Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - Ep 1274 ｜ Predestined to Hell？ Calvinism Explained

00:00:00.680 What is Calvinism? Is it just unbiblical, fatalistic determinism? Or is it actually

00:00:08.060 backed by scripture, centered on the glory and the sovereignty of God? These are very fair

00:00:14.340 questions. I get asked a lot what Calvinism is and what the Bible says in relation to Calvinism.

00:00:20.420 So let us break it down on today's episode of Relatable. It's brought to you by our friends

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00:00:56.100 Hey guys, welcome to Relatable. Happy Wednesday. Hope everyone is having a wonderful week so far.

00:01:03.560 All right. Today we are going to do something that is truly evergreen. We are going to talk

00:01:08.960 about Calvinism. Now I, back in 2019, did a whole series of evergreen content for my first maternity

00:01:17.980 leave. I did, I think like nine weeks worth of episodes that had to do with politics, that had

00:01:24.260 to do with theology and interviews. And I did an episode on predestination. We talked about different

00:01:33.140 points of Calvinism, but I received a text from a friend the other day asking, what is Calvinism?

00:01:39.600 Can you break this down for me? She found the old episode that I did and she said it was helpful,

00:01:45.100 but I thought that it would be a good time to kind of refresh this. I get questions about this a lot.

00:01:51.360 I think there are a lot of misunderstandings about what Calvinism actually is and why it matters.

00:02:00.740 And so to clarify a lot of the questions that you guys seem to have, I wanted to get into it.

00:02:07.560 The reason why Calvinism is considered controversial is because it is seen by many as a form of

00:02:13.940 determinism. So God is just determining what happens and we don't have any free will. Some people would

00:02:20.300 say Calvinism posits and we're just puppets without really any responsibility, but somehow also can

00:02:27.620 incur punishment. There are plenty of critiques of Calvinism, some that I think are totally valid

00:02:34.220 and interesting, and then some that are just misconstructions of what the form of theology is.

00:02:40.200 So let's start, let's give some context about not only what this is, but why it actually matters.

00:02:46.740 It's almost turned into a buzzword in theological debates, and you guys know how much I like to

00:02:52.520 define my terms. And I truly believe no matter what you believe, this will be a helpful primer on

00:03:02.440 what Calvinists actually believe. So Calvinism is a form of theology, and let's get down to brass

00:03:08.840 tax. Theology means the study of God. Theos, God, logi, or logos, word, rationale, reason, study.

00:03:19.020 The primary means of knowing God is through his word, which for us has been written down in something

00:03:26.360 called the Bible, and it has been carefully translated so that what we call the biblical canon,

00:03:31.980 the 66 books that we now hold in our hands matches the earliest manuscripts that we have found. And

00:03:39.760 these 66 books were chosen through a long process, but have been verified and validated and substantiated

00:03:47.700 not only by the references by the apostles and the New Testament writers, but also by Jesus himself.

00:03:54.560 And we could get into, we should do a whole episode about how these 66 books were chosen and how we know

00:04:00.820 that they are reliable. But for now, we will just say this, that the Bible is our primary means of

00:04:09.400 knowing God. There are other ways of knowing God. We know him through prayer. We know him through the

00:04:14.400 wisdom given to us by the Holy Spirit. We have that relationship with God through Christ, but we can

00:04:21.000 understand his character and his will best through scripture, which is authoritative. It is infallible,

00:04:27.340 so it cannot fail. It is also inerrant. So that means without error. In the 16th century, there was

00:04:34.820 something called a Reformation, and it was called the Protestant Reformation. It was ignited by a man 0.54

00:04:40.040 named Martin Luther. He was a German monk. He nailed something called the 95 Theses reportedly on the door

00:04:47.960 of the Wittenberg Church. And these are 95 issues that he had with Catholic leadership at the time,

00:04:54.920 Catholic practices that were going on at the time. He did not intend to start a revolution. He was

00:05:00.780 actually not trying to protest against the papacy. He held his entire life to some doctrines that are

00:05:07.960 considered to be Roman Catholic. So he wasn't trying to start a revolution by saying that, hey, it's wrong

00:05:15.240 to tell people that their loved ones can be sprung out of purgatory by giving money to the church via

00:05:20.580 something called indulgences. But start a revolution, he did. The Catholic leadership not only excommunicated

00:05:28.440 Martin Luther, but they sought his life. But incredibly, God used a variety of means to protect

00:05:34.620 Martin Luther, who became convinced that the single most important thing he could do was translate the

00:05:41.520 Bible from the original Greek and Hebrew into German. And the way that this coincided also with the

00:05:48.320 invention of the printing press is just incredible and speaks to God's providence and his desire for

00:05:54.420 people to know him through his word. And Martin Luther did this so that people could read for

00:05:59.260 themselves how to get to heaven. So they could see that it is by grace through faith, as Ephesians 2.8

00:06:05.660 tells us that a person is saved, not through money, not through church attendance, not through good

00:06:10.740 works. Martin Luther was not a perfect man by any means, but God used him as he uses all

00:06:17.980 imperfect people to light the fire of the Reformation fueled by the light of scripture and the hope of

00:06:24.200 the gospel. He insisted that scripture supports the main thing that makes Christianity different

00:06:31.320 from every other religion. Buddhism, Islam, Hinduism, even Judaism all tell you how to get to God. Here is

00:06:39.320 your list of requirements. Here's the money that you have to pay. Do these things, say these things,

00:06:45.160 and you'll be good. You'll be right with God. But Christianity fundamentally brings something new 1.00

00:06:50.820 by saying, no, no, no, you can't get to God. So he has to come down to you. You can't make yourself

00:06:57.640 clean. You can't pick yourself up. It is only God's grace that can make you alive and faith in that

00:07:05.480 saving grace that can save you. So what's called the five solas or the five alones of the Reformation

00:07:12.540 were and are by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone, according to scripture alone,

00:07:20.460 for God's glory alone. Sola gratia, sola fide, solus Christus, sola scriptura, soli Deo gloria.

00:07:29.300 That's the Latin for the five solas. And this is the gospel. And this gospel, which by the way,

00:07:36.420 was not new at the time of Martin Luther or the Reformation. This was the very gospel that was

00:07:42.120 preached by Jesus and the apostles and all the writers of the New Testament. The knowledge of

00:07:47.380 this gospel, the access to this gospel through God's written word for the common person spread

00:07:53.100 like wildfire throughout Europe. And ultimately, it laid the foundation for the United States,

00:07:59.740 this belief in the freedom of conscience, the responsibility of the individual to gain wisdom

00:08:05.560 and knowledge of Christ through his word was foundational to Western civilization in America

00:08:10.580 itself. The founders were Protestant. Those rebelling against King George were largely Presbyterian.

