Matt Slick is Going to Hell - The Insufficient Grace of His God
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Originally Posted by Matt Slick
Total Depravity - man is completely touched by sin in all that he is, but is not as bad as he could be. Furthermore, this total depravity means that the unregenerate will not, of their own free sinful will, choose to receive Christ.
- It is man who is deceitful (Jer. 17:9), full of evil (Mark 7:21-23), loves darkness (John 3:19), does not seek for God (Rom. 3:10-12), is ungodly (Rom. 5:6), dead in his sins (Eph. 2:1), by nature a child of wrath (Eph. 2:3), cannot understand spiritual things (1 Cor. 2:14), and a slave of sin (Rom. 6:16-20).
- The unbeliever CAN respond to God. His response will be in accordance to scripture that says he cannot do good, is a hater of God, is full of evil, etc., Therefore, we conclude that his free will response will be to reject God, according to the limits described by scripture itself.
- How is it possible that an unbeliever who cannot understand spiritual things (1 Cor. 2:14), who does not seek for God (Rom. 3:10-12), and who is a slave of sin (Rom. 6:14-20), simply "chooses" God?
- It is God who appoints people to believe (Acts 13:48), chooses who is to be holy and blameless (Eph. 1:4), calls according to His purpose (2 Tim. 1:9), chooses us for salvation (2 Thess. 2:13-14), grants the act of believing (Phil. 1:29), grants repentance (2 Tim. 2:24-26), who causes us to be born again (1 Pet. 1:3), draws people to Himself (John 6:44,65), predestines us to salvation (Rom. 8:29-30) and adoption (Eph. 1:5) according to His purpose (Eph. 1:11), makes us born again not by our will but by His will (John 1:12-13), and works faith in the believer (John 6:28-29).
- Man Apart from God
- Jer. 13:23, "Can the Ethiopian change his skin or the leopard his spots? Then you also can do good who are accustomed to doing evil."
- Rom. 5:10, "For if while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more, having been reconciled, we shall be saved by His life."
- Rom. 8:7, "because the mind set on the flesh is hostile toward God; for it does not subject itself to the law of God, for it is not even able to do so."
(1) I do not disagree with what was said about man's sin nature only the conclusion that you come to that claims the insufficiency of God's grace (which you fail to be honest with people about) in response or claim God's grace is sufficient in being limited. Man could not even walk across the street let alone receive Jesus without God's enablement but that does not mean man is totally depraved, for as the Bible tells us His will is "not wishing that any should perish" (2 Pet. 3:9); so He provides grace to us all. Some with more mercy some with less, but always sufficient. If you don't want someone to perish then you do all you can within righteous bounds to help that person. I don't see that in what you worship that has a morality and standards below my own. And so all these verses you gave point to man being a sinner, certainly in need of God's grace, but not a grace that is lacking as would be in Calvinism incapable of reaching us ALL to save "whosoever believes" (John 3:16) and "whosoever is of a willing heart" (Ex. 35:5). To the question asked, the answer is clear, man CAN respond because grace has been given, and so some do, since they have the free-choice. "Whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely" (Rev. 22:17). God is perfectly just in calling you to "repent, and be baptized every one of you" (Acts 2:38), because it is contingent upon individual faith as God pleads with you to "believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved" (Acts 16:31). "Every one who seeth the Son, and believeth on him, may have everlasting life" (John 6:40). "Believing ye may have life" (John 20:31). "The people willingly offered themselves" (Judges 5:2); "willingly offered a freewill offering unto the Lord" (Ezra 3:5). To reconcile verses that say man can't with verses that say man can is clearly because of the sufficiency of God's grace so that no man is totally depraved, not a one.
(2) The question is never asked how God saves only stating God does save. To which the answer is given in Scripture showing how God provides sufficient grace to everyone, not by works, nor by man's assuming or passion or plans of his will. Grace is given which requires a response. This is the grace in these verses. "The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!" (John 1:29); "we know that this is indeed the Christ, the Savior of the world" (John 4:42); "we have seen and testify that the Father has sent the Son as Savior of the world" (1 John 4:14); "He Himself is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the whole world" (1 John 2:21); "He, by the grace of God, might taste death for everyone" (Heb. 2:9); "Since we believe that Christ died for everyone, we also believe that we [Christians] have all died to the old life we used to live" (2 Cor. 5:14); "...we trust in the living God, who is the Saviour of all men, specially of those that believe" (1 Tim. 4:10); "For God so loved the world...that the world through him might be saved" (John 3:16,17). His love for the elect whom He spends eternity with is not mutually exclusive of dying for the sins of every soul made in His image. "And he is the propitiation for our sins: and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world" (1 John 2:2). God offers us salvation when He says "come unto me" (Matt. 11:28) because a response is required.
Our responses is duly required, for we have freewill and enabling grace: "If any... whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely" (John 7:37, Rev. 22:17). "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life" (John 3:16). God provides sufficient grace to us all. That's how He does it. "Therefore as by the offence of one judgment came upon all men to condemnation; even so by the righteousness of one the free gift came upon all men unto justification of life" (Rom. 5:18). "Who will have all men to be saved, and to come unto the knowledge of the truth" (1 Tim. 2:4). All men can be saved "whosoever believeth" (John 3:16) "to the knowledge of truth" and "unto justification of life." God provides the grace and requires our response. "If ye be willing and obedient" (Is. 1:19). There are so many verses requiring our response.
