Sin and Lordship Salvation

0:00 All right, for the next two hours, we're going to be dealing with a number of important issues, all right. So sometimes I try to decide, when things are going on within Christianity or within the culture, how much to bring to the pulpit. But because of where we are, obviously we're going through the Book of Romans looking at all of the their force and the next therefore we are at just fits perfectly with everything that's been going on over the last week. So we're going to bring in that bring some of those things in in this hour and in the next hour. But what the goal here is to really I want us to consider Christianity and how it handles a specific thing. The other things going on are not the focus. The focus is on these pilological matters, all right. So let's begin with this, all right. If you were to write on paper right now, the Christian life is a life of what would you write there at the end? The Christian life is a life of what would you put down? How would you describe?

1:11 The Christian life is a life of what? The Christian life is a life of what what would you put down? Yeah, I'm asking for you to answer, Okay, the Christian life is a life of faith. Okay, so what do you say, Robert challenges. Okay, that's a good one. Anybody else nobody else wants to commit. Okay, Well, for our purpose here, there's probably a lot of things you could put there that would not necessarily be incorrect. But the thing that I want to put down that I believe Christianity will deny is that the Christian life is.

1:55 A life of sin. Typically, it is taught and almost every church that the Christian life is a life of victory. The Christian life is a life of overcoming sin. That is the normal way Christianity is sold. Before you became a Christian, you were a bad guy. Now you become a Christian, you are one of the good guys. And now because we're one of the good guys, we can judge all of the people who are still the bad guys. That's the way Christianity is developed. All right. So and if you were, and I think that that's very important. The Christian life is a life of sin. I think that that's what we need to put down. That is at least my hypothesis, and I think facts back that up and facts prove it.

2:39 So I want you to do this if you. Can try to write down five sins, five sins that you think are common within Christianity. I want you to think of things that would be very common in Christianity. Five sins that are common happen all the time within Christianity. The lives of blae levers. You can put down five that you were familiar with. Whatever, five sins. Just just think of five that are common that they happen all the time, continually, perpetually. Five sins. Five sins.

3:26 You can go your top five, go with your husband's top five, and whatever you want to write down. Okay, five, but just things that you know. I mean, you've been everyone in this room claimed to have been Christians for a very long time, so you've been around Christians, You've been in churches. Five sins that are just far more common than anyone wants to admit. All right, what do we got? What do we got? Self righteousness? Okay, that's idolatry, poor stewardship, corrupt communication, apathy. Okay. I think we could all find scriptures that would condemn those things.

4:06 Do we would? We agree? We can find scriptures? All right? Anybody else got any if they wanted that were different? Than that list envy, Okay, what gossip? Yeah? That those are those are those are common? Those are pretty common, Okay? Any others? Oh, pride and self deceit. Pride definitely is there? Coveteousness right, lying? Okay, I mean, come on, that's it. I mean, bearing false witness, coveteousness. I mean, we can just go with some of the basic ones, right bitterness, anger, unforgiveness, not loving your enemy, or we could go with a big one. How many Christians are holy as God is holy? Zero?

4:53 That's a sin because we're literally commanded. Okay. How many are as perfect as God is perfect? None? Remember Jesus in the Summer of the Mounth said to be perfect? I mean, you know the ones I'm going to go to. How many love God with other heart, mind, body, and soul. How many love their enemies? I mean, I mean what I'm showing is it does not take long for us to make a list that would say Christians of all kinds of churches, of all kinds of denominations, and of all kinds of philological backgrounds, do what on a regular and. Consistent basis sin. My argument for the next probably two hours is going to be this. Christianity has a reality that Christianity doesn't want to acknowledge, and that inevitably Christianity does not really know how to handle this reality. We don't sell Christianity with admitting that reality, do we? How is Christianity sold?

5:56 If you don't know it, everyone should know it. It comes from Second Corinthian chapter five. If anyone is in Christ, he's a new creature. All things what. Passed away? Exactly right, that we are in Christs, so that everything has become new. The old is gone. In fact, it is told over and over and over. And this is mind boggling, is that in sermon after sermon after sermon, what do you hear you have been given a new heart? At the same time, we will sing a praise song that says created me. Well, why does God need to created me a clean heart if I'm a Christian? Because I thought I was already given a new heart. On one hand, we hear sermons that say, hey, if you're in Christ or a new creature, old things passed away, all things have become new. At the same time, five seconds later in the sermon, it will still say we need to fight and struggle against sin. What are we fighting and struggling against. If we've been made a new creature and the old is gone, there would be nothing to fight against. It's this weird contradiction and it can be maddening to listen to. It can just be like you listen to sermons and at some point, I just like you could play a drinking game and you'd be drunk by the time it's over, because it just makes no sense. It's just never ending circular reasoning and contradiction.

