How to become elect.

 

Ruth is blessed by the careful attention and the words spoken to her by Boaz. 

“The Lord recompense your work

            And a full reward be given you

Of the Lord God of Israel,

            Under whose wings you are come for refuge.”

                                                            Ruth 2:12

Ruth exemplifies the heart of the Living God who is alien to her.  She devotes herself to the mother-in-law she loves and transfers her trust to that woman’s family, land and Lord (1:16-17).  In order to bring an income to their meager household, Ruth works in the fields to harvest barley.  As she serves her mother-in-law, the people of that area observe the beauty of her devotion.  Her servant’s heart helps her gain favor with Boaz and, ultimately, wins her a place in the lineage of the Son of God, Jesus Christ.

There is a fundamental condition of servanthood that stands against the Calvinist world view.  Calvinism establishes a special class of humans that are considered to be elect or chosen.  Biblical theology establishes that this notion is incorrect and reminds the Calvinist that elect and servant are the same thing (Isaiah 42, 43, 44, 45…).  Calvinists need to be made aware that God (Jesus is God) established servanthood as the qualifying manifestation of the work of the Holy Spirit in the lives of believers (Luke 22:26-27).

Why servanthood?

Is there anyone that can be disqualified from serving?

           

Whosoever will – may serve.

            No special qualifications!

Lame, old, sick, wounded, privileged, abused, weak, strong, rich, poor, young, male, female… Anyone can pray.  Everyone can surrender.  No one is blotted out before the foundation of the world.  Whosoever will cannot be qualified by the ignorance of Calvin whose system of reprobation served his own psychology and undermined the cause of Christ.

Ruth – not born to the “elect” realm of Israel, teaches Israel about God’s heart and passes that legacy to her great-grandson: David = God-hearted King. (Acts 13:22) Servant.

Jesus Served mankind by coming to seek and save the lost.  He served mankind a blood-bought redemption.  He served out the penalty on a cross meant for me – meant for you.

Take up your cross and learn election.  You won’t find it by searching for what happened before the foundation of the world – that way is blocked.  There is only one way.

Come to the cross.

GO ye therefore...

Judges.
The entire book---
What is missing?
Where is the tabernacle?

"Everyone does what is right in his own eyes (21:25)."

Tribe after tribe is represented by a champion who fights on the side of the Lord.
How many of them go to the tabernacle?
None.

The tabernacle was supposed to make the circuit throughout the tribes. Month after month, they were each to be visited: culminating in the feast of booths or tabernacles (Deuteronomy 16:13, Nehemiah 8:17, John 7:12). 12 tribes in 12 months equals year one. Year 2---3---4---.
Instead, year after year, the tabernacle remains in the same place until someone builds a roof over it and they begin to call it Beth-el, the house of God (20:18). No longer a tent to be transported, it is a place to be visited -- like the pagan temples.

Meanwhile, the priests and Levites behave as though they are entitled to special treatment. They believe that they deserve goodness and fatness and whatever they want in life. Slowly, they build roofs over their heads and act as though they, too, should own land and have substance. Eventually, Israel's spiritual welfare has no meaning to them. Nearly 500 years of their constant ritual dependence on the relationship that Moses had with God gave way to idolatry and the wickedness of their pagan neighbors. There was no king to watch over these priests and force them to forsake laziness and visit the tribes who needed the truth in word and symbol.

As bad as false religions are, there are Christian churches that refuse to abandon bad doctrine and practices because they are linked to some exalted person 500 years in the past. The unbiblical ideas of Calvin have been synthesized and made to be more important than the truth spoken by Jesus (Jesus IS God!). The official position of Calvinists is that the power of predestination is in the hands of their preachers. A person may be made right with God if the preacher performs the proper ritual over him or her. Those who are unlucky enough to have no availibility to their idea of the fountain of grace are automatically reject/reprobate.

The ancient tabernacle belonged to all peoples (Acts 15:13-18...notice that God knows all from the beginning - not Calvin). The ancient tabernacle represents Jesus and anyone who visited in the past could be given a vision of the cross by the Holy Spirit.

God did not entrust His saving work to the whims of humans who would be inclined to talk loudly of grace while enslaving people to a system of works and special interest. God established salvation in Himself and predestined Himself (Jesus is GOD) to accomplish the work. He did this at the cross. Anyone who wants to be in on the predestination of Jesus can meet Him at the cross. He will camp out with you until it is time to go home.

