Episode Transcript
[00:00:02] Speaker A: Hey, YouTube theologians. Pastor Wolf Mueller here, Pastor St. Paul and Jesus Deaf Lutheran churches in Austin, Texas. Come and visit together with Pastor Andrew Packer, Good Shepherd Lutheran Church in Collinsville, Illinois. I do. I know, I know. Had a rumor about you, Pastor Packer, and the rumor was that your favorite thing about our podcast that we're doing here is the rumors that I hear about you.
[00:00:25] Speaker B: Our percent true. It's the only reason I do this is so I can hear a new.
[00:00:29] Speaker A: Rumor that is not even very meta.
What do you got?
[00:00:36] Speaker B: All right. This is from one person, but there's like, I don't know, questions within questions within questions. So I'll just start going through them and you can answer them. And then as we get through that set, we'll go to the next and see where we end up.
So I'm going to jump into their questions. They had a long introduction thing, but we're just going to jump into their questions. There's a lot of personal information in there. If our salvation is solely the work of the Holy Spirit acting on us, at what point are we actually saved? Is it at our baptism or some other time? Is it at the table when we take Holy Communion? Is it a moment in time at all? Is it when our lives start to exhibit the fruit of the Holy Spirit?
[00:01:16] Speaker A: Great question. So the Bible will use salvation to refer to a number of things, like the day of salvation, like, salvation has come to this house today, and that's the day that the gospel is preached and believed.
Baptism now saves you. So baptism is looked at as salvation.
The last day when the Lord returns in glory is considered the day of salvation. The day when we die is the day of salvation. The day upon which Christ died is the day that salvation is accomplished. The Lord is our salvation, our life and salvation.
We could even dial it all the way back to when the Lord determined to save us is when our salvation was established. So it's some of the mystery of God's the way that God, who is eternal, is dealing with us who are not and who are in this march of time.
And so I think that there's a huge variety of ways that the scripture itself talks about it. Now if someone says, well, when?
When are you saved? It's nice, I think, to point, well, I don't know. So I think all of those are legitimate. Sometimes it's good for us to hear, hey, it was in my baptism that the Lord saved me. And that is great. It's good to think about every moment that the Lord comes to us with his mercy. He's coming to us to save us. It's also good to think that we'll wait for the salvation of the Lord, that the redemption of everything is on the way for the last day. It's probably best to think in our own minds of the death of Jesus. I was saved because my life is hidden in Christ and his death is my life. But I think because the Scriptures use all of those different ways of speaking about it, that we ought to use them as well. What do you think about that?
[00:03:18] Speaker B: Yeah, I've always liked a couple of distinctions that I think are helpful. One, like you were saying on the cross, our salvation is accomplished, and then it's applied in time through the preaching of the Gospel, through baptism, through the Lord's Supper, through all these things. Like we're actually given those gifts in time. And then the Bible does say we are saved, we are being saved, and we will be saved. Which is what you went through. You went through all of those different things that we were saved.
You talk even like you said all the way back at the cross, or even when God determined to save us. Or you can talk about when you first believed, or if you were, you know, baptized as a baby, you could point to that event. So you can talk about I was saved at any of those times. I am being saved as I continue to receive the Gospel now, and I will be saved on the day of Jesus return. So all of those things are. Are true. So I think it's helpful to, like you said, to look at all of them, especially with the cross at the center of all of that, and go from there.
[00:04:20] Speaker A: Perfect.
[00:04:22] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:04:23] Speaker A: This and this. By the way, this, probably this question is motivated from this kind of Baptist idea that I was saved at the moment when I gave myself to Christ. And to know that, that the idea that I can know the moment when I was saved is a real pietist thing. Like, that's one of the marks of pietism. I can remember the moment when I went from darkness to light, from unbelieving to believing. The problem is that this piles up that confusion of the distinction between saving faith and reflective faith, so that I recognize my faith is different than that I have faith. And oftentimes, I mean, this is true, I think, for every sort of virtuous act of our emotive self is that it happens before we recognize it. Like most people don't recognize the moment that they fall in love with someone. You realize it later, like, oh, wait a minute.
And that's the true also for faith.
We talked about that I think a couple weeks ago.