7:17 So how do we handle it? Well? I could now this at the point I do have in my notes historically all the different ways Christianity has tried to handle this problem. Right, I can go and I've got a long list of all the different ways, and maybe at some point we'll get to it. But for this hour, we're only going to look at one way that Christianity tries to handle it, all right, and you know this way? It is called lordship salvation. Now, the reason we're going to focus on this is because of all the craziness that has happened this week. If I was to ask you to name the three most influential lordship salvation pastors in modern history, I think we all know who we would name first, Yeah, we can call him the og right right here, this book Gospel according to Jesus, right right here, right Who would be second? James Motgomery Boyce possibly most put R. C. Sproll As number two, right if you look at a list, right the late RC.

8:42 Sprowl. And I'm not going to mention number three. The reason I'm not going to mention number three is because he was removed from ministry this week because of sin, and he's attached to MacArthur's school and he's attacked attached to Liganier ministry. RC. Sprolls Ministry. Because it's not about him, all right, everybody understand it's not about him. Have no desire to mention him. There's news articles everywhere, It's been everywhere. It's this huge thing. There's been nine thousand YouTube videos made. Okay, I have no desire to get into that. But what I want to get into is the fact that his lordship salvation theology will be of no assistance to him now, and that what this brings up is that whether your lordship, whether you're not lordship, whether you're conservative or whether you are liberal, whether you are reformed or not reformed, whether you go to a non denominational church, you go to a denominational church. What is the reality of the Christian life? Sin? Now, if I look at the comments on Christian publications publishing this story, the comments have been absolutely insane. Basically a number a number one I could put probably rank them, but one of the main ones is no man who's

10:14 a Christian would commit such sin, so he's not saved. Now, that's lordship salvation mentality coming down to people who may not even know what lordship's salvation is. It is so infiltrated the church, so immediately he's being thrown out of the Kingdom of God because of sin. If anyone tries to argue against them, then basically you are a heretic, a false teacher, and you're an Antiinomian and you don't know what you're talking about, so you can't even reason with them. Okay, well no, I guess nobody says, all right, right, I mean it's it's ridiculous, and well that gets to another another issue. So what happened is fighting for the faith, which is Chris rosebro on his ministry, someone I wrote this long thing out about lordship salvation now they mention the pastor's name like fifty thousand times. So as I read through this and we talk about it, I'm going to do everything in my power not to mention the name if I mentioned the first Just the thing is, don't try.

11:15 To find it. Don't try. It's not about the person. Can everyone understand that it's not about the person. I don't want you to asking me about the person. It's irrelevant. Okay. I'm not here to condemn the person. I'm not here to judge the person. This is a philological issue. Does everyone understand that there's a philological element here. I know, as Christians sometimes we like the scandal, we like the personality, but the scandal and the personality is never the issue. The theology is the real issue. Right, So what do we do? So I'm going to go through what someone wrote and I think they bring up some very important questions and then maybe we'll we'll get into a little bit more about lordship, depending on how fast we can get through this. All Right, So this person who this started off this way. First of all, I am not writing this as a condemnation of the particular pastor, which I applied.

12:08 Right, It's we. Don't need to condemn it because the sin is already condemned. Right, we don't need to condemn it. It's already condemned. Now we can say that, yes, sin is the sin is wrong. But the issue is we don't need to heap more condemnation. The condemnation is already there, all right. The author goes on to say, it's actually the opposite. This is really sad, and everyone should agree, right, whenever sin happens, it should be sad. Now, my problem is already. Is in it weird how some sins are labeled sad and other sins? I mean, did we just not list a whole list of sins that we really do? We go, oh, that's really sad. That's really sad that that person's bearing false witch. That's really sad that that person is spreading gossip. Now, sometimes depending on the situation, we may but those sins happen all around us and in us, and we don't really have much of an emotional impact, does it. Hey, there's someone in your church who's prideful. Okay, right, yes, so already we see that there's this this is a common thing within Christianity. We'll we'll break that down a little bit more right, say yes, like, oh may okay, right, when someone as prominent as this particular pastor is falls,

13:41 Now the word falls, let's start right, start right, stop right there. Within a number of the Christian articles that I read, the comments, it seems people hate the word falls or fell or had fallen into sin. They loathe that word. There's a lot of people who do. And they seem to say that they don't like that word because they think it seems to imply, well that the person just stumbled or fell into the sin and they bear no responsibility. Let's just make sure we remember the word fall or fall in or fell is. Not denying someone's responsibility.

