both Augustine and Calvin, in their writings, denied limited atonement. This was not something that was settled until after Calvin's death, the sin out of Dorton. Chris is aware of this, so there's no real argument there. A biblical reputation of irresistible grace. The Calvinist believes that God's saving grace cannot be resisted by the elect when God has chosen to regenerate them. However, the Bible clearly teaches that man has the ability to reject God's grace. So the author of Hebrews, in Hebrews 3, 7, and 8, says, do not harden your hearts when you hear his voice. Hebrews 10, 26-29, Luke 14, 16-24, and again, the list goes on. In fact, Jesus told the inhabitants of Jerusalem that he wanted to gather them to himself, but they were not willing. Matthew 23, 37. Stephen scolded those who were stoning him by saying, you always resist the Holy Spirit. Acts 7, verse 51. It makes no sense for God to plead with us to accept his grace if it is irresistible to the elect and impossible to accept for the non-elect. The Bible everywhere implies that man does have the ability to accept God's saving grace. Isaiah 45, 22, John 3, 16, Matthew 11, 28, and again the list goes on. In fact, when Paul was asked what a person must do to be saved, he did not give the Philippian jailer a Calvinistic answer. Instead he proclaimed, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved. Acts 16 31. Now, I agree with my opponent that all true believers will, by the grace of God, persevere in the faith. Hence, I accept the fifth point of Calvinism. Not because of unconditional election, I reject that, but because of God's promises and God's grace. The Bible teaches that true believers are sealed for the day of redemption, born again of imperishable seed. The truly redeemed will never perish and cannot be snatched from their Savior's hand. Those who are justified will eventually be glorified and nothing can separate believers from God's love. The Apostle John indicates that those who apostatized from the faith were never really true believers. Now I want to share with you my own view of divine sovereignty and human responsibility. I reject the logical order of God's decrees as spelled out by the different types of Calvinism. From my understanding of the Bible, I would propose the following logical order of God's decrees. Number one, the decree to create. Number two, the decree to permit the fall. 3. The decree to provide salvation for all. 4. The decree to draw all people to himself through prevenient grace. 5. The decree to save those who freely believe. 6. The decree to complete the work he starts in all believers. 7. The decree to eternally condemn those who do not believe in Christ for salvation. I believe that God, in His sovereignty, chose to save those who, under divine persuasion and drawing, freely accept Jesus as their Saviour. I believe that it is a greater sovereignty for God to exercise control over truly free beings than it would be if He only controlled whatever comes to pass because He controls each person's will. In short, I accept conditional predestination, not the unconditional predestination of Calvinism. In my view of predestination, I can truly say that I am here tonight because I freely chose to be here tonight. But in my view, it is also just as true to say that I'm here tonight because God eternally predestined me to be here tonight. If my being here tonight would somehow thwart God's purposes, God would have prevented me from actualizing my free choice to be here tonight. God could have allowed me to get ill, or it could have caused my car to get a flat tire. In a similar fashion, I believe that God has predestined the elect to be saved, and that He foreknew who would accept Jesus as Savior, given certain circumstances. Since He loves all mankind and desires that none be lost, God predestines to bring about circumstances in which I would accept Christ as Savior, and that's given His prevenient, enabling grace, freeing the will, though I would retain the ability to say no. Still, there are some people, in my view, who would never freely accept Christ, no matter what the circumstance. God only actualizes the existence of the non-elect for the sake of the elect or for purposes of a greater good. Now, there's some additional problems that I see with Calvinism. Calvinists often witness like Arminians. Calvinists spend hours trying to persuade people to choose to trust in Jesus for salvation. Once the person accepts Christ, then the Calvinist spends hours trying to persuade him that it really wasn't his choice after all. Another problem for Calvinism, no one held the Calvinist view of predestination until Augustine. If the apostles taught Calvinism, then they apparently did not consider it important enough to convey this doctrine to their successors. Until Augustine embraced unconditional predestination in about 380 AD, we know of no church father who was a Calvinist. Another problem for Calvinism. Only hyper-Calvinists, in my view, are consistent Calvinists. If the doctrine of predestination automatically rules out a free human response when it comes to accepting Christ, then it seems that it would also rule out all free will. For Ephesians 1.11 clearly states that God works all things after the counsel of his will. So if God works everything after the counsel of his will, that would seem to rule out free choice, not just in salvation, but in all things, if you hold to the unconditional predestination of Calvinism. Calvinism implies volunteerism. If a human parent loves some of his children, but not all of them, we view this love as somewhat deficient. But when this principle is applied to God, the Calvinist often replies that whatever God wills is just and good. However, this denies essentialism, the traditional view of the Christian church, that God could only will that which is right or good since God's will is only subject to God's good nature. So because God is good, He could only will that which is good. Voluntarism teaches, on the other hand, that the good is arbitrarily good because the good is whatever God wills. Both John Calvin and Martin Luther embraced voluntarism when defending unconditional election. Another problem for Calvinism, the gospel is not good news for the non-elect. If Calvinism is true, then the gospel would not really be good news for the non-elect, since there is no possibility of them receiving eternal life. Yet when pagans attempted to worship Paul and Barnabas, Paul and Barnabas told them that they were not there to be worshipped, but instead they had come to preach the gospel, the good news. They had come to preach the gospel to them so that they would turn from idolatry to the worship of the true God. Acts 14, 15 and 17, 24 to 30. Hence, Paul and Barnabas believed they were preaching good news to pagans. and that they had the ability to turn from idolatry to worship of the true God. Yet they didn't know if any of the pagans were of the elect. If the gospel is good news for all mankind, then it is possible for every person to come to Christ. Another problem with Calvinism, the non-elect are held responsible for something they can't change. Calvinism is truer than the non-elect are held responsible for rejecting Christ, even though they lack the ability to come to him in faith. They were born with a sin nature, I agree. But they lack the ability to accept the cure of Jesus, there's no prevenient grace given to them, and are held responsible for God for not accepting the cure. I would agree with Jacob Arminius, this seems unjust. Another problem for Calvinism. How can Calvinists make sense of blasphemy of the Holy Spirit? Jesus thought that blasphemy of the Holy Spirit is when a person is guilty of an eternal sin and that they shall never be forgiven. But why would Jesus even bring this up if all the non-elect already have no possibility of their sins being forgiven? Another problem for Calvinism, it's admitted by many Calvinists, is that God doesn't love all mankind. If Calvinism is true, then God doesn't love all mankind. He only loves the elect. Yet God commands believers to love all mankind, even their enemies. Matthew 5, 43-48. Does anyone really believe that our love encompasses more people than God's love? I would argue that unconditional election is arbitrary. Of course, the Calvinists would disagree there. I would say another problem with Calvinism, we must redefine several of God's attributes. Agape love does not really mean unconditional love unless they agree that God doesn't agape love the non-elect. God's justice. How can God be just and fair to all mankind when he unconditionally elects some and unconditionally passes over others? What about God's goodness? How can God be considered good to create people and send them to hell when they never had any possibility of accepting Jesus as Savior? And then we must redefine even several key New Testament terms, like the world. The world doesn't mean for God to love the world or Jesus died for the world. It doesn't mean the world, it means only the elect in the world. Well, why didn't God say that then? Jesus came to seek and save that which was lost. Well, only the elect lost. Why didn't he say that? He died to save sinners. Well, we're all sinners. Why didn't he just save the elect sinners? But he didn't. He said he came to save the lost and he came to save sinners and he loves the world and died on the cross for the world. The Bible teaches that the unsaved, another problem for Calvinism, can seek God, repent and believe. We see this with Paul preaching to the pagans in Acts chapter 14 and Acts chapter 17. And then I would also say that Calvinism has a problem explaining the problem of evil, solving the problem of evil. If you're going to take... God's going to allow evil in human suffering if he's not drawing people to himself, trying to persuade people through pervading grace to come to him in faith, it seems like God is unjust to allow evil in human suffering. Thank you. Okay, so Dr. Phil brought up some pretty key, important disagreements with Calvinism. He mentioned one that total depravity works