(3) The leopard has spots, thus signifying having sins (Jer. 13:23) that he cannot change, so it is not saying we can't receive Christ, but that we can't atone for our sins. We can't eradicate our own sins. The minute we squash one another arises like playing wackamo. Romans 5:10 is a looking back upon our salvation. It has nothing to do with irresistible regeneration that is one of the false teachings of Calvinism. Romans 8:7 does not preclude the sufficiency of grace to the whole world whether through common grace (the lesser grace) and special grace of the gospel (the greater grace). "For the invisible things of him since the creation of the world are clearly seen, being perceived through the things that are made, even his everlasting power and divinity; that they may be without excuse" (Rom 1:20). The reason we don't have an excuse is because God's grace is sufficient for us all.
"Jesus came into Galilee, preaching the gospel of God, and saying, 'The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent, and believe in the gospel'" (Mark 1:15) "Repent ye therefore, and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out" (Acts 3:19). Conversion (salvation, new birth, regeneration, born-again) follows repentance and belief in Christ. "Today I have given you the choice between life and death, between blessings and curses. I call on heaven and earth to witness the choice you make. Oh, that you would choose life, that you and your descendants might live!" (Deut. 30:19) "For the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men" (Tit. 2:11). "The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness; but is longsuffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance" (2 Pet. 3:9).
Endless twisting of Scripture
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Originally Posted by Matt Slick
Jesus rose from the dead. Our forgiveness of sins is through Jesus and is received by faith alone, in Christ alone, by grace alone. The Sheep hear the Master's voice and follow him and he gives them eternal life (John 10:27-28) because he knows them by name (John 10:3). "Jesus therefore said to them again, 'Truly, truly, I say to you, I am the door of the sheep.' All who came before Me are thieves and robbers, but the sheep did not hear them. 9 'I am the door; if anyone enters through Me, he shall be saved, and shall go in and out, and find pasture,'" (John 10:7-9).
Matt Slick uses this as his signature on his forums. Notice how Matt Slick tries to play games here for his extreme dictatorial view of sovereignty that is devoid of love and is non-relational. First off, if it is by faith alone, then it is not in Christ alone. Or if it is in grace alone, then it can't be Christ or faith alone. A proper response to these three alone's that are not really each alone then, is that salvation is in Christ alone by grace through faith. Do you see that? God is the one who saves through Christ, but it is by grace through faith to be saved by Him. Who's faith? "According to the good pleasure of His will" (Eph. 1.5) the Father "himself is righteous, and that he justifies him who has faith in Jesus" (Rom. 3.26). That way you don't have the extreme view of sovereignty that is without personally relating.
Those who are regenerated and receive eternal life are not because He knows them by name, for John 10.3 says, "To him the porter openeth; and the sheep hear his voice: and he calleth his own sheep by name, and leadeth them out." How is this accomplished? The gate is open, and the sheep willingly "hear his voice" so "he calleth his own sheep by name" and thus "leadeth them out." This is the correct understanding and substantiated in verse 1: "Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that entereth not by the door into the fold of the sheep, but climbeth up some other way, the same is a thief and a robber." We are told to enter the sheepfold must enter "by the door" and it is "he that" must do it, and not some other way. Who does the entering? "He that entereth in by the door is the shepherd of the sheep." He must enter in the door. The door is our Lord Jesus Christ.
For Jesus to condemn others as "thieves and robbers" who do not come through Him as the gate, entails their personal responsibility and ability that they could have come, but were unwilling. Those who contend otherwise, "the sheep did not listen to them" (John 10:8). Do not listen to Calvinists in any other way than to help them.
One of Slick's minions writes,
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Originally Posted by beloved
God does not Love all men and does not have grace for all men, but only His elect of all nations.
That's not what my Bible says. In fact we see personal responsibility that we can respond because God grants us the grace that extends to the whole world. "For God so loved the world...that the world through him might be saved" (John 3:16,17). "And there ye shall serve gods, the work of men's hands, wood and stone, which neither see, nor hear, nor eat, nor smell. But IF from thence thou shalt seek the LORD thy God, thou shalt find him, IF thou seek him with all thy heart and with all thy soul" (Deut. 4:28-29).
Quote:
Originally Posted by Matt Slick
This act of regeneration is what God does. Remember, your believing is something God has given you: "For to you it has been granted for Christ's sake, not only to believe in Him, but also to suffer for His sake" (Phil. 1:29); Also, "Jesus answered and said to them, 'This is the work of God, that you believe in Him whom He has sent'" (John 6:29); And, "...and as many as had been appointed to eternal life believed" (Acts 13:48). This is also why we are born again not by our own wills, but the will of God: "But as many as received Him...[these] were born not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God" (John 1:12,13).
Regeneration is what God does. Certainly our ability to believe in Christ is also given to us, just as all things are granted to all creatures accordingly. The question then becomes how is it that belief is granted to some and not to others? It stands to reason since God pleads with you, died on the cross for the sins of the whole world and tells you what you must do ("What must I do to be saved? And they said, Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and you shall be saved" [Acts 16:30-31]), then the gift of belief can freely be obtained ("We have also obtained access by faith into this grace" [Rom. 5.2], "for by grace are ye saved through faith" [Eph. 2.8]), since it is for the whole world to be able to do so, and requires our response. God's work is to save, to lead people to Him so they will believe in Jesus whom He has sent. God does the saving by His own will so we can't by our will assume we are regenerated as taught in Calvinism. We must fulfill His condition for salvation which is to receive Him by coming to Him with an honest heart and as helpless sinners. "But the good soil represents honest, good-hearted people who hear God's message, cling to it, and steadily produce a huge harvest" (Luke 8:15). How did God appoint to believe? Those who come to Him with a heart of repentance, honesty and sincerity.
