Guest teacher: Marc Arteus

• Are All People, Just as They Were Lost Through Adam, Saved Through Christ? No, only those who are elected by God and united to Christ by faith. Nevertheless God in his mercy demonstrates common grace even to those who are not elect, by restraining the effects of sin and enabling works of culture for human well-being.
• If anything is good, it comes from God. From eternal goods, namely faith and salvation in Jesus Christ, to earthly goods like human art, science, government, and wisdom, there is nothing good that we have that we can say we produced ourselves. It all comes from God because God is gracious.

Additional Resources:

• The New City Catechism Commentary: "Though not all people are going to be saved, God still gives his gifts of wisdom and insight across the face of the whole human race. Through art and through science and through good government and in other ways, God is making this world a far better place than it would be if only Christians had those gifts.
• Common Grace Is Special Too (The Gospel Coalition): "The twin realities of common and saving grace share a dynamic relationship. For the believer, the joy we experience in common with the lost during a feast gives way to fullness of joy when that earthly meal redirects our hearts to the salvation feast believers share in Christ."
• Providence And Common Grace (Ligonier): "That human beings made in His image ignore and reject Him even after being shown common grace shows us just how desperate our condition is apart from His special grace."
• Four Biblical Foundations for Contextualization (9Marks): "Contextualization is both unavoidable and good. The gospel can―and should―be at home in every culture. We must identify with those we are trying to reach and adapt to their culture, no matter what discomfort it causes us. However, the gospel also challenges and condemns every culture at some points (including our own). "

• What Else Does Christ’s Death Redeem? Christ’s death is the beginning of the redemption and renewal of every part of fallen creation, as he powerfully directs all things for his own glory and creation’s good.
• Jesus came to make all things new, and the salvation of individual souls is just the first step of that process.

Guest teacher: Rodney Donahue

Additional resources

• The New City Catechism Commentary: "The saving of sinners is at the heart of the gospel. It is the fountainhead. And from this fountainhead flows a mighty river, one full of redemptive, healing power for every square inch of the cosmos."
• The Other Christ-Centered Joys of Heaven: An All-Things Vision of the Christian Afterlife (9Marks): "If all things are to be made new, can we dare to imagine what chocolate and coffee will taste like? What flowers might smell like? What it will be like to live in perfect harmony with the rest of the creation—animals, weather, and everything else?"
• The Bravest and Newest World (Ligonier): "Christians, however, have been called by God to an infinitely higher future reality, a hope better than any dream—the new heavens and new earth—coupled with a bravery that acknowledges the journey to that perfect world will be bloody and terrifying."
• What a World Ours Will Be (DesiringGod): "God did not create the material universe, including our physical bodies, to be thrown away at the end of this age. That is not what we see in the Bible."

• Why was it necessary for Christ, the Redeemer, to die? Since death is the punishment for sin, Christ died willingly in our place to deliver us from the power and penalty of sin and bring us back to God. By his substitutionary atoning death, he alone redeems us from hell and gains for us forgiveness of sin, righteousness, and everlasting life.
• Does Christ’s death mean all our sins can be forgiven? Yes, because Christ’s death on the cross fully paid the penalty for our sin, God graciously imputes Christ’s righteousness to us as if it were our own and will remember our sins no more.
• You can receive this forgiveness today if you've never received it. Christ died for you, and this offer of forgiveness is available to anyone.

Why must the Redeemer be truly God? Because of his divine nature, his obedience and suffering would be perfect and effective; and also that he would be able to bear the righteous anger of God against sin and yet overcome death.

Jesus is only able to save us because he is fully God. Because he is God, he is able to give us the same eternal and everlasting life that he has as God. Do you believe this?

Additional Resources:

• The Athanasian Creed, a historical tool for helping us explain the Trinity.
• The Necessity of Christology (Ligonier): a brief devotional on why Christology matters to our daily lives as Christians.
• The Deity of Christ (The Gospel Coalition): a helpful introduction to the doctrine of the divinity of Christ.

Why must the Redeemer be truly human? That in human nature he might on our behalf perfectly obey the whole law and suffer the punishment for human sin; and also that he might sympathize with our weaknesses.

Christ became a human to save humans. He is what it means to be truly human. And because he died as a human, on the day you die, his humanly resurrection will be your humanly resurrection.

Who is the Redeemer? The only Redeemer is the Lord Jesus Christ, the eternal Son of God, in whom God became man and bore the penalty for sin himself.

What sort of Redeemer is needed to bring us back to God? One who is truly human and also trulyGod.

Jesus is either nothing, and saves nobody - or he is everything, and the only Savior of the world.

(Originally recorded 1/21/26)

We are not saved by our ability to perfectly keep the Ten Commandments. We are saved by faith in Jesus Christ who perfectly kept the Ten Commandments and gives us his record of perfect obedience.

The Ten Commandments show us how to live God-glorifying and honoring lives. We show gratitude to Christ for his gracious salvation by living lives of obedience to Christ and his commandments out of love for him and what he has done for us.

(Originally recorded 12/3/25)