together with prevenient grace, which I'll say I don't disagree with. I think prevenient grace is just another way of talking about how God plows the field before he finally changes someone, you know, eventually. to acknowledge him and submit to his son. So I don't think pervenient grace is necessarily incompatible with total depravity. It can be understood in a Calvinistic framework. Phil mentioned that God frees our will through pervenient grace and therefore allows us to choose him, but we can also not choose him. I guess my response would be, well, what ultimately decides between the one who chooses and the one who doesn't? If it's within the person, then that's self-salvation. What do they need God for? What do they need Christ for when they can just pull themselves up by their own faith bootstraps and believe in God and enter back into God's presence and commune with God and have fellowship with God apart from Christ? Why was the cross necessary? I would argue that if that is the true account of faith, that what ultimately decides the difference between someone who believes and doesn't believe is within those people themselves, then the cross is unnecessary, regeneration is unnecessary, justification is unnecessary, all that is unnecessary. I mean, we might as well just throw it all out and become atheists. I mean, historically, I would argue that Arminianism and even Molinism have led to what is now secular humanism. Secular humanism is basically just, well, if we don't need God's all-encompassing sovereign grace to change us and to cause us to love Him and do good works and all those things, why do we need God at all? Let's just chuck the whole thing, you know? Let's punt it all. So I think secular humanism is just the logical consequence and practical consequence of Arminianism. Dr. Phil believes that regeneration does not precede faith. Well, again, ultimately, what is it that causes one man to believe in another? On his view, it has to be the men themselves. It has to be individual men who are somehow able to trump up within themselves the ability to believe in God. You know, even with all this talk of prevenient grace, well, God might come in and plow the field, but ultimately it's up to that individual to find it within themselves to believe in Jesus. And I don't find that being the case in the Scriptures. Now, I think what Phil is alluding to, though, is the covenantal aspect that I was trying to drive at in my presentation. There's a whole side to the Calvinism that is often neglected, especially when it's just five points Calvinism and that's all that's emphasized. Typically, the five points are just about how God sovereignly saves individual sinners out of their wretched condition. Well, the covenant encompasses so much more than that. It encompasses how God saves individuals within communities, within a covenant corporate reality. And like the church, like through families, like even to some extent through society and how God saved the Ninevites. I mean, he had the king of Nineveh repent in dust and ashes, and then all the people repented. So God can use covenantal means to bring about individual salvation. So the five points, I would argue, is not enough. We need more. We need to understand the covenant. I think what Phil's getting at is the covenantal side of salvation. Yeah, God requires us to believe. Yeah, God requires us to repent and believe on Jesus and do good works and all those things. Those are all stressed in the Bible. But again, we're talking about ultimately what causes the difference between the one who does and the one who doesn't. Well, this is where Calvinists have always claimed, and I think rightly so, God. It's God who ultimately decides the difference between the one who is saved and the one who is not. And He still requires everyone to repent and believe. He still requires all of His creatures to love Him, to submit to Him, to respect Him, to honor Him, to glorify Him. Even if they refuse to, He still requires it of them. It's kind of like a parent with his kids who has two or three that are kind of ornery and you know, disobedient. It's not like the parent all of a sudden stops requiring those children to honor them and respect them. God's the same way with his covenantal children. You see, I would argue that in Adam, all men are covenantally related to God. All men have some kind of covenantal relationship to God, either as covenant breakers in Adam or as covenant keepers in Christ. So we need to keep that firmly in mind as we're studying these things. We need to understand that the five points of Calvinism are primarily about God's eternal decrees. How God ultimately does what he does in the salvation of men, individual men specifically. The covenant gets off into broader territory. deals with corporate realities, national realities like Israel. That's why Paul in Romans 9, 6 says, not all Israel is of Israel. Those distinctions are important in the Bible. So we need to understand the difference between the creedal election and covenantal election. I think what Phil's getting at with a lot of his remarks, I think what he's arguing against is what traditionally has been called hyper-Calvinism. I think that's what he's opposed to. Classical, straight-up-the-middle Calvinism has always affirmed both decretal election and covenantal election. I think we need to keep both those categories firmly established in our minds. So I guess my question to Phil would be along these lines, what makes the ultimate difference between the person who's saved and the person who's not saved? Is it God or is it man? Who makes, what makes the ultimate difference? And we're not talking just covenantally, you know, does someone need to repent and believe in Jesus? Yeah, of course, we would agree with that. But ultimately, who decides? Who's going to heaven and who's not? Ultimately. And I think we have to say what the Bible says, you know, Romans 9, Romans 11, Ephesians 1, ultimately it's God's choice. God decides, ultimately, who's going to go and who's not. Covenantally, we make all kinds of choices. We choose to either believe or not believe, or repent, not repent, obey or not obey. Those are all covenantal categories. But again, Calvinism is about the ultimate realities. Who ultimately decides between those who will be saved and those who won't be. Just a few things I'd like to say here. He mentioned Romans 9, and you look at Romans 9, 10, and 11, Paul's answering the question, well, if salvation is through faith in Christ, then how can the Jews be the chosen nation of God, and so many of them reject Christ? He's not answering the question, hey, I'm going to solve for you predestination and free will. But in the process of answering that question, he does touch on things. He says God is sovereign. He's the one who makes the choice of who gets saved. I agree with that. God is righteous. What he does is righteous because it's in accordance with his good will. I agree with that. Paul also says that the Old Testament predicted that many of the Jews would stumble over Christ and that many of the Jews would be lost, so it was nothing to be surprised about. But Paul closes Romans 9 With these verses, I'll at least read verses 30 to 32, what shall we say then, that Gentiles who did not pursue righteousness have attained to righteousness, even the righteousness of faith? But Israel, pursuing the law of righteousness, has not attained to the law of righteousness. Why? And then he explains why they're not elect. Why? Because they did not seek it by faith. But as it were, by the works of the law, for they stumbled at the stumbling stone." And then he shows how that was predicted in the Old Testament. And so, basically, God is sovereign. God is the one who regenerates, who justifies. But he does that in response to our acceptance of his free gift. I think the key point of departure that's going to be here—well, two things, I think. Number one, which view is more biblical? And I would argue that Calvinism, once you accept the Calvinistic system of thought, it forces you to reinterpret words. So world doesn't mean world anymore. It only means the elect of the world. The lost doesn't mean the lost. It just means that the non-elect and the non-elect of the world and the non-elect sinners or that that will be lost and he will save the elect sinners, the elect world and so on. But the key, the other key here, so you got to ask, what does the Bible teach? You know, and when you look at the scriptures, Hebrews 11, 6, But without faith it is impossible to please him, for he who comes to him must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of those who diligently seek him. I find that hard to reconcile with Calvinism. Jesus said, if I be lifted up from the earth, I will draw all men unto myself. But another key is, he says, what makes the ultimate difference? He says, if I'm right, the cross is unnecessary, justification is unnecessary. He says it's self-salvation if the person accepts God's grace. I disagree. Just as with human gifts, you have the freedom to accept them or reject them. Even if you accept the gift, it didn't mean you earned it. It does not mean that you earned the gift just because you accepted it. I deserve the flames of hell right now as much as I deserved the flames of hell before I was saved. It was a free gift by God's grace. I wouldn't even seek them, but through prevenient grace and God's drawing and the convicting of the Holy Spirit, I accepted the free gift. Okay? If there's ten guys on death row and the governor says, I'll pardon any one of you guys as long as you'll accept my pardon, if three of them accept the pardon, they can't say that they earned the pardon. They just accepted the pardon freely given. He said Arminianism has led to secular humanism. Who says? Who says? You could find every heretical guy that started off in Calvinism, you could find as many as every heretical guy in Arminianism, or whatever else you want to call the different non-Calvinist views. He keeps talking about the covenantal aspect of salvation. Basically, he's talking about