February 12th: The Doctrines of Grace Applied

Speaker: Chris Laws

The doctrines of grace provide much instruction and guidance, solve problems, change our approach to evangelism, lead us to real assurance, make us revere God, give insight into human nature.

THE PROBLEM OF THOSE WHO NEVER HEAR
The Arminian has no answer to the problem: what about those who never hear the Gospel?
‘How can God condemn them? Some would have believed but they never had an opportunity. It’s so unfair.’
First, everybody has heard God speak. God speaks powerfully:

1. Through Creation:
“The invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen…so that they are without excuse” (Rom 1.20).
Mind finds fault with the testimony of creation. It smothers it with prejudice.
Dawkins said, ‘God, if He is there, He hasn’t made it clear He exists.’ Atheists will not look!
Sophisticated software in the brain – write itself? Molecular machinery.
The heart and will are against it – men actively “hold [down] the truth in unrighteousness” (Rom 1.18).
Atheism is a heart matter – doesn’t want to admit there is a God.

2. Through conscience. From time to time God strives with all men: “My Spirit shall not always strive with man” (Gen 6.3). “Their conscience also bearing witness” (Rom 2.15).
Can be extremely painful. But the heart and will are obstinate. “There is none that seeketh after God” (Rom 3.11).

3. Deep within people – the instinct for God, and His standards. “The work of the law written in their hearts.”
“When they knew God, they glorified him not as God” (Rom 1.21).
Calvin: “God has put into the minds of all men the knowledge of himself.”

These three ‘voices’ are so powerful that Paul says all men are without excuse.
Total Depravity is seen at work in those who have never heard. Mind, heart, will.
Everybody is condemned before God acts to save us.
Just as unconverted people reject messengers of the Gospel sent to them, so all men reject what light they are given.
Suppose someone did want to find the Lord: God would of course be gracious to them.
But Total Depravity teaches that nobody does want to find the Lord.

GUIDANCE FOR EVANGELISM
Many see conversion as just a matter of getting people to ‘accept Christ’ – just a ‘decision’ for Christ.
So they use entertainment to entice people to the services, emotional music to bring them to a ‘decision’.
The result has been many phoney conversions.

Total depravity teaches us that conversion is much bigger than deciding for Christ.
God must heal the stubborn will, make the heart love what it hated, illuminate the blind mind.
Irresistible grace teaches God must get a hold on a lost soul.
God must raise a dead soul to life – a new birth. A super-human act.
Make each person a “new creature”. No man can do that: only God.
Conversion is a miracle. “For we are his workmanship” (Eph 2.10).
That means that we are only “workers together with him” (2 Cor 6.1).
Once we grasp this, we have a great respect for God’s work in conversion.
1. We must ensure we don’t offend the Lord
2. No amount of evangelistic activity will make up for worldliness, or an impure heart.
3. Gimmicks are folly.

WHY WE DO NOT HAVE ALTAR CALLS
Some churches have altar calls – originally devised by Charles Finney to maximise the number of 'converts'.
Billy Graham made them popular.
Irresistible Grace teaches that conversion is the Holy Spirit’s work alone.
Altar calls are a vote of no confidence in the Holy Spirit – pushing a seeker to a decision.
Some use sob stories or emotional music.
False ‘decisions’ are easily made in the emotion of the moment, but without true repentance.
Pharaoh said, “I have sinned this time: the Lord is righteous, and I and my people are wicked” (Ex 9.27).
King Saul said, “I have sinned; for I have transgressed the commandment of the Lord” (1 Sam 15.24).
Today they would have been told they were converted. They were plausible.
Christ warned that some seed would fall among thorns.
Altar call decisions have
1. Given a false assurance of salvation to thousands.
2. Produced many cynical people now who say conversion is just an emotional experience.
Not in Scripture, not used by Reformers, Puritans, great revival preachers such as Wesley, Whitefield, Spurgeon.

Some preachers ask for hands to be raised to enable them to boast about the number of converts.
Wrong to take the credit for what the Holy Spirit has done.
Instead we preach the unpopular – “repent and believe the gospel”.
“From that time many of his disciples went back, and walked no more with him” (John 6.66).
The rich young ruler “went away sorrowful”.
Not even Christ’s miracles brought the people to conversion, much less our altar calls.

ASSURANCE
The Perseverance of the Saints teaches a believer cannot be lost. Need to rehearse the doctrine.
Unconditional Election sheds light on this.
If conversion was only our decision to become a Christian, assurance would ebb and flow with feelings.
But conversion is a unique transformation by God.
So we look for the changes that the Holy Spirit makes in lives – rather than just accept every profession.
The hallmarks of the Holy Spirit’s work are unmistakable.
It often falls to us to help a seeker who doesn’t think he/she is converted.

Beware: the marks of grace are seen in new converts.
Seven Certain Signs – is built on Acts 2. What God did in the lives of the first NT church converts.
A relapse into sin obscures the work of grace in a life, and causes loss of assurance.

APPRECIATION OF CALVARY
Limited Atonement unveils the work of Christ for millions of individuals.
1. Extraordinary power in what Christ achieved – something only God could do.
Christians can talk of Jesus with so little respect.
2. Because He died for individuals we grasp how amazingly close to His heart we are.
When love for Him dies down, think of the atonement He personally made for you.

ENCOURAGING EVANGELISM
Unconditional Election encourages evangelism; there are people in whose hearts God will work – the elect.
Acts 18.10 “for I have much people in this city.”
There are many in London. Some Londoners will be saved.
We can be assured of success in the winning of souls if we pray and evangelise.
If we don’t pray and evangelise, God will use others to save them.
The Arminian says God chose people on the basis of those He foresaw wanted to be saved.
In other words He chose the ‘sensible sinners’.

Unconditional Election tells us God did not choose the ‘better’ people.
Do you have a relative who is violently against the Gospel?
Unconditional election says that God may just as well save that person as a more receptive person.
The ‘sensible sinner’ idea contradicts the Bible’s teaching on grace. A man isn’t saved because he is a bit better.
“A man is justified by grace without the deeds of the law” (Rom 3.28).
God ‘show-cased’ the conversion of Saul of Tarsus to make the point.

FALLING AWAY & THE UNPARDONABLE SIN
The Arminian thinks a Christian may be lost eternally. The Perseverance of the Saints rules that out.
They say Hebrews 6 speaks of Christians who “fall away” and cannot be restored.
Hebrews 6 speaks of false conversions.