The Full Meaning of Salvation

Many view salvation as a legal transaction, which means that it’s a mere acquittal from the consequences of sin. While forgiveness of our sin is certainly involved, the NT view of salvation goes far beyond this when it proclaims that Jesus came to save his people from their sins (Mt. 1:23)—not merely the consequences of those sins. In fact, in expressing God’s perfect, self-sacrificial love on Calvary, Jesus saved us from the ultimate power of sin, which is Satan and the Powers.

The theme is emphasized throughout the New Testament. For example, the message Paul received when he first encountered Christ was that he was being sent to the Gentiles

… to open their eyes so that they may turn from darkness to light and from the power of Satan to God, so that they may receive forgiveness of sins and a place among those who are sanctified by faith in me (Ac 26:17-18).

Through Paul, God was going to free people from the power of Satan, the “god of this age” who “blinds the minds of unbelievers” (2 Cor. 4:4) and bring them into the power of God. Because of this, they would be in a position to “receive forgiveness of sins” as well as a place among the community of God’s people. It’s clear that salvation includes forgiveness of sins, but it even more fundamentally includes freedom from Satan’s destructive grip.

So too, Scripture teaches that salvation is about escaping “from the snare of the devil, having been held captive by him to do his will” (2 Tim. 2:26). It is about being “set free from this present evil age” (Gal 1:4) and liberated from our “enslavement to the elemental spirits of the world” (Gal 4:3,cf. Rom 6:18; 8:2; Gal 5:1; Col 2:20; Heb 2:14-15). It’s about being freed from the Accuser, knowing that on Calvary Jesus disarmed the Powers and made a mockery of them (Col. 2:14-15). And it’s about being “enabled … to share in the inheritance of the saints in the light” by being “rescued … from the power of darkness and transferred … into the kingdom of his beloved Son” (Col 1: 12-13). This inheritance involves receiving “redemption, the forgiveness of sins” (Col 1:14), but we have this inheritance only because we’ve been “transferred” from one domain to another.

In Christ, we see, God did a whole lot more than save his us from the consequences of our sin. He freed us from our enslavement to sin and the evil one who ultimately empowers it.
Yet, as marvelous as all this is, it still doesn’t exhaust the New Testament concept of salvation. For the ultimate purpose of the freedom Christ wins for us is to allow us to share in the wholeness of a marriage-like relationship with God. We are saved from sin and the diabolic Powers in order to participate in the eternally full life of the triune community.

Our marriage to God includes being “seated with Christ … in heavenly places” (Eph. 2), made participants in the divine nature (2 Pet. 1:4) and blessed with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly realms (Eph. 1:3). We are given a new identity in Christ that replaces our old identity that was conformed to the pattern of this world. Through the gift of the Spirit, God’s own Life is placed in us and wells up within us like a fountain of living water (Jn. 7:39).

Moreover, having been freed from the blindness induced by the “god of this age,” our minds are now empowered to experience the true God in all his glory and to be gradually transformed into this glory (2 Cor. 3:17-4:6). Through the on-going work of the Spirit in our life, all the qualities that belong to God by nature are gradually imparted to us by grace—love, joy, peace, patience, etc. (Gal. 5:22-23).
God rescues us from sin and Satan in order to share his blessed Life with us in a marriage-like relationship that will never end. This freedom from bondage and the wholeness of this relationship is encompassed by the New Testament’s concept of salvation.

- Greg Boyd

I’ll define the Trinity… If you define God

By Jeremy Myers

The last couple weeks I have been working my way through dozens of Bible and theology questions which people have submitted.

Below is a question that made me laugh, not because it was a silly question (there’s no such thing), but because of how impossible it was to answer!



The reader essentially asked me to define the Trinity…

I want to know more about the Trinity. Thank you.

Asking me to explain or define the Trinity is almost like asking me to define God! An impossible task!

There is so much to discuss and talk about regarding the Trinity, it is hard to know where to begin or exactly what you want to know about the Trinity. So let me do my best to briefly explain and define the Trinity, and also explain why the Trinity is essential and important for Christian doctrine.