that God has decreed that through Christ's death on the cross and through repentance and faith, The non-elect can enjoy, can be saved within a community and can enjoy some benefits here on earth, but if they're not of the decretal elect, if they're not of the elect that Jesus actually planned to save, they're going to burn in hell forever. That's not too appealing to me. And it seems to me to be inconsistent with the scriptures. Now, I actually think we need to take a second look at Jacob Arminius. He was a little bit unsure about the fifth point. I believe that we're secure in Christ, but I believe that Arminius was God-centered, his theology, not man-centered. He didn't seek to defend human free will. He sought to defend God's goodness and God's justice, and he thought that unconditional election calls that into question. I agree that we're spiritually dead, that we inherit a sin nature, from Adam in the garden, but being spiritually dead means exactly what it says in Ephesians chapter 2 verses 1 to 10. It means being separated from fellowship with God, without Christ, without God, without hope, far from God, and no access to the Father. It's like Jesus said, apart from me you can do nothing. Being spiritually dead means we are separated from God, but through the drawing power of Jesus, John 12, 32, and the conviction of the Holy Spirit, John 16, 7-11, through God's prevenient grace we are enabled to say yes to God. A man left to himself will never seek God, but God draws us and enables us to believe, still we have the ability to resist God's grace. Now, he seems to be confusing Paul, even when he quoted from Romans 11, 6. When Paul condemns works salvation, he puts grace against works and faith against works. He doesn't put grace against faith. Faith works with grace. So non-Calvinist evangelicals, though at least at least the ones that I know, do not teach work salvation. Work salvation is the view that a person earns their salvation by works. Faith in Jesus does not earn God's favor. We still deserve hell. Faith accepts God's salvation as a free gift. Still, salvation is not deserved. So it's not work salvation. Paul did not pit grace against faith. Instead, he puts grace against works and faith against works. Let me see here. I think we could ask the Calvinist, is salvation by faith? He talks about making Calvary unnecessary, justification unnecessary. Well, everything is solved in one big unconditional election if Calvinism is true. So who makes those doctrines unnecessary? If Calvinism is true, then we are not really saved by faith. Salvation is solely by God's election. In Calvinism, faith is not actually the instrumental cause of our receiving salvation. Instead, faith would be an effect of salvation. Let me see, there's a few verses I'd like to view. There's like about 80 pages of verses here. All right, good, good. John 16, 7-11, Jesus says, But I tell you the truth, that it is to your advantage that I go away. For if I do not go away, then the Helper will not come to you. But if I go, I will send him to you. And he, when he comes, will convict the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgment, concerning sin, because they do not believe in me. 2 Peter 3.9, the Lord is not slow about his promises, some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing for any to perish, but for all to come to repentance. Isaiah 45.22, turn to me and be saved, all the ends of the earth, for I am God and there is no other. We all know John 3.16, for God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish, but have eternal life. Jesus said, come to me all who are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest. That passage in 2 Peter 2.1, it says, but false prophets also arose among the people. And then it describes them saying that they deny the master who bought them. Well, when did Jesus pay the price for the sins of the false prophets, if he only died for the elect? And I'll close with this, 1 Timothy 2, 1-6, 1 Timothy 2, 1-6, 1 Timothy 2, 1-6, 1-6, 1-6, 1-6, 1-6, 1-6, 1-6, 1-6, 1-6, 1-6, 1-6, 1-6, 1-6, 1-6, 1-6, 1-6, 1-6, 1-6, 1-6, 1-6, 1-6, 1-6, 1-6, 1-6, 1-6, 1-6, 1-6, 1-6, 1-6, 1-6, 1-6, 1-6, 1-6, 1-6, 1-6, 1-6, 1-6, 1-6, 1-6, 1-6, 1-6, 1-6, 1-6, 1 This is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior, who desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth. For there is one God and one mediator, also between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, who gave himself as a ransom for all, the testimony given at the proper time. What we're going to do now is we're going to have our five-minute closing remarks. Chris will begin with his five minutes, and then Phil will have five minutes for his. Chris, you can begin. Well, thank you again for having me and being willing to sit through our talks here. You guys are very patient people. The five points of Calvinism are some of the most significant glorious doctrines that the church militant has ever come up with. That's an older way of talking about the church here on earth before we enter into glory. And as I hope I've shown in this debate, these doctrines are not just applicable to the salvation of individual souls, but also to the covenantal interaction between God and the people He's created, whether eternally elect or eternally reprobate. These points are glorious and have ramifications for every single thing we do in life. If God is absolutely sovereign over everything, then he probably wants us to learn how to think, live, move, and have our being in light of his control over his creation. We need to learn how to have our Calvinism coming out our fingertips. I also think it would do us well to refine these five points a bit by putting them to a covenantal grinder and buffer. There are some sharp edges to the way these five points have been presented in the past, and I think it's possible to take some of the unnecessary edginess off of them if we learn how to recast them in a more covenantal light. No doubt there is always going to be a certain amount of useful edginess that Calvinism is always going to have just by its very nature. Whenever sinners are confronted with an absolutely sovereign and holy God, there is going to be some ruffled feathers. But it is the unnecessary offenses that have been tacked on over the years due to the overzealousness of some Calvinists who think that defending the five points means we have to be surly, mean-spirited, or anti-evangelistic, or what is even more insidious, thinking that in order to defend the absolute sovereignty of God over everything, that we must also denigrate God's covenantal interactions with man, or denigrate the full image of God in man. full-blown five-point Calvinism doesn't need to do any of these things. We can fully affirm, because the Bible ultimately teaches that God is absolutely sovereign over whatsoever comes to pass, and that He covenantally interacts with whatsoever comes to pass. And lastly, we shouldn't just teach these doctrines as if they are quaint little platitudes, or as if they are just high-minded intellectual propositions. We need to learn to love them. And we need to learn how to teach these great truths to our children and our children's children in such a way that they learn to love them. There is nothing worse than someone who professes to know the truth, but by his actions shows everyone that he doesn't really love the truth. This is what it means to be a hypocrite. And there have been many Calvinistic hypocrites who profess to know all about the doctrines of sovereign grace, but in their lives, they're still living like practical Arminians. Which brings me to my very last point. I promise this is the last one. I'm sure there are many of you who don't give these points much intellectual buy-in. but who also are more faithful in your Christian walk than you are at crunching logical syllogisms. And to you, I say, God bless you, and may you continue living like practical Calvinists. And may God keep your Arminianism in your head and out of your heart. And I will also pray that if God decides not to change your heart and mind on these five points, that he will change the hearts and minds of your children. And indeed, that the whole culture and world around us would soon be as in love with these doctrines of grace as so many others have been in the past. Thank you, Chris. Phil, you have five minutes. Yeah, I'd like to thank everybody that worked so hard to put this together, and Chris, great brother in Christ, great friend, and I really appreciate your tone. I think tonight that I showed biblical passages that call into question the first four points of Calvinism as understood by Calvinists. Again, I would hold the total depravity, but with prevenient grace. The Calvinist holds the total depravity without prevenient grace. If Calvinism is true, then God does not love all mankind, at least in a saving way. If Calvinism is true, God does not desire all to be saved. He does not draw all mankind. Jesus did not die for every person. If Calvinism is true, God regenerates people against their will, and then after that, they believe. If Calvinism is true, God condemns the majority of mankind, the non-elect, to eternal damnation, even though there was never really any possibility they could trust in Jesus as Savior. I want to quote again that verse, Hebrews 11, 6, "...but without faith it is impossible to please him." For he who comes to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of those who diligently seek him. And we don't start out seeking him, God takes the initiative and through prevenient grace enables us to believe. But even if we believe, we have not earned our salvation. We cannot earn salvation, we deserve the eternal flames of hell, however we have the freedom to accept or reject the free gift of salvation because of God's prevenient grace. Psalm 145 reads, The Lord is gracious and merciful, slow to anger and great in loving kindness. The Lord is good to all and his mercies are over all his works. The Lord is righteous in His ways, in all His ways, and kind in all His deeds. The Lord is near