Toledo Reformed Theological Conference
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Steven Lawson
The Good Shepherd and His Sheep (part 3)
(Buckle Up!)
(verses 19-21 He is not the Son of God because He casts out demons, He casts out demons because He is the Son of God)
John 10: 27-30
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Perhaps no other truth sweetens other truths like the doctrine of eternal security.
Eternal security was the bait that drew Spurgeon’s soul to Christ. He feared committing his life to Christ and be unable to finish it. All who start the Christian life complete the Christian life.
If I found Him, He would not give me a temporary salvation, but an eternal life that could not be lost.
It is not a matter of us holding onto Christ, but of Christ holding onto us.
What good is it to be redeemed on the cross if in the end you die lost. What is the point of being effectually called and born again if in the end you die lost.
This is one of the signature texts in the doctrine of eternal security
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The power of the shepherds voice (v. 27)
My sheep hear My voice
Those who are not His sheep do NOT hear his voice (v. 26)
They know my voice and I know them, to know them means He loves them
They follow me. That is the response of the sheep to the voice of the shepherd and they will always follow me.
They will not, they cannot, be diverted to another voice. They hear His voice and no other voice. Every other voice is foreign to us and His drowns the others out.
The permanence of eternal life (v. 28)
I give eternal life to them, before which we were dead in trespasses and sin.
Eternal life speaks to the quality of life
i. A Life not of this world, a spiritual life not of this world. Abundant life.
ii. New birth: The life of God in the soul of man (Whitefield)
iii. It is a life unlike any other. The word “eternal” in John’s Gospel is coupled with “life”. Not just getting man out of hell and into heaven, but getting God out of heaven into man.
Eternal life speaks to the duration of life
i. It is a never ending life, can never be undone.
ii. If you can be saved for five years and lose your salvation, you didn’t have eternal life, you had five year life.
The present tense of eternal life (v. 28)
Not that in the future I will give eternal life, I will give NOW eternal life, at the moment of regeneration. Heaven comes to us before we go to heaven.
Present Tense: John 3:15; John 3:36; John 5:24; John 6:47; John 6:54; John 17:3
Eternal life is not about a place, it is about a person. Being in heaven is not what makes you secure, Satan fell from heaven.
The protection from eternal perishing (v. 28)
And they shall never perish, a linking thought
Perishing: to be eternally lost in an eternal hell, under the wrath of God. It doesn’t mean extinction or annihilation, away from the God of love and with the God of wrath. You can only hope that you could escape God in hell. He is omnipresent.
The preservation by Christ’s hand (v. 28)
And no one will snatch them out of my hand
Christ holds all His sheep omnipotently in His hand
No one, not false teachers, not temptations, not even ourselves
If you are one of His sheep you would never want to be released and never can be released.
He personally holds us in His hand. There is no guardian angel watching over us, it is Christ holding us, watching over us, placed there by the Father.
There is nothing you can do to be placed in His hand, and there is nothing you can do to be released
The preservation by the Father’s Hand (v. 29)
My Father who has given them to Me is greater than them all
Held jointly by both the Father and the Son.
He holds us, and upholds us, and establishes us
Even after He puts us in the Son’s Hand, He never lets go of us. We remain His permanent possession.
The partnership of the Godhead (v. 30)
I and the Father are one. Not one person (Modalism), but one. One in substance, one essence, one nature, one aim, one purposes, one goal, one mission, one will, one work, one enterprise
The Arminian fractures and divides the Godhead
i. The Father looks down the tunnel of time to see who would accept Christ, and then chooses those sinners as His. I will choose those who will choose His Son. Christ will die for all, the Father will choose those who believe, the Holy Spirit will woo those who hear the preaching.
ii. The Father works with one group, the Son with another group, and the Spirit with a totally distinct third group
But the Bible teaches that I and the Father are one.
i. The unity of the Godhead argues most powerfully to argue for the doctrine of Particular Redemption/Limited Atonement.
ii. That is why we baptize in the name of the Trinity.
Salvation is pictured in 1 Peter as an ark, and there is only one door, sealed from the outside by God almighty.
We are not bragging on ourselves, we are bragging on the Lord.
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The Passion and Priority of Worship: The Glory of Christ (Heb 2:9-18)
Steve Camp
The Crowned Servant (Heb 2:9)
He is sufficient for all things, for creation, salvation, justification and sanctification.
He must increase and I must decrease
We see Him (revelation) lower than the angels (incarnation) crowned with glory (coronation) suffering death (humiliation) tasting death (justification) (he was firing these two fast for me to type up)
Written to young Jews being seduced back into legalism
Jesus is the firstborn, the preeminence, greater than all.
Our society is fascinated by angels.
Philippians 2:6-8 Poured Himself out, in submission
Jesus will never be all you need until He is all you have
The Captain of Salvation (Heb 2:10)
To be made perfect in suffering
Only He has walked the path that none other can
We shouldn’t be surprised when a unbelieving world acts like an unbelieving world.
Christ the Sanctifier (Heb 2:11)
He set Himself apart from glory to the cross so that we may be set apart from this world.
He is not ashamed to call us brothers.
But are we ashamed to call Him our Lord?
Christ the conqueror of Satan (Heb 12:14-15)
We all share in flesh and blood, so He also took what was common to us (flesh) but foreign to Him.
The cross was not the defeat of the Son of God by Satan. It was Christ crushing the head of the serpent.
Many preachers on TV are offering us what Satan offered Christ, all prosperity and no cross.
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