14:21 It's just it's a biblical philological term. Right. We talk about the fall of Satan, we talk about the fall of Adam and Eve. Right, it just means that we that we were standing in this place and we fell down. Right, It's almost like the idea of falling over or falling down. It's not saying that the person bears no responsibility and they were like they're over here looking God God and they stumble and it fell over. I know we can give that impression. And so it was kind of frustrating watching some of these comments. It's kind of like it's a common term, right, It's been used. It's not to deny once because whenever someone falls or sins, and evitably, what do the public want?

15:06 They go for blood? Right, They want the person. They want them exposed, they want it talked about, they want them destroyed, they want them crucified, they want they want shame, and they don't want any language that would possibly show any form of mercy and grace. They want to know every detail. They want it out. And it's like whoa. I mean, Christians come like they grab the they grab the hammer and the nails, and they're ready to crucify someone in the public square. It is crazy. It's like whoa, It's it's just a term, all right. The point is the person sinned, all right, So the term fall does not necessarily mean what.

15:47 It's not negating the. Seriousness of it. Okay, Can everyone understand that, all right? The tragedy isn't just the failure itself. It's the deeper irony and what follows. The sad reality is that the very theology this person preached for years, lordship salvation will likely leave him with a message of pulling himself back up by his own bootstraps. Now, I will argue it will not leave him to pull himself up by his own bootstraps. It will leave him possibly just done. Because those within the lordship world will typically do what to someone who does this, throw them out of the Kingdom of God, say they're not even saved, and just be basically do what with them, wash their hands. Well, this particular pastor, guess what how MacArthur's ministry handled him.

16:54 He just deleted it. He's gone. He doesn't even exist anymore. You go to Master Seminary because he you know, he was very much involved in MA just gone. Just deleted, not like a statement like, hey, we we understand that this is sin, but we are going to do everything in our power to show mercy and grace and restore. No, just deleted, just deleted, like it didn't exist. And you're kind of like, is is that the way do you just delete someone? Now? I understand deleting the content, but why wouldn't you just leave something there going? Yes, we are aware of the sin and we're going to do everything in our power to do what to address it in a biblical way by not excusing sin, but at the same time doing what showing mercy, love and compassion to everyone involved. Right, I mean, you can give a statement where you're not in it, but no, it's just gone just delete, just gone delete that.

17:52 That's not the way it should be done. Right, aren't we glad God didn't just delete David from the Bible? Solemn from the Bible, Paul Abram Abraham, because all these men, their sin is where God doesn't delete it, does he? It's right there and many and these men who do these horrible things then are talked about in the Hall of Faith in Hebrews, and you're like, wait, how did they show up there? Because well, there's a whole theological explanation for that. So I don't know if it's going to leave him pulling himself up with his own bootstraps. I think it may leave him as a man without a country in a sense that he'll just be everyone's just going to turn their back and do this.

18:36 I won't acknowledge. I'm not going to acknowledge. I'm not gonna do anything. Or and then sadly, though, to be fair, g just what others will do, because I've already seen it. This person. Not only did he teach the lordship salvation, obviously he's connected to Ligua in their ministries, what other theological perspective did he teach? Calvinism? So guess what immediately people who hate Calvinism are doing. Calvinism is the reason. Calvinism is the reason Calvinism is a false teaching, and that false teachers are the ones who fall. Are false teachers the only one who fall? Because I think I've known plenty of non reform people to fall. Right reform people fall, non reform people fall, Charismatics fall, Non Charismatics fall, Baptists, Presbyterians, Lutherans, Church of Christ, Catholic Is there any group that doesn't have these things happen?

19:37 There's no group. Why because the Christian life is a life of sin and so and so guess what. Some Christians will just throw him out of the Kingdom of God. Others will use it as an opportunity to attack an entire theological system. Those are what are we going to see? Christianity is incapable of handling sin, which we should be the experts in right And why should we be experts at handling sin? Because Christianity is a life of sin. All right, everybody, I'm going to continue to say that, right, yeah, you and we should be understanding because we all sin, right, and that's going to be very key in our in our Romans message. All right, So this person goes, what this pastor really needs right now are Christian brothers and sisters to come along him as fellow sinner saints. I love that Christians should come along with him as what as a fellow sinner and saint. Well, we are all sinners, but we're all saints at the same time. Remember that was Luther's idea that kind of confused everyone. How can I be a sinner and a saint at the same time because I'm a sinner what in practice? But I'm a saint in my position before God, right, which is I thought was the whole Protestant Reformation. But obviously Luther lost that war, right, The Catholics did not defeat the product.