to all who call upon Him, to all who call upon Him in truth. He will fulfill the desire of those who fear Him. He will also hear their cry and will save them." That's Psalm 145, verses 8 and 9, and 17 to 19. Now, if Calvinism is true, then there may be people in this room or people loved by people in this room, who will be tormented in hell forever merely because God did not unconditionally elect them. And there was nothing these people could do to change their fate. There was no saviour for them to turn to, no good news for them to embrace. Now, the fact is they deserve eternal torment, but then again, so do we. Why would God unconditionally elect some and then unconditionally pass over the rest of mankind, many of whom are our loved ones and our friends? I agree with Calvinists that God is all-powerful and sovereign, but God is also all-good and all-loving. Therefore, I stand with those who proclaim the God of the Bible to be a good and gracious God who loves all mankind and desires all mankind to be saved. But he will not force his salvation on man. God is just, but he is also loving. He is sovereign, but he is also good. John 12.32, Jesus said, If I be lifted up from the earth, I will draw all men unto myself. The scriptures teach us that Jesus died for all mankind. He paid the price for all mankind. And so it's my hope that if there's anyone here who's never trusted in the Lord Jesus for salvation, that they would answer the call, that they would look to Jesus and acknowledge that there is salvation in no one else. And so God is just, but He is also loving, He is sovereign, but He is also good, and He desires that all would be saved and none would be lost. Blessed be the name of the Lord our Savior. Thank you, Phil. We've now reached that part of the evening where you get to be involved. Our question and answer period will be 45 minutes. Each debater will have two minutes to answer the questions that you pose. No matter who asks the question and no matter to whom you pose the question, both will have an opportunity of two minutes to answer. Please remember you are asking questions. You cannot give a statement. You cannot debate the debaters. There is a microphone here in the middle of the room, so if you'd like to start standing, those who want to come forward and step up to it may do so now. Remember, we have only 45 minutes, so please, please keep your questions brief and concise. And let us begin with the first questioner. Sure. But come up, please. Come to the microphone in the middle here. Is there a woman on the number? At this point, I don't know. And if somebody asks you when we get to number nine or 10, if you ask 10 questions, I will stop you. I take five. Actually, though, so we'll know. People go ahead and line up, and then if there's too many questions by any single person, we'll ask you to maybe go to the back of the line, and if there's time, we'll pick you up later. Awesome. I'll just go straight to the point. It's for you, Chris. I appreciate your tone as well. It's very respectful. A question in regards you didn't address, in regards to the Holy Spirit, blasphemy of the Holy Spirit. I understand blasphemy of the Holy Spirit to be rejection of the Holy Spirit based upon who Jesus is. And it's the only sin that sends us to hell. I'm just wondering why those people sent to hell are rejecting the Holy Spirit. What's the Holy Spirit doing with the unelect? I didn't really get to this in my discussion, but I would argue that the same covenantal reality is true with the spares, as I tried to get into with Christ. The Spirit has a dual role, and ultimately his two roles are what the Father and the Son have planned for him. So either he's going to save an individual or he's going to damn an individual. And so the Spirit will work and wrestle with men and get them to repent and believe, but covenantally there is a sense in which, yeah, the Spirit can be resisted. I even put that in my notes. I believe that there is a covenantal side to this, like I've been trying to argue, that puts God in the mix with man to the extent that man can thwart, in a sense, plan for him? I don't think you're really answering it. Either that or I'm just not understanding it. If God, the Holy Spirit, and I'm sure you believe God is the Holy Spirit, why is God, the Holy Spirit, I guess, toying with unbelievers? I think he's toying with them. He's bringing them to a greater conviction of guilt, really. I mean, if they have no choice of choosing. Well, they do. They have to choose. Why don't we do this? Why don't you let him finish? Let him finish, because then if you need to reestablish your question, you can ask. And I think I think this is where the rubber really hits the road. I think what you're arguing against is hyper Calvinism, which says essentially God does everything and man does nothing. I actually think this applies to all the different, more mild forms of Calvinism. I just don't see a place. I think it makes blasphemy of the Holy Spirit, which I see as a final hard denial of Jesus as Savior. Jesus says that some people had just committed it. and they're guilty of an eternal sin, which could never be forgiven. All other sins could be forgiven, but that sin cannot be forgiven. It makes no sense. If they're already of the non-elect, there is no possibility for salvation anyway. But I will say this on behalf of Chris. He has the covenantal aspect. He sees God working with humans also in a non-salvific, non-saving way that is kind of A lot of people haven't really heard about that, so I kind of know where he's coming from, but I don't see how it meets the point on this particular issue. But I do kind of see a little bit where he's coming from there. Okay, maybe I can sum it up a little better this way. Ultimately, the Holy Spirit is working out whatever the Father and the Son decreed for him to work out. And so whatever the spirit ends up doing with an individual, whether it's save them or damn them, it's ultimately based upon what the Father has decreed from all eternity. Maybe that's the simplest way to put it. Our next question? I have two questions, one for each side, so I suppose I should ask the first. Well, as I said, each person will be able to answer, to respond, so you can ask either way, but both will respond to each question. Okay, so I'll ask the first question, and it's actually directed towards Mr. Comus. How is it, and this is based in 2 Corinthians 4.4, how is it that the God of this world, which I'm assuming is not our triune God, must blind the unbelieving lest they believe if they are unable to believe in their depravity. Can you repeat that? Sure. It's in 2 Corinthians 4. My question is, how is it that the God of this world, it's mentioned in 2 Corinthians 4. must blind the unbelieving lest they believe if they are unable to believe in their depravity. So this kind of goes to the question of your view of depravity. Are you asking me if I think total depravity means total inability to believe? I think, if I may, the question is why would the scripture say that the God of this world tries to blind the eyes of the unbeliever when in fact they can't believe anyway? Is that right? Well, I mean, I don't know. It's kind of a chicken and egg thing. You know, does the God of this world blind them and therefore they can't believe or is their unwillingness to believe in a part and parcel to their blindness? I mean, I think Van Til put it pretty succinctly when he said that our inability is correlative with our unwillingness to believe. Yeah, and I would just say that I would agree that if Satan goes through the trouble of blinding non-believers, it's because he's trying, he's at war with God, he's trying to prevent them from believing. And it doesn't seem to make much sense that Satan would blind people who are already blind and are going to be eternally blind anyway. Next question. Yes, this one's directed toward Dr. Fernandez and towards his position in some sense. If God chooses those he foreknew, if God chooses those he knew who would believe, sorry, those he foreknew that would believe, it seems that human acts inform God, which seems to deny his omniscience in some sense and bases election in a man-first, in somewhat of a logical order. Could you Could you explain omniscience in regards to kind of a seemingly, a seemingly problem? freely chose to create a world in which creatures would have genuine free will, then if he's omniscient, if he's all-knowing, he would foreknow whatever choices they would make, given whatever circumstances they would be, and how they would respond, for instance, to his prevenient grace. And so if God eternally knew I was going to choose to be here tonight, and I was going to be here tonight, if I chose not to be here tonight, God would have eternally foreknown that. And I don't think that, to me, it doesn't lessen God and make Him any less infinite to put Him in a box and say He really can't create a world. He can only foreknow future choices because they're not really free choices. To me, a God who is able to foreknow genuinely free choices has a greater knowledge than a God who could only foreknow choices because those choices aren't really free. One of the key points, if I might just throw this in, you can both touch this, does the fact of God foreknowing a man's free choice, I think is what the question was, inform God? Do we, by our free choices, inform God even though he sees it foreknowingly? In my understanding, God foreknows. God has infinite knowledge of every possible world and what free beings would do in every possible world, and then he freely chooses to actualize which of the possible worlds it is that he wants to actualize, and so basically it's You know, my way of looking at it is if God did not want that free choice to come about, He could have just actualized a different possible world. Okay, so God isn't informed by man's free choice, in your opinion? Well, yeah, I think that's exactly what happens. If we believe in God's exhaustive foreknowledge, and He foreknows what men will freely choose, but he doesn't determine what they will