[00:05:31] Speaker B: Yeah, it wasn't too long ago. The next questions are really connected to that, to our answer. At least as we know from Scripture, Jesus died for the sins of all mankind. Does this mean all mankind is saved? Potentially saved, for sure. But how do we know? If we choose to not accept his grace and mercy and make him lord over our lives, instead decide to go live a life separate from God, living in blatant sin, Is this not also a choice to deny him? Is this the unforgivable sin of blaspheming the Holy Spirit? Because the Holy Spirit is the one acting here? Is he simply not choosing those who he leaves in a blatant sin? Seems like a choice is made either way.
[00:06:08] Speaker A: So the real. So this question is edging up next to the next question, which will come theologically, which is the unanswerable question, right? So why some are saved and not others? Kriali Ali Noon what Francis Pieper, our great old Lutheran theologian, called the crux theologorum. That is the cross of the theologian, and it's called a cross because it's where our reason is crucified. Because it just. You can't. You can't answer the question. We know three things are true. Number one, that God's grace is universal, that the Father loves everyone and desires everyone's salvation. That Christ died for the sins of the world, not just for the sins of the elect, that he died for all sin. That the Holy Spirit desires and is working the salvation of all people. That's universal grace. We also confess grace alone. And that is that it is only by the Lord's work that anyone believes. And it's not like partially God's work and partially our work. Even 99% God and 1% US. It's not our choice. It's not our decision. We're dead in our trespasses and sins. So that faith is a resurrection. New regeneration is God taking an enemy and converting him into a friend so that all we can do in our fallen nature is fight and resist and hate God and not believe his promises. We know. So that's. That's grace alone. So universal grace, grace alone. And the third reality is that of condemnation, that not all people reach eternal life.
So.
So how do we sort that out? And the answer is we can't. And it's not even just that we can't. It's that we're forbidden from doing it because any attempt at sorting it out is wrong. Every answer to the question is wrong. Because we, on this side of the resurrection and maybe even on the other side, I don't know. But at least on this side, any given answer will deny one of those three claims, will either become Calvinist and deny universal grace, or will become free will theologians and deny grace alone, or will become universalists and deny the reality of condemnation. And all the three of those are errors. So we just have to say we just don't know. So when the question comes and says, are all people saved?
There's probably a different way to answer it, depending on what doctrine you're asserting.
Are all people died for by Christ and therefore atoned and redeemed and reconciled to God? Answer Yes. Are all people going to be in the new heaven and the new earth, in glory in heaven and eternal life? Answer no. And are.
Do all people have faith in Christ? No. No. So do. Are all people justified? No, not everyone is justified, although humanity is justified by the death of Jesus on the cross. And yet that justification is not applied to every person. So your distinction that you made earlier, the winning of forgiveness and the application of forgiveness is really important here. So that the universal atonement accomplished by Jesus on the cross means that forgiveness is one for every person, but not applied. But we see, we want to put our choice in there. That was part of the question. It seems like a choice. Well, it can't be a choice. We must deny that it is a choice. Jesus says, you did not choose me. And that has to be the case. The Christian will always confess, I did not choose Christ. That's part of our Christian confession. He chose me.
And we can't take away that confession, even though we think that that'll solve the problem.
Thoughts about that, it seems like there's.