Define the Trinity

First, the Trinity is best defined as “One God who exists in three persons.” There are not three Gods. There is only one God. But somehow, in ways beyond human comprehension, God exists in three persons, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

There is no good analogy in creation, but some have likened the Trinity to the three forms of water, ice, water, and steam, while others have equated it to the light and heat of the sun. My personal preference (though again, it is a bad analogy) is how we as humans consist of body, soul, and spirit. We are one person with three parts. Of course, God does not consist of parts. Each person of the Trinity is fully God.

It is difficult to understand, but this is primarily because we are not God.

Explaining the Trinity to mortal human beings is like trying to explain colors to a blind man or sound to a deaf person. It like trying to use words to explain speech to a dog. You can bark at the dog, but that doesn’t help, and you can speak to a dog with words, but he won’t understand what you’re saying and will never be able to speak for himself.

Believing in the Trinity

So if the Trinity is so difficult to understand, why is it important to believe? There are probably thousands of reasons why the Trinity is critical to Christian thought, but there are three of the most important reasons. (Yes, I chose three simply because I am writing about the Trinity.)

1. First, the Bible teaches us that God exists as a Trinity.
No, the word “trinity” is never used in the Bible, but there are passages all over the place which reveal that there are three persons in the Godhead who exist together as one God.
We know, for example, that God is one (Deut 6:4; 1 Tim 2:5; 1 Cor 8:6; etc.), and yet Jesus, who most perfectly revealed God to us (John 14:7; Col 1:15; Heb 1:3) often spoke of His Father and of sending the Holy Spirit (e.g., John 10; John 14-17). Even at the baptism of Jesus, we see Jesus coming up out of the water and the Holy Spirit descending upon Him like a dove, and the Father speaking to Jesus from heaven (Matt 3:16-17).
There are numerous other passages, but the bottom line is that whether we understand it or not, the Bible teaches the reality of the Trinity (cf. Matt 28:19; 2 Cor 13:14; 1 Pet 1:2).

2. Second, the Trinity is important because it shows that God is relational and loving.
Christians believe that God does not change in His character or attributes. Yet think about what it would mean for God to not be a Trinity. If God did not exist as a Trinity, then prior to the creation of humans and prior to the creation of angels, God could not have lived in any form of loving relationship with anybody or anything.

Without the Trinity, God could not have lived for eternity in love or in relationship. The Trinity allows the loving and relational attributes of God to have eternally existed with God.

Other monotheistic religions which have no concept of the Trinity have great trouble explaining or understanding how God could be loving and relational. Why? Because for most of God’s existence, there was no one to love other than himself.

In fact, it could be argued that if there was no Trinity, there could have been no creation whatsoever. Why not? Because if the Trinity did not exist, then God would not be relational (because there was no one to relate to), and hence, there would be no reason for God to create anything with which to relate. The only way a non-relational God would decided to create being to love and take care of was if He recognized that without other beings in the universe, He was lacking or deficient in some way. But then, this makes God less than God!

A non-Trinitarian God could not and would not create, unless He decided to become relational and loving, in which case, He would be admitting some sort of imperfection in His being.
It is much better to believe what the Bible teaches, that God is loving and relational and as such, has always existed in a loving relationship within the Trinity. As a result of this loving relationship, God decided to create other beings with which to share the loving relationship He already experienced within the Godhead.

3. This then leads us to the third reason the Trinity is important: Christians love others because God is love.

Christianity is an outward, loving, relational-focused way of living. Part of this is because we believe in the Trinity. In Genesis we read that God created us in His own image. There is a wide range of ideas on what this means, but one thing that is certainly included in the truth of being created in God’s image is that we were created for community. Just as God had an eternal relationship within the Trinitarian Godhead, so also, humans are to live in relationships with God and with one another.