freely choose, that's basically classical Arminianism, then yeah, our free choice ends up determining God's choice. God looks down the corridor of time, watches the movie ahead of time, or whatever you want to say, sees what we're going to do freely, do, and then chooses based on that choice. I don't think it just informs God's choices, I think it actually determines God's choices and that's why I think Arminianism is a slippery slope to humanism, polytheistic humanism. Alright, next question. Alright, I have two questions. Didn't contemplate this first one, but I'll throw it out there based on the question on 2 Corinthians 4 that was just raised, verse 4. So if the point of this passage is that ultimately the God of this world has the ability to blind me such that I can't believe, then how do I not end up thanking myself for having the strength to resist the God of this world, or how do I end up not thanking Satan for not blinding me for my salvation ultimately instead of thanking God? Is that too obscure? I'm not sure, you said not thanking Satan for blinding me, not thanking God? Okay, so if the point of this passage is to teach that there is this group of people who are able to believe, yet the God of this world, in this case interpreting that as Satan, is able to blind them from not believing, then wouldn't it seem logical that for me to read this and then still feel secure in my own salvation, I'd either have to thank myself for resisting the God of this world, in which case, I guess I'd pat myself on the back, or that I would be in the very weird position of thanking Satan for not happening upon me so as to blind me, if that is what this passage means. It just seems to me, like many Calvinists do, There's the attempt to distance themselves from hyper-Calvinism, where a man has no free will at all. And then any time an Arminian or a non-Calvinist talks about freedom, the Calvinist who said he wasn't a hyper-Calvinist, who said he believes in some free choices, cries foul when the Arminian says that that was a free choice, because now all of a sudden, wow, so that made God know that event. With me, I believe God had the final say, even of our free choices, because he could have chosen to prevent those free choices from being actualized. Well, yeah, getting back to, you're referring back to 2 Corinthians 4.4, right? Yeah. It doesn't appear to me, when Paul says, whose minds have gone to the stages of blindness, who do not believe, that he's making one or the other based on the other. It's not like one logically has to precede the other, one has to temporally precede the other. It just seems like Paul's kind of throwing them both in the mix there, saying, look, those who have been blinded do not believe. Well, okay. Alright, question 2. Alright, I was wondering if you both could give your comment, interpretation of just a short little section of scripture, just because we've talked about a lot, but I haven't heard any exegetic, so just be good to hear you both comment on Romans 9 verses 12 down to 24, and I'll just read them real quick. Be very quick. So it was said to her, the older shall serve the younger, just as it is written, Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated. What will we say then? There is no injustice with God, is there? May it never be. For he says to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion. So then it does not depend on the man who wills and 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 in that my name might be proclaimed throughout the whole earth. So then he has mercy on whom he desires and he hardens whom he desires. You will say to me then, why does he still find fault? For who has resisted his will? On the contrary, who are you, O man, who answers back to God? Will the thing molded say to the molder, why did you make me like this? Or does not the potter have the power over the clay to make from the same lump one vessel for honorable use and another for common use? What if God, although willing to demonstrate his wrath and to make his power known, endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction? And he did so to make known the riches of his glory upon vessels of mercy, which he prepared beforehand for glory, even us whom he called, not from the Jews only, but also from among the Gentiles. All right. From now on, there'll be no more long passage reading. Chris, let's begin with you. I just say amen, Paul is a Calvinist. That was great. And I'd say that I had a feeling he was going to stop at verse 24. And that's why I gave an overview of the whole passage. I gave the context of the passage. of Romans 9. And the context is he's trying to answer the question about the Jews who have rejected Jesus as the Messiah. How can they be God's chosen nation, yet they're turning from Jesus? How could the gospel, salvation through faith in Jesus, be true? And so Paul answers the questions using several things. And he says, first of all, not all physical Israel is saved. He documents that from the Old Testament. Then he says, you know, God's the potter, we're the clay, we have no right to talk back to him. He's just saying God is sovereign. He's the one who makes the choice. He says that God is righteous, God is just. Any good Jew would agree with that. But then, and he says the Jews shouldn't be surprised, verses 25 to 29, that so many of their brethren are lost, because the Old Testament predicted that. But then it comes to verses 30 to 33, which I read very clearly in my rebuttal, that Paul shows the one condition that God has for his election. God's election is not arbitrary or unconditional. Faith in Jesus is the one condition for election. Non-elect Israelites were rejected by God because they pursued God's righteousness by works of the law and not by faith. Gentiles weren't looking for God, but attained God's righteousness and salvation by faith. Then Romans 9 runs into Romans 10, which talks about trusting in Jesus alone for salvation. Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes. So take Romans 9, 10, and 11 all in context. You stop at verse 24. Is this the passage he read? I'd probably be a Calvinist, but I read the rest of the passage. Next question. comment on that just because I think we need to go. We've got quite a few people and we need to keep it moving. Okay, of course, this is for both of them. Chris, if I call my daughter and she comes home, that doesn't mean that I'm calling her for election. And I kind of felt like in Adam, you were saying that when God called Adam, that that was as if it was a call to election. Did I misunderstand or understand that correctly? I'm sorry, you said it was a question for both of them? Of course, because that's what you've directed to him. Again, the distinction between decretal election and covenantal election. Every time God calls someone to come into his presence, that's a good example of covenantal election. Now, whether God decreed eternally to save Adam, we don't know. Secret things belong to the Lord, but the things revealed belong to us and to our children forever. That's Deuteronomy 29, 29. So what God's secret plan was with Adam, I don't know. Covenantally, yeah, he definitely called him into his presence, just like he calls us into his presence every Lord's Day. See, and I'd just like to say something about Chris. When I got together with him and he discussed his views, there were some nuances in his thought. He's very well thought out. He studied under Doug Wilson in Idaho, a brilliant guy. It took a while for me to understand the difference between what he calls the credo election, which by the way is what I think this debate is really about. That's what the five points I think are about. I think most Calvinists would agree with me. But then there's a distinction between that and the covenantal decree. It's a difficult task in a short amount of time to explain the nuances of a very complex systematic theology. And so I just want people to, I'm using my time right now to just say, he probably needs more time to explain that to a lot of people who've never heard it before. It took us several hours before I can make heads or tails out of what you're saying. And also, might there be a difference in Adam's, God's call to Adam, would you say that was a general? call or a specific internal call? The efficacious call or the one that can be resisted? All we can know is what God has revealed. We can't know God's secret intentions and thoughts. I would say it was the general call of Adam. Now whether Adam really repented and believed and is going to be in heaven forever, none of us know. None of us have that access to the book of life where all the names are written, right? I don't. All we have is this book here, and this book doesn't have a list of names in it. Okay, for both of you, of course, Phil. Do you believe that God saves by looking down the corridor of time, this is what it seemed to be saying here, to see who will accept him as Savior? So then God tailors that man's experiences to choose him, i.e., we have the analogy of the flat tire, and so God, if he had wanted you to be here, He wouldn't have given you a flat tire, and if he didn't, he would do that. Okay, so? I didn't finish it. Oh, go right ahead. But if he looks down and sees that a person will not receive him, then God does not love that person, and is it incapable of persuading him to bring him into the experience of life and to believe? In Acts 17, when Paul was talking to the Stoic and Epicurean philosophers on Mars Hill, he stated, and he has made, and God has made from one blood every nation of men to dwell on all the face of the earth, and has determined their pre-appointed times and the boundaries of their dwellings, so that they should seek the Lord. in the hope that they might grope for him and find him, though he is not far from each one of us. For in him we live and move and have our being, as also some of your own poets have said, for we are also his offspring. Therefore, since we are of the offspring of God, we ought not to think that the divine nature is like gold or silver, something