00:08:17.240 The pilgrims were not only Protestant, but they were Puritans. That's like the Protestant of Protestant. 0.74

00:08:22.980 And even more specifically, they were Calvinists. So the reason it is so important for anyone to

00:08:29.460 understand Calvinism, whether you are one of my beloved Catholic listeners, or whether you are

00:08:35.000 a Protestant, whether you are an agnostic, is because it has had a huge influence on the American

00:08:41.380 conscience, how we define right and wrong, how we define legal and illegal, not exclusively, but

00:08:47.180 definitely predominantly. Calvinism, maybe in light of, because of, or maybe despite its influence,

00:08:56.780 depending on how you look at it, has been extremely demonized by all types of people,

00:09:02.360 both in and outside of Protestantism. I think some non-Protestants think that all Protestants are

00:09:08.640 Calvinists. That is so not true. It is actually probably a very small sliver of Protestantism today.

00:09:16.040 But that's why I think it's important to understand what it actually is, because even though very few

00:09:21.940 people relative to the general population would call themselves Calvinists, the belief system,

00:09:27.920 the worldview that it has kind of created or helped shape is extremely influential today. And even after

00:09:37.860 this episode, you may or may not believe that that demonization is justified. I can't wait to see your

00:09:44.200 comments for us to discuss this. But let us try our best to really understand what it teaches. Calvinism is a

00:09:53.680 theological framework that is born out of the Reformed Protestant tradition. So all that I just

00:10:00.480 explained with its own set of specifications that we will get into today. I'll get into some of those

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00:11:55.000 A lot of people, when they think of Calvinism, they only think of predestination. And that is

00:12:09.760 definitely, I would argue, a defining feature. It is something that makes the Calvinist view of

00:12:17.380 salvation very distinct. But Calvinists themselves would say that Calvinism reads the Bible with a

00:12:25.200 keen focus on a magnification of God's sovereignty and God's glory. So what does sovereignty mean? It

00:12:32.760 means that God is in control, basically. That he reigns over all of it. That he does not have

00:12:41.340 limited power. There's no part of the spiritual or physical realm that his power cannot reach.

00:12:47.860 And this emphasis on God's glory means that God does what he wants to do and how he wants to do it.

00:12:54.580 He allows what he wants to allow. He causes what he wants to cause, all for his glory, whether we

00:12:59.900 understand it, whether we like it or not. And Calvinists would argue this includes salvation and

00:13:07.260 damnation. And that is where the controversy for many begins. I actually remember in sixth grade,

00:13:14.560 I was so incensed by this idea of predestination. I was basically like the people in Romans 9,

00:13:20.600 being like, how would it be just? How would it be good and merciful and kind? All of these things we

00:13:25.800 know about God for him to create people that he knows are going to be sent to hell and he doesn't

00:13:30.920 choose to save them. And so you might already be thinking those things. And if you are,

00:13:36.000 then 12-year-old Allie completely relates to those questions. And they're really good questions.

00:13:41.160 We'll get into some of them today. Before we get into the rest of the theology of what Calvinism

00:13:47.520 actually is, let's back up a little bit and talk about what it's named after. It is named after a

00:13:52.420 man called John Calvin. And this is according to Ligonier Ministries. And there's John Calvin right there

00:13:58.740 with his pointy beard. Very important. It seems like this is like a mainstay of Calvinism today.

00:14:04.280 You can tell that a man is Calvinist by how much of a beard he has. Remember Chad Wright? Chad Wright,

00:14:13.760 hardcore Calvinist. We love Chad Wright. He has a similar beard to John Calvin. This does seem to be

00:14:20.540 just an indicator of someone's Calvinism. But he crossed over with Martin Luther. He lived from 1509 to

00:14:28.440 1564. There were other Reformed theologians at this time. And remember, Reformed refers to the

00:14:34.840 Protestant Reformation. These people had a lot of problems with what the Catholic Church was doing

00:14:39.280 at the time, some of the things that they were teaching at the time. And so they were inspired by

00:14:44.940 what Martin Luther was doing. Didn't agree with everything that Martin Luther said, but many people,

00:14:50.640 like John Calvin, he held to the five solas or the five alones of the Reformation, and he built upon

00:14:59.520 that. And John Calvin, again, according to Ligonier, I didn't finish that thought. That's a ministry

00:15:04.340 started by R.C. Sproul, who died, I believe, in 2017, was a Reformed Calvinist theologian.

00:15:10.260 But he wrote, John Calvin wrote, The Institutes of the Christian Religion. I wrote it first in Latin,

00:15:17.560 and then it was translated into his native French language in the mid-1500s. And this was and still

00:15:25.800 is a very important breakdown of what John Calvin believes the Bible teaches about the Christian

00:15:34.820 religion, particularly when it comes to salvation. Calvinism stresses the sovereignty of God and his

00:15:43.020 creative power and providential care. The absolute authority of the Bible is the source and norm for

00:15:48.540 all of life and the reality of both human sinfulness and human responsibility. A hallmark

00:15:55.320 of Calvinism is continuing the role, according to Ligonier, of God's law. The Ten Commandments remain

00:16:00.500 the rule of the Christian life. After conversion, they would say Calvinists would believe that this is

00:16:07.720 part of the moral law. And not only Calvinists believe this, this is really just kind of like

00:16:12.360 a Protestant teaching, that we don't abide by the ceremonial law, we don't abide by the cleansing laws,

00:16:18.000 because Jesus has become our cleansing, he's become our sacrifice, but he didn't do away with

00:16:23.940 the moral law. He doubled down on the moral law. We see him emphasize the Ten Commandments in the New

00:16:29.280 Testament, not do away with it. And then there are the five points of Calvinism you'll talk about,

00:16:35.800 or you'll hear about people saying, I'm a five-point Calvinist, or I'm a four-point Calvinist.

00:16:41.400 And that is summarized by an acronym called TULIP. And maybe you've heard of this before.

00:16:47.360 TULIP stands for total depravity, unconditional election, limited atonement, irresistible grace,

00:16:56.700 and the perseverance of the saints. These were set forth by the Synod of Dort in 1618 to 1619.

00:17:03.400 And that is really what summarizes all of the principles, the core beliefs of Calvinism.

00:17:12.000 So let's get into what TULIP actually is. So as I said, T stands for total depravity. Total

00:17:20.760 depravity means that we are not just sick in need of some medicine. We don't have the ability to save

00:17:27.740 ourselves. There's nothing good inside of us that makes us naturally want to seek God. But any

00:17:36.460 inkling that we have that there's something higher or something better, or that we need to be saved,

00:17:43.860 has nothing to do with our natural selves and has to do with the grace of God through the Holy Spirit.