Satan's Great Trick

One of Satan’s greatest tricks is to convince you that the sin you are being tempted with is a very small sin. “This is just a little one. It’s not like you’re going to kill anyone. It’s not like you’re committing adultery. You’ve done it before and God didn’t strike you down. The joy will by far outweigh the risk. We will keep this one between just you and me.” And too often you believe his lie. You indulge in what seems like just a little sin, a harmless peccadillo.

One of Satan’s greatest delights is to convince you that the sin you have just committed is a very big sin. That same sin that was so small in the future looms so large in the past. Now he whispers, “Oh, you have sinned so badly. You have sinned so big. How could you have done this? You’ve gone and done it this time—you’ve sinned beyond his grace.” And again, you believe the lie. You wallow in guilt and sink into despair.

Do you see the pattern? Do you see the cycle? Do you see the sheer evil of it? Satan’s great joy is to convince you that the sin you are about to commit is very small and the sin you have just committed is very large. He convinces you of this even when they are the very same sin. Don’t believe his lie! Don’t fall for his trick! But if and when you do, don’t give him his great delight.


There is hope, even when you fall for his trick for the thousandth time. The terrible reality is that there are no small sins, no minor offenses. There are always grave consequences for recklessly disobeying God’s commands. But your glorious confidence is that those consequences have already been faced and met and paid by God’s own Son. There are no sins so small that you can enjoy them with impunity, but no sins so big that they can take you beyond God’s saving grace.

God’s Trustworthiness in Our Trials

What sort of God would place us on a planet where the circumstances of life so crush us that we determine that our only hope lies in knowing Him? Would He be a hostile God or an agape God, if He knew that it takes some deep-water days to bring a man to the end of his strength and into the glorious experience of Christ’s strength in him and through him?

God is not the author of evil. “God is love” (1 John 4:16). And remember, James 1:13 says, “Let no one say when he is tempted, ‘I am being tempted by God’; for God cannot be tempted by evil, and He Himself does not tempt anyone.”

Hebrews 5:8 says of Jesus, “Although He was a Son, He learned obedience from the things which He suffered” Amazing! Although I don’t understand this completely, I see one thing clearly: Undergoing tough circumstances is part of our conformation process.

Philippians 3:10 says, “That I may know Him, and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death.” A sweet camaraderie is developed between you and Jesus as you undergo difficult times together. Romans 8:18 says, “I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that is to be revealed to us.” At times, His agape love permits us to experience difficult times for our best good.

- Bill Gillham

A Prayer of Gratitude

If you are at all like me, you probably find it easy to pray those prayers of petition (“Please give me…”) but far more difficult to pray those prayers of gratitude (“Thank you for…”). Here is some valuable assistance from The Valley of Vision.

O My God,
You fairest, greatest, first of all objects,
My heart admires, adores, loves You,
For my little vessel is as full as it can be,
And I would pour out all that fullness before You in ceaseless flow.
When I think upon and converse with You
Ten thousand delightful thoughts spring up,
Ten thousand sources of pleasure are unsealed,
Ten thousand refreshing joys spread over my heart,
Crowding into every moment of happiness.
I bless You for the soul You have created,
For adorning it, for sanctifying it,
Though it is fixed in barren soil;
For the body You have given me,
For preserving its strength and vigor,
For providing senses to enjoy delights,
For the ease and freedom of limbs,
For hands, eyes, ears that do Your bidding;
For Your royal bounty providing my daily support,
For a full table and overflowing cup,
For appetite, taste, sweetness,
For social joys of relatives and friends,
For ability to serve others,
For a heart that feels sorrows and necessities,
For a mind to care for my fellow-men,
For opportunities of spreading happiness around,
For loved ones in the joys of heaven,
For my own expectation of seeing You clearly.
I love You above the powers of language to express,
For what You are to Your creatures.
Increase my love, O my God, through time and eternity.

Thankful for the Passion of God

The classical view of God has held that God is impassible, meaning he is above pathos (passion or emotions). The main reason the church came to this view was that, following the Hellenistic philosophical tradition, they associated emotions with change while believing God was above all change (immutable). Moreover, experiencing emotions implies that one is affected by something outside of oneself, and the Church, again following the Hellenistic tradition, generally came to believe God was “above” being affected by anything outside of himself.

