Great Doctrines of Salvation

We are talking about foreknowledge today. There's three things that are, three subjects that we've been dealing with. Courtney dealt with election. I'm going to talk about foreknowledge today and then he'll go in and talk about predestination starting next week. these three doctrines really do kind of go together.

So as we talk about this I think it's going to help us to be pretty clear as best we can. on the relationship between election foreknowledge and predestination. So, I know you all have great memories. What did election mean? Are you God's elect? This side of the room is, this side of the room we're not so sure about. Sure, we all are. And you elect why? Why are you going to elect one?

Because God looked down through history and thought, Alan Tracy is going to be a really good dancer, so I'm going to pick him. Why did he pick Alan? Because he was better than the rest of the guys? His sovereign will he chose. And this is probably the big question. When God chooses somebody, did he do it because he knew, well that person, Holly's going to come to Christ. And because I'm God, I know that, so I'm going to pick her. Is that why he did it? Was that the reasoning?

It must be because you're all quiet. I think the best way to go at this, because We Americans, being politically correct, always want everything to be fair, don't we? Isn't that right? We just want a level playing field and we'll compete on that basis, right? So let's say, okay, God says I'll give you a level playing field and I'm just going to be fair. How many of you get saved? How many? Nada. Zero. None of you. Why? Why did none of you get saved? We've all fallen short. Say that again? We've all fallen short. All fallen short and the greater reason is because our father Adam fell short. and we fell short in Him. And Adam also has, because of his sin, has a temperament and a viewpoint and a nature that loves sin, loves the darkness, hates the light.

So if you start with that premise, what you have to come down to is that God's sovereign will and His grace, that He would even save one. Now I do recognize that when you talk about God's sovereignty and man's responsibility, it is that subject within Christianity that is very difficult to understand.

I'm going to read a couple of things to you. See how you should think about this. The Bible plainly asserts that the influence of God upon the unsaved must be exercised if ever they are to turn to him in saving faith. Do you agree with that? Everybody understand what I just said? That God has to influence man.

If anybody is going to get saved, he is going to have to be the initiator. No man can come to me except the Father who sent me draws him. The will of the creature is a creation of God and in relation to it, he sustains no timidity or uncertainty. He made the creature's will as an instrument by which he might accomplish his sovereign purpose and it's inconceivable that it should ever thwart his purpose. Do you understand what he just said?

You have a will, right? Forget the freedom part of it, but you have a will. Do you think that any time that any act of your will or anybody else's will is going to thwart the purpose of God? No. You don't think so? These guys over here aren't so sure. I'm not so sure. Because if you could, he wouldn't be sovereign. So how does that fit? If he's sovereign and you can't thwart him and you have this thing, will, how do you look at it from your perspective?

You walk around and say, well I screwed up but it was okay because God knew I was going to do it. Or, I can't make any mistakes so I can be laissez faire about my life. I don't really need to exercise my will, I can live sort of will-less, thinking that now that I'm a believer it's all going to turn out good in the end. Do you use your will as a believer? How many think you do? How many think you... probably not. How many are sure? Cool. Not too many chickens, just a few. If you do use your will, what do you think you use it for? Choose which master? You use it to choose who's going to control you. Or you use it to exercise faith. You do not use it to implement.

Do you understand what I'm saying by that? I can decide whether my old sin nature is going to control me or the Spirit of God is going to control me. I can decide and read the scriptures and say, wow, you know, God has done all this cool stuff and he wants me to respond in such a way. I think I'm going to do that. I think I'm going to implement everything he's commanded me to do. You can't do it. But you can implement your will. I'm going to trust God to carry that out in my life.

See the difference? Because the commands to do in the New Testament are greater than your ability to carry them The best example for men is when Ephesians 5 says, Husbands, love your wife as Christ loved the church. Well, the honest man is going to say, no chance of that ever happening. Right? I do love my wife, but to that extent, not going to happen.