21:05 Make it very clear, Catholicism did not defeat the Protestant Reformation. Protestants defeated the Protestant Reformation. I know that will tick off a lot of people, but it's just absolutely true, all right, And these sinners and saints should come alongside him to remind him that no sin can separate you from from God if you believe in the Gospel alone. That's the message of grace. But unfortunately, Lordship's Salvation doesn't leave much room for that kind of comfort and a situation like this. Lordship Salvation consistently teaches that before someone can truly accept the Gospel, they must count the cost and be willing to.

21:49 Give up everything to Christ. It emphasizes the person's willingness to sacrifice as a sign of genuine faith worth. How do you know your faith is genuine because you're willing to do what? Give up everything? Count the cost? And I know that because I used to preach that message emphatically over and over and over, because I learned it from where this book. The worst thing that ever happened in my Christian life was buying Christian books. Okay, I should never have done that. Okay, that book impacted everything of my Christian life. You got to be count the cost. Count the cost, Count the cost, Count the cost. Because I conflated which two ideas salvation and discipleship. I conflated the two and that salvation and discipleship are what.

22:51 The same thing? Because that's what lordship teaches right, Well, other than saying no no, the scriptures that call me to Christ for salvation is about grace alone, through faith alone. The scriptures that call me to discipleship are about what. Doing this and this and this and this and then? Is there not a long list when it comes to the discipleship versus Hey, you can't be his disciple unless you're willing to do what, Die to yourself, deny self, follow him, not follow self. And if you don't do those things, you can't be his disciple. You gotta hate mother and father. All those scriptures, Well, it's all due. It's a list of dos and don'ts is it not? Well, I have to do all of those things in order to be saved, Well, then nobody's truly saved. Lordship salvation makes you you've got to be willing to do all of this stuff. Well, if you're willing to do all of this stuff, it's gonna have a hard time processing what your ongoing sin, because how are you continuing to sin?

23:54 If you gave up everything to. God and you're denying self, dying to self, why are you still That would then call into your question to do what to willing to do that, which then would call into question what your salvation. That's where you will be left. Lordship teaches that before someone can truly accept the Gospel, they must count the cost and be willing to give everything up. It emphasizes the person's willingness to sacrifice as a sign of genuine faith. So here's the ironic question. Does this sin now prove that this pastor wasn't willing to give everything up? And for that matter, what about every other sin? The fact that someone sins after making such a commitment only proves that nobody can live up to those kinds of commitments. That's the irony of lordship.

24:50 You're gonna be willing to do all of this, but what happens People continue to sin? So then it should call into question everyone's willingness, which then should ca into question everyone's salvation. How does lordship get around that? Because inevitably, and you know what we do, And I started talking about this even when I was still preaching lordship, is that we had created our own system of mortal. And venial sins. I even started to talk at this point, my brain was still trying to process it. But even I begin to realize, wait a minute. The ends calls everyone to question my salvation, but this ends nobody cares about why. Right, that's that's that fifty of these are okay, one of these well true, Well the individual will do that as well.

25:54 But and lordship other people. Lordship is all about judging everyone else. I mean, lordship is all I mean. Lordship may try to deny that, but I'm sorry. Lordship is always about you tell, determining who saved and who's not saved. Why do you want that power so bad? Because lordship wants that power to be able to say that. Person's not saved, that person's not saying who are you? Who made you? God? And that's going to be very much a part of Romans too, which calls it at into question when we get to that in the next hour. All right, so you can already see that. That's just. It just absolutely destroys. Everything, all right, So let me read this whole thing again. Lordship consistently teaches that before someone can truly accept the Gospel, they must count the costs and be willing to give everything up. It emphasizes the person's willingness to sacrifice as a sign of genuine faith So here's the ironic question.

26:44 Does a sin now prove that this particular pastor wasn't willing to give everything up? And for that matter, what about every other sin? The fact that someone sins. After making such a commitment only proves that nobody can live up to this kind of commitment. Lordship puts faith and all our ability rather than Christ alone, and that makes the sting of failure that much worse. Now, what's even worse, though I'm a little bit I will disagree a little bit with here is Lordship will constantly say, not that it's our ability. Lordship will say the reason we do all of this is because God is doing it and us and through us. Well, that only creates more problems, right, because if God is doing it in me and through me, then what should be the inevitable result perfection? So then that just creates another broken circle within lordship salvation. But then the thing is, if you believe God is the one doing it for you and then you commit the sin that everyone thinks is the big one, right, whatever it may be, well then you know you're gonna be left questioning your own salvation, because then that would seem to call that God is not doing what working in you, which I think I'm so sick a Christian talking about what God is a doing inside of us, because it makes no sense. If God is doing all of this, we should be perfect. And if we're not perfect, then you're only an admittable conclusion will be God is not working in you. Therefore nobody is saved. This is where Christianity is fundamentally broken, and