If we keep our focus on Jesus Christ as we think about what God is like, how could we ever come to the conclusion that God is above having emotions? Jesus certainly had passionate emotions, ranging from joy to anger to sorrow. Many try to argue that these emotions were simply part of Christ’s human nature, not his divinity. This response splits Christ’s divinity from his humanity (a heresy known as Nestorianism) and undermines the revelatory nature of Christ’s humanity.

Even more fundamentally, one would only come to this conclusion if they started with the assumption that they already knew what God was like before they came to Christ to find out what God is like. If we instead started with Christ—allowing his humanity to reveal to us all we need to know about God—we’d never come to the conclusion that God is “above” experiencing passionate emotions.

The rest of the Bible confirms this point. From the portrayals of God as a compassionate mother (Isa. 49:15–16) to the depiction of God as a Father who is willing to painfully sacrifice his only Son (Rom. 8), the Bible gives us a beautiful portrait of a God whose experience of suffering and love can scarcely be imagined.

Just prior to the crucifixion, Jesus spoke to his disciples about his departure (John 14-16). He assured them that he would not leave them as orphans but that he himself would be with them in the power of the Holy Spirit. He told them that the Holy Spirit would teach them what they needed to know. He told them that he was giving them his peace, and so they need not have fearful hearts.
Then he said, “I have said these things to you so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete” (John 15:11).

From this we can learn two things. The first is that Jesus is full of joy over us. His prayer is that we would be filled with “the full measure” of his joy. Though we ordinarily don’t think of God or Jesus in these terms, Scripture makes it clear that we give God a great deal of joy!
This is illustrated in the parables of the lost sheep, the lost coin and the prodigal son (See Luke 15). For instance, the shepherd joyfully carries a lost sheep home on his shoulders and then calls all of his friends and neighbors to come rejoice with him. In the same way God rejoices in heaven over one sinner who comes to repentance. The Lord delights in redeeming us.

The OT makes the same point. The Lord rejoices over us with gladness, and exalts over us with loud singing (Zeph 3:17). He takes delight in the people he has chosen for himself.
The second point we need to learn form Jesus’ teaching about joy is that the Lord desires us to share in this joy. The Lord’s desire is for all who trust in him to be filled with “an indescribable and glorious joy” (1 Peter 1:8). The psalmist proclaimed that the Lord fills the hearts of all who trust in him with joy (Ps 4:7). The Lord renews the crying heart and turns “mourning into dancing” and clothes it with joy (Ps 30:5; 11).

Passages such as these show us the depth of passion that God has for us. Whereas the Greeks—and far too much of the Church’s theological tradition—considered this sort of passion and vulnerability to be a defect, in Scripture such features are clearly among those things which make God the supreme God that he is. They are foundational aspects of God’s eternal character and sovereign Lordship over the earth.

To suggest that the “higher” view of God is that God is “above” such emotions in his essence, and that such passionate depictions are simply anthropomorphic concessions to our limited ability to understand or due to Christ’s humanity, is to pull the rug out from under the most beautiful and exalted dimension of the Bible’s teaching on the nature of God. And, consequently, such approaches arrive at a view of God that is contrary to the view offered throughout Scripture, and embodied in Jesus Christ.

God, who created us in his image and is the source of all our strengths and virtues, must be viewed as being supremely passionate. Not only does God experience emotions, he experiences them to a degree that infinitely outruns our deepest and richest emotions. Rather than being impassible, we should see God as supremely passible.

For this, we are thankful.

Gossip

The ethics of the Christian should be equal to the ethics of the journalist And yet it is so often true that the so-called Christian will repeat the story, the rumour, the piece of gossip, which he knows perhaps only by hearsay, and of the truth of which he is by no means certain.

The journalist has to resist the temptation to write the spicy and malicious story. Too ,often the Christian falls to that temptation, for there are no hotbeds of gossip like Churches and congregations .

There are two things we should never repeat.