00:17:50.700 So Calvinism teaches that sin has corrupted every single part of human nature, mind, heart, will,

00:17:57.300 emotions. It doesn't mean that we are as bad as we could be at all times, but we certainly have the

00:18:04.840 capacity for that, that every single part of that, of our nature, has the capacity to be as sinful as

00:18:12.380 possible. And ultimately, it is about our state without Christ, that we are completely spiritually

00:18:18.260 dead and unable to seek God or do anything truly good on our own. So Calvinism gets this from Ephesians 0.82

00:18:28.580 2, 1 through 3, which you have heard me cite many times on the show. And you were dead in the trespasses

00:18:34.560 and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the

00:18:38.900 power of the air. And I could go on and on. That's one of my favorite passages. If you are dead in your

00:18:45.120 sin, do you have the ability to wake yourself up? Does medicine help you? Does someone reaching for

00:18:55.420 you and lifting you up help you? No, if you are dead, you are completely helpless. You actually have

00:19:01.860 to be resuscitated. You have to be made alive. You can help yourself or clean yourself off or do

00:19:08.800 anything about the stench of your decaying body at all because you are dead. And so Ephesians 2 says that

00:19:14.860 we are completely dead in our sin. And this is part of where Calvinists get this idea of total

00:19:20.600 depravity, that we have nothing inside of ourselves that reaches towards salvation, that that is all a

00:19:27.840 gift from God. They also get that a few verses later in Ephesians 2, 8 through 10, that this is not your

00:19:35.820 own doing. It is a gift of God. And then the U is unconditional election. Unconditional election,

00:19:43.200 Calvinists say, is based only on God's free choice. Calvinism says that God chose before the

00:19:49.780 world began which specific sinners he would save. And he based that choice only on his own will and

00:19:56.980 love, not on anything he saw that they would do. Ephesians 1, 4 through 5 would be a verse that's

00:20:05.120 cited here, even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and

00:20:11.080 blameless before him. In love he predestined us for adoption to himself as sons through Jesus Christ,

00:20:18.000 according to the purpose of his will. Also Romans 9 is cited often. Romans 9, 11 through 13. Though

00:20:26.200 they were not yet born, he's talking about Jacob and Esau, and had done nothing either good or bad.

00:20:32.040 In order that God's purpose of election might continue, not because of works, but because of him

00:20:36.200 who calls, she was told, their mother, the older will serve the younger. As it is written, Jacob I

00:20:42.160 loved, but Esau I hated. So obviously, as Paul is writing to the church in Rome, they are having some

00:20:50.560 of the same feelings of injustice. Hey, like how is it possible that God chooses people who are going to

00:20:57.560 be saved and who are not going to be saved? And Paul basically says, like, can the clay say to the

00:21:02.860 potter, why did you make me this way? And he answers that God made vessels of wrath and vessels

00:21:08.900 of mercy. And then he gives this explanation of Jacob and Esau. All right, in just a second,

00:21:14.940 we will get to limited atonement. This is the L in tulip, limited atonement, which says that Christ

00:21:21.000 accomplished salvation for the elect on the cross, not the whole world. We'll get into that in just a

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00:22:49.480 Okay, so this is maybe one of the most controversial aspects of Calvinism, I would say.

00:23:02.600 Limited atonement says that Christ accomplished salvation only for the elect, so only for those

00:23:08.220 that God chose before the foundation of the world, not the entire world. Whereas the other 0.82

00:23:13.180 perspective, which we'll get into Arminianism in just a little bit, is that Christ died for everyone,

00:23:18.700 and it's our responsibility to choose to have that blood that was poured out for us on the cross

00:23:25.920 cover us. So Calvinism teaches that when Jesus died on the cross, he actually secured complete

00:23:30.560 salvation for the exact people that God had chosen, so limited atonement. The elect in his death was

00:23:37.060 perfectly effective for them. Hebrews 10.14, for by a single offering, he has perfected for all time

00:23:44.820 those who are being sanctified. So context here, Calvinists would say, is that Christ's one

00:23:51.020 sacrifice does not just offer perfection. It is perfected for all of time, the same people who are

00:23:59.780 being sanctified. The group that is perfected is identical to the group for whom he offered himself.

00:24:05.380 And then you have John 10.14-15, I am the good shepherd. I know my own, Jesus says, and my own

00:24:12.040 know me, just as the Father knows me, and I know the Father, and I lay down my life for the sheep.

00:24:18.800 The I in Tulip is irresistible grace. This means God's call to the elect always succeeds. Calvinism says

00:24:26.020 that when God decides to save one of his chosen people, the Holy Spirit powerfully and sweetly opens

00:24:32.060 their blind eyes and changes their hearts so that they will willingly and gladly come to Christ.

00:24:38.520 So it is not possible, Calvinism would say, for someone to be captured by the grace of God and

00:24:45.940 then wrestle themselves free. That his grace, when it meets someone, when it captures someone,

00:24:52.180 is completely irresistible. Now, someone may have a spiritual experience, Calvinism would say.

00:24:58.000 Someone may look like they're walking the walk. Someone might be interested in the Bible. Someone

00:25:04.020 may even preach the Bible very well and understand all of these doctrines and understand Calvinism,

00:25:13.420 but still not actually be saved by the grace of God. But Calvinism posits, when you have been

00:25:21.880 captivated by the grace of God, you do not have the power to resist it because of God's total

00:25:27.160 sovereignty. Now, again, the other side would say, no, God's grace is there, and it's trying to

00:25:33.640 convict someone, but someone still does have the power to resist it. John 6, 37, all that the Father

00:25:40.400 gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me, I will never cast out. So Calvinists would use this

00:25:46.000 to say that not only can you not resist God's grace and initial salvation, but you also can't

00:25:52.320 escape his salvation, that there's nothing you contributed to your salvation. So there's nothing

00:25:57.680 that you can do to get rid of your salvation either. And that leads to the last one, P,

00:26:03.960 perseverance of the saints. This promises that true believers who have been captivated by God's grace

00:26:11.620 by no merit of their own, no contribution of their own will be kept by God forever. So this is the

00:26:18.720 belief that you cannot lose your salvation. There are many Protestants who do not hold to this belief,

00:26:25.200 who do believe you can lose your salvation, but Calvinism teaches that everyone that God has truly

00:26:30.380 saved will be kept safe by God's power all the way to the end, that they might stumble,

00:26:36.340 they might lose their way sometimes, it might look like the pilgrim's progress,

00:26:40.820 there will be temptation, there will be sin, but nothing that they do can escape as well.

00:26:46.600 Now they would also say that someone who is truly following Christ, that because the Holy Spirit

00:26:51.920 lives in them, there will be fruit, there will be a hatred of sin, there will be a repentance of sin.

00:26:57.500 That doesn't mean there will be perfection every day in their moral life, but that they will be

00:27:04.160 sanctified. Calvinists do not generally believe that someone just prays a prayer and walks down,

00:27:10.820 the aisle and says, you know, yes, I'm a sinner and I need to be saved and that they can go on

00:27:17.980 living like nothing really happened. That person is truly a Christian. It's not that Calvinists would

00:27:24.440 say you have to contribute your righteousness to be saved, but they would say you have to look at the

00:27:29.460 fruit of someone's life in order to be able to tell that that person has truly been saved by the

00:27:36.840 Holy Spirit and is being sanctified by Christ. Philippians 1.6, they would say, proves this,

00:27:42.560 and I am sure of this, God through Paul writes, that he who began a good work in you will bring

00:27:48.840 it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ. Another modern name for tulip for these five points

00:27:58.240 is the doctrines of grace. You may have heard that before from people like R.C. Sproul or people like

00:28:05.540 John MacArthur or John Piper. All of these people are considered to be reformed teachers today.

