Paul's Passing Thoughts

Suicide https://t.co/G0vE43CS3m

— Paul M. Dohse (@PaulMDohse) July 21, 2017

In light of the new birth gospel, referring to the saved as “friends of God” seems to fall way short of what you would call a literal family member. So, as ones here at PPT who strive to think biblically by properly defining Bible words, let’s take a look at what the Bible means by the word, “friend.”

For the most part, “friend” is set against a major gospel theme in the Bible; a call to be reconciled with God because the unsaved are His enemies. A “friend of God” speaks to one who has been reconciled with God. According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, a friend is defined as, “one that is not hostile | Is he a friend or an enemy?”

“You adulterous people, don’t you know that friendship with the world means enmity against God? Therefore, anyone who chooses to be a friend of the world becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4 NIV).

Merriam-Webster also notes that this word has multiple levels of relationship that happen to fit with the Bible definition as well: “one attached to another by affection or esteem” and “one that is of the same nation, party, or group” and “one that favors or promotes something” and “a favored companion.”

All biblical ideas.

Actually, in many instances, the biblical idea of “friend” is a deeper relationship than family: “One who has unreliable friends soon comes to ruin, but there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother” (Proverbs 18:24 NIV). In life, you may have friends who are closer to you than family members in every way. Hence, blood is not always thicker than water.

We may also want to ponder, “Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends” (John 15:13 NIV).

The biblical idea of “friend,” in some respects, is a deeper relationship than family because it covers all levels of relationships. However, our family relationship with God through the new birth makes us righteous while our friendship displays our changed nature.

But Houston we have a huuuuge problem. As the present-day Protestant resurgence reveals true orthodoxy more and more, we find that authentic Protestant orthodoxy actually declares so-called believers…”enemies of God.” Truly, the core problem with church is too simple and on display in broad daylight.

The whole Protestant God hates believers and believers hate God and Jesus therefore covers us and saves us from God can be pondered here, and here.

paul

Presently, I am supposed to be completely out of the loop regarding TANC Ministries because I am preparing to take a state exam for medication certification. However, when perusing what Andy is up to while I am gone, I was made privy to this article by Kevin DeYoung.

I am 60 years old, and in my mind, of all the people I have been made aware of in my life to varying degrees, DeYoung is the epitome of the consummate lackey. While shockingly apt at thinking the thoughts of others, he is more likely to be hit by space junk in the pulpit than having an original thought in his own cranium case. DeYoung makes everyone a mind reader; just read Protestant orthodoxy and you are reading everything that is in his mind.

Anyway, the article is particularly rife with opportunity to further demonstrate why the Protestant Reformation was the biggest hoax ever perpetrated on mankind. One may marvel at the audacity of elementary error being dressed up in such scholarly splendor.

DeYoung begins by writing, “The doctrine of limited atonement–the L in TULIP–teaches that Christ effectively redeems from every people “only those who were chosen from eternity to salvation” (Canons of Dort, II.8). As Ursinus explains in his commentary on the Heidelberg Catechism, Christ’s death was for everyone “as it respects the sufficiency of satisfaction which he made, but not as it respects the application thereof.” In other words, the death of Christ was sufficient to atone for the sins of the whole world, but it was God’s will that it should effectively redeem those and only those who were chosen from eternity and given to Christ by the Father.”

First of all, salvation is neither atonement or redemption. In the absolutely insane month of August coming up, I am actually going to add another project that Andy is going to participate in although he doesn’t know it yet. We are going to put together a video series to challenge a group of pastors who are meeting in August with the following: for crying out loud; you are pastors, please start using biblically correct words when talking about salvation.

However, though not New Covenant salvation according to the Bible, atonement is the basis of the Protestant false gospel; Jesus is a cloak (covering) for unrighteousness that denies the new birth.

And, salvation is not redemption either. Redemption is the saving of the weak/mortal body from eternal death in the resurrection, not the saving of the soul. Making salvation and redemption the same thing enables Protestantism to endorse progressive justification or “final justification.” While constantly feigning belief in present assurance, they constantly refer to “final justification” being future because, you know, that’s when it is final. Why is salvation on the installment plan so important to them? Well, if you are signed, sealed, and delivered, what do you need them for?