Or, since you'd be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above. on things above and not on things of the earth. That's a command. Well, get busy. Call me this afternoon and tell me how it's going. Do you see what I'm saying? The commands of the New Testament are beyond your capacity and your own strength to do. But you can exercise your will to have the Spirit of God implement that in your life. That's where your will comes in. You can believe Him. Faith is a matter of will.

You see that? Not implementation. Is that okay? Steve? So if God is not willing that any should perish, does he draw everybody? What do you think? The whosoever will is there. Everybody agree to that? He sets it up so that everybody is, put it this way, the opportunity is there for every single human being, right? But how come all don't come? They choose not to. They choose not to. Well, do they even get to the point where they have a choice? Yeah, they do. According to Romans 1, they do.

They have a choice to honor God as God and be thankful. And God says, hey, you're without excuse, because I've revealed myself to you in my creation and in your conscience. You can choose to honor me as God, or you can choose not to. You can choose to be thankful, or you can choose not to. But that isn't salvation.

Steve says, well, how about whosoever will may come? The option is always there, but what the Word of God says is that only those that the Father draws comes. How come? Why is it that way? Is it God's problem, or is it man's problem? What do you think?

God doesn't have too many problems. He's only got two or three, you and me and one other guy. So is it a situation where God is just, you know, just didn't choose everybody? Or is it, does He say, okay, here it is, I will that none should perish, whosoever will may come. But only those I've chosen do come.

Right? So at the Great White Throne Judgment, you know, my buddy who lives across the street over here is going to stand up before God and say, well, I don't know why you're picking on me. You didn't choose me. Has he got a legitimate argument? Not if you consider that God is infinitely holy, just, right, and good. That's right.

See, I think what we don't realize is that my buddy across the street who shows up at the Great White Throne Judgment and he's not saved. You know what his attitude is going to be there? It's a good thing you didn't pick me because I wouldn't have come then and I'm not coming now. I don't want anything to do with you.

So who's responsible there? The man is. God says whosoever will. I've made all the provision. I've crucified my son. It's all done. All you have to do is believe. No, I don't think I will. So why would he pick Steve then? Why did he pick Steve? Maybe Steve knows. You guys keep getting farther away from me. We'll get more people and I'll have to move back.

When exercising his will, man is conscious only of his freedom of action. He determines his course by circumstances, but God is the author of circumstances. Man is impelled by emotions, but God is able to originate and to control every human emotion. Man prides himself that he is governed by experienced judgment. But God is able to foster each and every thought or determination of the human mind. God will mold and direct in all secondary causes until his own eternal purpose is realized.

It's pretty cool, isn't it? So, what should this kind of language instill in you? Well, you know, gee, God is, you know, my life isn't going like that. I'm making these decisions. I'm going here and I'm doing that. And I am very seldom aware that God is even in the neighborhood. Or, it should be very exciting news that God is that way. Would it be exciting to know that he is that sovereign?

See, we think that if God doesn't choose one, that he's somehow not cool. That he doesn't love everybody. That he isn't, again, he isn't fair. Because if I got saved and I didn't deserve it, that means the guy sitting next to me who doesn't deserve it, he should get saved too, right?

He had the same choice. He had the ability to make the same choice that you did. He just decided not to do it. He decided, yeah. He may not even have been presented with the gospel. He may not. Does that mean he got shortchanged in this fairness deal? No, because you have to start with the premise of who man is.

None seek after God. Like Truce said, none are holy. Not one seek after God. Not a single one. None. And that's where you have to start. So it's only God's grace and mercy that causes God to save one person. Well, that's not hardly worth it. In my mind, if my son dies on the cross to pay the penalty for your sins and we only save a couple, is that worth it? Yeah, it is. If you're the only one, it would have been worth it.