[00:09:59] Speaker B: Always a danger and trying to get beyond like what the Bible says, right? So that the Bible says Jesus died for all. And then we want to extend that out and try to complicate it. And then the Bible says that salvation is 100% God's grace alone. And then we want to try to overcomplicate that and overthink that because it doesn't fit all of the boxes and everything for us. It doesn't seem to make logical sense that if Jesus died for all and God's, you know, salvation, the gift of God, all of God's grace, then we want to ask those questions, well, why? Why aren't some saved then? But then on the other hand, the Bible says if someone's not saved is because they've rejected the gift of God. And so I think just holding all Those things in a kind of tension that this is what the Bible says clearly on these things. And letting the Bible speak clearly on those issues is the safest path. I mean, that's one of the reasons I think I came out of Calvinism was seeing that, like, the Bible's very clear on these things, and if I want to try to make it fit a certain system, then I have to start saying, well, it says that, but it doesn't really mean that. And then to make it fit into a mold. Whereas if you just let all these things speak for themselves and say, I don't know how to make all of that fit into my boxes, into my categories, but the Bible's clear. Jesus died for all. The Bible's clear that salvation is 100 God's work. It's not my work. And the Bible is 100% clear that if someone rejects, it's not because God forced them to reject, because they freely rejected the gift. And to just say, this is what the Bible says, take it as it is. But I think it's hard for us to do because we want to. We don't. We don't like. We don't like the messiness of it. We don't like that it leaves things unanswered for us. I have this come up with my own children, but also with, like, in various classes I teach at our school and Bible classes here, right? Especially kids have questions and they're really good questions, and they'll ask things and I'll say, the Bible doesn't answer that. And they almost get, like, upset, like, well, why doesn't it. It should answer that. And I have to say all the time, part of being a Christian is learning to humble ourselves and say, I have this question, and it's a good question, I think, but God didn't answer it. Therefore, I have to humble myself and say, God doesn't give me an answer and say, I don't know, but he knows, and leave it at that. But that's hard for us. Like, we always want answers to all of our questions, even when the Lord says, you don't need that answer.
[00:12:26] Speaker A: The goal of it is to. Well, so that we rec. We get to the place where we recognize that we don't have an answer and what do we do? And the answer is, that's where we fall to our knees and praise the Lord. So I used to think of this unanswered, this as like a wall. Like, you run into the wall and you can't go any further. And you just should probably stop running into the wall. But I begun to see it less like a wall, the more like a cliff. Like, you better stop or you'll fall over. I mean, that's what free will theology is. Universalism is, Calvinism is. It's falling over that cliff. It's not coming to the boundary.
You just kind of tumble over the cliff. But we should come to the edge of the cliff and not just stop, but fall on our knees there and worship God. Which is exactly what Paul's teaching us at the end of Romans 11. So there's three chapters where he's dealing with the mystery of the doctrine of election. And he ends by saying, he says, oh, the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God. How unsearchable are his judgments and his ways past founding out? For who has known the mind of the Lord, or who has become his counselor, or who has given to him and shall be repaid to him? For of him and through him, and to him are all things to whom be the glory forever. Amen. So that this mystery is given to us for the purpose of praise, for the purpose of doxology, for the purpose of worshiping God. So that's important to know that this mystery is not to end in frustration, but to end in the praise of God.
[00:13:59] Speaker B: Do you think St. Paul was mocked for holding to mystery? Because whenever this kind of stuff comes up, someone in the comments will say, well, that's the Lutheran get out a free card for everything. We just say it's a mystery. And so, you know, we're not willing to go to the logical conclusions of things. And we just use that as a. As a way to get around tough questions. And yet that's the way Paul ends a series of tough things. Right. Like, there is a point where we have to acknowledge we're not God.
And I mean, Calvin himself said that where the Bible stops, we should stop.
[00:14:30] Speaker A: Right.
[00:14:31] Speaker B: And sometimes there's gonna be disagreement over where that point is, obviously. But all we're saying is there's a point where we have to stop and just humble ourselves and say we don't understand God fully or completely, nor are we ever going to be able to comprehend him fully. We're finite, he's infinite, and we can understand what he's revealed. And then we have to back off. Yeah, and say, we don't know, but we worship you and praise you because you are good and gracious and have revealed what we need to know for salvation, which is like the thing. Right. That's the most important thing.
[00:15:02] Speaker A: Right.
[00:15:03] Speaker B: He's revealed the most important thing. The stuff he's hidden, obviously, isn't that important for us to know.
[00:15:07] Speaker A: This is the. I mean, this is one of the doctrines of sola scriptura that's so important, is that there's not only a positive assertion of what we can know, but then there's also a positive or maybe a negative assertion of what we can't know or what we need not know. In other words, there's a limit on the Scriptures where we say, here's what the Lord has given us, and this is all that you need. You don't need more than that. It's one of the great problems with the Catholic doctrine of tradition that says you need more than what is here, which I'm totally against. But that constraint, that limit on the things that must be known is really helpful for us, and we thank the Lord for it.
I don't like to use the word mystery, especially in these sort of theological things, but I think if someone's going to, it's fine. But the biblical language is what his judgments are unsearchable. His ways are past finding out.