shaped by art and man's devisings. Truly these times of ignorance God overlooked, but now commands all men everywhere to repent. And so I think Paul is saying exactly that. God set the times and the boundaries in an attempt to persuade man through his prevenient grace to seek him. And that he is now calling all people, even the non-elect, to repent. So it seems to imply that Paul thought they had the ability, due to prevenient grace, to repent. Chris? Okay, so are you asking if I believe in that view of foreknowledge? I was just putting out the question, you know, since it has to go to both of you. No, I don't. I mean, I believe God's foreknowledge is like, like I tried to allude to earlier, is co-relative with his foreordination. So, I mean, we could put it as simply as this. Whatever God foreordains, he foreknows, and whatever he foreknows, he foreordains. It's as simple as that. Both are eternal attributes of God. ultimately condition anything he knows or determines on anything man knows or determines. Now covenantally, based on what we see and what we understand as mere human beings, God interacts with us in a way where Faith precedes regeneration in a covenantal sense, you know, or faith precedes election. I mean, Phil read to you all the passages where, you know, that covenantal aspect really is emphasized. But to get back to Romans nine, I do believe Paul starts out with the covenantal. view of things there in Romans 9, but he quickly gets into, like Mr. Hitchcock just read, the individual narrowing down of exactly who God loved and who God hated. He loved Jacob, he hated Esau. Those are particular individuals, and if you can't deal with election on the level of particular individuals, I don't think you really understand it on the level of covenantal corporate realities as well. The two go hand in hand. Alright, next question. Final question. No, just two per person, because we're getting a long line. Thank you guys for coming. Obviously you're both well-read, well-studied, and especially in church history, I'm sure. I'm curious to know, who would you each choose as maybe the five best Christian thinkers, theologians, throughout history, and whether or not each of those individuals would subscribe to, just overall, the five doctrines of Calvinism? Phil, why don't you start? Yeah, I would have to say that, boy, it's hard to limit it to five because I would say Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, Tertullian, Augustine, I throw in Aquinas, Calvin, Luther I think is a better thinker than people give him credit for, as was Melanchthon, you've got Arminius, underrated, Wesley, I think you've got great thinkers, but five-point Calvinism doesn't show up until after Calvin dies and it's the sin out of door, because I could show you quotes from Calvin where he seems to hold that faith precedes regeneration logically, And then he believes in unlimited atonement. Now, I think the Synod of Doric logically spelled it out, and I think if Calvin had been alive then, I think he would have changed his thought and remained a Calvinist, but just tightened the logical coherence of his thought. I don't think he would have changed mine. I could be wrong, but I think Arminius is underrated. But I think you've got great thinkers in both camps. You know, going all the way back to the church fathers, I think there are hints of five point Calvinism there. I think there's been some good scholarly work done in that area. You know, Michael Horton's book, I think, was Amazing Grace. He has a whole list of quotes in the back there of early church theologians who affirmed something pretty close to what we would call five point Calvinism. Now, the fact that five point Calvinism wasn't explicitly spelled out until the sentence of I think it's just another example of how God has progressively grown his church through the ages. The doctrines that were debated early on in the church was the issue of the Trinity. So because the Trinitarian view of God didn't get explicitly spelled out to the Council of the United States. I mean, it wasn't in the Bible. Well, no, it was there. It's just God has patiently worked these things out over history. And I think we still have a long way to go. You know, I think personally that we still have a long way to go to understand how the covenant interacts with God's eternal decrees. I think that's a big, hotly debated issue, especially amongst Reformed Presbyterian types right now. Especially within about the last ten years, how does God's eternal decrees function or interact with or interplay with God's covenantal interaction with his people? So I think there's a lot of good work that needs to be done there as well. Alright, next question. If I may read a brief passage of scripture and then... How brief? Like three verses. Do it very quickly. All right, this is from Hebrews chapter six, and the author says, For it is impossible to restore again to repentance. Those who have once been enlightened and have tasted the heavenly gift and have shared in the Holy Spirit and have tasted the goodness of the Word of God and the powers of the age to come and then have fallen away. uh... since on their own their christianity in the son of god so it's a so my question basically since both of you uh... would believe that those who are quote fall away from the faith were never originally crippled about the doctor phil's perspective and then your uh... Perspective concerning the covenantal go ahead. Just ask the question. They'll tell you what they look at So basically what I'm asking is how can somebody who's not actually saved taste the heavenly gift sharing the Holy Spirit and You know partake of the goodness of the Word of God. All right, who would like to start? sure, I'll tackle that one since that is a Part and parcel of you know, what this heated debate that's been going on in our reform Presbyterian circles for the last ten years revolves around a lot of these mourning passages of apostasy. And so I would argue that, again, covenantally, completely legit to think of the decreedly reprobate as partaking of God's grace in some way, shape, or form. The Westminster Confession, I think, hits on this in chapter 10 on the doctrine of the sexual calling, where it talks about the Holy Spirit having common operations with the decreedly reprobate. That is, the Holy Spirit gets down dirty and wrestles with those who are going to be in hell for all eternity. And how does he do it? Well, he enlightens them, he gives them a taste of the heavenly gifts, and they partake of the Holy Spirit in some way, shape, or form. I would argue it's a covenantal partaking. It's not an eternal, decretal partaking, because obviously these people don't persevere. There are people who come into the church, who taste the heavenly gifts, hear the Word of God, commune with the saints, and do all those things, but then end up falling away. So what status are they in God's redemptive plan? Well, they aren't eternally elect, They aren't decreedly elect, but they are covenantally elect. There's some, on this particular point, his view of the covenantal elect, he actually comes closer to Arminius than I do, yet he's the Calvinist and I'm the non-Calvinist. Closer to Calvin than most people. But when I mentioned what Arminius believes, you said something like he's pretty close to Calvinism there, and I think he's been so misrepresented. But with all those things in Hebrews 6 verse 9, Talking about all those things, those people, the author says, but beloved, we are confident of better things concerning you. Yes, things that accompany salvation. Though we speak in this manner. So I take that to be that you could have those things and not have salvation. He feels confident. The author feels confident that they have salvation. So these are people that their lives have been reformed. They've somehow experienced the Holy Spirit, but they're not really regenerated and that they could fall away. But I think the key verse in Hebrews about the warning passages is Hebrews 3, verse 14, where the author says, for we have become partakers of Christ. So we have now become partakers of Christ if We hold fast the beginning of our confidence, steadfast to the end. So if you are now a true believer, you will persevere to the end. Alright, next questioner. Hi, I'm kind of nervous. Two questions, quickly. And this is on responsibility. Dr. Fernandez said that man can't be held responsible. Hopefully I'm quoting you correctly or the gist of it. That man can't be held responsible for believing in Christ. if he is unable to do so, is that correct? That man can't be held responsible to believe in Christ if he has the inability to believe in Christ. Yeah, I think if God commands something and then empowers man to obey that command and man says no, then man's responsible. Now, I do believe that the non-elect are responsible for their sin and deserve the flames of hell, but so do we. Why would God unconditionally elect us and then unconditionally just... I just don't see God's justice there. And that's what I'm trying to comment on. Because speaking from a Calvinistic worldview, that man is unable to believe in Christ unless he is regenerated from hell. And I believe you stated that, therefore, man is not responsible. to believe in first because he is unable. Is that correct? Total inability is another way of saying total depravity, and I would agree with the Calvinist on that point, but then I think God adds prevenient grace, which sets the will free, though the Calvinist just believes that the only way God sets the will free is through regeneration. So if God doesn't regenerate you, your will has never been set free. Yeah, no, Calvinists have always held to a general free will of all men without exception. I mean, just read the Westminster Confession of Faith, which is, you know, pretty much the standard Calvinistic confession. There's a whole chapter in there just on free will and how all men have free will without exception, not just those who've been regenerated by God. So it really is a misunderstanding, and I think a pretty common