So, I think we got to question three last week. Try and explain the difference when defining man's knowledge and God's foreknowledge. How would you describe the difference? Question number three. Define man's knowledge. How do you learn things? What's the process you go through? By observation. We study. We have experiences. We even have a thing called revelation. Typically it's by past events. Sure, by past events and what we have experienced. And that's how we look at everything. Can man predict the future based on the knowledge that he's obtained? Sometimes. Is he absolutely certain every time? I've talked about Yuvaldo Jimenez. He hasn't lost since last Sunday. I said he was going to win and he did. But if you guys were betting the farm on some of those political elections this week, you lost a few.

So man can He can predict outcomes in some respects, but not with certainty. Now, God's foreknowledge is not limited to the outcome of events. Do you understand that? He's not limited to that. He foreknows because he foreordained. His foreknowledge is not dependent on one that has to wait upon events, but the knowledge which God has is from his eternal purpose.

The best way I know, and I explained this last week, because we think sequentially in time, right? I have this thought, and then I have this thought, and then I have this thought, and maybe I remember those two, but not at the same time I'm having this thought. We think sequentially. God doesn't think like that.

He has all knowledge in play right now. All the knowledge, all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge are in Christ and they are in play right now. All history, all future, all everything is in play right now. That's a hard concept to get your arms around, but when you're dealing and comparing my knowledge and my ability to predict future events with who God is, God is different than me.

So what does the statement mean that God foreknew us? Question four. God foreknew Katie. What does that mean? Because of redemption he knew Katie as his own, personally. He knew Katie to be his own personally. You understand that? It does not mean that he knew what Katie would do, although he didn't know that. What this word means is that he knew Katie personally before the foundations of eternity. That's kind of scary, isn't it? And he loved her then. And he created her then. In his mind. And once he did it, it was a certainty. Now, I don't know if you guys ever read this thing called Interior to All? I'm going to read this to you, it's kind of cool.

Once upon eternity there was but infinite non-existence. No atom, A-T-O-N, no universe, no world, nothing, nothing, nothing but God. The eternal triunity of love, God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. For thus saith the High and Lofty One who inhabits eternity, whose name is Holy. contrary to fickle scientific theories, the time and space in the universe is eternal. Let your heart, dear friend, draw back there and contemplate the beloved Son eternally in the bosom of the loving Father, receiving and reciprocating that divine love in all its unutterable purity and ardor in the spirit of love. Back there in eternity, before anything had been brought into being, environed in the pure essence of divine life, light and love, in the mind of the Father, in the heart of the Son, in the hands of the Spirit, by and for his love, God conceived you. You. Thought of in eternity past, brought forth in time, for eternity future, forever loved. How about those apples?

That's pretty cool, isn't it? In the secret place of the Most High, in the bosom of the Father, before anything was created, the Father fashioned you in His heart of love. Thine eyes did see me, did see my substance, yet being unformed. And in my book all my members were written, which in continuance were fashioned, when it was yet there was none of them." Isn't that cool?

When the giver of life thinks and speaks even in eternity past, it's done. While he may not choose to carry it out immediately, it is forever completed. For he spoke and it was done. That which has been is now and that which is to be has already been.

Psalm 33 9. If you look at God and you look at his foreknowledge and especially your relationship to God from that perspective, it changes the way you view God. I'm one of those guys that I didn't meet the Lord until I was 35 years old, and for me to discover a truth like this just knocks me off the couch. That He foreknew me then, and knew me personally, created me in Christ then.

Isn't that something? Now that's foreknowledge. I wish I had some of that the next time I go to Las Vegas. Is foreknowledge just knowing how things are going to work out? I've already answered it, but you answer. Is foreknowledge just knowing how things are going to work out? What do you say? It's simple. Give me a yes or no. How many think yeah it is? How many think no it's not? Explain. Because you have the word just in there. Yeah. That's as good an explanation as any.

So God's foreknowledge depends on his divine purpose, and when you consider that his divine purpose was to know you in the beloved before, then whatever is going to happen sequentially in your life is based on what he foreknew before he ever created. In other words, maybe here's a good question. Was the sin of Adam in the garden something that God went, oops, I've got to do something to fix this?