28:18 nobody wants to admit it. Now they're gonna quote from the pastor who I almost said his name. They're gonna quote from the pastor who has fallen. All right, here we go. The gospel that leads to heaven tomorrow leads to holiness today. The gospel that leads to heaven tomorrow leads to holiness today. No holiness, no heaven end quote, No holiness, no heaven. So according to his own words, what does that mean? He's not saying. And if no holiness means no heaven, no one is saved because no one is holy, because holy is what perfection. So how can you preach a sermon and guess what he preaches that sermon and everybody's like a man. He's such a great pastor. Oh, he's the greatest expository of scripture I've ever heard. No, that's not preaching, that's insanity, that's propaganda.

29:28 That's straight up a lie that denies the very reality he had to know when he said those words, that he himself is not holy. But do you know what the sad part is, I used to preach the same stupid way. Sadly, I don't think it will now sometimes it does, But go ahead, as far as what no, no, no holiness, no heaven, Well right, no, nobody's going to happen, okay, right right now now, now, Yes, sometimes I do believe it a certain sin can wake someone up to their theology.

30:29 But I just think Lordship Salvation has been around a long time. And guess what Lordship Salvation has seen for it since its inception. Failure failure, failure, failure, failure, failure, failure, fail failure, failure, failure. Fail you fail failure. Okay, I mean if we go back to how look how MacArthur handled the City, I mean it's famous case now, I mean it's everywhere. The woman separates from her husband, wants to get a divorce because he's abusing and sexually abusing her children. How did MacArthur's church handle it. She got excommunicated, He goes to prison, and the and they support the man in prison as like a prison missionary, the man sexually abused as children, and they have yet to remove her excommunication. She's still excommunicated to this day, even after all the story came out. How is that even humanly possible? Or wouldn't you just simply say what we messed up? Is that hard? So we're gonna remove her excommunication even though we still believe divorce is wrong.

31:38 But because of all the you know, other circumstances to this case, we've obviously our judgment was wrong. Is it? Can we not agree that our judgment ex Christians is typically wrong, not always right? But no, no, no, the woman is still excommunicated, Like that's insane to me. How can she still be excommunicating for what she's turned over to Satan, for the destruction of the flesh, for leaving someone who's sexually abusing her kids. That's Christianity. So that's lordship not willing to do what to budge or to change its view. That's where you just have to go. Man, we gotta get this, we gotta get this right. I've been wrong before a million times, like every minister has been wrong, every church has been wrong. Why because we're fallible people, right? Are we infallible? No? So the whole thing.

32:43 I just but that quote is insane, no holiness, no heaven. At the same time, I'm not shocked to see that quote. That's standard lordship. Salvation talk, right, that's just standard, and you preach it. What confuses me is the people in the pew. We'll say amen. What are you saying amen to? Because what should ever win into pew? Do? Well, I'm not saved. Remember I talked about my friend's church in Iowa when they were preaching through the Sermon on the Mount, and he kept saying, if you don't obey the Sermon on the Mount, you prove your repentance is not genuine. Therefore you're not saved. And I heard the people in that congregation say amen. And I gave my friend a hard time saying, well, obviously your church is better than my church because nobody at my church should say amen to that, including their pastor, because none of us obey the Sermon on the Mount.

33:37 Perfectly do we? I can go to one verse in the Sermon on the Mount be he perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect. Does anybody obey that? All? Right? Well, then we all do what. We all fall short of the Sermon on the Mount because the Sermon on the Mount was never designed for us to be able to obey it. It was designed to show us our inability to obey it. So therefore we need faith and the one who preached it, because the one who preached it is the only one who could omit it. You see how that's a radically different approach to Christianity. So I'm gonna read this again, taking this pastor's own words, The gospel that leads to heaven tomorrow leads to holiness today. No holiness, no heaven. End quote.

34:17 Now this is the author goes on and asks this, but what happens when someone stumbles in a big way? Now I don't. Even like the way that's written. What do you mean what happens when stumbles in a big way? Shouldn't the issue be what happens when they sin in any way? Because any sin is what. Not holiness? Does everyone understand that any sin, the smallest sin, is not holiness? In fact, the smallest sin is what incompatible with holiness? Because holiness is separate, it's other than sin. So the issue is not what happens when someone stumbles in a big way. The question should be happens when someone commits the smallest sin? And I don't even like to use the word the smallest sin, but I have to use it so that you understand what I'm referring to, because like it or not, we have small sins and we have big sins. And I don't know why we condemned Catholics for that because we do the exact same thing.

