The Bullpen with J.D. Greear

By J.D. GreearReligion & Spirituality Christianity

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The Bullpen with J.D. Greear episodes

October 16, 2023 If God is Really in Control, Why is There so Much Evil and Suffering?
Each week, we’ll be posting a special short version of each 12 Truths and a Lie podcast on Ask Me Anything. To listen to the full version and subscribe, just visit AccessMore at www. accessmore.com/pd/12-Truths–A-Lie-Podcast-by-JD-Greear
Show Notes:
In this episode of 12 Truths & A Lie, Pastor J.D. answers one of the most ancient questions throughout Christianity: Is God really in control? And if so, why is there so much evil and suffering? To start answering this question, we have to understand the bigness of God. A lot of people struggle with this question because they like to think of God as a slightly bigger, and slightly smarter version of themselves.
Want to ask J.D. a question? Head to our Ask Me Anything hub to submit your question. We’ll pick Ask Me Anything back at the end of the year.
As always, don’t forget to rate and review this podcast!
Find Pastor J.D. on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook.
7 min
October 09, 2023 How Can I Discover My Purpose on Earth?
Each week, we’ll be posting a special short version of each 12 Truths and a Lie podcast on Ask Me Anything. To listen to the full version and subscribe, just visit AccessMore at www. accessmore.com/pd/12-Truths–A-Lie-Podcast-by-JD-Greear
Show Notes:
Have you ever been in the midst of some task-something lifegiving, challenging, and exciting all at once-and thought, “Man, it seems like I was made for this!”? What if that feeling wasn’t just a fleeting thought, but a picture of reality? What if God actually has given you a specific task, some way to reflect his kingdom?
In this episode of “12 Truths & A Lie,” Pastor J.D. teaches us what God thinks about our work. Many of us haven’t given that a lot of thought. What does God have to do with my job? Actually, quite a bit! Through your work, God can fulfill promises, display his redemption, and advance his mission.
Whether you’re a builder or a banker, a student, or a stay-at-home mom, you’ll learn the five ways you can approach your work from a uniquely Christian perspective.
Want to ask J.D. a question? Head to our Ask Me Anything hub to submit your question. We’ll pick Ask Me Anything back at the end of the year.
As always, don’t forget to rate and review this podcast!
Find Pastor J.D. on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook.
8 min
October 02, 2023 What Are the Most Important Practices in a Christian’s Life?
Each week, we’ll be posting a special short version of each 12 Truths and a Lie podcast on Ask Me Anything. To listen to the full version and subscribe, just visit AccessMore at www. accessmore.com/pd/12-Truths–A-Lie-Podcast-by-JD-Greear
Show Notes:
With everything that goes on in church, do you ever wonder, “What exactly is the most important thing we’re doing here?” Most churches keep themselves-and their members-really busy. They judge their success by how many people attend or how many baptisms they’ve done. But heaven doesn’t celebrate any of those numbers. It only celebrates disciples.
In this episode of “12 Truths and a Lie,” Pastor J.D. shows us the heart of Jesus’ mission. It’s found right in the Great Commission. But it’s not “going,” “teaching,” or “baptizing.” At the center of it all is one command: “Make disciples.” Disciple-making wasn’t a special assignment for a select few, but the central calling for every follower of Jesus.
You’ll learn all about Jesus’ call to become a disciple, along with the five identities of every follower of Jesus-worshiper, family member, servant, steward, and witness. Most importantly, you’ll learn how you can discover your role in the disciple-making process. Because God’s method for reaching the world isn’t big ministries with uber-talented preachers, but everyday Christians, filled with the Spirit, making disciples everywhere they go.
In other words, God’s method … is you.
Want to ask J.D. a question? Head to our Ask Me Anything hub to submit your question. We’ll pick Ask Me Anything back at the end of the year.
As always, don’t forget to rate and review this podcast!
Find Pastor J.D. on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook.
8 min
September 25, 2023 How Can I Know for Sure I’ll Go to Heaven?