misunderstanding, that Armenians accuse Calvinists of denying general free will. Now, there's also a special kind of free will that only God gives to His decreedly elect. That's the kind of free will that allows us to worship God in the beauty of holiness and obey God and obey His commands and fellowship with His people. I'm sorry, your next question? Well, I actually didn't get my first one out, because the actual is that man does not have the ability to believe in Christ. And you stated that man can't be held responsible for that because he is unable to do. So maybe I must understand you, because my question is this. Because in the Bible, command does not imply ability. For instance, God commands man to keep the Ten Commandments, but only one man in all of history has kept the Ten Commandments. Yeah, and I addressed it just about two minutes ago, sir. So, I said that God commands us to obey Him. We don't have the ability to do so. He gives us His prevenient grace, which then frees the will. And but if you still, you still have the ability to resist. So, yeah, I'm in agreement with what you're saying, except for this debate, really, when it comes down to one total depravity is not as man totally depraved is the total depravity also come with pervenient grace. The Calvinist says no. The Armenian says yes. I'm sorry, I'm going to I'm going to have to stop you because there's a line behind you. We're running out of time. And that question was like three parts. My question is about. How would you explain the apparent tension between the concept of total depravity and being created in the image of God and also along with the passages of Romans 2, 14 and 15 that says that even the unbeliever has in the format of his soul the program of morality? Who would like to go first? Okay, your first question was what do I think of man being created in the image and likeness of God? Your question was how does depravity... The question is considering the apparent tension between being totally depraved at the same time being created in the image of God and having in our souls, even in the soul of the unbeliever, the format of human morality, per Romans 2, 14 and 15? Well, when God created us in His image and likeness, that implies some form of free will, the ability to choose, the ability to think and reason, and that wasn't annihilated at the fall, but it was marred. So even those who will be in hell for all eternity, they aren't going to be non-human in the sense that they won't have some kind of free will, some kind of ability to think and choose and all that, but it will be severely marred. To the point of, you know, you may not even be able to recognize that they are human, that they're creating the image and likeness of God. I'm not making my question clear. I'm sorry. Well, let's let let's let. Did you understand the question, Phil? I think I did. But I think my response would be along the same lines of Chris. that we were created in the image of God, morally perfect, and then once we fell, we're totally depraved, all of man's faculties, yet so it marred God's image, as Chris said, so we still have knowledge of right and wrong deep down within our hearts, but because we're depraved, we like to suppress that. So we're free to choose, we could add one plus one and still get two, we can get some things right, but the thing we can't do, Jesus said, apart from me you can do nothing, we're not able to please God. Chris and I are in agreement with that. In the flesh, no one can please God. We're in agreement on that. The difference is, with total depravity, does God give prevenient grace to all men, which then sets the will free, before regeneration or not. And so I think it's prevenient. God monergistically gives prevenient grace, then some choose to believe because their will has been set free, and then God monergistically regenerates and justifies. All right. All right. That's not what I was asking. Sorry. We can take a lot of thoughts off. Two questions. One, did God desire to covenant from a salvific standpoint with other peoples in the Old Testament, the Philistines, the Canaanites, and why did he covenant only with a group of people in the Old Testament and not the Canaanites and the Jebusites and so forth? So that's question one? Yeah. All right, let's go ahead and answer that. I think that's a great example of how God picks and chooses who he's going to have a relationship with. In the older covenant, it was with a very particular people. It wasn't with all men yet. That didn't come until Pentecost when God puts his grace out for everyone. I think that's a great example of selective particular grace? I think it's a great question, but the Scriptures are clear that God blessed Israel. See, when things got so rotten that only one family was walking with the Lord, God flooded the earth. Well, things were starting to get that rotten again, I think, and so God blessed Israel to be a blessing to all nations. He blessed Israel to be a light to all nations. So I agree, things got really bad, but I don't, you know, There are entire civilizations that reject God and would not accept God's prevenient grace, in my understanding. Second question? The question is related to that question. So if God desires all men to be saved, is it possible that he desires all men without distinction as opposed to exception? Because if he desired all men to be saved, could that distinction be the fact that he's talking about Exception of all people or their distinction of tribe tongue and nation. Yeah, and I would I would disagree that the first Timothy 2 1 to 6 Paul tell very early in the history of church to pray for Kings and people in positions of authority in the pray for all mankind and you trace how he's talking about all men Jesus gave his life a ransom for all and God desires that all be saved so no, I think that you I Yeah, I think if you first embrace Calvinism, and then that becomes the theological lenses through which you interpret the Bible, then all of a sudden all men would become people from every tribe. But I don't think it would be that, I don't think it's that way from good exegesis, I myself. And Calvin in his Institutes, well actually in his commentaries in Galatians and 1 John chapter 2, talks about Jesus dying for all mankind, so he didn't even hold the limit of atonement himself. Yeah, I agree. Calvin didn't explicitly spell limited atonement, but I think you can get it from him by getting necessary consequences in some ways. But with regards to your question, again, I would just go back to the covenantal decretal distinction. I think it's so key to interpreting the whole Bible. Again, Deuteronomy 29, 29, secret things belong to the Lord. The things revealed belong to us and to our children. Passages like 1 Timothy, I think, are good examples of that. God desires all men to be saved. Is that a decretal desire? We don't know. And I think, ultimately, we have to say no, because not all men are going to be saved. Is it a covenantal desire? I would say yes. Covenantally, God desires not just all kinds of men, but all men, I would argue, without exception, and yet that same desire has a dual effect, just like Christ's atonement has a dual effect, and that is to either eternally save or to eternally damn. I would argue that the second death isn't predicated upon Adam and his fall, but upon Christ and his death on the cross. I think hell is Christ's territory. He owns it. He's the king of hell. Next question. For grace you have been saved in faith, and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast." Well, if I freely, for my free will, choose God, choose Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior, does that not give me the ability to boast before the person who does not make that choice? No. It's just like, how many people took one of my free books? I gave it by grace. Did you earn it? Chris? Yeah, the analogy is an okay one that Phil just gave, but all analogies break down ultimately with God. With God and salvation, God gives grace to believe, and if he doesn't give the grace, then we're not going to believe. And if someone can stand before God and say, look, my faith is something I trumped up within myself, I produced it within myself somehow, some way, well then they have something to boast of. They have something to brag about in themselves that they were able to produce within themselves before God. Here, here's my good work, God. And so, you know, I think what Paul was wrestling with in Romans 9 were the self-righteous good works of the Pharisees. Well, we have the same kind of thing going on in our day. There's a self-righteous faith of Arminianism. I mean, I'll just tell you flat out what I think. Next questioner. Thanks, gentlemen. My two questions first is, do either of you have children? Five. Two children, three grandsons. My second question is, based on your positions here, how do you motivate and exhort your children to share the gospel to the world today? Basically by word and deed. Try to set the example. Try to bring our daughters up in a godly home. You know, people have free will and stuff, and so unfortunately, you know, my daughters aren't walking with the Lord. And so I've got a lot of time I get to spend with one of my grandsons. And I love him. I love my daughters. And you just do the best you can. You love them. You represent Jesus. You share the gospel with them. You pray with them. And I just wish, I wish every story had a happy ending. But I'm trying to be that godly man that my grandson needs to look up to. He's not getting it in his home. And Chris looks like a great family. He's really doing a great job. I'm very, very proud of him. Thank you, Phil. Well, within the Calvinistic worldview, we believe raising of children begins with baptism. We baptize our kids in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, and that is a sign and seal that God really owns them, not us. God is their father, not us. Ultimately, it's God who's going to raise them up to either love them or hate them. That doesn't mean we have nothing to do with the raising of our children. We