What Should I Say to a Reformed Christian Who Dismisses Many Non-Believers as Lost Causes?

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What Should I Say to a Reformed Christian Who Dismisses Many Non-Believers as Lost Causes?

June 17, 2024

Questions about the best way to respond to someone who believes in double predestination and who dismisses many non-believers as lost causes and whether someone who believes they need faith plus works for salvation can still be saved by their faith.

* What’s the best way to respond to someone in the double predestination camp who vocally dismisses many non-believers as lost causes?

* Can someone who believes they need faith plus works for salvation still be saved by their faith?

Transcript

This is Amy Hall. Welcome. You're listening to the hashtag SDR-esque podcast with Greg Koukl.

Yes. Hi. Oh, Greg.

All right. So, Greg, this first question comes from Maggie. As someone seeking to navigate slash learn more about Reformed theology, what is the best way to respond to someone in the double predestination camp who vocally dismisses many non-believers as lost causes? This angers me greatly, having recently escaped a cultish group.

God didn't give up on me. Well, it sounds like the pushback there is the so-called double predestination. The idea is if God, and this is kind of a matter of perspective, that if God chooses some people to be saved as a matter of His sovereign grace, and not judge them the way they deserve, but allows others to simply perish and be judged for their sins, which is a judgment they do deserve, then God has predestined each group, that's double predestination, which sounds cruel regarding God.

And it's hard to countenance that, that God would predesten people to go to hell. And here's my, I have a couple of thoughts on this, and I know you have a lot. But the first thing is, you always have to answer the first questions first.

And the first question, the first question's ought not be, well, I understand what you're saying about God choosing who is going to be saved, but that creates a problem for me. And I don't, here's the problem. And so what about this? What about that? What about the other thing? What about double predestination? Those are the wrong questions.

That's the wrong way to start. The right way to start is to find out what the Bible teaches. Okay, so when you read the word chosen, or you read the word predestined in the places where it appears, or you read the word elect, you have to figure out what is being meant by the use of those words.

And you, in my view, many people, because of discomfort with the doctrine of sovereign grace, they turn those words upside down. And, or let me back up and put it this way. They say, I don't like the idea of sovereign grace because, oh, that sounds like double predestination.

So, elect doesn't mean that God elects. It means that we elect ourselves and then God elects the ones who elect themselves. Or that we choose ourselves and then God chooses the people who he knows are going to choose him.

Or something, or predestined doesn't mean to establish something beforehand. In other words, they turn these words upside down and they have to make them mean something entirely different than what they mean normally in normal usage and in the text. I think a better way to do it is to try to let the text speak for itself with regards to the nature of God's grace.

And then if this raises other questions, then we try to solve the problems in light of the teaching of Scripture. Rather than what seems to me to be discarding or disregarding the teaching of Scripture because of what seems to be unpleasant consequences that follow from it. And it's not that those kinds of questions aren't important, it's just the order that I'm concerned with.

And so, I'm convinced about sovereign grace. I think election means God elects. I think that chosen means God chooses.

And I think that predestined means that God establishes something before they happen. And in the appropriate application with regards to those verses. So, now, what about double predestination? Well, if I understand grace properly and biblical anthropology, man is fallen and they are all destined for hell in virtue of their sovereign, I'm sorry, in virtue of their fallen nature.

They have rebelled against God, they're guilty and deserve punishment. Everybody's already destined there. God didn't predestined that to happen in the sense that most people, it is like he's choosing this person to sin so he can just send him to hell.

God doesn't, is not the author of sin, not the author of evil. Okay, he doesn't tempt us in James chapter one. The fact is you got mankind on a super highway to hell.

That's their destiny. And then God intervenes to rescue some. Why he rescues some and not all is another issue, I don't know.

But those that are going to hell are already going to hell. And he chooses, and at least this is one way of characterizing this issue. There are different ways that people are characterized.

This is what I'm most comfortable with. Human beings are already on their way to hell because of the fall. And God is graciously saving some people who don't need to be saved.

Does that mean he's not saving the others? Yes, does that mean that they're going to hell then? Yes, but it's not because God did select them, it's because they rebelled against him. That's like saying basically criminals are going to jail because they didn't get pardoned. How awful is that? How fair is that? How is that good? Well, the criminals don't deserve a pardon.

If they get a pardon, it's an act of grace that they don't deserve. So God rescues a group for his own purposes according to the kind intention of his will, Ephesians 1, and then he lets the others go. And where they're going is where they're always headed.

And that is to judgment for their crimes against him. So those that get judged get judged, they get a judgment they deserve, and those that get forgiveness get a grace they did not deserve. That's good.