Come to the cross.

Who is Lord? ... Joshua

"Joshua made war for a long time..." (Joshua 11:18) probably about 5 years.  In that time, he took the thirty-one cities that were occupied by those who worshipped Baal.  Joshua had orders to kill every person - no matter how old.  When you first consider that order, you try not to picture the issue of children.  How could these men go from city to city, killing women and children?

Baal (or Bel, Beel) is the generic name for "lord" among the Canaanites.  So, if you translate Daniel's Babylonian name, Belteshazzar, you get "the one who leads the lord" – which he certainly did as he led the pagan kings.  Beelzebub (Matthew 10:25, 12:24, etc.) is translated as "lord of the flies" and is understood by the 1st century Jews as the lord of the demons.  Baal, in the Old Testament, is often a term for the pagan god(s).  The Philistines, being the Sea People (Mycenaean Pirates), worshipped many gods but their principle god was Dagon, the fish god (1 Samuel 5).  The Amorite and other kings that were slaughtered by Joshua (chapter 12) worshipped Baal but their specific god was Molech (or Moloch).  The worship of Molech involved the ritual rape of children and babies, followed by their sacrificing, burning or both.  There's no idiotic Hollywood/Disney picture of noble sacrifice here: just satanic hatred and molestation of humanity.  When Joshua and his men arrived, the children were already dead or mutilated.  Who wouldn't destroy the adults?

Joshua 11:20 describes the attitude of the Lord (Jehovah - Hebrew = YaHWeH) toward the 31 doomed, Molech loving kings.  "For it was of the Lord to harden their hearts, that they should come against Israel in battle, that He (the Lord...implicit is that Israel is included with the Lord since they are in service [elect] to do his bidding. Thus the condition that Israel is included under the command of the Lord of Hosts. Thus the condition that we are spiritual Israel if we obey Jesus, the Lord of Hosts. Join Jesus at the cross!) might destroy them utterly; that they might have no favor” = literally - they didn't have a prayer.

Calvinists like to explain that God, in His inscrutable (Calvin must have skipped over Amos 3:7 when he made up his nonsense about God's secrets...) sovereignty, hardens the hearts of people just because He wants to and gets them to do cruel, ugly things because He can.  This simple minded approach to the truth of the Word is foolish and dangerous.  As noted above, the Canaanite kings were hideous and it was a mercy from God to annihilate them all.  For God to harden their resolve was to fix them in the condition they had chosen and practiced for years.  They personally chose "that hideous strength" -- like Hitler -- like Klansmen -- like Idi Amin.

Calvinistic oversimplifications lead to stupid conclusions.  The unbiblical notion that God has reprobated most people in advance gives the Calvinist an unconscious sense of superiority.  Left unchecked, where does the notion of pride and superiority always go?  Following Jesus?  Gotta deal with that "cross" clause first...

God Himself (Jesus is God) set aside superiority that was truly His (Philippians 2:6-8) and served humans who were/are all sinners - none of whom had been blotted out before they came into existence.  Jesus offered a redemption based on love beyond all reason.  He gave Himself on the cross.

Come to the cross.

Careful where you camp ... Deuteronomy

First day of school.

A teacher enters a classroom with 25 students seated in their desks.  She smiles at them and sits down at her desk for a moment.  Suddenly, she jumps up and walks quickly to the principal's office.  She is joined by all of the other teachers in the school.  Each of them has a similar issue.  The computer printout of the class roll that our teacher holds has 10 names on it that are interspersed with 15 blackened spaces.  15 names have been blotted out.  All of the teachers begin asking the obvious questions: How are we supposed to deal with the students without names? (Reply = They are not students)  How are we supposed to keep them from misbehaving and causing problems for the "students"? (Reply = That is part of the classroom environment to which the students are pre-destined)  How do we address the children without names? (Reply = Technically, they are not children but it really doesn't matter what you call them)  How do we contact their parents??? (How should we know...there is no record of their names...)

