Next, in our Doctrines of Grace class at Turning Point Community Church we discussed the topic of man's free will. The fundamental issue boils down to this: Does fallen man have the moral power to incline himself to God's offer of help, or is it absolutely necessary for God to do an initial work of re-creation in the soul before the person has the moral power to say yes to the Gospel? Is it supernatural assistance or supernatural regeneration?
In its section on free will (Chapter 9), The Second London Confession of 1689 answers this way: "Man, by his fall into a state of sin, hath wholly lost all ability of will to any spiritual good accompanying salvation; so as a natural man, being altogether averse from that good, and dead in sin, is not able by his own strength to convert himself, or to prepare himself thereunto."
According to Augustine, the Fall was so profound and the power of sin so strong in man that only God can change the disposition of his soul.
- The Words of Jesus: (John 6:44 NKJV) "No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him; and I will raise him up at the last day."
(John 6:65-66) "And He said, 'Therefore I have said to you that no one can come to Me unless it has been granted to him by My Father.' From that time many of His disciples went back and walked with Him no more."
- The Words of John: (John 1:12-13 NKJV) But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, to those who believe in His name: who were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God."
- The Words of Paul: (Eph 2:1 NKJV) "And you He made alive, who were dead in trespasses and sins."
Basically, what all this refers to is that because of the fall, man is completely and morally unable to come to God because he is dead in his tresspasses and sins. Since man is spiritually dead, how can he possibly take the first step?? In other words, what can a dead man do? To better understand this, its probably good to look at a physical example. So lets take the story of Lazarus found in John 11:1-46. As the story goes, Jesus came to see Lazarus but he had already passed away. So Jesus then proceeds to raise Lazarus from the dead.
Now, in this event, who had to take the initial action? Jesus did right? Since Lazarus was dead, he surely did not get up, come out of his tomb and say, 'ok Jesus, I am a sinner and need forgiveness, I accept your free gift of eternal life, please save me now.' And then lie back down and wait for Jesus to raise him from the dead.
Obviously, this is a rediculous scenario. Needless to say it was Jesus who had to take the initiative and call Lazarus out of the tomb; raise him to life. Unfortunately, today in our churches people are being taught the opposite. That they need to come to Christ, that it is a decision they have to make. This position is called Semi-Pelagian which says that man was affected by Adam's sin in that he is born with a corrupt nature, but there remains a remnant of original righteousness, a power in man's will, that can cooperate with or reject the grace of God. Unfortunately, the majority of Christians in America today hold to this view.
But the Bible clearly teaches that this is not true. Back in the beginning of time, God originally told Adam that if he ate of the forbidden fruit, he would surely die. Gen 2:16-17. When he ate of the fruit from the tree of the Knowledge of Good & Evil, true to God's word, he died; he died right away spiritually and then eventually also died physically.
This is why Paul wrote in Eph 2:1 - "And you were dead in your trespasses and sins..." And again in Romans 3:10-12 he states, "As it is written, there is none righteous, not even one; there is none who understands, there is none who seeks for God; all have turned aside, together they have become useless; there is none who does good, there is not even one."
So, since we are spiritually dead, how can we possibly accept Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior unless he makes the first move and removes the blinders from our eyes? I've also heard the argument when people will say, "then you're saying we're just a bunch of robots, that we aren't allowed to make our own decision." Now to me this is a rediculous statement because you're saying then that there are those people out there, who if they knew better (were raised from the dead spiritually), they would still choose, with their "free will" to go to hell instead of Heaven?? I don't think so.
Everyone seems to think that with this doctrine, God is violating man's free will. However, the opposite is actually true. God is actually removing the blinders from your eyes to enable you to better see the choice your making. Here's a great example that I heard in a sermon online that may help to clear this up a bit.
Picture a group of people with blindfold on and they are all running down the street. At the end of the road is a huge pit with molten lava and fire in it. You scream out to warn them about this pit but they say, 'no you've got it all wrong, we're heading for the beach and we can even feel the warm sun as we get closer.' So you grab one of these folks and remove his blindfold and now he's able to see what he's headed toward. Are you going to tell me he's going to keep running in the same direction he was originally heading?? I don't think so! He's going to turn and run the other way.
That's the salvation experience. By reaching down and regenerating our hearts, God is in effect, removing the blinders from our eyes so we can actually see the Total Depravity of our hearts and the direction we're heading without Christ - eternal damnation. With our "blinders" removed we're able to see how much our sin has offended and hurt our most Holy God, then and only then are we able to come to Him in repentence and faith to obtain forgiveness for our sins and gain eternal life.
Well that's it for Total Depravity. Next week we'll begin delving into the second letter of the acrostic TULIP - U - Unconditional Election. Until then
God bless
Rob
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