That's the assertion that Paul makes in the Scripture. And he's quoting the Old Testament. Who has known the mind of the Lord? So that if there's a danger of.
There is a danger of not being ignorant of the things of which we are supposed to be ignorant.
It was. And this is. If you want to. This is an.
If you want to look at, like the Lutheran Reformation in these terms, some really interesting things start to reveal himself. Because Luther was dead set against scholasticism. And that being dead set against scholasticism, a big part of that was saying there are things that cannot be known and ought not to be known, and to claim to know them is to try to sneak in and see the hidden things of God. And you're going to crack your head open. If you try to climb that ladder, you're going to fall and it's going to break your neck.
[00:16:59] Speaker B: All right, do you want to move on to. Yeah, I think that's all of his questions. This one's. There's some setup to this. It's longer, but I think it's really good and helpful. And I think it's related to.
Since we're talking about the gospel being applied to people.
Let's see. And she says in the December 9th drive home video.
So that would be one of your other videos you mentioned two ways that people experience sin are guilt and shame related to our own sin, and 2 guilt and shame related to the sins of others. Do you remember saying that? That was recently. It's like probably a couple days ago. It's like, it's like two days ago. So hopefully you remember. Okay. However, it seems like there's a third experience of sin. Sin hurts and wounds people. It hurts people badly. Think of people living in war torn countries, people whose governments or powerful companies, through greed, take advantage of them. Battered women, abused children, bullied children, children growing up without, in homes without solid husband, wife leadership, on and on and on. All of these have been terribly hurt by the sin of others. Yet as Christians, we sometimes approach them with, you're a sinner who needs God's forgiveness. That's true. But the gospel they probably need to hear is also, I've come to bind up the brokenhearted. I am with you, do not fear. I hear your cries for mercy and I'm here. I have loved you with an everlasting love, etc. I think Jesus saw the difference between the three experiences of sin and mostly used words of gospel addressed to those who have been hurt by sin. He only pronounces forgiveness a few times in the Gospels. He proclaims law only to the arrogant and to those who are asking.
To those who are asking, what do I need to do? How might we ordinary Christians who meet so many suffering people do a better job of discerning and saying the words of gospel that people need to hear?
So, and she goes on to say too that, that she thinks we do a, that confessional Lutherans, evangelicals, try to do good deeds for people. Like we do things to try to help them, like physically who are suffering in those ways, but wants to know maybe how can we word the gospel to them in a way that's, that's beneficial for, for them when they've been sinned against. Which made me think about. I'm sure you've read it because you're involved in all the doxology stuff.
Beverly Yankee wrote that article, the Gospel for those who've been Sinned against, an article that I think is still on their website. So anyways, it made me think of, think of that article. But what are your thoughts on that? I know that's a lot.
[00:19:22] Speaker A: It's great. I mean, so God be praised for the question. It's stunning really. And it's one of the things that.
So when you read the Bible, the reality of the scripture, when, when, if you were to say, how does the scripture define my reality as a child of God?
And it is one of being afflicted persecuted, lambasted, suffering, neglected, fought against, dragged around, abused, despised, mocked, spit on. In other words, the, the, the assumption of the Christian, of the Christian life is that it's. That. That we're surrounded by enemies who hate us and are doing everything that they can to try to unravel our lives and destroy us.
So in other words, it's assumed that we have real and present enemies and dangers. So we read the Psalms.
My enemies surround me. They set foes for they dig traps for me. They. They set snares for me. Oh, how many are those who despise me? How long will you turn my glory to shame?
So the reality of being a Christian is being surrounded by the world and the devil as well as our own sinful flesh.
And oftentimes I think the. I think the question is maybe it can be kind of summarized like this. Like we normally are talking about our flesh. Like the flesh that tempts us, the flesh that has tempted us and we've fallen. The. The flesh that still tempts us, that needs to be mortified. And so we see sin in terms of flesh and individual ethical decisions, and less in terms of those around us who are hurting and, and, and abusing us. And, and yet if we don't have that understanding of the reality of sin, then the Bible doesn't make sense.
