Episode 53 of the Theopologetics Podcast is now available! Dr. Edward Fudge joins me to discuss the Stone-Campbell Restoration Movement and the Churches of Christ which have emerged from it. This episode contains part 2 of the interview; see episode 52, "Restored," for part 1.
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You misquoted me. I said it would be God's decision to determine if one is saved upon being hit by a bus prior to being baptized. I would appreciate it if you would make sure the quotes you use are accurate. Thanks!
ReplyDeleteI strongly recommend that you arrange an interview with someone more widely known as a historical expert within the church of Christ. Such as Jerry Rushford who works for Pepperdine or C. Wayne Kilpatrick with Heritage Christian University or Truitt Adair with Sunset International Bible Institute. I have asked around here in Alabama, and nobody has heard of this Edward Fudge. All of them have heard of these other individuals. To simply take this man's opinion as accurate or correct simply does no justice to your own cause, let alone the Christian cause.
ReplyDeleteYou brought up the subject of Pelagianism.
ReplyDeleteAugustine rightly fought against this heresy
but in doing so he over-reacted to it to such
an extreme he invented the doctrine of "original
sin". Just like Luther & Calvin, they objected to Indulgences and the Papacy so fervently, they over-reacted and invented many new Protestant doctrines that still exist today.
If we are born sinners, born totally depraved, born guilty, then if we die in infancy we deserve hell, that would be just.
Sin is not a substance, it is an act.
What was it that caused Adam & Eve to sin?
It was not a sinful nature, it was temptation. Adam and Eve were tempted and they sinned so easily, so naturally, so spontaneously that it would almost seem that they had a "sinful nature" before they sinned.
It has always been easier to sin than to resist temptation. James 1:12 says, "Blessed is he that endureth temptation." Heb. 2:18 says, "For in that he himself hath suffered being tempted," and Heb. 12:4 says, he "resisted unto blood, striving against sin."
Christ "suffered" under temptation, not because of a sinful nature, but because resisting and overcoming temptation involves suffering. Adam and Eve did not resist temptation. That is why they sinned so easily. They took the easy way of pleasure and self-indulgence, which is always easier than the path of obedience to God.
But if the fact that it is easier to sin than to do right implies that men are born with a sinful nature, we would be left with the unscriptural conclusion that both Adam and Christ had sinful natures:Adam, because he sinned so easily, naturally, and spontaneously; and Christ, because it was necessary for him to "endure," "suffer," "resist," and "strive" to overcome sin.
James tells us how all men are tempted. "But every man is tempted when he is drawn away of his own lust and enticed. Then when lust hath conceived it bringeth forth sin, and sin when it is finished bringeth forth death." James 1:14, 15. James explains here that all men are tempted through the desires of their sensibility. These constitutional desires and appetites are not sinful in themselves. They are merely the occasion to temptation, and it is only when they are gratified contrary to the law of God and reason that they become sinful. Adam and Eve had them before they sinned, or they could not have been tempted. Christ had them, or he was not a man and could not have been tempted as other men. But the Bible affirms that Christ was a man and that he was tempted in all points as other men, and yet without sin: "For we have not an high priest which cannot be touched with the feelings of our infirmities; but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin." Heb. 4:15.
Sin is universal, not because of an inherited sin nature, but because temptation is universal, and, because when men are tempted, they choose to indulge their own desires, rather than obey the law of God written in their hearts.