00:28:15.440 So what is the influence of Calvinism? Well, if we go a little bit more deeply into who Calvin was,

00:28:23.860 that kind of gives us an indication. So if we go back to 1533, because of Calvin's contact with

00:28:30.180 people who opposed the Roman Catholic Church, Calvin had to flee Paris because this was a very

00:28:36.960 Catholic city, of course, and he was not safe there. Many also believe that this was the year 0.99

00:28:44.380 he experienced a sudden and unexpected conversion, specifically to the Reformed faith. In 1536,

00:28:51.320 Calvin officially broke with Roman Catholic Church and planned to settle in Strasbourg.

00:28:57.440 But then he ended up in Geneva. That's where he stayed. He was a lecturer and a preacher in Geneva.

00:29:04.460 He became very popular there. He preached what is called still today, expository sermons,

00:29:11.300 without notes, often 10 times every two weeks, and delivered three theology lectures weekly,

00:29:17.560 wrote extensive biblical commentaries. He also trained pastors. Calvin's Geneva became known as

00:29:26.120 the university there, became known as the most perfect school of Christ that ever was on earth

00:29:31.960 since the days of the apostles, according to another reformer, a Scottish reformer by the name

00:29:37.840 of John Knox. Historian Mark Knoll says,

00:29:41.700 If Luther sounded the trumpet for reform, Calvin orchestrated the score by which the Reformation

00:29:47.080 became a part of Western civilization. I think that's a really good way to put

00:29:52.620 why understanding Calvinism for any person is important. This is what R.C. Sproul said,

00:29:58.960 John Calvin stands alone in church history as the master of systematizing

00:30:02.700 biblical truth with doctrine. He was driven by a desire to interpret all the details of biblical

00:30:07.820 revelation. Rarely, if ever, have we found a systematic theologian. So looking at the entire

00:30:13.700 system of Christianity through scripture, systematic theology by Wayne Grudem is an awesome resource.

00:30:21.120 There are a lot of systematic theologians, and some are super trustworthy and thorough.

00:30:26.400 Able to quote lengthy passages of the Bible with one breath, followed by a considerable recitation by

00:30:31.160 memory of the writings of St. Augustine, Calvin mixed his mastery of linguistics with his heart set on

00:30:37.180 fire by the word of God. There are a lot of quotes that I could read that are in my notes about

00:30:44.900 Calvinism. But what I think is important, I wasn't even planning to talk about this, but this is just an

00:30:50.900 aside. What's important to know is that this is actually the predominant worldview that built America

00:30:57.740 and not the modern evangelicalism that we see today. And so a lot of people will say, I've seen this from

00:31:09.460 some of my Catholic friends, that it is like Protestantism is dispensationalism, is the reason

00:31:16.620 why they would say America puts Israel first, and they would say has some like wrong idea of Israel.

00:31:24.140 But Calvinism is not dispensationalist. Now, there are some Calvinists who would call themselves

00:31:30.820 dispensationalists, probably, like John MacArthur. Now, some people would quibble about whether or not

00:31:36.300 John MacArthur was truly reformed, and if he believed in the doctrines of grace because he was

00:31:41.120 dispensationalist. I know I'm throwing around a lot of just like Christianese that may not matter to you 1.00

00:31:45.880 and might be kind of confusing. But dispensationalism is pretty new. Go back and listen to my Israel

00:31:53.500 episode, to my past In Times episodes to understand what dispensationalism is. But this is actually more

00:32:03.580 of the influential worldview that has kind of shaped the Protestant and American conscience for a very

00:32:11.620 long, for a very long time. If you go back again to the history of Calvinism and the influence that

00:32:19.260 it had on theologians, on seminaries throughout Europe, and then you look at the English Puritans,

00:32:25.600 who were deeply Calvinistic, they carried this reformed faith about justification by faith alone,

00:32:32.540 namely, and even the doctrines of grace in Tulip, into North America. And then by 1776,

00:32:38.820 roughly two-thirds of American colonists belonged to Calvinist-leaning churches. This is according to

00:32:46.120 Joel Beakey, who is awesome, an awesome scholar and preacher on all of this. Calvinism differed from

00:32:53.160 Lutheranism, so Martin Luther on the Lord's Supper, so Lutherans tend to believe in the true presence of

00:32:59.740 the Eucharist, the role of God's law, guide for believers versus mainly convicting sinners,

00:33:05.800 and the scope of predestination. And this is an argument that I hear a lot from my Catholic

00:33:11.320 friends, that the fruit of Protestantism, just look at this, it's division. You have all these 0.54

00:33:15.960 people who are reading the Bible and they're interpreting things differently. Isn't that a

00:33:20.740 case to be made for the Roman Catholic Church and the authority of the magisterium and the authority 0.62

00:33:25.660 of the Pope? Because look at all of this division. And look, I understand what you're saying,

00:33:30.900 certainly. I don't revel in arguments and division, especially disagreement on really important

00:33:36.240 things. But we would argue disagreement in pursuit of the truth is worth it. If we're just to use an

00:33:43.640 analogy here, we could also say, isn't it sad that we had this bloody revolution of America versus

00:33:50.220 England? Wouldn't it have just been better if we just stayed unified? At least we would have

00:33:55.460 all, you know, shared our nationality and shared our common culture of being Englishmen, even if we

00:34:01.680 were under the tyranny of King George. Again, this is an analogy here. We would say, no, it was worth

00:34:09.220 the division. Like it was worth the tearing apart. It was worth the Declaration of Independence. It was

00:34:14.800 worth the bloody revolution. But because what we got was better. Because yes, now there are states that

00:34:22.440 have different constitutions. Yes, with all of this freedom of religion and speech, there's all kinds

00:34:28.000 of conflict. But we believe that the freedom of speech and freedom of religion, if it gives people

00:34:32.920 the opportunity to seek what is good and true without possibly the misguided authority of the state,

00:34:39.980 then that's a good thing. Again, that is an analogy. You don't have to agree with it. Of course,

00:34:44.120 as a Catholic, I don't expect you to. But I'm trying to get you to understand the Protestant

00:34:48.940 perspective of why we are okay with denominations. Do we all wish that we agreed? Absolutely. But I'm

00:34:55.300 so glad that we have been given access to and the authority of understanding Scripture in the best

00:35:02.500 way that we possibly can. Yes, under the authority of our pastors, with the help of theologians,

00:35:06.900 and through the guidance of the Holy Spirit, as imperfectly as we possibly can. But that is what we are

00:35:14.080 trying to accomplish. And so when we look at some American Calvinists, we can see someone like

00:35:20.900 Jonathan Edwards, who preached the seminal sermon, Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God. I have that

00:35:29.920 little booklet at home, so different than the kind of sermons we hear so often today, that God doesn't

00:35:36.780 want you to have it hard, that He wants you to feel good about yourself. You know, the God of self,

00:35:41.000 the God of self-esteem sermons that we hear, that is, if you feel good about yourself and you love

00:35:46.280 yourself, then everything will be fine. And that is what God is most concerned about, is just cheering

00:35:52.620 you along to fulfill your desires. Well, that is certainly not the God of Scripture, but it's

00:35:58.440 definitely not the Calvinist God. It's not the Puritan God. And actually, in the little book on the

00:36:03.720 Christian life by John Calvin, he has an incredible—I wish I had it in front of me—he has an incredible

00:36:08.500 passage about the dangers of self-love. Because in fact, any time you see this phrase, lovers of

00:36:14.800 self in Scripture, is an indication of the evil of the end times, not something that is beneficial.