We should never repeat the story about the truth of which we are uncertain.

During war-time there was actual legislation to punish, and to punish severely, the person who disseminated alarmist and defeatist rumours.

The proverb has it that three things can never come back - the spent arrow, the spoken word, and the lost opportunity.  There is nothing so attractive as gossip, and there is nothing so dangerous as gossip.

We might well remind ourselves more often than we do that we shall one day give account for every idle word that we have spoken (Matt.12:36).

We should never repeat what we have been told in confidence, or what we have been privileged to see or to experience in some private moment of intimacy.

One of the great institutions of the Roman Catholic Church is the confessional. It may have its abuses, but it is infinitely valuable to have some place in which a person can lay bare his soul in utter ,confidence that what he says will never be repeated.

To betray a confidence is one of the lowest actions to which any man or woman can stoop-and , yet it is repeatedly done.

As James was so well aware, there are few things in this world which can do so much damage as the tongue (Jas. 3:1-12).

Let us remember the strict ethic of the journalist regarding the repetition of any story, and let us as Christians be no less honourable in our speech.

- William Barclay

“I Feel So Guilty”

I will go away {and} return to My place until they acknowledge their guilt and seek My face; in their affliction they will earnestly seek Me. --Hosea 5:15

I must admit where I am before I can leave where I am.I must own something to disown it, possess to dispossess! Many suffer from guilt. There are many genuinely afflicted believers who need the revelation that Jesus takes away guilt and forgives and that there is no obstacle between them and Him. However, there are several reasons why guilt feelings sometimes will not leave, and those are what are addressed in this article. For one thing, for all of the believers who lack understanding of God’s willingness to forgive, there are an equal number who only feel guilty because of what the revelation of their sin has done to their image; it is not genuine guilt. A fellow slandered a brother. 

Later, he began to think that the brother was going to find out. He then started repenting and repenting, praying and praying that the brother would not hear about it. He was so sorry that he had said anything at all. However, after talking with him I discovered that he was not nearly so concerned that someone got the wrong impression about the disparaged brother as he was that others might get the wrong impression of himself as a slanderer! The guilt was merely based in self-image. Sometimes guilt is just a feeling with no center, as if the enemy wants we believers wallowing in insufficient joy. 

However, there are times when guilt is not relieved because there has not been true confession, which does not consist of going around telling everyone what terrible persons we are. True confession is to God for an offense against Him.I have heard people say, “Jesus, I confess that I made such a fool of myself.” What does that have to do with Jesus? That is embarrassment, self, and flesh. If we were not living to men, how would we know that we made fools of ourselves? Proverbs 28:13 states, “He who conceals his transgressions will not prosper, but he who confesses and forsakes {them} will find compassion.”

Michael gives us some basic insights into dealing with the emotion of “guilt.”  This is a very important discussion for MANY.  Take to heart every word Michael has given us in this Day 151 writing.

I am grateful that I learned a long time ago that God wants to heal emotional “hooks” the enemy has gotten in Believers, as much as God wants to heal the actions we either committed or that others committed against us.  Prayer asking God to heal these emotional hooks is very effective.

Confession, then Asking Forgiveness (never Apologizing…that word is not in God’s vocabulary!), then Forsaking (if needed), then Reconciliation…this is God’s way for us to initially act when facing guilt.  But, often, the need for healing of the emotional hooks is what is missing in Christians’ lives.

Filling the Earth with His Glory

“But he was wounded for our transgressions; he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the LORD hath laid on him the iniquity of us all” (Isa. 53:5-6).

Every sin that man has been or will be guilty of has been whipped clean...forgiven...by the finished work of of Jesus' death and resurrection. Jesus by His death on the Cross bore the sin of "ALL". Until we have a proper appreciation and understanding of God’s accomplishment through the finished work of Jesus, we can never be kingdom believers walking in the reality of His life in us. We must have more than just an superficial understanding of the plan of God for humanity.