Here is a picture of the doctrine of Reprobation that Calvin teaches his followers.  According to Calvin, blotting happens "before the foundation of the world" and there is nothing that can be done about it.  Never mind that the Bible clearly teaches that any blotting that is done will happen after the Lord has explored the facts about an individual (Calvin wants Reprobation to be a class action by God) and has given His divine judgment (de jure...) on what that person deserves (Deuteronomy 29:19-20).  Reprobation happens in time or after time...not in advance.  If you Calvinists want to quote chapter and verse of the Institutes to justify the stupidity of the system of reprobation, then you do so with Scripture and the character of God slapping your bigoted faces.

Imagine our scene above in the year 1966 and the blotted out names all correspond to 5th grade children in Alabama...and all the blotted ones are African-American.  Suppose one of them knows that her name is Condoleezza Rice and she has learned the pain of her race in relation to the Constitution of the United States that proclaimed her as a 3/5 (three fifths) person (Article 1, Section 2, Paragraph 3).  The 3/5 rule can be properly expressed in another way: for every five African-Americans counted, two of them are blotted out.  Expendable.  Worthless.

Now what do you Calvinists want to say about your reprobation system?

God has provided a place where all of us can unburden ourselves of the foolishness of our pride and superiority.  No one has a special hall pass and an empty backpack; the burden of sin gets packed up in time for humans who are accountable for themselves.  If God Himself (Jesus) will stoop low to get beneath our burden of sin so that He can become sin for us on the cross (2 Corinthians 5:21), then who are we that we should be anything other than on our knees in the presence of the cross.

Come to the cross.

Unhallowed ground ... Numbers

Majority rules!

Supposedly the wisdom of democracy is imbedded in its people. When they get together and vote, the correct path should open up in front of the majority and all must submit to that wisdom.

Supposedly.

Shammua, Shaphat, Igal, Palti, Gaddiel, Gaddi, Ammiel, Sethur, Nahbi and Geuel are ten names that are famous for one thing (Numbers 13:4-16). They all stood against Joshua and Caleb and opened a path of destruction as they voted against the Lord.

Numbers 14 shows the indignant response of the Lord as He curses the people who are 21 and older (14:29-34), proclaiming that they will all die in the 40 wilderness years ahead. All except Joshua and Caleb, the faithful minority. The people foolishly try to move into the land and are chased out by the Amalekites and Canaanites because, as Moses had said, "...the Lord is not AMONG you" (14:42).

Some time later, a Levite named Korah (Numbers 16) had gotten together his own congregation to whom he had been preaching lies. His first sermon series was "We are as Holy as Moses." His second series was "There are many lands of Milk and Honey." (He had Oprah on his talk show that month...) When he preached his Biggie sermon, " The Lord really is AMONG us," the senate and representatives (16:1-2) showed up to vote the blasphemy of the majority -- similar to the abomination of desolation.

Korah was trying to reverse the curse of the Lord against himself and his elder assembly. (It is appropriate that he is linked to Cain in Jude 11 since Cain had worked to reverse the the curse on the earth by using innocent blood as fertilizer. See post on July 14, 2012, "Fruits of Cain.") Korah's preached perspective was that Moses had exalted himself and was ignoring the intrinsic holiness of all the people (like imbedded wisdom...). The Lord made Moses understand (16:9-11) that Korah was covetous of God's choice of servants and desired the office of High Priest. He wanted to be exalted instead of humble, as were Moses and Aaron.

The showdown commenced and Moses, the Lord's prophet, could envision the demonic diggers of Tophet (the pit -- see Isaiah 30:33) which had been told by God to dig uphill for a change -- under the camp of Korah. The one who desired a high pulpit would find the bowels of the earth as his new home. Moses pronounces a new thing; a path by which humans can enter the realm of hell without going by way of death. Korah and his crew are devoured by the pit while still alive as the Lord vetoes the majority vote against Aaron.

The Bible makes clear that "elect" is inextricably linked to "servant." (Isaiah 42:4, etc.) Any attempt to make "elect" mean "mastery" of "rule" or, being powerful to declare, as a mere human, "who are his and who is holy" (16:5), will be met with Tophet. The unbiblical notions of reprobation (who are damned and who are unholy) that Calvin inflicted upon his followers are a smoke screen for declaring that "elect" should be redefined as "master." Moses makes a clear case that God alone can declare and demonstrate "who are His and who are holy."

The blessing that God has given to all of mankind is that sinners who would be servants may stand upon the firm ground at the foot of the cross of Jesus. The cross is the new path that God has provided for sinners to enter His eternal realm through the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

Come to the cross.