35:18 What does lordship do with that? If you're going to preach no holiness, no heaven, well, then guess what you're saying, No one is saved. Does that mean that they miss out on heaven? If that's true, what does it say about Paul who called himself the chief of all sinners? Now, when Paul called himself the chief of all sinners, how does lordship handle that? Well? He was just very sensitive. He was just very sensitive to small sins. Now when he called himself the chief of sinners, it would. Be some times. I wish we could find some document where Paul lists his sins. But if he listed any big sins, it would blow everyone's mind. Right, if Paul is calling to him self a chief of sinner, there's a high probability that he knew of some sin in his life, right, probably sin that nobody would want to hear. We'd probably like Paul did want No, Paul probably wasn't saved. That would be the Christian answer, because because how did lordship get around all the sin in the Old Testament? Typically Christians will say something not necessary lordship, But Christians in general say, well, they didn't have the Holy Spirit, so they couldn't be as good as we can be. Well, that's just ridiculous nonsense, right, because Paul himself said do what Paul had the Holy spirit obviously, but they say that Paul what he says, he's the chief of sinner, it was no big sin like David or Solomon or anything like that, because we've got to minimize it. Right, But what did Paul say, the things I want to

36:50 do I don't the things I don't want to do. One of those things Paul didn't want to do that he did. That could be really that could be a big list, right, right, I mean there's a lot of things, right, yeah, right, for exactly, I know so then again some people come and say, well, Paul said these words before he was saved and all that nonsense. Right, it's just all it ridiculous. All right, So now let's talk about Now they're going to talk about MacArthur, all right, because he's one of the most vocal proponents of lordship and has made no hesitation in condemning other pastors who has fallen. So they named some other pastors who have fallen. For one of them, MacArthur called him a heretic after he fell, saying that his theology was an excuse to sin and that his failure proved he wasn't saved.

37:50 That was a good one for MacArthur. Then came Robbi Zacharias, who everyone thought was, you know, the greatest guy in the world after his Hidden Sins works, But MacArthur claimed that it proved he wasn't a true believer either. MacArthur has set himself up as an arbitrator of who is and who isn't saved based on moral conduct. So when some pastors fall, what does MacArthur do. Not saved? Now, this man taught in his very seminary, So is MacArthur gonna do the same thing. I don't know the way they just deleted him from. The face of the earth. They're a high probability the MacArthur will kick him out of heaven. MacArthur doesn't determine who's in heaven, and those who follow lordship salvation think that they have the right to make that determination. Probably there may they may just go silent. Who knows how it's going to work. But the point is lordship gives you you feel like you have the ability to determine who is saved and not saved, and lordship you I look, I've talked to too many people who hold the lordship, even people who've been in this show church, and you'll get the call and they'll mention a situation and almost inevitably, the question will be, so do you think they're saved or not saved? You're basing salvation off conduct. Salvation is not based off conduct.

39:16 Everyone want to write that down. Salvation is not based off let me correct it. Salvation is not based off our conduct. Salvation is based off the conduct of Christ, and his conduct is perfect. So MacArthur, what do I always say? Give me your test and then I will hand your test to whom Christ Christ passed the test, So back off, MacArthur. You're not God. Now. The only problem is wardship. People don't like hearing that. They get very mad. Christianity is about a change. If you don't change, you're not saved. Well, who gets to determine how much change determine salvation? They can't determine that, right, they can measure that. Well, there's gotta be some according to home, because that sounds like you are saying that you're saved by what, not in imputed righteousness, but in infused righteousness. The whole thing is broken, and it's sad to see how it plays out. All right, So here's the question, what will MacArthur do now? Given that this particular person was a figurehead at MacArthur's own conference year after year after year, this man was a figurehead at the shepherd's conference. Will he condemn this man as he did with the other pastors, or will he be the

40:48 one to decide, based on lordship standards that the sins of those two were habitual? Will this man's sin was a minor mistake? Will he pivot the standard he's used to determine someone else's salvation based on a personal preference The sad truth is is that lordship theology consistently sets up leaders to make judgments about who is truly saved based on outward conduct. Lordship salvation determines who saved based on what external conduct. What is my hypothesis salvation is determined by whose conduct Christ, not yours. I know that a radical thought, but what's said is should that be considered a radical thought in twenty twenty four? It's not if we believe in what happened in fifteen seventeen, but what happened in fifteen seventeen Luther lost. I just want to call Luther up and go, dude, you were an idiot. You should have just stayed in the Catholic Church because it's Protestantism is a complete and utter failure. Catholicism makes fifty thousand times more since than Protestantism.