Man’s problem was sin. God took care of sin through Jesus. Man's downfall post-cross is his preoccupation with "sin consciousness" rather than "God consciousness"! Sin is not a problem with God because He has dealt with it through Jesus...sin is a problem for man in that it robs him of "God consciousness", and gives him a feeling of being separated from God. If we were more God conscious we would experience living in the presence of God and in fellow-shipping with Him our "sin consciousness would be dead.

Romans 3:23 says that “All have sinned and come short of the glory of God.” The glory of God is to fill the temple of God and PEOPLE are His temple...nor buildings called churches. Man was created to be a vessel to contain the fullness of everything that God is. We were not created to be full of self, sin, lusts of the flesh or the pride of life that "sin consciousness" glorifies and magnifies. We were created to be the full expression of His glory and to manifest His kingdom in the earth to glorify God.

There are two sources of life available to us as people to draw out life from, the first Adam or the last Adam. The natural carnal man receives his source of life from the first Adam and lives being "sin conscious", even if he is a believer. The spiritual man receives his life from the second Adam...Jesus...and is "God conscious" manifesting the compassion, love and grace of God as the Community of the Redeemed to the Community of Humanity.

Hungry Hearts

Every human being with normal mental and emotional faculties longs for more. People typically associate their longing for more with a desire to somehow improve their lot in life—to get a better job, a nicer house, a more loving spouse, become famous, and so on. If only this, that, or some other thing were different, we say to ourselves, then we’d feel complete and happy.


The best word in any language that captures this hunger for more, according to C. S. Lewis, is the German word Sehnsucht (pronounced “zane-zookt”). It’s an unusual word that is hard to translate, for it expresses a deep longing or craving for something that you can’t quite identify and that always feels just out of reach. Some have described Sehnsucht as a vague and bittersweet nostalgia and/or longing for a distant country, but one that cannot be found on earth. Others have described it as a quasi-mystical sense that we are incomplete, combined with an unattainable yearning for whatever it is that would complete it.

Lewis saw Sehnsucht as reflective of our “pilgrim status.” It indicates that we are not where we were meant to be, where we are destined to be; we are not home. Lewis once wrote to a friend that “our best havings are wantings,” for our “wantings” are reminders that humans are meant for a different and better state. In another place he wrote:

“Our lifelong nostalgia, our longing to be reunited with something in the universe from which we feel cut off, to be on the inside of some door which we have always seen from the outside is … the truest index of our real situation.”

I’ve come to the conclusion that the most important aspect of this Sehnsucht is a need to experience God’s perfect, unconditional love. A central aspect of what this means is that we long to know, in an experiential way, that we have unlimited or unsurpassable worth to God and that we are absolutely secure in this love and worth.

The degree to which we feel anything approximating this unconditional love, unsurpassable worth, and absolute security is the degree to which we feel fully alive and at home in the world. To the degree we don’t experience this, however, we remain hungry, out of place, and less than fully alive.
Sehnsucht is hunger for life.

We are made to perpetually share in a life in which we are perfectly and unconditionally loved, in which we experientially know we could not matter more to God than we already do, and in which we feel absolutely secure in this love and worth, for we know that nothing—including the loss of our biological life—could cause us to lose this life.


This hunger for life is the most fundamental driving force for our lives.

God's Sovereignty in Relation to Freewill

Dr. Henry C. Thiessen declared: "God . . . can foresee how men will act without efficiently decreeing how they shall act. God is not limited in the carrying out of His plans, except as He has limited Himself by the choices of man . . . God has set certain general bounds within which His universe is to operate. Within these bounds He has given man freedom to act." (Lectures in Systematic Theology, pp. 346, 396)

The learned Dr. C. Wordsworth touched upon it this way: "The display of God's sovereignty to the world is the end which He has in view. The end is always sure; for it is an end fixed by God. The means are left free to man. Men may choose the good, and they may choose the evil; they may obey God, and they may rebel against Him. This is by God's own permission; for He has given them free will. If they obey Him, as God desires and commands and invites them to do by many gracious promises of reward, then His glory is promoted directly by their actions . . . Whether they obey Him or rebel against Him, the end which is His glory, is always attained. His design cannot be frustrated by their sin." (The New Testament in the Original Greek, With Notes and Introductions, "Romans," pp. 195-196)