DeYoung continues: “The good shepherd lays his life down, not for the goats, but for the sheep (John 10:11). This is why John 6 says Jesus came to save those the Father had given to him, and why Matthew 1:21 says he died for his people, and John 15:13 says for his friends, and Acts 20:28 says for the church, and Ephesians 5:25 says for his bride, and Ephesians 1:4 says for those chosen in Christ Jesus.”

Look, I could post on every sentence in this article, but I only have time to hit the highlights and I really don’t even have time for that. We let the likes of DeYoung assume “those” means “individuals.” Nope, in fitting with the rest of new birth justification and biblical election, more than likely, biblical election refers to groups of people and not individuals; particularly, Jews and Gentiles.

Moreover, another prime example of how Protestant scholars believe that “good grammar makes bad theology” follows here: “This is why John 6 says Jesus came to save those the Father had given to him…and why Matthew 1:21 says he died for his people… and Ephesians 5:25 says for his bride.”

Read Ephesians 5:25. Where in the world therein does it say that the church is the bride of Christ? So, He loves the church like a bride, that doesn’t make the church His bride. When we say, “Let’s be like a tree and leave” to convey a desire to leave a certain place, does that make us a tree?

Like all Protestant ventriloquist puppets of whom DeYoung is chief, he uses presuppositions to deceive; “those” always means “individuals,” and the main point of election is the WHO and not the HOW. It’s all about who God decided to save, and not how He saved them. He saved them by sending His only Son to the cross to end the law. The Bible states that the righteous demands of the law were “nailed to the cross.”

So, who did Christ die for? Everyone born under the law. Who was born under the law? Everyone. End of discussion…and the end of so-called “limited atonement.”

But WHY are Protestants hellbent on this version of election/predestination? Because the church is a sanctuary city from the doctrine itself. It’s the paramount good cop/bad cop approach. You ever heard of John Calvin’s “power of the keys”? Whatever the Protestant elders bind on earth is bound in heaven, and whatever they loose on earth is loosed in heaven, or something like that. Bottom line? If the elders like you, you’re in. This ministry has documented DeYoung and other Protestants saying this in no uncertain terms. And they say it because its formal Protestant orthodoxy.

So, what is the why?

The essence of sin itself, a desire to control others.

paul

Source: It’s Funny How Baptists Admit They’re Lost

In yet another example of how Protestantism is wrong about virtually everything; its orthodoxy calls for a belief that there is no moral difference between Christians and non-Christians. This ministry has documented a vast number of citations that make this point other than the constant affirmation thereof heard on Christian radio, TV, and everyday conversations. The belief that Christians actually offend God less than unbelievers is often dubbed “moralism.”

The home fellowship gospel is stated by the practice of meeting in homes which exemplify a literal new birth into the family of God, or the “household of faith.” The household is God’s literal family. It is also a body versus an institution, and gifts versus authority; the only authority is the head of the body, Christ. The body has one head. The focus is cooperative group contribution to the knowledge of Christ, not groupthink.

Elders are apt to teach and protect the group from error as each discerns for themselves whether or not the teaching seems right according to Scripture. Hence, the elder is a contributor to the body like all the other gifts. Eldership is a gift, not a position of authority. In the body analogy, the organs and members are gifts for edifying the body.

Key to understanding all of this is the new birth and how it changes a person’s function in the real world.

The beginning point is the believer’s relationship to the one law, or the Bible. One law—two relationships: condemnation and love or under law and under grace, and also “under the power of sin.” “Under grace” does NOT mean you are no longer under a law, it is just a different relationship to the law.

What does being “under sin” mean? Sin is empowered by the law. The Bible is VERY clear on this. Sin uses the law to create particular “desires” within any given person. Those desires can include a desire to kill people, a desire to steal in order to get someone’s stuff, or a desire to have sex with animals. How these desires pan out regarding complex paradigms vary, but one major consideration is conscience and consequences (which is a dynamic that takes place in everyone) versus the intensity of the desire which is increased through practice.

Simply stated, sin’s ability to use the law to condemn is the source of its power to tempt and enslave through ignorance of love and strong desires; again, the Bible is VERY clear on this.

When condemnation is removed; sin is stripped of its power.

However, sin still resides in the mortal body. It can still use the law to tempt a believer, but not enslave a believer. Due to the weakness of mortality, sin can harass a believer, but the believer can actually say “no” to the sinful desire and use the same law that once condemned the believer to learn how to “control the body.” Not that the body in and of itself is evil, but whether or not the body is used to fulfill good desires or evil desires.