Did he know that was coming? Sure he did. Well, haven't you ever thought to yourself, well if he knew that, why did he do it? Why did he do it? Why did he set it all up so it would be that way? I mean, if you and I were going to set up a universe, we wouldn't have had that hiccup, would we? I mean, if for one, we could keep our son home, he wouldn't have to die. Why did he do it? I didn't hear you say that again. It seems like that's one of the things you just can't know. What do you think? You think you can't know why he did it?

He got his love. Got his love? So he saw beyond that. He still loved us. I mean that's the proof of his love. He went ahead and did it anyway. Even though he created that. Created the problem, created all that. Was that the only option he had? I was going to say, it was the beginning of the sequence where he ended up showing his grace in no other way. Did everybody understand what Alan just said? It was a way in which God could show his grace in no other way than he can.

I mean, when you think about, he's not the causer of sin, right? But he wants creatures, he creates us with a will because he wants us to willingly choose him and to trust him. He didn't make us mindless robots. He did it with the angels. He gave them wills and then once they made their choice then he locked them in place.

But with us, even though we come from a fallen race, where the choice was made, Romans 5.12 says we sinned when Adam sinned. Adam didn't sin on our behalf, we sinned in him.

If you and I were Adam, Aaron and Trish were Adam and Eve, and they're in the garden. Would they have done what Adam and Eve did? Absolutely. He said no. He's not too cocky, is he? Would they have done what Adam did? Sure they would have. Why? Because they're just like Adam.

They're the same stock. So you're right. God, even though it looks like that was a tragedy, sin entering the world, God used it to even demonstrate his greater grace and greater love that he wouldn't have been able to do it in another way. You okay with that? Alright. When it comes to salvation, does God only choose those who he knows are going to believe in his Son? Come on, it's not a hard question.

What do you think? Maybe a better question is, why do they believe? Why did you believe? Because you were smarter than the rest of the guys, right? You went to Cherry Creek schools rather than Denver. Does God only choose those who He knows will believe? What do you think? How many think, yeah, maybe He does? How many think, no, He doesn't?

Oh, the whole room is chicken. The whole room is chicken. Now the issue is, again, God knows each one personally. It has nothing to do with knowing what you're going to do. It has everything to do with Him knowing you personally. He knew my personality and characteristics and everything about me as a person before he ever created the heavens and the earth. Isn't that something? So could you say that God's foreknowledge depended on anything in man? It's not. It's not.

Because God has determined the outcome of believers according to Romans 8, 28 and 29, a contradiction as to the context and motive of the passage. In other words, God foreknows what you're calling. He's also predetermined, which Courtney will talk about next week, what your ultimate outcome is going to be. Did you know that? Did you know that God already has that in place for everybody in this room? Some of you don't think you're so sure about that. He has.

And the Word of God, what He has prepared for them. Like Corinthians says, it has not entered into the mind of man the things that God has prepared for those who love Him. And most Christians hang their hat right on that verse, but they don't read the next verse. You know what their next verse is? But God has revealed them unto us. So if you read Paul's epistles, you're going to find out exactly what your destiny is. And trust me, it's way over the top of what you ever thought it would be. It's incredible what he's going to do.

So let's look at Acts 26.5. So what was the answer to 6? To what? Number 6. Are you moving on? I am. The answer is that God knew, it wasn't so much that God knew The reason people believe is because God, as belonging to him, knew them personally by redemption. He knew them and had redeemed them before they ever made the decision.

Just give us the answer, Mike, yes or no. The question is, when it comes to salvation, does God only choose those He knows will believe in His Son? The answer is no. The answer is also yes. Because all those that He chooses will believe in His Son, but that isn't the reason He chooses them. And God's foreknowledge is not dependent on anything in man. In other words, He is not limited to what your decisions are going to be.

