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Have you ever heard this scenario? A Christian says to his non-Christian friend, “Here is the gospel message but you need to ‘take the gift.’ You need to use your faith to grasp the gift of the gospel or it does you no good. If you don’t take it then you won’t receive it.” In this narrative faith is seen as something a person conjures up. This is unbiblical. The Scriptures argue that faith is a gift. You were dead in your sins and transgressions and God came to you first by His Spirit and Word to regenerate you and give you faith.
Sermon text: Canons of Dort, Heads 3 & 4, Articles 14 & 15
Scripture Lesson: Ephesians 2:1-10
1 comment so far
Sep 27, 2007Rudolf #
All issues of salvation are directly connected to the established covenant which God has established from before there was time or before any of Adam’s race ever walked upon the earth.
God moves across the dead individual and causes a spark to be created. A new birth. With that birth we are given faith, to accept and believe that which we once did not…NOR COULD. This is what God does and decrees. To Him be always honor and glory.
Christ was the propiciation and the propiciator in our salvation, so that the wrath of the Father was no longer directed towards us…but at Christ, God’s Son. That death was effective for all the elect. Arminianism on the other hand misleads and misrepresents that work of Christ, and may simply guide those who are dead in sin and enemies of God to think that by an act of their will somehow come to saving grace and salvation.