I think we talked about this before when we read the Psalms. Like, for the Psalms to make sense, you have to have enemies. And if you don't have enemies, then you're like, what's all this stuff happening here? I don't even understand it. If I don't have enemies, I don't understand the Bible. So how do we treat our enemies? How do we think of our enemies? And how does the Lord think of our enemies? And here comes in a huge theme of the Scripture again, which we hardly preach about. If now it would be easy to preach. Like if this Sunday the secret police came and grabbed you by the collar and pulled you out of the pulpit and put you in jail. Then all of a sudden, to your congregation, like two thirds of the Bible all of a sudden makes sense.
Like, the Lord is the one who avenges us. The Lord is our defender. The Lord is our redeemer. But the Lord has vengeance on our enemies.
It's the flip side of justification.
The Lord is the one who will vindicate us, who will stand up and argue for us, not only in God's court, justification, but also in man's court. So that on the last day, the life of the Christian is understood as a righteous life. And so that preaching is everywhere in the Scriptures. Now, how do we bring that into our own?
How do we bring it into our own preaching and our own vocabulary is a great question. I mean, and that is probably well worth my time to sit and spend a couple hours just reflecting on, as well as yours, Andrew, and probably all the Lord's people. But how do we preach that the Lord is our shield?
How do we preach that the Lord is our refuge? How do we preach that the Lord is the one who fights for us?
This picture of Psalm 46, where he's breaking the spear, he's burning the chariot, and he looks back at us and says, be still. Watch this. Be still and know that I'm God. I will be exalted in the earth so that the Lord is exalted in his destroying of the enemies of his people.
So the Lord is a strong warrior who is on our side. That's that. That's what the gospel sounds like to those who are on the short end of the stick of this life.
I don't know. That's just kind of initial reflections on the beautiful question.
[00:23:54] Speaker B: I was thinking too, as you were talking about, that maybe, perhaps, probably the reason it gets avoided sometimes by us is because it's uncomfortable to go to someone who's suffering like that and to say, because what are they wrestling with, right? They're wondering, what have I done to deserve this? Probably as part of it, they were wrestling sometimes with shame for what's been done to them. They're also could be wrestling with thoughts of, if what you just said is true, then why did this happen to me, right? Like, if God is my defender, if he's my shield, then why did he allow this to happen to me? And. And so I think sometimes it gets really complex, really fast for us, and that's perhaps why we maybe struggle with it more than some of the other things. But, you know, I was thinking, because I'm preaching on Zechariah's song from Luke 1 tonight, and he has all kinds of things, right? Like that, that we being delivered from the hand of our enemies might serve him without fear, right? There's several times that we should be saved from our enemies and from the hand of all who hate us. Like over and over again is that language of God being the one who rescues us from those who have sinned against us horrifically. And also for them that the gospel is good news for them, too, not just that he's going to avenge the wrongs done to them, but also that he is going to bind up their broken hearts and that he can bring healing, if not fully in this life, then in the life to come. So those are, I think, maybe some reasons we struggle with it. It's just. It's a difficult topic.
[00:25:28] Speaker A: It is.
[00:25:28] Speaker B: And, but. And yet there's probably. Every time we preach, there's probably people sitting there who are. Who have been recently sinned against in horrible ways, sometimes ones that are horrible beyond our imagination.
[00:25:42] Speaker A: I was thinking of this from the psalm we had On Sunday, Psalm 66. You've brought us into the net. You laid affliction on our backs. You have caused men to ride over our heads. We went through fire and through water, but then you brought us out to rich fulfillment.
But sometimes we're in the not yet brought out stage of things in this life. So there's been a lot of times in my own ministering to people where I'm hearing the story. And again, it's a confession not of the sin I've committed, but of the sin committed against me. And what do you do? It's tough. There's a lot of things to say about that. But one of the things is to say you have an enemy.
And maybe it's just good for us Christians. We are not authorized by the Lord. According to Ephesians 6, where Paul says, our battle is not against flesh and blood. So we are not permitted to declare war against any person, flesh and blood. Our war is against the principalities and powers, against the devil and his demons, against the kingdom of darkness of this present age, et cetera.
Our kingdom is not against people, but people can declare war against us. And it's good to just recognize that.
So I'll tell someone, you have an enemy. And it's the worst when it's in the family. But it's this, your wife is your enemy, your husband is your enemy, your children are your enemy, or your boss is your enemy, or whatever the terrible circumstances, you have an enemy. Now you know what to do. Because Jesus says, well, you got to love and pray for and bless. Do good. That's the command of Jesus toward our enemies.