do. We have everything. We have to teach them, instruct them, love them, discipline them. But ultimately, it's God's decision whether or not our kids are going to love or hate Him. Alright, next question. Mr. Comus, as Bill mentioned earlier, Jesus said that when the Holy Spirit comes, he will convict the world of sin, righteousness and judgment. This passage was not addressed by you, either the significance of world or the significance of convicting the entire world. I'm kind of disappointed that everything I've heard from you so far has been pretty much assumption without any scriptural... Do you have a question, sir? Yes, I do. In reference to the convicting ministry of the Spirit, in Acts 7.51, when it was said that the Jews who were listening were always resisting the Holy Spirit, if the non-elect are not convicted by God, if the Holy Spirit does not have a ministry toward them, What was he doing, attempting to convict these Jews who were actively resisting him? Again, I would argue that the non-elect, the reprobate, do in fact resist God's Spirit. I think Stephan makes it clear here that He puts it in covenantal categories. He says you stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears. Notice he appeals to the covenantal sign and seal of circumcision. Now physically these men were circumcised, but spiritually they were uncircumcised. You always resist the Holy Spirit, as your fathers did, so do you. So we're talking about a covenantal resisting here. That's the context. And so, again, I would argue that covenantally, yeah, men resist God all the time. Men, in a covenantal sense, thwart God's will. I mean, what was the cross? The cross was man putting God to death, in a way. thwarting God's will, covenantal will, I guess you could say, for Christ to be King and Messiah of His people. Covenantally. Now, decretally, God had this whole other plan and design in mind. Covenantally, or decretally, eternally. I mean, God had all this stuff He was working out on the cross, so if you and I were standing there at the foot of the cross, we would have thought, oh man, this is done. God is dead. We're out of time. We're short on time, so Phil, go ahead and answer this and then hopefully we'll have only one question each coming up. Okay, yeah, just the passage from John 16, 7 to 11 just says the Holy Spirit will convict the world of sin and of the sin of not believing in Jesus. So it just seems to me that God does His prevenient work to try to chip away at hardened hearts to enable the will of fallen man to believe. Alright, next question. Can I just make one comment on prevenient grace? Historically, Calvinists haven't denied prevenient grace. Calvinists have actually affirmed prevenient grace. I think Westminster Confession has plenty to say about prevenient grace, but with the added caveat that, look, it's not just necessary for God to go in and plow the field. God also has to plant the seed. God also has to give us all the instruments we need to trust and believe in Him, like faith. Faith is an instrument that God has to give us. That's why it's a gift. It's not a work that you produce within yourself. All right, next questioner. Yeah, my question is, I guess both you guys can answer, but more towards Dr. Phil. I got the impression you were kind of saying one of the things about you didn't like about Calvinism was kind of like he like God would choose to elect some and not others and I don't if I'm understanding right kind of like maybe questioning or that's How does that make God good or so, if I'm understanding right? But even if he didn't elect anybody, I don't see how that still would have anything to do with his goodness. Because even if he didn't elect any of us... I'm sorry, do you have an actual question? Well, that's what I'm trying to get to. Well, you seem to be lecturing. Go ahead and answer. Well, I'm trying to answer. I don't understand how that has anything to do with his goodness on that. His goodness is justice. Yeah. See, if God... I agree with the Calvinists. If God condemned all mankind, because we're sinners, if he just condemned us all to the eternal flames of hell, he would be just to do that. I agree with the Calvinists that God is just. God exercises his justice to condemn the non-elect. He's just in condemning them. And God doesn't violate his justice, he's still just. if he chooses to save the elect, but it's when you put the two of them together, then what you have, you have a problem there. It just seems to go against everything that the Bible teaches about what justice is, so that it's kind of like a guy's got three children, and they're all running towards the edge of a cliff, and he has the ability to save all three of them, but he chooses to only save one. Can we call that a loving father? And so I think something's got to go in our concept of justice if we're going to hold to that Calvinistic view. And that's why Calvin turned to volunteerism, where God's will is arbitrary in order to respond to his critics on unconditional election. We're beyond our time, so what I'm going to do is ask you to be more quick with your answer. We'll have one more question after that, and then we'll be done. Can I respond? Yes, please do. Yeah, my response to that is, let God be true, though every man a liar. Let God be just, though every man be condemned. God is just no matter what he does. God is loving no matter what he does. God can't not be loving. God can't not be just. And if we try to impose some standard of human justice or human love upon God, we're assuming that we are, in fact, God and that God must submit to our standard. Here God, here's my standard of what I think love and justice is, now you need to submit to that. Well, I think that's exactly what Arminianism and Molinism and any non-Calvinistic system of thought ends up doing. It ends up making man the judge and God the submitter, the clay. Okay, last question? Yes, my question is based on John 1 29. If Jesus took away the sins of the world, why then is sin an issue And why is depravity an issue? And why aren't all elect? I'm sorry, what was the last part? Why aren't... Why isn't everyone elect if their sin and depravity is not an issue? Phil? Okay. Yeah, I believe that Jesus died for the sins of all mankind. He's the Lamb who takes away the sins of the world. So basically, Jesus has done everything that could satisfy God's justice. by dying on the cross for our sins, the ultimately worthy substitute sacrifice. But God is not only a just God, He's a loving God. And he's not going to force us into his kingdom, so he's going to give us the freedom to accept or reject that, and that's why not everybody is elect. Again, it's not free will when it comes to accepting Christ that I'm promoting. It's prevenient grace, so it's freed will, that God sets us free from the bondage of the will, but not everyone believes. My brain is dead. So, can you just repeat the question real quick? Why is anyone still going to hell? Well, I think, and again, this is where we've got to understand the covenant. God's covenantal design of things, faith and repentance, are essential to salvation. So if you don't repent of your sin and believe, then you're not going to be in fellowship with God. So I think it's a balancing act. We don't want to take God's eternal decrees and do away with the covenant, and we don't want to take the covenant and do away with God's eternal decrees. And I think what has ended up happening is Hyper-Calvinists have taken away the covenant and kept God's eternal decrees, and Arminians have kept the covenant and done away with God's eternal decrees. So I think we need both. And I'm not going to sit up here and pretend that I know all the ins and outs of this. I mean, it's kind of like figuring out the Trinity. There's a lot of mystery and there's paradox involved, and we have to live with that. At the same time, we can know things and the Bible reveals things. Well, we've reached the end of our evening. That was certainly interesting. I do want to ask the two post follow up questions that I surveyed you earlier. Those of you who came in with a positive idea of what you believed, you already knew what you believed. It was firm. Have any of you, those of you who had that positive position, changed your position? If so, please raise your hand. OK, there were a couple of people who came in saying, I'm not sure I would like to know from you those who said, I'm not sure. Has this evening helped you come to a conclusion? If so, please raise your hand. Interesting, very interesting. Thank you. The it's been my privilege to be. It's been my privilege to be here this evening, and I want to thank Eric Urabi. In fact, Eric, would you come to the microphone? I'm going to have you close in prayer. I do want to say thank you to Mr. Comus and Dr. Fernandes, and let's give them a round of appreciation. And now I turn the final conclusions over to Eric Urabi. I just want to thank everyone for coming, and I hope everyone gets Dr. Phil Fernandes' book, The Atheist Delusion. It's out in the foyer, and that was just a blessing from Dr. Fernandes to offer that to everyone that came this evening. So please make sure you get his book before you leave. And I will make this quick prayer, and we'll go ahead and end. Father, we thank you for this wonderful evening. My purpose when I Kind of envisioned this a year ago father was that you be glorified father and I truly believe these men exemplify that and glorified your word as best as they could as they Interpret your scriptures try to understand your knowledge and your wisdom as set forth in your word father and I think they did a wonderful job of trying to explain their positions based on their interpretation of your word father may you continue to bless both of them as they continue on their way of making inroads into your into this world promoting your kingdom father again may grace and peace be upon them and I thank you for dr. Rick Walston may you continue to bless them maybe and we all be glorified may I mean excuse me may Christ be glorified as we pray in his name amen amen