Key Quotes on the Sufficiency of Grace (Week 1 - Jan 2014)


Some believe grace is not really a gift but gives man an opportunity to believe or not, but this scenario is about as likely as believing that shining a light into the eyes of a blind man will enable him to see if he wants to. If the blind is not given new eyes, he will not see. And once he is given new eyes he already sees. Grace is grace because Jesus gives to us what we were unable to give to ourselves: eyes to see, ears to hear, and a heart to believe. (Deut 29:4; 30:6)

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Some teach that 'salvation depends on human will', but the Bible teaches (and I quote) 'it depends not on human will or exertion, but on God, who has mercy." (Rom 9:16)

We cannot believe in just any "Jesus", and think that because we are using this word, that we are, therefore, honoring God. The Jesus of the Bible is one who saves by grace ALONE, not the false or inconsistent Jesus' proclaimed by many who want to partly retain the merit, wisdom or humility of man. It is only when man is stripped of all hope in himself and, by grace, turns to Jesus alone that he understands the gospel. Do you trust in Jesus alone? If you do then know this, Jesus provides EVERYTHING we need for salvation, including the Holy Spirit to believe (John 6:63, 65), the wisdom and sound judgment to believe (1 Cor 1:30) and a new heart to believe (Ezek 36:26). Jesus is sufficient.

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"But to this day the LORD has not given you a heart to understand or eyes to see or ears to hear." - Deut 29:4.

And yet, even after reading this, some still think they can have these things without God granting them. Perhaps if they try hard enough. Indeed, by nature people have a will ... and they can make a choice ... but they need regenerating grace to make the RIGHT choice. Without God giving them eyes, ears or a new heart (i.e. full regeneration) the choice is still driven by a spiritually dead man who loves darkness and hates the light (1 Cor 2:14; Eph 2:1; John 3:19, 20) but thanks be to God, while we were still dead God made us alive in Christ (Eph 2:5).

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"Nobody who has not the Spirit of God can see a jot of what is in the Scriptures. All men have their hearts darkened, so that even when they can discuss and quote all that is in Scripture, they do not understand or really know it... The Spirit is needed for the understanding of all Scripture and every part of Scripture." - Martin Luther, The Bondage Of The Will

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"Let us now understand that the only true faith is that which the Spirit of God seals on our hearts." - John Calvin, Institutes I.vii
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"I have many in this city who are my people. – Acts 18:10 ... They are Christ’s property, and yet perhaps they are lovers of selfish pleasures and haters of holiness; but if Jesus Christ purchased them, He will have them. God is not unfaithful to forget the price that His Son has paid. He will not suffer His substitution to be in any case an ineffectual, dead thing. Tens of thousands of redeemed ones are not regenerated yet, but regenerated they must be; and this is our comfort when we go to them with the quickening Word of God.” - Charles Spurgeon

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"A man's conversion is nothing, his believing is nothing, his profession is nothing unless he is made to be a new creature in Christ Jesus... If our faith has not brought with it the Holy Spirit, if, indeed, it is not the fruit of the Spirit...then our faith is presumption, and our profession is a lie." - C. H. Spurgeon

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I will put the fear of me in their hearts, that they may not turn from me. - Jeremiah 32:40 [the promise of the everlasting covenant]

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"Man is like a tree. His heart, not his will alone, is the root. There is no possible way by which the will can choose to produce fruit contrary to the character of the root. If the root is bad, the tree is bound by its very nature to produce evil fruit. Man is like a person standing alongside his treasure chest. There is no possibility of bringing pure gold out of a box filled only with rusty steel. The contents of the heart determine what words and deeds may be brought out. Far from being neutral, the will must reach into the heart for its choices. Every thought, word and deed will partake of the nature of the treasure within. Man is like a stream which cannot rise above its source. If the fountain is polluted, the outflow will be evil. If the source be sweet, the stream will not be bitter and cannot choose to be so. These three illustrations alike contain the same lesson. What a man is determines what he chooses. Choices of the will always reveal the character of the heart, because the heart determines the choices."
- Walter J. Chantry

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At the fall, we changed, God didn't. By nature God is holy so He cannot become less-than-holy and still remain God. So even in our fallen state, God gives us commands to live in perfect holiness if we would live. For example, He calls us to love him with all our heart, mind, soul and strength, an impossible supposition for fallen man - yet this does not stop God from commanding us to do so. Why? Paul says the purpose of the Law now is not to reveal our moral ability but our inability. "Through the law comes knowledge of sin."(Rom 3:19, 20) Thus, when God humbles us through His law, we see our utter bankruptcy ... that there is no hope in ourselves left, and only then we can understand that God is making room for the gospel since it becomes obvious that the mercy of God in Christ ALONE can save us.