00:36:20.020 It's actually something that we are trying to get rid of as we fill ourselves instead with the love of

00:36:26.180 Christ that helps us see rightly our own worth and the worth of other people. The Great Awakening

00:36:33.140 began in Massachusetts in America in 1734 to 1735. Jonathan Edwards really spearheaded that,

00:36:42.700 and he was affected by the doctrines of Calvinism. We are still living kind of in the shadow of these

00:36:48.260 Great Awakenings. You also had someone like George Whitefield. He was an Anglican evangelist. He arrived

00:36:55.680 in America. He preached these open-air sermons on things like total depravity, the tea, and tulip.

00:37:01.360 And then if you go back to the UK, you have someone like Charles Spurgeon. He was also a

00:37:07.120 Calvinistic preacher, still massively influential today. His massive influence demolished this myth

00:37:14.420 that Calvinists can't be passionate evangelists. His church baptized thousands, supported dozens of

00:37:19.700 missionaries, proved that strong doctrine and fervent evangelism go together. And that probably speaks

00:37:26.900 to a question that I think a lot of people have about if you are Calvinist and believe in this

00:37:31.620 predestination, why would you pray and why would you evangelize? You've got Martin Lloyd-Jones. You've

00:37:38.860 got J.I. Packer. You've got R.C. Sproul. You've got John MacArthur. You've got John Piper. And then,

00:37:45.560 of course, you've got Votie Bauckham, our dear brother that we just lost. You have people like James White and

00:37:50.100 Paul Washer and Jeff Durbin, who all consider themselves Reformed and, I believe, consider

00:37:56.640 themselves somewhere on the spectrum of Calvinism. So still extremely prominent in America today

00:38:06.340 in shaping what we think about the Bible and what we think about salvation. But let's get into

00:38:11.760 specifically predestination, this very controversial point. And then we will get into what the Bible says

00:38:17.440 and also what other belief systems within Christianity and within Protestantism actually

00:38:24.560 believe. I have a lot of very good friends, theologians that I respect that are not Calvinist.

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00:39:54.900 Okay. Let's talk about predestination. Everyone's favorite topic. Everyone's favorite debate subject.

00:40:03.300 Okay. So predestination is the idea that God predestined before time began. Not just before

00:40:12.540 we live, but before time began because God is not limited by time. He is eternal. He did not start

00:40:19.740 when the world started. He has always existed. And he predestined before our time began who was going to

00:40:28.540 be saved and who was going to not be saved. Who was going to spend eternity in hell. And like,

00:40:37.000 this is tough for me. Like, this is really tough for me because, and so like, I will just tell you,

00:40:44.160 because I understand the reaction to that. The reaction that I had when I was 12, I fully understand

00:40:54.260 and still sympathize with that because what father or mother would create a child knowing that their

00:41:03.780 soul will be spent in torment forever and ever. And how is it possible to say that that person

00:41:11.480 deserves that wrath and deserves that punishment if they did not have any contribution to being

00:41:19.440 created? And if we read that God is loving, if we read that God is good, if we read that God is kind,

00:41:26.280 and we know he is purposely creating babies, embryos, knitting them together and bringing them to life

00:41:35.820 only to send them to hell eternally, like that is really difficult. And so that is why people have a

00:41:43.720 very hard time with this belief that God truly chose whom was going to be damned and whom was going to

00:41:51.560 be saved before time began. So I just want to like validate your questions about that, that I'm not

00:41:59.620 dismissive of those things because I think that's a really good question and something that we should

00:42:04.220 be wrestling with. So here's how Calvinists would explain it though. The doctrine of predestination

00:42:10.420 is the teaching that before the creation of the world, God decided the eternal destiny of all

00:42:15.060 rational creatures, so human beings and all angels. God's choice to save certain sinners by grace is

00:42:21.040 called election. And his choice to leave certain sinners to the damnation they deserve is reprobation.

00:42:27.980 Predestination is part of God's decree, his eternal purpose in which he has decided all that will take

00:42:33.380 place, ordaining everything for the manifestation of his glory. So this is for Crossway,

00:42:40.260 Joel Beakey and Paul Smalley wrote this. Many Christians, including Reformed theologian Jonathan

00:42:46.540 Edward, officially found the doctrine of predestination disturbing, but later came to see its beauty and

00:42:54.060 comfort. Some reject this predestination argument because they think it's just human speculation. And

00:43:00.700 of course, they also believe that it's disturbing or it's unjust and God cannot be unjust. There are many

00:43:06.960 passages that talk about God's elects. We already talked about Romans 9. We talked about Ephesians 1,

00:43:14.660 4 through 6, but there's also Romans 8, 32 through 34. Calvinists would say,

00:43:21.200 He who did not spare his own son, but gave him up for us all. How will he not also with him graciously

00:43:27.160 give us all things? Who will bring any charge against God's elect? It is God who justifies.

00:43:32.620 Who is to condemn? And then there is also Romans 11, 28. As regards to the gospel, they are enemies for

00:43:44.260 your sake, unbelievers. But as regards to election, they are beloved for the sake of their forefathers,

00:43:51.640 for the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable. 1 Timothy 5, 21. In the presence of God in Christ

00:44:00.200 and of Christ Jesus and of the elect angels, I charge you to keep these rules without prejudging.

00:44:06.640 Therefore, I endure everything for the sake of the elect. 2 Timothy 2, 10 says that they also may

00:44:12.500 obtain the salvation that is in Christ Jesus with eternal glory. Titus 1, 1. Paul, a servant of God and

00:44:20.000 an apostle of Jesus Christ for the sake of the faith of God's elect and their knowledge of the truth,

00:44:25.220 which accords with godliness. 2 Peter 1, 10. Therefore, brothers, be all the more diligent

00:44:31.600 to confirm your calling and election. For if you practice these qualities, you will never fail.

00:44:38.940 And we could kind of go on and on there. Acts 13, 48. And when the Gentiles heard this, 0.62

00:44:43.700 they began rejoicing and glorifying the word of the Lord and as many as were appointed

00:44:48.760 to eternal life believed. This is at the end of Romans 8, verse 29. For those whom he foreknew,

00:44:59.280 he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his son in order that he might be the firstborn

00:45:05.980 among many brothers. And those whom he predestined, he also called. And those whom he called,

00:45:12.400 he also justified. And those whom he justified, he also glorified. Another part of Romans chapter 9

00:45:21.860 says this, what shall we say then? Is there injustice on God's part? By no means. For he

00:45:27.120 says to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy. I will have compassion on whom I have

00:45:31.580 compassion. So then it depends not on human will or exertion, but on God who has mercy.

00:45:36.240 For the scripture says to Pharaoh, for this very purpose, I've raised you up that I might show my

00:45:40.360 power in you and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth. So then he has mercy on whomever

00:45:46.180 he wills and he hardens whomever he wills because God hardened Pharaoh's heart. So there are a lot of

00:45:54.340 objections to this. There is the belief that, okay, if God predestined people to go to hell, then he can't

00:46:01.220 be just, he can't be merciful, he can't be kind, he can't be loving, and therefore it must not be true.