42:03 At least, it's consistent. It teaches what salvation based off i'd infused righteousness. It makes sense. They admit mortal versus venial sin. It makes sense. Our system makes no sense. We say we believed imputed righteousness, and then we turn around and reject imputed righteousness outright by saying what determines someone's salvation. Our conduct. That's insane, that's I mean. If I was to tell people I'm just gonna go to a Catholic church, everybody was. Say, you're lost, your loss, your love. Why it's at least honest. You want me to go to a Protestant church that's more messed up than Catholicism.

42:49 I'll just go back to a Catholic church at least be honest with myself. The other systems are lying, they're broken. It's not Christianity. It drives me crazy the way this has gone down. As Luther and Calvin both recognize it's not for us to judge who belongs to the kingdom, what a shocking idea. Luther once said, the Church is hidden, the Kingdom of God is not visible to us. We cannot see who belongs to it. What did Luther say we cannot see who belongs to it? Why would Luther say we cannot see who belongs to it? Because Luther is the famous one of basically describing imputed righteousness as and I can't get too blunt. You know, Luther was very his language was not always very good, right, But Luther basically the idea is we're like, we're like dung and we're just covered legally by imputed righteousness, but we're still dung. Now, he got very, very blunt in his description.

43:56 He didn't necessarily use the word dung. But okay, you get the idea, right, all right? Who was being very much but we get the idea right. But Lordship says, we're no longer dumb. I don't need to look for the imputed righteousness. What do I need to look? I look to Sarah's behavior, and then I can determine if Sarah's saved or not saved. Well, you know what, that almost always then benefits That system benefits whom old people? Who does it not benefit the young because whose sins are probably going to be much more visible the young. Well, the old is going to bed at eight o'clock at night.

44:43 So yeah, if you're old, be Lordship, you'll think you're the greatest person in the world because all you're gonna look is at external behavior. Right. Calvin echoed this when he wrote, we cannot judge from outward to pearances who are elect or who are not. Such judgment belongs to God alone. The pastor who fell once said in the end. All that matters is did we live for the glory of God? Now that sounds good, right. All that matters is did we live for the glory of God? How many would say amen to that? I would probably have said amen to that. This calls us into question. But here's the truth. It's not about how perfectly we live for God's glory. If that were the measure, none of us would stand. What truly matters is whether we believed in grace alone, through faith alone, and Christ alone, the very essence of the Five Soulos of the Reformation. It's not our holiness that secures our place in heaven. It's Christ's holiness. It's not how well we live for God's glory that saves us. It's whether we believe in that Christ, that what Christ has done on our behalf.

46:02 Amen. That's and and of course this was posted. I mean, fighting for the faith is Lutheran, so that has very much a Lutheran fell for it, right, And it's just. It's just sad, all right. I don't think we're gonna be able to finish this. In this pastor's case. I fear the response from his own philological camp won't offer him the comfort he desperately needs. Instead of hearing about the sufficiency of Christ grace, he may be told to get back up, fix the sin, prove the repentance. But when the failure hits this hard, it's not something you can fix by pulling yourself up by the bootstraps. That's where he needs grace, not judgment. Now I know some people will lose their mind. He needs grace not judgment.

46:48 That does not mean you're excusing the sin, all right, everybody understand that, right, Remember the way it long gospel works. Someone who already is filled with shame, guilt and knows they're guilty, they don't need the law. They need the Gospel. The law is for someone who's doing what I'm not sinny, it's not wrong. I can do what I want. They need to hear the law. Someone who knows that what they're doing is wrong, acknowledges what they're doing or wrong, says that it's a sin. They just need the Gospel. Now I know that that's where you're gonna be doing. You're an Antiomian. You're an Antinomian. Okay, I'm so sick of hearing that word. Okay, okay, how about I think I think antiinnomian should be banned from Christian vocabulary because I don't think anybody knows what it even means. Okay, the point is, no, you're not excusing behavior. You're not saying someone doesn't have to behave. What you're saying is that no matter how well you behave, it still wouldn't be See, that's the problem we want to fix. Everything is about behavior in Christianity. It's behavior, behavior, behavior behavior.

47:56 Christianity is not about my behavior. It's about christ behavior for me because my behavior, no matter how good. Here's the thing. This man, before he fell, his behavior still wasn't good enough. That's the thing that ticks me off. Everybody wants to talk about his failure. Before he fell, he still wasn't good enough. He would still be condemned. But somehow, until he committed this one sin, he was good to go. No, he wasn't, because you're not good to go ever other than in Christ. Does that make sense. At one point, this famous pastor quoted another famous pastor, and it says, the greatest need of my people is my own holiness. That's what he said, is about being a pastor, the greatest need my people have is my own holiness. Well, I can tell any church if your greatest need is for your pastor's holiness, you are in trouble because your pastor's holiness.