God is rescuing some as a result of his kindness. Okay? So it can be characterized in ugly terms like double predestination. But this is actually an act of grace where God rescues, at least some.

And why would God be faulted for rescuing some? He's not causing them to go to hell. Hell is the destination that they deserve in light of their chosen rebellion. So, I mean, there's two steps here.

One is let's figure out what the Bible teaches first, not worrying about the troubles, what we don't like, what bothers us. And then once we determine that, then we can ask ourselves the questions, okay, how are we to understand this other thing in light of what we've just learned? And I think the best way to understand this particular issue is God rescues some and allows the rest to go where they're already headed to a just judgment. Well, I'm just going to take, I'll tell you Maggie how I'm going to take your question here, because with that whole background and framework, then I think what I want to respond to in this is the idea that this person is vocally dismissing, quote, vocally dismissing many non-believers as loss causes.

And I just want to say that is not the reformed physician. If I'm understanding what you're saying, if what you're saying is he is saying, well, they're not elect. So therefore, I'm not going to bother telling them the gospel.

That's not how it works. We don't know who the elect are. Obviously, there was a time when he wasn't saved.

And what if someone said, well, he's a lost cause because he's not elect. You don't know if they're elect or not until the end of their life when you see if they have believed or they have not believed. And we don't have that information.

What we're called to do is to preach the gospel because that is the means by which God saves people. That's the means by which he opens their eyes. That's the means by which they are saved.

It's not that just randomly people are suddenly saved or not saved. And then at any one point in time, if they're not saved, that means they'll never be saved. That's just ridiculous.

We all know that's not the case. So if he's trying to say that he knows who the elect are and who aren't. And therefore, that is not reformed theology.

We are called to preach the gospel. We're called to explain it to people. It's God's job to open people's eyes are not open.

It's not our job to figure out who is elect and who is not elect because we can't figure that out. It's impossible. In fact, this is the habit of reform preachers too.

You know, when you look at the last great Puritan, Spurgeon. All right. Spurgeon was very evangelistic.

He gave these big giants in terms of always calling people to Christ. But he was a Puritan. He was reformed in his theology.

He believed in God's sovereign grace. And in the standard biblical understanding of God's grace. He gave election and chosen in predestination, et cetera.

And yet this didn't dissuade him from preaching the gospel quite the opposite. Well, ironically, there should be the opposite issue with this person because think about it. If it's the case that God sovereignly opens people's eyes, then no one is a lost cause.

There's no one who's beyond his ability to save. There's no one who you can look at and say that person is so far from God that he can't do anything. Think of the apostle Paul for goodness sake, if someone were to make a judgment based on appearances.

Right. Yeah. He's a guy by Paul's own admissions who tracking down Christians in different cities and seeing to their execution.

So it's ironically those who think God has the power to open anyone's eyes that therefore we're free to tell the gospel to everyone and anyone, no matter how far away they seem to be. Okay, Greg, let's go on to a question from Brandon Earl's. I've often been told that certain groups believe in faith plus works for their salvation opposed to faith alone, such as Roman Catholics.

If that is a fair characterization, does their faith alone save them regardless of whether they believe they have to have works accompanying the faith? Well, again, I'm a little confused about the reference to Roman Catholics. I think that he probably meant that Catholics believe faith plus works. Yes.

So, yes. I've been told that certain groups believe in faith plus works for their salvation as opposed to faith alone. For example, well, that's actually not what Catholicism teaches anymore because you don't have to have the faith anymore.

According to Catholicism, you can be what's what Rauner, that's his first name, the Roman Catholic theologian Karl Rauner, I think, called, it's not unconscious Christians, it's anonymous Christians, I think is this word. But that is there are people who are Christians in all kinds of different faiths. There are Jews that are Christians and don't know it.

There are Hindus that are Christians and don't know it. There are Buddhists that are Christians that don't know it because on the view now, if you're a zealous follower of any faith tradition that translates into basically moral behavior, then God recognizes that faith in the other tradition as salvific and applies the blood of Christ to them. That's called inclusivism.

Now, this is a false doctrine. It is not taught in the New Testament. Quite the opposite, in fact, Rauner made the point that it was a thousand years into Christian history before anybody had that idea.

But since Vatican II, this is their view. So now it's not faith plus works unless you want to count. It's not faith in Jesus plus works.

Now it's just works because these other religious folk can be included. If they work right, even though their faith isn't properly placed, then Jesus' blood will be efficacious on their behalf. And I think the question here, though, let me see if I can modify it.

Are there people who have are confused, maybe, theologically confused, or have some sense that their works matter to God, even though they trust in Jesus and they're trying to do the best they can to be good because they think that's a factor. And certainly that's part of Roman Catholicism. But it's also part of a whole bunch of Protestant religions, too.