00:46:10.360 We must have some kind of contribution to our salvation. Calvinists would say, look, God can

00:46:17.040 do what he wants to do. And we evangelize because God has called us to evangelize. We pray because

00:46:24.220 God has called us to pray. We glorify God and we call God good and kind because that's what he tells

00:46:33.180 us that he is. And it's not pointless to pray. It's not pointless to evangelize because they would

00:46:40.260 say God has sovereignly predestined these to be the means by which he accomplishes his purpose.

00:46:47.480 We know throughout scripture that like God didn't need his people to walk around the walls of Jericho

00:46:52.800 seven times for him to destroy the walls of Jericho, but he predestined that as a means by which he would

00:46:58.520 accomplish his purpose. He didn't have to use Moses to write down the 10 commandments, but he did. He

00:47:05.580 didn't have to, you know, go through the plagues and open up the Red Sea to set his people free,

00:47:11.240 but he did. God uses particular processes and particular means to accomplish his purpose. And

00:47:17.800 we could say, well, that seems pointless if he can do what he wants to do. But Calvinists would say,

00:47:22.940 it's not up to us to say how God should accomplish his will. We are simply to obey.

00:47:30.300 Wayne Grudem in his book, Systematic Theology, he talks about this doctrine of concurrence, which

00:47:37.540 says that two things can be concurrently true, that God is totally in charge. He is completely

00:47:43.180 sovereign, that nothing escapes his will, that even what Satan does is allowed by God in his power,

00:47:50.440 and also that humans have a real responsibility, that we are actually held accountable for our

00:47:57.560 actions, that we actually bear the weight of our sin. These two things are concurrently true,

00:48:04.300 and how they're concurrently true can be a mystery. But Calvinists wouldn't say that we have to

00:48:10.960 completely understand the mystery of concurrence, how God's sovereign character and man's responsibility

00:48:17.060 can be logically and theologically reconciled. We can try to do that. But at the end of the day,

00:48:23.860 we do what Paul does in Romans 9, and we simply break out and praise and the glory and the foreknowledge

00:48:29.960 and the wisdom of God. And a lot of people say, well, doesn't this lead to worry about, well,

00:48:37.380 how do you know you're chosen? How do you know you're really saved? Look, if you are a Christian,

00:48:41.880 if you have been captured by the Holy Spirit and because of him or walking in Christ, then you

00:48:47.360 have been chosen. You have been saved. We simply have to trust and obey. Calvinists would go to

00:48:56.100 Psalm 115.3, our God is in the heavens. He does all that he pleases. Isaiah 46.9-10,

00:49:02.920 For I am God, there is no other. I am God, there is none like me. 2 Corinthians 4.6,

00:49:09.020 For God, who said, let light shine out of the darkness, has shone in our hearts to give the

00:49:13.240 light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. So it is God who actually

00:49:18.600 gives us the knowledge. He gives us the grace that is required to be saved. It is nothing that we do

00:49:26.940 on our own. So Calvinists have much scripture that they offer in defense of their belief of tulip,

00:49:34.880 but what does the other side say? As I said, people that I really respect oppose Calvinism. So we'll

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00:50:32.480 All right, here is my very good and wise friend, apologist and evangelist, Frank Turek, stating his

00:50:39.140 opposition to Calvinism. Stop four.

00:50:42.080 See, the ultimate problem with Calvinism, hard five-point Calvinism in my view,

00:50:46.300 is it makes the world a sham because we really don't have a free choice, but God is telling us that

00:50:51.860 we ought to choose him when we can't choose him because he hasn't chosen us at all. And secondly,

00:50:57.200 it makes God the author of evil. In fact, let me give you a debate that took place 40 years ago

00:51:01.880 at Dallas Theological Seminary. It was between Norman Geisler, my mentor, and a guy by the name

00:51:07.260 of John Gerstner. And at one point, Geisler turned to Gerstner and he says, he said, does man have free

00:51:12.520 will? And Gerstner said, yes, man has free will to do what he desires, but God gives him the desire

00:51:19.960 of his heart. So Geisler said, who gave Adam the desire to sin? And Gerstner said, mystery.

00:51:27.280 And Geisler said, contradiction.

00:51:29.440 I love Frank Turek. And I think that we could have a really interesting discussion about this

00:51:35.980 because I would, I would have questions. So here's how I, here's how I see it. We know that God is

00:51:45.000 completely in control, right? That there is nothing that his power cannot do, that there is no realm

00:51:52.440 in which he is inept, that his power is not limited in any way. He's all powerful. I think

00:51:59.020 all Christians would agree on that. He is all knowing. He is omnipresent. And if these things

00:52:07.400 are true, that we read about God throughout scripture, that he is completely powerful,

00:52:13.700 that he knows everything, he can do anything, and that he's everywhere at once, then I have a hard

00:52:21.580 time seeing how that doesn't also apply to someone's salvation. Now you could say, here's what I hear

00:52:27.600 a lot, that he knows who is going to be saved, but he doesn't choose. But for someone who is all

00:52:34.680 powerful, is that not the same thing? Here's an analogy. Say you have a babysitter. This is kind

00:52:41.440 of a disturbing analogy, but you've got a babysitter who is watching a two-year-old. Now the babysitter is

00:52:47.920 sitting there watching the two-year-old fall into the pool. She sits there. She doesn't do anything.

00:52:53.320 The two-year-old drowns. Now, did the babysitter push the child into the pool? Did the babysitter

00:53:00.300 insist that the child goes out into the pool? No, she didn't do any of those things, but she sat there,

00:53:05.520 her hands free, seeing this child, knowing that they're about to fall into the pool, and she does

00:53:10.580 nothing. Now, is that person, is that babysitter responsible? Yes, she is. She had the power to 0.97

00:53:21.620 stop it, and she did not. Now, you could argue that she didn't choose that, but because she had

00:53:30.100 the power to stop it and didn't, she kind of did, right? The only way that she would be let off the

00:53:35.860 hook there is if her hands were literally tied behind her back, or there was a good reason why 0.99

00:53:42.800 she did not see this happening. But we know with God that his hands are not tied behind his back,

00:53:48.960 that he does know everything, he does see everything, and he is all-powerful. So I don't

00:53:54.500 see how we can reconcile God's all-powerful nature with this idea that there are some people that he just

00:54:01.780 can't save even though he really wants to. Because the opposing view, the Arminian view,

00:54:08.540 is that God died to save everyone, and that he wants to save everyone, but not everyone is going

00:54:17.840 to choose that. So within that view, there are some things that God wants to happen, something that's

00:54:23.680 important in salvation, but for some reason, God's power cannot overcome that person's will.

00:54:29.440 Whereas the Calvinists would say, no, no, no, God is all-powerful. His grace is so powerful that that

00:54:35.000 person, whatever their will is, whatever their rebellion is, cannot overcome God's grace.

