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Daddy’s Shoes

Posted by Nathanael Szobody on

Right love and faithfulness meet each other

Both peace and righteousness kiss each other

Faithfulness will spring up from the ground

Righteousness from above look down

The Lord will give what is good

And our land will give it’s food

Righteous will be before him

And will set his feet on the road

-Psalm 85

It is said that Christian virtues have been divorced from each other. Righteousness, love, faithfulness, peace, have been set against each other. The one who advocates love does so at the expense of justice. For the sake of peace the assertion of right and wrong are sacrificed. Love knows nothing of faithfulness, and faithfulness has nothing to do with love.

Who hopes in the life to come? Hope in this my friend: that Right love and faithfulness will meet each other, and peace and righteousness will kiss each other. How hard it is to be faithful; in that day, faithfulness will spring from the ground!

For Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example that you might follow in his steps. For he committed no sin, nor was there deceit in his mouth. When he was reviled, he did not revile back. When he suffered he did not threaten, but continually gave himself up to the one who judges the righteous. He himself took up our sins in his body on the tree, so that we might die to our sins and live to righteousness; by his wounds you are healed.

-I Peter 2:21- 25

There is yet one who was faithful and is faithful; him in whom all is at peace, and whose righteousness is love

Universal Grace and Grace Alone

Posted by Nathanael Szobody on

Calvinist doctrine teaches that the doctrine of Salvation by Faith Alone (sola gratia ) and the doctrine of Universal Grace (universalis gratia) contradict each other. They say this because, since humans are saved by the grace of God alone, then it must follow that if God’s grace is for all, then all must be saved. Though clearly all are not saved.Their conclusion, then, is that grace must not be universal, it must only be for the elect. First we must say that Scripture advocates both doctrines and so they must both be believed, even if our reason is not satisfied on all points.

Secondly one may observe that scripture approaches doctrines from two perspectives; one is that of humans and the manner in which human nature interacts with God, and the second is the immutable nature of God and his eternal will for the fullness of time, revealed in Christ. These two perspectives are presented in various places in scripture for their respective pastoral purposes. The immutable will of God that all should be saved is revealed to us to impress upon our hearts the character of God which is love and to bring us to glorify Jesus’ death and resurrection as supremely sufficient for the salvation of all people, hence the term ‘second Adam’. Whereas the perspective of sola gratia is a teaching that is spoken to us in a position of those who have been saved and so it moves our hearts to glorify God and his son Jesus for his unilateral and unconditional gift of salvation to us apart from our merit. So sola gratia and gratia universalis find their proper exposition not in the grid of a systematic but when spoken appropriately to the heart.