Exploring Faith: Sabbath, Leadership, and God's Sovereignty

Well, there’s a lot in there, but traditionally, the reason why the church moved from Saturday worship to Sunday worship, is that we do know from the New Testament that the Christian community came together on the Lord’s Day, which was Sunday. And there they devoted themselves to the teaching of the Apostles and to corporate worship and the celebration of the Eucharist and so on. [00:04:57]

The primary meaning that is usually understood by the verb ‘authentain’, means judicial or juridical authority, governing authority. And so, if you have women elevated to a juridical position of authority, then I think you have a conflict with the apostolic teaching. Now, having said that, let me just add that people will often acknowledge that, yes, in the first century, Paul did prohibit women from holding offices that were of a judicial nature. [00:07:45]

I personally don’t think it is. I got in trouble in the denomination in which I was ordained, but I served for several years in that denomination, when the church had allowed and encouraged the ordination of women to judicial offices. My problem came when they passed a decree that all ministers had to participate in that ordination process. That’s where I have to get off the train, because I said, I have a conscientious objection to this. [00:08:55]

I personally believe He was. I believe that Jesus as the new Adam, did have the potest peccare, the ability to sin, the moral ability, the power, to sin if He chose to do so. And He was not already in the state of glorification where He would be non potest peccare, the impossibility of sinning. And so, I think that the temptation that Jesus experienced was real and genuine, and He had, at least theoretically speaking, humanly speaking, the human ability to sin if He wanted to. [00:16:21]

I think I can do that very clearly. We don’t believe that God’s sovereign government of the universe is reduced to rule and government of mythical fates. That’s what fatalism means. Now, nor is it determinism in the sense of mechanistic determinism, which says that the people are reduced to role of inhuman robots, that God simply pulls their strings, and so on. [00:33:57]

In the third chapter of the Westminster Confession of Faith it says that God has, for all eternity, immutably, determined whatsoever comes to pass – semicolon – but not in such a way that denies secondary causes or does violation to the will of the creature, so that Reformed theology, historically, has always argued that human beings, even in their fallen state, still have what was called a free will. [00:34:41]

We distinguish among at least different types of the love of God. We can talk about, what we call, God’s love or His goodwill, His benevolence, that is, that God has a kind disposition to all men. There is also, with respect to God’s providential activity, where God causes his rain to fall upon the just as well as upon the unjust, and in that sense it is not only benevolence, but it’s also God not just having a good attitude towards people, but what He does in carrying out His good works. [00:38:04]

The ultimate question of God’s will and love is that love, or what we call love of complacency, that’s a little bit misleading because when I talk to you about complacency, people mean ‘well, I’m feeling complacent, I’m at ease, I can put my feet up and relax.’ That’s not what the love of complacency means theologically. The love of complacency is that love that God has for Christ and for all those who are in Christ Jesus. [00:39:09]

The question is not, when did you become a Christian, it’s are you a Christian. You have already articulated, Peter, that you are a believer and you know Whom you have believed, and you know that you put your trust in Christ. It’s just not all that significant knowing when that day occurred. God bless you. [00:12:49]

Regeneration is instantaneous. You’re not partially regenerate, you’re not partially born again. You either are born again or you aren’t. And so, there is a moment in which you move from being a non-believer to a believer, but we have to make a distinction between the actual conversion and the experience of that conversion. In fact, people may be converted before they are aware of their conversion, whereas other people never know at what time they were converted. [00:13:19]

I believe that a miracle is something that is done in the outward perceivable world, that only God can do. It is an action contra naturam – against nature, and not just contra peccatum – against sin, but against nature. I say, in that narrow sense, I believe that the sign gifts have ceased, for this simple reason, that in the New Testament, the signs were given to authenticate the credentials of agents of revelation, just as they were in the Old Testament. [00:20:26]

The supernatural signs were given to the prophets to confirm that they were teachers sent from God. Just like Nicodemus, I think, he was sound when he said to Jesus, ‘Teacher we know that you are a teacher sent from God or You would not be able to do the things that You do.’ And the New Testament, when trying to authenticate and vindicate it’s claim to final revelation, appeals to those sign gifts that were wrought by the agents of revelation in the new covenant, namely the apostles. [00:21:08]