00:54:42.740 Now, Arminians would say, this is named after someone named Jacob Arminius, who also lived in

00:54:48.600 the 16th century. Now, he originally believed in Calvinism, but then later rejected that. They shared

00:54:54.820 some beliefs, but they're different. 1 Timothy 2, 3-4, this is good, and it is pleased in the sight

00:55:00.240 of God our Savior, who desires all people to be saved. So that's where they would go and to come to

00:55:04.760 the knowledge of the truth. 2 Peter 3, 9, the Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise, as some count

00:55:10.140 slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach

00:55:17.040 repentance. So that's where they would go. They would say, look, God desires all people to be saved,

00:55:24.720 but not everyone is going to choose this. And because not everyone is going to choose it, then

00:55:32.500 that must mean that God is just not able to accomplish everything that he wants. Now, I think

00:55:40.080 you could probably reconcile those two views by saying, yes, God loves all people, but we also

00:55:46.360 read that God hates sinners. God wants all people to be saved, and maybe some could argue, yes,

00:55:52.440 in a greater sense, he desires all people to be saved, but that doesn't necessarily negate that

00:55:57.620 he chose some people to be saved and chose some people to be vessels of wrath and to be damned.

00:56:02.700 Now, I think from the Arminian perspective, you could say God is still all powerful. He is still

00:56:09.460 all sovereign, but he has allowed things to happen that he does not ultimately want to happen. He

00:56:16.060 allows rape to happen. He allows evil to happen. He allows war and oppression and corruption to happen. 0.98

00:56:23.420 He doesn't want these things. He doesn't cause these things. He doesn't author these things,

00:56:27.680 but he allows these things to happen for his greater glory. I think both Arminians and Calvinists

00:56:34.020 would agree on that. Calvinists, however, would say, yeah, that includes him choosing some people

00:56:40.400 to go to hell. Arminians might say, no, he's allowing some people to go to hell, but he doesn't

00:56:47.560 want that. And that, they might say, I'm kind of making this argument for them, I don't know if they

00:56:53.620 are or not, that he predestined the means by which they can be saved. And he has sovereignly chosen to

00:57:01.500 give people free will to have faith in Christ and accept his gift of salvation. And he wants people

00:57:12.540 to exercise that free will to choose salvation, knowing that some won't. When you talk about it like

00:57:21.060 that, the views really aren't that different. Some could argue that it is a semantic argument. I do think

00:57:28.400 it's more than that. I do think that the questions about Calvinism and this determinism and this fatalism

00:57:36.140 are valid and understandable. At the same time, you really can't escape Romans 9. You can't escape the

00:57:44.360 language about predestination and election and God's sovereignty. If God knows something and he can do

00:57:50.420 something, then he is choosing to at least allow the outcome. And here's kind of how I think of all of

00:58:00.280 it. That God is true and he is right and he exists independent of what I think about him. So if God

00:58:09.240 exists and God says he's kind and God says he's merciful and God says he's sovereign and God says that we are

00:58:16.580 predestined and God says that there is an elect and God says that he hates evil and that he hates evildoers and

00:58:26.440 God says that he desires all people to be saved and he says in John 3 16 that God so loved the world that all who

00:58:35.040 believe in him will not perish but have everlasting life. If God says all of these things, then somehow all of these

00:58:41.640 things are true. All of these things are true regardless of my ability to understand them, regardless of my

00:58:49.100 ability to create the logical human connections between all of these things. If all of these things

00:58:55.200 are true, independent of me, then I simply have to accept them and do the next right thing in faith. If God

00:59:02.800 tells me to evangelize, I evangelize. If God tells me to pray, I pray. If God tells me that he is seeking and

00:59:09.820 saving the lost and that I am a part of that, then I seek to be a part of that however I can.

00:59:18.680 Regardless of whether you believe that God actively chose people to go to hell or to heaven,

00:59:24.760 all of these things are true and the commands for the Christian are the same. I think that they are

00:59:29.680 worthy debates to have. The beautiful thing I think about Protestantism is that we can bring

00:59:35.840 scripture. We can bring the authority of the Bible and we can do our best to do the iron sharpens iron

00:59:42.300 thing and better understand who God is through the word that he has revealed to us. But at the end of

00:59:49.980 the day, I simply have to submit to the fact that all of these things are true and even though sometimes

00:59:56.720 they seem contradictory, that doesn't change my calling or my purpose as a Christian. We are all

01:00:04.140 called in Jesus' last earthly dictate to us to go therefore and make disciples of all nations,

01:00:12.840 baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. We are all told that

01:00:20.080 salvation, this is indisputable, is a free gift of grace, that we are justified by grace alone,

01:00:27.040 through faith alone, in Christ alone, for God's glory alone. I think all Protestants agree on that.

01:00:33.880 The mechanism, whether it's God knowing but then deciding to use this mechanism of free will to

01:00:40.740 allow people to choose salvation, or whether it is God saying, no, no, no, no, that free will thing

01:00:45.820 when it comes to salvation, that's not something. I'm completely sovereign over the salvation and I

01:00:52.800 have specifically one by one predestined the people who are going to heaven. Whichever one of those

01:01:01.680 things, if it's one of those two things that is being debated is true, the calling for the Christian

01:01:08.020 does not change. I do want to say something about the fruit of Calvinism that I've kind of seen

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01:02:33.680 Okay, so growing up in a very traditional evangelical setting that I am so incredibly thankful for,

01:02:39.740 raised Southern Baptist, still go to a Southern Baptist church today.

01:02:42.700 I did not know what the Reformation was. I was not taught about Martin Luther. I was not taught

01:02:47.860 about John Calvin. If anything, if I heard anything about Calvinism, it was probably negative. I think

01:02:54.140 a lot of evangelicals, mostly are Arminian today and largely dispensationalist, have a little bit

01:03:02.220 of a different view of free will and God's sovereignty. I really didn't know what Reformed

01:03:08.380 theology was until maybe I was a junior in high school. And I don't think I would have called

01:03:14.980 myself Reformed, but I started learning about people like C.S. Lewis, which we could debate

01:03:21.280 his doctrines and what he actually believed. John Piper, all of these people in what was called,

01:03:28.040 I didn't realize, this young, restless, and Reformed movement. This resurgence of expository

01:03:34.040 preaching just exploded in all of these Protestant church plants across the country. Acts 29 used to

01:03:40.500 be a big part of that. And expository preaching is preaching verse by verse. And so, we're going

01:03:49.760 through the Book of Romans. It might take us 12 years, but we're going to go verse by verse. In fact,

01:03:54.360 if you listen to John MacArthur, who has been an expository preacher for, or was, he recently died,

01:03:59.200 but for a very long time. If you listen to his sermon on Romans 1.1, the entire hour-long sermon

01:04:06.440 was about Paul. The first Paul. That was the entire sermon talking about who Paul was, why

01:04:13.320 that authorship is important, and what his testimony was. And so, that's expository preaching.

01:04:19.600 And that, I think about people like Matt Chandler and others who were a big part of this kind of

01:04:25.800 young, restless, Reformed, this without, I don't know, me even knowing it. They were kind of

01:04:31.780 popularizing expository preaching and Reformed theology. So, I started learning more about that.