Illustrations:

Dr. A. H. Strong in his Systematic Theology presented an illustration which is suggestive: "The man who carries a vase of goldfish does not prevent the fish from moving unrestrainedly within the vase." (p. 363) The man, the superior being in this case, keeps for the moment the goldfish bowl in a state of being moved. He may determine, unhindered, whether he will place the bowl on the table, on the window sill, or on the piano; near the light or in the shade; etc. If he is benevolent we may suppose that he will so act as to insure the best conditions for the goldfish. And his will is overruling. The fish themselves, however, within the well-defined limits of their bowl, have a measure of free choice. They may swim one way or another, or they may cease from all swimming and rest on the bottom of the bowl or float near the top of the water. As food is available, they may partake of little or much or none at all. The superior creature, man, does not force the food down their throats nor determine the exact amount which each individual fish will partake of. If the illustration be shifted to pets of a higher order, the man may urgently appeal to their cooperation for their own good and he may desire a degree of fellowship with them, but still, while superior, he does not control their every movement. Yet their apparently free liberty is circumscribed by the very sphere of their existence. In all of this there may be a thought as to how man may have a measure of free choice but not thereby vitiate the sovereignty of God.

Another illustration, this one from the writings of A. W. Tozer, was presented by Professor Robert Lightner. "A. W. Tozer gives this illustration of the relationship between divine sovereignty and human freedom: `An ocean liner leaves New York bound for Liverpool. Its destination has been determined by proper authorities. Nothing can change it . . . On board the liner are several scores of passengers. These are not in chains; neither are their activities determined for them by decree. They are completely free to move about as they will. They eat, sleep, play, lounge about the deck, read, talk, altogether as they please; but all the while the great liner is carrying them steadily onward toward a predetermined port. Both freedom and sovereignty are presented here, and they do not contradict each other. So it is, I believe, with man's freedom and the sovereignty of God. The mighty liner of God's sovereign design keeps its steady course over the sea of history. God moves undisturbed and unhindered toward the fulfillment of those eternal purposes which He purposed in Christ Jesus before the world began.'" (Regular Baptist Press Quarterly, Doctrine of God, Adult Student, pp. 29-30)

Is Faith the Gift of God?

Another related point may naturally come up here. While the necessity of faith is recognized, still is not faith itself the gift of God?

It is true in one sense that faith is the gift of God, but it is God's gift to all who want it, to all who are willing to use it. Since, as is most generally agreed, the sincere offer of salvation is made to all, and since "whosoever will" may receive the gospel, it is evident that saving faith is within the reach of all. Such faith is given of God to those who desire to be saved. It is not given to all, because all will not avail themselves of it, will not yield to the moving of the Holy Spirit, and will not let the regenerating power of God work within them.

On the freeness of the gift of faith, Dr. R. A. Torrey said: "Faith is God's gift. Like all of God's gifts it is at the disposal of all who wish it, for there is no respect of persons with Him. We shall see directly that it is given through a certain instrument that is within reach of all, and upon certain conditions that any of us can fulfill." (What the Bible Teaches, p. 379)

Dr. William Evans said: "God wills to work faith in all His creatures, and will do so if they do not resist His Holy Spirit. We are responsible, therefore, not so much for the lack of faith, but for resisting the Spirit who will create faith in our hearts if we will permit Him to do so." (The Great Doctrines of the Bible, p. 149)

Similarly, Dr. Harry Ironside said: "Faith is the gift of God . . . All men may have faith if they will; but alas, many refuse to hear the Word of God, so they are left in their unbelief. The Holy Spirit presents the Word, but one may resist His gracious influence. On the other hand, one may listen to the Word and believe it. That is faith. It is God's gift, it is true, because given through His Word." (Full Assurance, pp. 98-99)

What Total Depravity is NOT and What it IS

A. H. Strong showed what depravity is not, then what it is, and then said: "Yet there is a certain remnant of freedom left to man. The sinner can (a) avoid the sin against the Holy Ghost; (b) choose the less sin rather than the greater; (c) refuse altogether to yield to certain temptations; (d) do outwardly good acts, though with imperfect motives; (e) seek God from motives of self-interest . . . The sinner can do one very important thing, viz., give attention to divine truth." 

