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1689 Baptist Confession Chapter 9: Of Free Will - Commentary

Simon Wartanian | 25,153 views | 16,462 words | 1:25:57 hours | 04 March 2015 21:41

.../post/1689-Baptist-Confession-Chapter-19:-Of-The-Law-Of-God-Commentary/1038#Romans-6:14-%E2%80%93-Not-Under-Law-But-Under-Grace"see here). When we were under the law, either the one written on stone or the one written on the heart (see the Law of Creation). The law condemned us whenever we sinned and brought us under condemnation. But that power of the law has been destroyed for the believers through Christ. Now the law points us to Christ through Whom we receive forgiveness for every sin (Acts 13:38-39). We are now under grace. We are under the Covenant Of Grace whose promises are “confess your sins and you will be clean” (cf. 1 John 1:8-9). There is no condemnation for us who are in Christ as He was the One who paid by His precious blood for every sin we would commit (Rom. 8:1). How different than the covenant of works! The one condemns and administers death and condemnation; the other administers righteousness and eternal glory (2 Cor. 3:7-11). Thus those who are under sin and “continue in sin” are under the bondage and condemnation of the law, that will only bring death (Rom. 6:16, 23), impurity, lawlessness (Rom. 6:19), and shame (Rom. 6:21). But Paul bursts into thanks to God for His amazing grace:

Rom. 6:16-18 Do you not know that if you present yourselves to anyone as obedient slaves, you are slaves of the one whom you obey, either of sin, which leads to death, or of obedience, which leads to righteousness? 17 But thanks be to God, that you who were once slaves of sin have become obedient from the heart to the standard of teaching to which you were committed, 18 and, having been set free from sin, have become slaves of righteousness.

Glory be to the Sovereign Who has freed us from our slavery to sin. We would have never come to Christ through our free will because our will was only free to do what accords with our desires, which at that time was only sin (Rom. 14:23; 2 Tim. 2:24-26; Eph. 2:1-3). But it is God who has bought us from the slave market of sin and made us slaves of Himself. We no longer are under the harsh dominion of sin, but are under the dominion of the gracious God Who saved us. It is an axiom that whoever or whatever we obey and love the most, to that we are slaves. So, when we were in the State of Sin, we were obedient to sin and thus were slaves of sin. But now thanks be to God, we have become and are becoming more obedient to God. We have been set free from sin and now we have a new goal: we now, thanks to the new nature, want to be slaves of righteousness and no longer slaves of sin. We want God to rule in our lives. We want to produce fruit in keeping with our repentance and demonstrate our love for God by being obedient slaves to Him and not defy Him through sin. We no longer want to be ashamed of the things that we did before we came to Christ, but we want to be obedient slaves of God and produce fruit which is consistent with our new nature, which does not lead to death, but instead to life eternal with God! (Rom. 6:21-22)

Rom. 6:14 For sin will have no dominion over you, since you are not under law but under grace.

Thanks be to God!

Remaining Corruptions

The fact that we have been freed from the dominion of sin does not mean that we no longer sin. If we claim that we no longer sin, we disqualify ourselves from being Christians (1 John 1:7). We do sadly sin, but this is because of the remaining corruption in us and the sinful world around us. Paul says that there is still an aspect ...

1689 Baptist Confession Chapter 12: Of Adoption - Commentary

Simon Wartanian | 13,436 views | 2,439 words | 0:12:42 hours | 04 March 2015 21:56

The 1689 Second Baptist Confession Of Faith Confession Commentary Reformed Baptist Chapter 12 Chapter Twelve Adoption Children Of God

...adoption into God’s family is possible. Yes, there is indeed a sense in which all are children of God in that He has created them, but the Bible never focuses on that (Acts 17:26-27). The New Testament, again and again, speaks about our adoption into God’s family-centered in Jesus Christ our Lord. Paul says in Galatians 3:26 that it is in Christ that we are children of God. It is not that we simply are His creation, but we are children and we are adopted into God’s family in Christ and through faith. Thus, the faithless are not admitted into God’s family. This privilege is only in Christ and through faith. This is a blessed privilege in virtue of the Covenant Of Grace and not the Covenant of Works in Adam for all men.

We are made children by regeneration. We are spiritually born of God and thus in this way and through Christ, we are rightly children of God. We are adopted and received as children through faith and regeneration (John 1:12-13). It was God’s purpose even before the foundation of the world that we would be welcomed into His family through Christ (Eph. 1:5). God predestined us for the grace and privilege of adoption. God elected us so that we would be His children for the glory of His holy Name and the praise of His grace. It was God’s purpose that we would be redeemed and cleansed from sin so that we would be adopted into His fold through Christ (Gal. 4:4-5). Through Christ we are made heirs of God’s promises, we are made true children of Abraham through faith and thus the Abrahamic promises have their fulfillment in the Jewish and Gentile believers in Christ (Gal. 3:29; 2 Cor. 1:20). As Christ is the rightful heir of everything (Heb. 1:2), so we who are in the Son are heirs to what the Lord Jesus is an heir. We are co-heirs with the Lord (Rom. 8:17). In and through Christ we are made the true Israel of God (Gal. 6:16). The Lord says that He is the True Vine (John 15:1-2), which was a clear picture of Israel (e.g. Hos 10:1) and that we are in Him. If Jesus is the true Israel and we are in Him, then we are the Israel of God, Jewish and Gentile believers in the Messiah, not unbelieving ethnic Jews.

