Featured Calvinism, The fruit of scriptural truth pt3.

Its the work of Trinity, as the Father draws them to Jesus, Jesus died in their stead, and the Holy Spirit enables them to now be saved!

 

Local assemblies have a mixture of wheat and tares....

 

I never noticed any of the letters to the churches mentioning that. Jesus taught that to Israel. The Apostles didn't repeat it to the Church.

 

I am not saying if we died before repenting and believing we would go to heaven, we needed to be saved, we were lost hell bound sinners before he made us born of God and sealed in the Holy Spirit. So we were in Christ only in the foreknowledge of God in that he foreknew us before our births, not an emphasis that he foreknows what we would do in life as in what we would choose, even though He knew that too as Psalms 139 describes.

example Paul says we were like the others, but we were not them. God made all things work for our good as we were called according to His purposes, so God preserved our lives from when we were naturally born.

1 And you He made alive, who were dead in trespasses and sins, 2 in which you once walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit who now works in the sons of disobedience, 3 among whom also we all once conducted ourselves in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, just as the others.

4 But God, who is rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, 5 even when we were dead in trespasses, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), 6 and raised us up together, and made us sit together in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, 7 that in the ages to come He might show the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.

Further Paul says this about us and our mother's womb in v15, God preserved our life. Childbirth back then was much more deadly than today. By God's grace, He brought you to where you are in Christ today. God is the one who chose to reveal His Son inside you at the proper perfect time according to His purposes and will.

Galatians 1:14-16
New King James Version

14 And I advanced in Judaism beyond many of my contemporaries in my own nation, being more exceedingly zealous for the traditions of my fathers.

15 But when it pleased God, who separated me from my mother’s womb and called me through His grace, 16 to reveal His Son in me, that I might preach Him among the Gentiles, I did not immediately confer with flesh and blood,

 

“Regeneration precedes faith,” RC Sproul
The New Birth by R.C. Sproul

However, when we consider the teaching on this issue as found in John’s record of Jesus’ discussion with Nicodemus, we see the emphasis that Jesus places on regeneration as a necessary condition, a sine qua non, for believing in Him.

He says to Nicodemus in John 3:3: “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.” Then again in verses 5–7, Jesus says, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not marvel that I said to you, ‘You must be born again.’”

The must-ness of regeneration of which Jesus speaks is necessary for a person to see even the kingdom of God, let alone to enter it. We cannot exercise faith in a kingdom that we cannot enter apart from rebirth.

 

Bunyan, Belief, and the New Birth: Why Regeneration Precedes Faith

In the last sermon he ever preached, August 19, 1688, John Bunyan said, “Believing is the consequence of the new birth.”[1] I would point out here, like Bunyan would, that this is casually rather than temporally. And the point is what is “in man” (cf. John 2:24-25) is so corrupted and evil that in and ourselves we will not savingly believe on Christ. Believing savingly on Jesus then, is the consequence, rather than the cause, of the new birth.

Throughout Church History, not everyone has agreed with this assessment. But take note of Jesus’s words in John 6:63 – “It is the Spirit who gives life. The flesh is no help at all” (emphasis mine). To further substantiate Bunyan’s claim of regeneration preceding faith, we turn to the Apostle John’s first epistle. To build our case, we will examine 1 John 2:29, 3:9, 4:7, and finally, 5:1. Take note of the repeated phrase in each verse in italics.

This is good here about what Keach said.

Regeneration is not the effect of these acts but the cause. As Benjamin Keach (1640-1704) wrote, “You must first have Union with him, before you can bring forth Fruit to God; you must act from Life, and not for Life.”[2] The acts John mentions are not for life, but flow from new life.

 

It would have been nice if Mr. Sproul had addressed verse 10. Nicodemus was supposed to know this already from the Law.

So where is it taught in the Law? It is taught in the Law, but it would be a safe bet that only one in a hundred million Christians knows where it is taught in the Law. Did RC Sproul know? If he did, he never let on.

If one doesn't know where it is taught in the Law, how can one know what it actually means and to whom it is meant to apply?

 

Ezekiel 36 talks about the new birth in v25,26,27. The water is as Christ said born of water and the Spirit as in the washing of regeneration and renewal in the Holy Ghost. Notice the emphasis on what God has done. He causes the people to walk in His statutes. This is also referred to in Jeremiah 31:31-34 ( Hebrews 8 )

24 For I will take you from among the nations, gather you out of all countries, and bring you into your own land. 25 Then I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean; I will cleanse you from all your filthiness and from all your idols.

26 I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; I will take the heart of stone out of your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. 27 I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will keep My judgments and do them.

28 Then you shall dwell in the land that I gave to your fathers; you shall be My people, and I will be your God. 29 I will deliver you from all your uncleannesses. I will call for the grain and multiply it, and bring no famine upon you. 30 And I will multiply the fruit of your trees and the increase of your fields, so that you need never again bear the reproach of famine among the nations. 31 Then you will remember your evil ways and your deeds that were not good; and you will loathe yourselves in your own sight, for your iniquities and your abominations. 32 Not for your sake do I do this,” says the Lord God, “let it be known to you. Be ashamed and confounded for your own ways, O house of Israel!”

33 ‘Thus says the Lord God: “On the day that I cleanse you from all your iniquities, I will also enable you to dwell in the cities, and the ruins shall be rebuilt. 34 The desolate land shall be tilled instead of lying desolate in the sight of all who pass by. 35 So they will say, ‘This land that was desolate has become like the garden of Eden; and the wasted, desolate, and ruined cities are now fortified and inhabited.’ 36 Then the nations which are left all around you shall know that I, the Lord, have rebuilt the ruined places and planted what was desolate. I, the Lord, have spoken it, and I will do it.”

 

All who attend your church are saved?

 

The New Testament letters are addressed to the saints. It's talking to them, assuming that they are in fact, saints.

How dangerous of us to assume things in the letters apply to "someone who isn't me". Knowing that all of it is directed to saints, one should figure out how it applies to saints instead of figuring out ways to make it apply to somebody else.