01:04:38.360 Then someone gave me my ESV study Bible when I was a sophomore in college, and that really

01:04:44.500 revolutionized how I read the Bible, my understanding of the end times, my understanding of God's

01:04:49.500 sovereignty. Again, I probably did not know the five solas at the time, or TULIP. But ESV, that

01:04:56.740 version, and the study Bible is very Reformed in its interpretation and commentary on Scripture.

01:05:03.220 That really shaped what I thought. It wasn't until after college that I really learned what the

01:05:08.520 Reformation is, why we should be celebrating it, what John Calvin is. And so, when I started studying

01:05:14.640 Tulip and Calvinism and all of these things, it was very enlightening for me to understand the history

01:05:21.980 of Protestantism, the history of the Great Awakenings, the history of the interpretation of

01:05:26.620 Scripture, the Puritan movement, Jonathan Edwards, the history of evangelism, and how different that

01:05:32.880 was from a lot of modern evangelicalism. Now, when it comes to the fruit of Calvinism,

01:05:38.940 there's a lot of good fruit and Reformed theology, a love of Scripture, a desire to see Christ glorified,

01:05:46.200 an understanding of the theology of suffering and self-denial. That really comes from the Puritan

01:05:52.920 history. I think there's so much good in that. But also, I am so thankful for modern evangelicalism,

01:05:59.620 which really isn't Calvinistic in nature. It's much more Arminian. Even if I would rather have an

01:06:07.180 expository sermon than here are three points and the altar call, I think much of the fruit of

01:06:13.580 evangelicalism to try to Christianize America as much as possible, to build these Christian schools,

01:06:20.240 to have a large influence as the church in our local communities has been really beautiful. Like,

01:06:26.020 if you look at Charlie Kirk's life and look at his legacy and look at who eulogized him and the gospel

01:06:32.620 that was preached at his memorial in Phoenix, you see that the fruit of evangelicalism really is such

01:06:42.220 a strong desire for people just to know Christ and for people to know the gospel. Now, I believe that

01:06:48.640 many, many Calvinists that I know and respect a lot have that exact same desire, and they know their

01:06:56.560 stuff so well. And you guys probably know that I am a Calvinist as well, if you've been following me

01:07:02.820 for any amount of time. However, I do think a weakness in Calvinism that I've seen, especially

01:07:09.660 over the past few years, is just a hardness of heart and a callousness towards the unbeliever. 0.94

01:07:17.480 I'm not saying everyone, and I'm not speaking in generally sweeping terms, but this is a weakness

01:07:26.520 of Calvinism is a pride in our theology, a pride in understanding every jot and tittle of doctrine

01:07:33.700 and never allowing that doctrine to give us the humility and just the desire for the glory of

01:07:40.800 Christ and for other people to come to know him that it should be giving us. In fact, some of the

01:07:46.720 people that are like the angriest that I know, that seem to be the most prideful in their own

01:07:51.900 righteousness that I know are Calvinists, which is ironic because the first tenet of Calvinism is

01:07:58.440 total depravity and their reliance on Christ, like for all holiness. I mean, there's even a name for

01:08:04.700 cage-stage Calvinists, which I totally understand when someone realizes, oh my gosh, you can read the

01:08:09.920 Bible this way and see all these doctrines this way. It's very exciting. You become so obsessed with

01:08:14.100 your doctrine. And I saw a clip the other day of Paul Tripp, whom I'm sure I don't agree with on

01:08:20.560 everything, say, like, he said, you know, Satan is happy to give you your theology. Like, he's happy

01:08:28.860 to give you your obsession with the labyrinthian nature of the doctrines of grace or reformed theology

01:08:36.240 as long as he can have your heart. And he was talking about two men that he had counseled who

01:08:42.020 understood the depths of theology, like, understood the Bible, but they were some of the angriest and

01:08:49.020 most prideful people he knew. And I think that there is a danger there because of the, I think,

01:08:55.120 beautiful, like, complexity of Scripture to get so caught up in that and to get so prideful in our

01:09:01.160 understanding of that, especially in the Calvinist world, that we really forget that Christianity really

01:09:07.220 is about love, speaking the truth and love through the gospel, being used by God to save souls, to loving

01:09:17.440 the lost, and helping the poor and the vulnerable. That's not some social justice talk coming from me. I just

01:09:26.300 sometimes think that's lost in the obsession that we Calvinists have when it comes to theology. And some of the

01:09:33.360 ugly, ugly fruit that I have seen from people who call themselves Calvinists over the past few years 0.87

01:09:39.460 has really been just, it's left a horrible taste in my mouth. But at the end of the day, here's what I

01:09:45.340 want to say for anyone, no matter what you believe, Catholic, Protestant, Calvinist or not, it's about what's

01:09:52.900 true. What is true? Independent of what people who say that they believe a certain way, independent of

01:10:01.740 how they act, like independent of their personality or their persona on X, independent of the pastor who

01:10:10.260 fails you, independent of any false teaching that you hear from someone in your camp, what is true?

01:10:17.500 What does the Bible actually say about God and about salvation? That's the most important thing.

01:10:26.240 Not who the representatives are of these things, but like what is actually true? Let what is true take

01:10:32.780 root in your life and bear fruit in your life and focus on Christ and focus on his salvation. I do think

01:10:39.300 it's so important to understand these things and debate these things and know these things. But at the

01:10:43.780 end of the day, again, the gospel is for you. And Jesus did die on the cross to save us from our sins

01:10:53.860 so that whoever believes in him by grace through faith will not perish and go to hell when we die,

01:10:58.980 but have eternal life. I don't think we need to get caught up. Am I chosen or not? The beautiful thing

01:11:05.460 though about election is that when you become a Christian, you are saved forever and ever, and

01:11:12.900 there's nothing that you can do to lose that. Those who leave Christianity were never really saved in

01:11:20.920 the first place because God is all-powerful. And he who began a good work in you will be faithful to

01:11:27.620 complete it. That's, I think, where we can get our comfort in all of this. So I know that was a lot.

01:11:34.420 There's a lot more that I could have said. There's so much on Calvinism. You can look at

01:11:38.540 Ligonier. You can look at Desiring God. Get a little book, the little book on the Christian life

01:11:44.120 by John Calvin, no matter where you stand. Like, it's just really, really wise and really good.

01:11:49.500 I hope that give you some understanding and some basis when people say Calvinism to

01:11:54.200 know what they're talking about. All right. We will be back with an incredible testimony

01:11:58.740 on Friday. I know you guys are going to love it. I'll see you then.

01:12:04.420 We will come to you then.

01:12:06.020 Bye.

01:12:08.160 Bye.

01:12:09.340 Bye.

01:12:16.760 Bye.

01:12:19.800 Bye.

01:12:20.460 Bye.

01:12:21.200 Bye.

01:12:21.320 Bye.

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01:12:22.140 Bye.

01:12:26.260 Bye.

01:12:27.560 Bye.

01:12:27.760 Bye.

01:12:30.240 Bye.

01:12:32.360 Bye.

Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - December 03, 2025

Ep 1274 ｜ Predestined to Hell？ Calvinism Explained

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