49:00 Is a facade. It's show right. The pastors can demonstrate holiness externally, you don't have a clue what's going on internally. So this author goes on to say, but that's not true. The greatest need of any preacher or congregation isn't the holiness of their pastor. It's the recognition that neither the pastor nor the people will ever be holy enough on their own. What they all need is the truth that only Christ is holy enough, and we stand in His righteousness alone. You don't need my holiness, You need christ holiness because you're not gonna ever be holy. I'm not gonna ever be holy, but Christ was holy. For what for us?

49:42 Is that excusing sin? No, it's not to excuse sin. You got to repeat that a million times because you're excusing sin. No, I'm acknowledging the reality of sin. Whether I excuse it or don't excuse it. What's going to happen sin? Lordship's salvation shifts the focus to the believer's performance rather than Christ finished work. When a moral fall happens, whether it's this pastor or someone else, the theology doesn't leave room for restoration without questioning whether the person was ever truly saved. But the Gospel tells us something radically different. It says that our salvation does not depend on our moral performance, at rest on the performance of Home Christ.

50:28 So here we are. The very theology that this man preached for years now offers him no assurance. But the true Gospel does. Jesus declared it is finished. That includes this pastor's failures. It includes my failures because they're legion, and it includes your failures, which is probably a legion as well. Right, none of us can ever be holy enough, no matter how hard we try. That's why the five soulas matter so much. Grace alone, through faith alone, and Christ alone, that's what saves us, and that's what keeps us secure even when we fall. This version ties in MacArthur's past condemnation, raises the question about how he might respond to this particular pastor, and brings back the quotes from Lutheran Calvin about not judging who is truly part of the kingdom. Let me know if this fits or if there's anything you would like to modify, that's.

51:29 What was posted. But it does fit it all together, and I think it's perfect. I don't think anything needs to be modified. I would modify just a little here or there, but for the most part, that's a perfect response to this. Now it's not going to be Christianity's response. No, at large, Christianity will not respond that way. Lordship Salvation doesn't know how to handle it. But let me make it very clear, it's not just Lordship's Salvation. I'll end with this. Christianity at large does not know how to deal with the reality. What is the reality? We're all still sinners and it happens continually. It happens continually, And I don't know why we can't admit that. Don't we all long for the vision of a version of Christianity that we've all been sold that hey, you become a Christian in boom Now basically sin is not a problem anymore. But I'm tired. I got tired of trying to pretend that that was the case. And the only way I could pretend it is by overcompensating on the things that I did well Because I knew I did them better than anybody else. So then I was like, well, then I'm better than everybody else.

52:51 But I wasn't. Even though I did those. Things maybe better than everyone else, I wasn't better than everyone else because that was only focusing on one aspect of the Christian life, where there is a whole lot more. And guess what, just because I wasn't committing this siner, this center, this center, this sin, there was still what plenty of sin? And in many cases, if you break sin down into categories, right, like there's certain types of sin, there's different types. You may be committing the same type of sin, just not the same specific sin. Right. You may not be committing the sin of homosexuality, but you may be committing the very same type of sin. Does that make sense similar sin because I would be in a sexual sin category. Correct, Well, you can commit sexual sin without actually committing sex having sex. Right, And at the whole point, like it's weird, like if someone commits a certain sexual sin, we throw them under the bus.

53:48 But biblically, any man who looks at a woman, or of a woman looks at a man, and there's luss, we're all guilty. So on one hand who's not an adulterer. Christianity doesn't want to, and then christian will try to draw a distinction. What does the Bible draw? Now, the whole point was Jesus wasn't our drawing a distinction? Was he? He was just saying, guess what the physical or the mental are? Both? What sin? He was condemning both. But we have we can put them in different categories. Now, I understand there's more. There's consequences of the of different things. I understand that. But I'm saying from a thiological standpoint, we seem incapable of handling it. You know why we're incapable of handling it? And I'll and this will be the last statement, Well, we're incapable handling handling it because God's holiness is beyond our ability to handle. God's holiness is beyond our ability to cope with it. And that's the entire message of the gospel. Right, God's holiness is beyond our capability. A right, let's pray look at we come before you this morning. We pray for everyone involved in the situation, everyone involved, and we pray that what we do in this situation is look to ourselves, not look to them. It's not about finding out about them.

55:13 It's about more being honest with who we are. Because everyone in this room and everyone who will hear this, there's one truth about all of us. We were sinners, We are sinners, and we will continue to sin until glorification. And we are thankful for the only hope, which is Jesus Christ. And it's in his name we pray. And God's people said