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‘If all were saved, the wages of sin demanded by justice would be hidden. If none were saved, no-one would see what grace bestows.’ - Augustine

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Since we have been perfected for all time by Christ's single offering (Heb 10:14), we can declare with Scriptural authority, that Jesus Christ's atoning death and resurrection is SUFFICIENT to save us to the uttermost (Heb 7:25). Therefore, those who declare that a person can lose his/her salvation are not only declaring God to be a liar but are overthrowing the gospel because they are trusting partly in their own ability to persevere to maintain THEIR OWN just standing before God. Salvation is all of Christ. We work, yes, we persevere, yes... but not in order to maintain our salvation...no we work BECAUSE God has saved us ...We work out of our salvation. It is God who has given us His Spirit as a “deposit” “guaranteeing” our inheritance (2 Corinthians 1:22, 2 Corinthians 5:5; Ephesians 1:14)

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"There is no goodness in our will now, but what is hath from grace; and to turn the will from evil to good, is no more nature's work, than we can turn the wind from the east to the west... Christ must oil the wheels of mis-ordered will, and heal them, and remove the stone, and infuse grace (which is wings to the bird): if not, the motions of the will are all hell-ward." - Samuel Rutherford, The Trial And Triumph Of Faith

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"Men are indeed to be taught that the favour of God is offered, without exception, to all who ask it; but since those only begin to ask whom heaven by grace inspires, even this minute portion of praise must not be withheld from him. It is the privilege of the elect to be regenerated by the Spirit of God, and then placed under his guidance and government." - John Calvin, Institutes II.III

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The wisdom of the age has it backwards. Declaring that a person is a sinner does not make one a hater, but a lover of that person ... and of mankind. Do Christians point out sin to shame, bully or incite violence against someone? Absurd and a profound misapprehension of our intent. In calling someone a sinner do Christians think they are superior, more moral? May it never be! Most people's sin pales in comparison to mine. Fact is, it would only be hate or discrimination if we refused the gospel to someone because we thought their sin makes them somehow unworthy of it. The gospel declares that anyone who, by the grace of God, comes to Christ will be forgiven, no matter how abominable their sin. And such are granted a new heart which loves God and his law.

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Since men are never found naturally willing to submit in faith to the humbling terms of the gospel of Christ, how can the Christian message be good news? (Rom 3:11; John 6:64,65; 2 Thessalonians 3:2) Because God gives to us freely, what he demands from us. In the gospel God reveals the same righteousness and faith for us that God demands from us. What we had to have, but could not create or achieve or fulfill, God grants us freely, namely, the righteousness of God (2 Cor. 5:21). He reveals, as a gift in Christ Jesus, the faith and righteousness that was once only a demand. Faith is not something that the sinner contributes towards the price of His salvation. Jesus has already paid that price in full for us. Faith is our first gasp of breath in our new birth, so to speak. It is a witness of God's work of grace already haven taken place within us (Eph 2:5, 8; 2 Tim 2:25; 1 John 5:1; John 6:63, 65).

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"Such is the condition of men since the fall, that if left to themselves they would continue in their rebellion and refuse the offers of reconciliation with God. Christ then had died in vain. To secure the accomplishment of the promise that He should see of the travail of his soul and be satisfied, the Holy Spirit so operates on the chosen people of God, that they are brought to repentance and faith, and thus made heirs of eternal life, through Jesus Christ their Lord." Charles Hodge, Systematic Theology, Vol II, Part III, Chapter XIV

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"Before the new birth a man can bow at Christ's name, and sometimes wonder at Christ's miracles, but that is all; once born again, a man sees a fulness and a completeness and a sufficiency in Christ of things necessary to salvation, so that he feels as if he could never think upon Him enough." J. C. Ryle, The Christian Race - Regeneration III

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To those who, by the quickening grace of the Spirit (John 6:63), come to faith in Jesus (John 6:65), the commands are not burdensome but taste like honey as we are no longer slaves but children. (1 John 5:1-4)


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"If a man is saved, it is because God has saved him. But if a man is lost, that is to be attributed to his own rejection of the gospel and his rebellion against God's way of salvation." - Martyn Lloyd-Jones, Romans - Saving Faith

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Interestingly, I have recently heard the charge that when we appeal to grace passages (indicatives) we are attempting to cancel out God's commands (or imperatives). Lord forbid, we appeal to the grace passages, rather, in order that we may carry out the command passages. For apart from grace we can do nothing (John 15:5, 3:27, 6:63; 1 Cor. 4:7, 15:10; 2 Tim 2:25)

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One of the primary reasons for the division in the church over free grace vs. free will is the failure of one side to distinguish between law and gospel. Synergists erroneously reason (outside of Scripture) that if something is commanded in Scripture then man must have the moral ability to do it. Instead, after the fall, the Bible uses the holy commands as an instrument of God to strip man of all hope in himself and behold his own moral bankruptcy (Rom 3:19, 20).

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The work of redemption is both particular and it is Trinitarian. The Father elects a particular people for Himself (Eph 1: 4, 5); Christ dies for all those the Father has given Him (John 17:9, 19). and the Spirit applies the effectual work of Christ on the same (John 3:8; 6:63). However, those (amyraldians) who reject particular redemption introduce a conflict between the Divine Persons. The Triune God becomes disjoined from one other in their saving intent. In this case the Father elects particular individuals, but the Son, on the other hand, dies for all, and the Spirit again seals those the Father elected. Such theology would have us believe that the Son works in disharmony with the other two Members of the Trinity. But Christ is not the author of confusion but rather (the bible declares) came to save all those given to him by the Father (John 6:37,63,65; 17:9; 19, 24)

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Sun, 01/05/2014 - 21:51 -- john_hendryx

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