Maybe put it this way. Some of you have been believers since you were real little, right? I mean, you've kind of always known yourself to be a Christian, right? Some of you have met Christ when you were a little older, like me, right? When I met the Lord, it was interesting. focused me on the issue of salvation and on Christ.

All the stuff that was out here disappeared. So when I made the decision to believe on Christ, in my mind, from where I sat, it was the only decision to make. Was I exercising my will? Sure I was, wasn't I? Was I being twisted and contorted and hammer-locked into believing in Christ? No, I did it willfully based on my best perception of the events and the facts that I knew at the time. Right? Isn't that right? And so I believed and I was saved. Well, the guy standing next to me may or may not have had the same calling. It's like the guys on either side of Christ on the cross.

Both of them heard the same information, didn't they? Both of them had the same opportunity, didn't they? Why did one of them say, Lord, remember me when you come into your kingdom today? And the other one said, nah. Why? They both had exactly the same circumstances happening to them at exactly the same time, didn't they? What was the difference? God knew the guy in the right would come, because he likes conservatives, on the left he doesn't like liberals, and that got him coming.

Why? Why this guy? He believed me. And why did he believe? What was happening? Christ was dying for his sins. He just said, you know, remember me. You didn't do anything to deserve what they're doing to you here. Because God called that man. That's why. He specifically called that man. Exact same set of circumstances, right? That man exercised his will to believe in... I mean, can you imagine those circumstances?

Here you are hanging up on a cross, you're going to die for sure, and your buddy is two doors down, and in the middle is this man, what do you know about him? Other than the fact that he's up there undeservedly, And somehow you know that he's different. And you say to him, when you come into your kingdom, remember me, and he said, oh, today, you'll be with me in paradise. Was that false bravado? Or somebody who, you know, just took too many hits to the head? No, it's the God of the universe specifically calling a man to be with him for all eternity. Neither one of those guys deserved it. people call him the good thief. There's no such thing as a good thief. They're both bad.

Right? So did God say, Jesus said, well I'm going to, you know, I know that you're going to choose me, so I'm going to pick you. No. Both of those guys had the same frame of reference. Both of them did. You alright with that? Holly's not sure. It's like a chicken and an egg thing. You're saying you have a choice, but then you're saying, well, God called you. So it kind of doesn't seem like a choice if it's already preordained. Oh, I see what you're saying.

Every human being's choice before the call is to stay in darkness. John chapter 4 says that man loves darkness. He loves his sin. How many in this room ever committed a sin they didn't want to do? Oh, come on. I'm not going to ask you what it was. Every sin I ever committed, I wanted to do it. I made the choice to do it. Nobody forced me to do it. No, but it's kind of like, was it Paul that says I do the things I don't want to do?

That's after he was saved. Yeah, oh, you mean before. Before you're saved. Oh yeah, okay. There's no struggle. One, you do them all. Yeah, absolutely. Every single one. There's no struggle in a non-believer whether to sin or not. There's no struggle at all.

Other than the fact that maybe, you know, if I do this particular sin, maybe the society is going to come down on me, or my husband or wife is going to divorce me, or the guy across the street is going to shoot me. But I want to do it. There's no moral reason for me not to do it. there's no influence on me. You see that? I love darkness. I love sin. You get really good at it.

And actually the world has gotten better at sin over the last 10,000 years, not less good at it. We're better at it than Adam and Eve. And for God to choose me and to call me in the circumstances I find myself in, for me to exercise my will to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, and just to do that, not to do anything meritorious, just to believe Him, it has to be of God. Because I wouldn't do it. How many of you were saved, say, past the age of 15? Did you do it because you just grew up that way? You had to make a decision, didn't you?