At least de facto, the way it actually works out, even though it's not officially part of their doctrine. Well, Jesus talked about a mustard seed of faith. You can move mountains.

And so I think there's a place here for a sense of flexibility. God is the one who ultimately knows. And what we want to communicate to people is the most accurate understanding of the grace of God as we're able to do.

And Paul says, if it's of the law, then it's not of grace, or it's either faith or works not both, not one and half and half. If righteousness comes to the law, then Christ died needlessly, Paul says, in other places. So there is a strong contrast there.

However, even in all these texts you have, it's peppered all the texts. I just read through John 6 a couple of days ago, the Bread of Life Discourse. The powerful emphasis on faith in Jesus, trusting in Jesus, depending on him.

He is the bread of life that if we consume, so to speak, that we will never die. But Jesus, the Father is given those to him that are his, and he will raise them up on the last day, and they shall never perish. So there's tremendous security in our faith in Jesus, rescuing us.

But then interspersed in maybe even a couple verses later you see an exhortation to righteous living. And of course, this is appropriate for saved people. And I think Titus chapter 3 puts it in the right order that God saved us, not according to our deeds, done of righteousness, but according to his grace in the washing and regeneration of the Holy Spirit.

But once that's the case, then it's profitable for us to engage in good deeds. Paul says, there's the proper pecking order. Okay.

And I think the same thing is going on in James chapter 2. But nevertheless, I'm sympathetic that people can be confused. Well, I believe in Jesus, but it looks like I'm supposed to do these other things too. So I'm going to try to do these other things.

And they're not realizing that these other things are appropriate elements of sanctification in light of regeneration and justification. They don't produce it. Yet I still think that the faith that is the foundation of the Herald Enterprise, even though maybe a little confused about works, is probably adequate to save them.

And this is where it's hard to tell. You know, God's the one who sorts it out. So that's good.

It'd be better. I'm glad. I don't have to worry about it.

But I think it'd be better for us to be clear on the relationship between faith and works and grace and works. And I'm sympathetic that for a lot of readers, it's not so clear in the text. The godliness without which we will not see the Lord or the sanctification without which we will not see the Lord.

These are passages in the New Testament. So, but I think that in the case of Roman Catholicism proper, I think they've gone way too far with their radical inclusivism, which indicates faith in Jesus is not even necessary. Faith in false religion is adequate.

And being a good member of a false religion, well, a good Buddhist is an idol worshiper. That's violating the first commandment. How could that be good? But nevertheless, that's the way it's characterized now.

And it really comes down to more of a workspace salvation in practical terms when you look at something like Roman Catholicism. But that doesn't mean that every Roman Catholic who's confused on this issue is damned, because I think there are many that do have a genuine faith in Jesus, but are confused maybe by some of the teachings of the Roman Catholic Church as to how works fits into the whole picture. So, there's a distinction between official doctrine versus what an individual might believe or the kind of faith he might have or how he views his works in light of faith or whether he's depending on his works to save him.

I agree, Greg, I don't think we can make a totally blanket statement here, but I will say that I can at least point to a place. It is possible to go to a point where your dependence on works will. What's what I'm looking for? Just qualify your grace.

Because in Galatians 5, 2 through 5, Paul is talking to people who want to add back the Mosaic law into their faith in Christ. And what he says is, you have been severed from Christ. You who are seeking to be justified by law, you have fallen from grace.

So, if you are looking to certain rituals or whatever it is to be the basis of your salvation, if it is similar to this situation there, then Paul would say you've been severed from Christ. The words he used right after that is, you who are seeking to be justified by law, I think something to that effect. And their act of getting circumcised wasn't just getting circumcised, it's circumcised to keep the law to be justified.

That's what he's arguing against in Galatians 5. So, it would depend, I think, on how the person is viewing their works and what their faith is. And you're right, Greg, all we can do is point to the principles of what scripture teaches about this. So, how an individual falls within all these things, I think you'd have to know a lot more about that specific person.

Well, thank you, Maggie and Brandon, we appreciate hearing from you. And as always, we would love to get your questions. All you have to do is just go to X and do your question and then have hashtag SCR ask some point in your post there.

Or you can just go to our website at str.org. And if you go to our hashtag SCR ask podcast page, you'll find a link there and you can send us your question. And all we ask is that you just keep it short. It should be no more than a couple sentences.

I always say it's the length of a tweet, but not everyone knows what that means. Hopefully you know what two sentences means. Two normal sentences, sometimes they get a little bit long.

But we love hearing from you and we love having just a ton of different topics that we can choose from. So hopefully if you've been waiting on that, we'd love to hear your question. Well, thank you for listening.

This is Amy Hall and Greg Coco for Stand to Reason.