Now, that doesn't mean, especially when we're in situations of danger, especially physical danger, that we don't.
What we don't authorize, we don't kind of catalyze the authorities to help rescue us from that particular situation. We want to be out of those particularly dangerous situations.
But in the normal kind of life, as we are being afflicted and despised and persecuted, et cetera, that we recognize we have enemies and we know now from the Lord Jesus what to do, who to pray for and how to suffer. And to know that the Lord is with us in this suffering, that he hears our prayers and that he'll deliver us.
Now, again, we have to be very careful on this. And this is again, you're talking about why this is such a dangerous thing and why it's so important that each circumstance is discussed, especially with your pastor and wise Christian friends. Because sometimes we need to remove ourselves or be removed from a particularly dangerous situation because it's not good for us and it's not good for the person who's afflicting us. But sometimes we can't. Sometimes the martyrs are thrown in prison and they're called to receive that abuse. Even the death sentences that were given to the martyrs called to receive those with joy. To know that it doesn't mean that God has forgotten us or despised us, but that he's still with us in the midst of all of this suffering.
[00:29:05] Speaker B: I read a book recently that I really liked and appreciated on for multiple reasons. But I think it gets into some of this was called A Light in Darkness, the Church's Role in Ending Human Trafficking by Eddie and I don't want to butcher the man's last name by, you know, that did a really fantastic job with wrestling with some of these things and topics including bringing the gospel to people who are in such a horrific thing like human trafficking, which applies to all the situations we've talked about too, other suffering, but also what it looks like then to seek to what the Bible says do justice for them.
How do we actually help them both in word and deed. So I highly commend that book is a short good read for anyone who's interested in more on that kind of stuff.
[00:29:55] Speaker A: That's great because we are both pursuing justice for the wicked.
And we also recognize that human justice will always be incomplete.
And so this is one of the reasons why there's great triumph on the last day. This is where this gets, I think, very hard because the Bible tells us that in the Lord's condemning of people on the last day there will be a great shout of joy.
And we on the one hand think now this is horrific that anyone would be cast out and condemned and cast into the lake of fire. And yet when the devil's cast into the lake of fire, just to take that as one example, we will all rejoice over that victory.
And the last day, the judgment day, is understood as the victory. The conquer the Lord's conquering of his enemies. And because we're on his side, it's also conquering all of our enemies.
And so just like a king wins a battle and all the people cry out in victory and joy, or just like when a. When an evil and unjust man is condemned by a court and everyone is relieved and applauds.
So the judgment day. The Lord will not only be praised for his saving, merciful work, but he'll also be praised for his judging and condemning work.
And on the one hand, like, the more that we suffer at the hands of evil people in this life, the more that makes sense. But even still, we're praying for them, that the Lord would convert them and rescue them and bring them into the fellowship of his church. We're not working that condemnation. We're trying to work for salvation. And so is the Lord. Until the last day, when that's it, the day's over and the night has arrived and the last day is here.
[00:32:07] Speaker B: I was reminded too, you know, Jesus, we're taught that we're to weep with those who weep, and people are suffering like that. That's one of the things we do too, as we come alongside them, is we realize they're suffering and we offer the comfort of the gospel, but we also sit and listen and mourn with them over the losses and things they've suffered from the sin of others. So I don't have any other questions, but I think that's probably a good one.
[00:32:34] Speaker A: Yeah, some heavy questions today. Thanks for sending them in, by the way, everyone who's listening, God be praised for you. Apparently we got our Q and Q and A form working now because Pastor Packer told me it went from like three questions in there to like 300. So thanks for. Unless you guys all of a sudden got really curious about things, but I think I actually fixed the. I fixed the. The electronic plumbing of our website so that now the clog is unstopped. So. So you can send those questions at wolfme Co Contact while you're on the web page. Sign up for Wednesday whatnot. That's cool. That's a weekly dealio of curious things that I'm taking a look at and I put out this morning. I sent one out about Kleinig's article on Luther on meditation, which is great. A great little piece to reflect on. It's really a lot of fun.
So you can sign up for that and send in the questions and we'll see you again next week. God's peace be with.