(Systematic Theology, p. 640)

"Total Depravity" and "Inability"

A problem, however, may here present itself. Is not the total depravity of man recognized as an established precept of sound Biblical doctrine? And if so, how could man who is totally depraved-utterly sunk in sin and morally bankrupt fulfill any responsibility at all in the matter of his own salvation?

Man, to be sure, is totally depraved. Before God he is wholly corrupt, utterly vile and filthy, steeped in sin and undone.

But as has often been pointed out, total depravity in man does not mean his total inability.

Dr. James Orr, the noted Scotch Presbyterian, said on this: "The doctrine in question is, indeed, misunderstood when the adjective `total' is held to imply that every human being is as bad as he can be, or that there are not natural virtues, and even beautiful and lovable traits in characters that are yet unregenerate . . . `Total' here does not mean that every part of man is as corrupt as it can be, but that no part has escaped depravation or corruption (totus, in the sense of `in every part'). Sin is in the nature, and its perverting, depraving, defiling influence pervades it all."

(Side-Lights on Christian Doctrine, p. 97)

Prayer When Your Anxious

As you read this, remind yourself that the only thing that ultimately matters is that you are submerged in God’s love right now. Remain mindful of the fact that the perfect love that God expressed by becoming a human and dying on a cross to redeem you engulfs you, right now. Remind yourself that you could not be more loved than you are this moment. You could not have more worth than you have at this moment.

Remain mindful of the truth that this is not because of anything you have achieved or ever will achieve in your life. It’s because of who God is and who you are, as defined by Calvary. Remind yourself that this perfect love never began, never ends, is never threatened, and never wavers. As you breathe your next breath, let it represent your decision to breathe in God’s loving presence and all these truths associated with it.

As you breathe in God’s love, exhale everything else. Because God loves you, trust that if there’s anything you truly need God will give it to you, just as Jesus taught us (Matt 6:32-33). Relinquish (exhale) all your possessions, achievements, reputation, future aspirations, health, beauty, relationships, and anything else that could possible be a false source of worth and significance to you.

As you relax in the sufficiency of God’s presence, see all the things that you exhaled evaporate in the light of God’s ever-present love, like a morning mist disappearing with the first rays of the rising sun.
Notice what happened to any anxiety you may have. When you are truly present, breathing in God’s love and exhaling everything else, you may find that your anxiety is lifting, even disappearing.


When God’s love becomes our sole source of Life moment-by-moment, we will have no regrets about the past and no fears about the future, for we are fulfilled and are trusting God in the present. We learn from our past mistakes, of course, and make ordinary plans about the future. But anchored in the fullness of God’s abundant Life right now, we’re freed from the pointless, idolatrous exercise of judging our past or stressing out over the future.

The Ocean Of Grace

All is well.
Just remember,
Everything is perfect.
Nothing can go wrong
In this beautiful place,
This ocean of Grace.
You are part of it.
You are in it.
It is in you!

How wonderful that this Ocean of Grace, of Luminous Buoyant Love, is a Living and Personal Friend, a Very Special Someone - God Himself!  Our very own Dad!  In Him who is PURE LOVE we live, and move, and have our being.  Wow!  Cradled in these Oceanic Arms of Grace, our whole lives are swaddled tenderly in the One who is Perfect Love!  THAT is eternal security, THAT is eternal life, to BE in Him who is pure kindness, to know Him as He truly IS at all times - LOVE.  We rest on those endless waves of grace, lulled to sleep by the gently rocking, caressing Sea of Love Himself.  We sink into His depths and experience a peace and restfulness that is truly unfathomable!  We are at Home here in this Ocean of Grace called God!