The Liberties and Privileges

With our adoption into God’s family, we by amazing grace receive abundant privileges and graces, which we could have never deserved.

His name

We have God’s name upon us. The book of Revelation describes the believers as having the Father’s name upon their foreheads in contrast to those who have the mark of the Beast on their forehead (Rev. 3:12; 14:1; 22:4). To have His name upon us means that we belong to Him. We are His possessions. We are His children. He lays His claim especially upon us. We are welcomed into His family and the Lord Jesus, our precious and loving Savior, becomes our elder brother (cf. Rom. 8:29). In fact, the Father has predestined us to be like His beloved Son (Rom. 8:29). It is the Father’s desire that the Lord Jesus be an elder brother among many more who are conformed into His character and image. We will be spotless and pure just like our Elder Brother.

Our being adopted as children of God is a great demonstration of God’s love for us (1 John 3:1). That we should be loved and cared for by Him is a great privilege and a marvelous grace, instead of rightly receiving the punishment that we deserve for our sins. We were previously children of wrath (Eph. 2:3), but now we are the sons and daughters of the living God (Rom. 9:26).

Receive the Spirit and Seal...

Hebrews 6:4-6, Apostasy and Calvinism

Simon Wartanian | 21,782 views | 11,271 words | 0:59:55 hours | 15 May 2016 15:27

Hebrews 6 Apostasy Perseverance Of The Saints Reformed Theology Calvinism Falling Away From Grace

...wen says the following on the phrase:

For of these things it is added, Καὶ ἐχόμενα σωτηρίας, — “Such as accompany salvation:” literally, “such as have salvation;” that is, such as have saving grace in them, and eternal salvation infallibly annexed unto them, — things that are not bestowed on any, such as are not wrought in any, but those that shall be saved; that is, in brief, true faith and sincere obedience. For in whomsoever these are found, they shall be saved, by virtue of the faithfulness of God in the Covenant Of Grace.^[2]

This is therefore proof that the things in vv. 4-5 where not things which “accompany salvation”, but rather the fruit of faith is that which accompanies and belongs to true salvation wrought by God in the sinner and that is the evidence of whether one is a true or false believer.

The purpose of the passage

We have continually argued that this passage does not speak of those who are true regenerate believers, members of the New Covenant and indwelt by the Spirit and then they fall away, but rather of professors who, from the outside, could not have been separated from the true believers and then fall away, reject and oppose Christianity. This does not speak of the people who stop going to church because of scandals, personal problems or the difficulty in believing in a good God in a wicked world, but rather speaks of those who have great privileges, knew the truth of God’s Word, Gospel and power, and even after that they turned their back to God and did not come to true and godly repentance. This is therefore a warning about those people who have cross the line. They will not repent, because God has set to judge them for their sins and not grant them repentance.

The purpose of the passage is then to warn professors in the church to examine themselves and not be like those described in the passage. Furthermore, it leads the true believer who is not sure of their salvation to seek the Lord for assurance and to examine themselves and their fruit. It is, among other means, through the warnings about apostasy that the Lord preserves His saints. Some object and say that “if it is impossible for the elect to fall away, then the warnings are useless.” I do not agree with that. The impossibility for the elect falling does not consist within themselves, but rather consists in God who works perseverance within them. Therefore, theoretically, it would be possible for an elect person to fall away from the faith and therefore it is not a brute impossibility for an elect person to fall away. But in reality and as the Bible teaches, apostasy from true faith is impossible because God preserves us through many means, including warning us to examine ourselves and of apostasy.

Conclusion

This passage does not, contrary to many passages, teach that true believers do fall away, but rather teaches that those who make a profession, know and experience the truth and then apostatize will be damned forever with no chance of repentance.

Now we move on to a passage with similar input. [Hebrews 10:26-29 see here]

Footnotes

^ Mickelson’s Enhanced Strong’s Greek and Hebrew Dictionaries. Taken from the TheWord Bible Software. G5461.
a, b, c, d, e John Owen. Exposition of Hebrews. in loc. www.studylight.org/commentaries/joc/hebrews-6.html#4 See also Greek Testament Critical Exegetical Commentary on this word here https://www.studylight.org/commentaries/hac/hebrews-6.html
^ “And for this [rite] we have learned from ...