There was no fooling around. In calling, he moves those to believe to the saving of their souls whom he chooses. In justifying, he provides a substitutionary, efficacious savior by whose death and resurrection he is legally able to place the chief of sinners in as perfect a relation to himself as that of his own son. And in glorifying, he perfects all that infinite love has designed, the precise number that will be glorified will be the precise number and the same individuals, not more or less, that he predestined, each one will have believed, have been saved, have been perfected and presented like Christ in glory. Each one. Not one more and not one less. You okay with that? That's hard, isn't it? Especially when you read the Constitution, it tells you you've got free will. Trust me, you don't have free will.

Acts 26.5. Anybody got it? Whoever has it and whoever can.

If they knew me from the beginning, if they would testify that after the most straight sect of our religion I lived a Pharisee. Okay, so Paul is saying here that other people know and can predict who he is and what he's going to do because they've known him from his youth. What did they know about him? That he was a Pharisee. Because he was being accused of being something other than a Pharisee. But he said, these guys standing here that are bearing witness against me, they know me by my history. And they can stand up here and tell you and predict what I would have done and am doing from where I come from. That's another definition of foreknowledge.

All right, Acts 2.22 and 23. Let me read it. Men of Israel, listen to these words.

Jesus the Nazarene, a man attested to you by God with miracles and wonders and signs which God performed through him in your midst, just as you yourselves know. This man, delivered over by the predetermined plan and foreknowledge of God, you nailed to the cross by the hands of godless men, and put him to death. So in terms of foreknowledge, God determined the cross of Christ, right? He determined that Christ was going to become a man and he was going to die on the cross, right? What agency did he use to carry out that purpose?

Human beings. Now do you think that every one of those guys that were doing that were saying, boy we probably shouldn't do this, this is something that God is really going to be upset with us if we crucify this man. You think that was their viewpoint? No. They thought they were doing the right thing. The Roman soldiers that took them out there and crucified them, that was their job. Right?

The Jews that cried out, give us Barabbas and not Christ, crucify Him, that's what their frame of reference was. We will not have this man to rule over us. God determined beforehand that every one of those personalities involved in the cross would do what they did. And they all did it with their wills. Isn't that something? They willingly did it.

Nobody put a gun to to any of the high priest's head and said, now you're going to have this fake trial and we're going to condemn this man. Nobody twisted Pilate's arm. These guys all exercised their will, but the whole event was predetermined by God.

Every single issue, every incident, every thought, every viewpoint, every everything. out a lot in Isaiah 53, right? Sure. All the events. All the events. How many years before the event actually happened? 700. 700 years. 700 years before the crucifixion in Isaiah, everything that happened is already laid out there for you to read, including the attitude of the guys. So, I've got to keep the glasses on. So the cross of Christ was something planned and foreknowned and carried out, right?

Everybody agree with that? Revelation 13 says, And all that dwell upon the earth shall worship him, whose names are not written in the book of life, of the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world. Again, how can you say that Christ was the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world when he only showed up 2,000 years ago? How can you say that? Here's how you can say it. If God has all knowledge, all information in play right now, guess what?

Christ was not an afterthought when Adam sinned and Lucifer sinned. I have the same problem. If it wasn't foreordained, there wouldn't need to be a Jesus. Oh, I see. If Adam's sin was not foreordained, there wouldn't need to be a Savior. Right. Okay. I think that's good. That's a great question because it does test your mind.

If God would create this creature Lucifer, who was supposedly the most magnificent of all of his creations, why would he one day look at himself and say, hey, I'm going to do this thing myself without God. I'm really something. I'm going to set my throne up against God. And not only that, I'm going to talk a third of these other angels into going with me. Why? Did God determine that that would happen? Maybe, is God's foreknowledge causative?

If he knows you're going to do something, did he cause you to do it so you can say, hey look, you can't blame me for this, because you already knew. It's like telling my son, if you do this and this and this, you're going to have a train wreck. He has a train wreck and he comes back and says, Dad, you knew, it must be your fault. Really? If you exceed the speed limit on an icy road and you go off and hit a tree, and I warned you about it, is it my fault? If God says to you, I'm going to give you the opportunity, I'm going to give you a test.

