Daily Archives: December 6, 2010

God’s Decisive Action

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I read this earlier today and thought it was a very good insight and worth passing on. From an article entitled, “One of the Most Important Principles in Reading the Bible” Dr. John Piper writes:

Sometimes readers of the Bible see the conditions that God lays down for his blessing and they conclude from these conditions that our action is first and decisive, then God responds to bless us.

That is not right.

There are indeed real conditions that God often commands. We must meet them for the promised blessing to come. But that does not mean that we are left to ourselves to meet the conditions or that our action is first and decisive.

Here is one example to show what I mean.

In Jeremiah 29:13 God says to the exiles in Babylon, “You will seek me and find me, when you seek me with all your heart.” So there is a condition: When you seek me with all your heart, then you will find me. So we must seek the Lord. That is the condition of finding him.

True.

But does that mean that we are left to ourselves to seek the Lord? Does it mean that our action of seeking him is first and decisive? Does it mean that God only acts after our seeking?

No.

Listen to what God says in Jeremiah 24:7 to those same exiles in Babylon: “I will give them a heart to know that I am the Lord, and they shall be my people and I will be their God, for they shall return to me with their whole heart.” Continue reading →

Understanding 1 Timothy 4:10

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Question: Pastor John, I appreciate your blog very much but I do have a question. Please could you explain 1 Timothy 4:10 which says, “For it is for this we labor and strive, because we have fixed our hope on the living God, who is the Savior of all men, especially of believers.”

Answer: I am pleased to know that you are enjoying the blog and thank you for your question.

This verse has had many interpretations. Here are a few of them:

(1) Universalism – The idea that “God is the Savior of all men” means that all will be saved. This of course is contrary to all sound doctrine and in fact, has always been viewed as heresy by the Church. The proponents of this idea emphasize the love of God as God’s chief and most important attribute, to the exclusion of all others, such as His holiness and His justice. This heresy is very easily refuted because the Bible makes it very clear that some people will end up in hell, forever (Rev. 14: 9-11; 20:15; Matt. 5: 21-22, 27-30; 23: 15, 33; 25: 41, 46).

If the phrase “the Savior of all men” was seeking to teach universalism, the rest of the verse would have no meaning when it says “especially of believers.” Continue reading →