In the new birth, two primary things happen: the believer is given a new heart that loves God’s law, and is no longer under the condemnation of the law. The same law that once brought only death now brings life and life more abundantly. This gospel is the same gospel that Moses preached: “I set before you this day life and death; choose life.” It has always been the same gospel though applied differently at points of historical eschatology which will not be addressed in-depth here.

Suffice to say here, the Old covenant law was a vessel to which ALL sin IS imputed and was increased for the full expression of Christ’s love. The law was increased over time for the purpose of death and life both; and both condemnation and love.

Christ came to establish the baptism of the Spirit through His death and resurrection. This brought two things into consummation: the baptism of Jew and Gentile into one body, and the official ending of the law’s condemnation. Until Christ came, the law held the believer’s sin in captivity, hence Old Testament believers are sometimes referred to as “the captives.” However, that ministry, in a sense, remains for unbelievers in our day because “all sin is against the law.” Every sin committed by an unbeliever is still imputed to the law, and when they believe, all their sins are vanquished along with the law; they are no longer “under law,” or more specifically, no longer “under condemnation.” For this reason the Old covenant is “passing away” but is not yet ended completely.

And here is another way believers are changed: the Bible teaches that sin itself has a core desire; to control and enslave. People under condemnation condemn as a way to control others in the same way sin controls them via condemnation. This is the crux of marriage counseling; most marriage problems flow from a spouse’s desire to control the other spouse through condemnation.

So, Christ came to die and END the law of condemnation for those who believe, and was resurrected by the Spirit so that the law could be fulfilled through love by those who follow Him in death and resurrection. When Christ said He didn’t come to abolish the law, but to fulfill the law, He wasn’t talking about the law of sin and death; He was talking about the law of the Spirit that sanctifies. This issue boils down to the Spirit’s two uses of the one law; to convict the world of sin and the judgement to come, or to sanctify. The believer dies with Christ to the old law, and is resurrected to the new law. The law of the Spirit of life has set us free from the law of sin and death. The denial of two uses of the law is tantamount to an outright denial of the new birth. Moreover, identifying one’s self as a “sinner” is tantamount to declaring self as yet under the condemnation of the law. In every biblical case, a “sinner” is “under law.”

If one’s old self died with Christ, and the same resurrected with Christ as a new creature, good works, viz, LOVE is not also substituted; truly good works flow from the believer and are not a substitution. And ironically, unbelievers know this intuitively (probably because the works of the law are written on their hearts according to Romans 2:12-16) and expect good behavior from professing Christians.

What do unbelievers hear from “believers” instead? “There is no perfect church; We are all just sinners saved by grace; Come and join us anyway and we will have one more hypocrite.” Unbelievers know better. The primary thing that keeps them from being saved is fear of radical change. Most unbelievers have a better grasp of the gospel than any Protestant and that includes all of its various stripes such as Baptists and all of their stripes.

The belief that most people don’t accept the gospel because they want to deny their sin is false. Unbelievers know they have a sin problem. Hence, “If they see how readily we admit that we are sinners when we humble ourselves, they will be encouraged to confess their sin” is a false notion. Not so; they don’t fear staying the same and seeing their sameness in and deeper and deeper way with the help of being “edified” at church; to the contrary, they fear the radical change of the new birth. Instead of “edifying unto good works,” the edification is the ability to see the depths of our totally depraved selves. The lost world will not buy this package.

There is only one thing that will dissuade fear of real change; when they see our godly, free, and happy lives and want the same for themselves. A testimony of staying the same will neither impress or convince.

In all of this, how can one stay the same and still be “saved”? You know, “Come just as you are.” There is only one factor left in the equation: faithfulness to the authority of the institutional church where staying just as you are lest you have a “righteousness of your own” will usher you into heaven by faith alone in sanctification. The crux of that is something that the church has in common with sin itself…

…a desire to control others with its splendid temples giving testimony to the sale of salvation on an installment plan.

These pagan temples are set against the believer’s body that is the Spirit’s temple where the members are used to offer living sacrifices to God in sanctifcation. Confining worship to a temple made with hands denies the temple of the new birth; our very own bodies that are gifted to edify the family of God.

paul