There's this tree, the knowledge of good and evil. Don't eat it. You can eat all the rest, everything else is for you, but don't touch this one tree. And so you go and do it. Can you turn around and say, and that's exactly what Adam did. What did he do? He said, God, you know that woman you gave me? She caused me to eat. In other words, it's your fault. That's how the sin nature thinks. It's always somebody else's fault. All you got to do is pick up the Denver Post tomorrow morning and you'll see blame everywhere except for the guy who's doing the talking. He never says I'm responsible. OK? OK? Kind of? We get all tied up in the time frame. We think in finite time. And when you try to figure that out in infinite time, we get all messed up.

You know, that's why I think like that door analogy. I like that because at least it has some, you know, come, and then you go through the door, and then you look back, and you're in here for eternity. There's some transformation that happens in that, you know, we use our faith to believe and go through, but then we become eternally back-linked, our history to Christ, and we get all jumbled up in the time frames. You know, God knows about all this stuff, so yeah, did he cause it? Did he know? And we just, that's something we can't comprehend, how that's all in play at one time. When you say it's all in play at one time, that's extremely hard. You can't. You have a finite mind. You can't do that. So we tried it. And now I'm going back to when it did by an election. You can't explain this stuff. You know, and in some respects, we can't grasp a lot of this, I think.

Yeah, I would say this. I was going to say even to Steve's question earlier where God's not willing that any should perish. That's Peter talking to the beloved. And he said to us, we're sure. Here's another thing, and this goes to attitude. If you accept the premise that God elects, foreknows, predetermines, and you go at the Word of God from the basis of, well, I'm one of the elect, and he foreknew, and he's got to predetermine things for me, and you get into the Word and start looking for what you're predetermined to, it'll change your idea about God's sovereignty. Because the Word of God teaches what He intends to do with everybody in this room is beyond your wildest dreams. Like He says in Corinthians, it has not entered in your mind what God has intended for you. That is incredible, but if you read the Word of God, guess what? He's going to lay it out for you. He's going to tell you what He intends to do. He's going to glorify you with the same glory that Christ has. You're going to be in the intimate circle of the Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit for all eternity. The only thing we're not going to have is deity. Everything else you're going to be in. Boy, when you drive around on a gloomy day in Denver in June complaining about how cold it is outside, the glory to be revealed in us is so far over the top.

And you know what? There isn't one power in the universe that can change what God has already determined that's going to be true of Holly or Alan or Grace. Not one entity or power will change any of it. So the cool thing is to find out what it is.

It will really encourage you. The difference between election and foreknowledge. Election means that God specifically chose some to salvation. He creates in the hearts of the elect a vision of limitless persuasion to induce a favorable reaction on the part of all that are called, which reaction is rendered infinitely certain. So when a decision is secured for Christ in the individual, the individual exercises his own will apart from even a shadow of constraint.

Did that make sense? If it didn't, see me afterwards. Poor knowledge means that God was acquainted with us and knew us as his own before he began and before time began. So, last question. Is there the slightest possibility that what God foreknew would not come to reality? No. Good. It didn't take all day to answer that one. That is a question you should always have in the back of your mind, especially when your circumstances look pretty glum. There is not the slightest possibility that what God has foreordained and determined and known not to come to pass. And even your sin will not deter Him.

It won't do it. And sometimes it makes you angry because you think, boy, if I sin, I'm going to get God to change His attitude towards me. Sorry. No way. So you can do the matching yourself. Courtney will pick up next week with Predestination. So let's close.

Father, how we thank you. I guess it's encouraging to our hearts that we would know that you have had foreknowledge about us personally and individually from before time, before you did anything, that you knew us in Christ then. and determined that we would be with you for all eternity. How restful and peaceful that is to our hearts, Father. We thank you. We thank you for the Lord Jesus Christ and we pray in his precious name. Amen.