Each week, we’ll be posting a special short version of each 12 Truths and a Lie podcast on Ask Me Anything. To listen to the full version and subscribe, just visit AccessMore at www. accessmore.com/pd/12-Truths–A-Lie-Podcast-by-JD-Greear
Show Notes:
Have you ever asked yourself, “How can I know, for sure, that I’m going to heaven when I die?” So many Christians have wrestled with this question for their entire lives, which can lead to anxiety and insecurity about their eternal destination. How can you know, for sure, that you’re going to heaven when you die? Most people feel like knowing for sure they’ll go to heaven has something to do with their behavior-If you are good enough; if you believe enough; go to church enough; give enough.
In this episode of 12 Truths and a Lie, Pastor JD talks about how to experience true assurance of our salvation. Listen as the truths of scripture are explained in regards to knowing for sure that we have been counted as righteous. We get Christ’s perfect record credited to our account. When God looks at J.D. Greear, he sees not how many times I’ve prayed, how sincere I was in my faith, how pure I was… but he sees Jesus’ record credited to mine.
Our prayer is that you can find peace in the fact that when God sees you, he sees the perfect life of Jesus. And so he says to you, “YOU ARE MY beloved child, in whom I am well pleased.”
In the next episode, Pastor J.D. will take a deep dive into discipleship—you don’t want to miss it!
Scripture references found in this episode: Romans 4:1-5; 1 John 5:13; John 14:18; Genesis 15:6; 1 Cor 13:1; John 1:16-18; John 2:20-27; 1 John 3:1; 1 John 4:15; Prov 24:11
Want to ask J.D. a question? Head to our Ask Me Anything hub to submit your question. We’ll pick Ask Me Anything back at the end of the year.
As always, don’t forget to rate and review this podcast!
Find Pastor J.D. on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook.
6 min
September 21, 2023 12 Truths and a Lie Trailer
Each week, we’ll be posting a special short version of each 12 Truths and a Lie podcast on Ask Me Anything. To listen to the full version and subscribe, just visit Access more at www. accessmore.com/pd/12-Truths–A-Lie-Podcast-by-JD-Greear
About 12 Truths and a Lie Podcast:
Whether you’re a new Christian or have walked with God for decades, life is filled with difficult questions that can feel impossible to answer. In the 12 Truths & A Lie Podcast, Pastor J.D. Greear confidently tackles some of the most perplexing issues, including our purpose, the afterlife, how to handle political differences, and more with profound insight, empathy, and scriptural application.
J.D. Greear serves as the Lead Pastor of The Summit Church in Raleigh-Durham, NC. He is the author of several books, including “Stop Asking Jesus Into Your Heart,” “Essential Christianity,” and his most recent work, “12 Truths and a Lie.” Additionally, he has been a member of the Board of Directors of Chick-fil-A since January 2022 and previously held the position of the 62nd president of the Southern Baptist Convention.
Our prayer for you is that this podcast will help draw you closer to God and be bold in asking hard questions. Here’s the promise: with each question, we will pursue the answers according to what God’s Word says…the ultimate truth.
Want to ask J.D. a question? Head to our Ask Me Anything hub to submit your question. We’ll pick Ask Me Anything back at the end of the year.
As always, don’t forget to rate and review this podcast!
Find Pastor J.D. on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook.
2 min
September 11, 2023Why Does James Say We’re Justified by Works?
This week, Pastor J.D. answers a listener question from Cameron who asked, “Why does James say we’re justified by works?”
Show Notes:
That’s a great question and one that I hear a lot and it’s one that I used to ask a lot as a young college student.
Just so we’re all clear and you seen where the tension is, Paul says in Romans 3:28, “Therefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith without the deeds of the law.”
And yet, James 2:24 says: “You see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone.”
So a lot of people read that and they think it’s a contradiction. What James is teaching is actually not a contradiction to what Paul had said. It actually harmonizes the discussion. It shows us what faith that saves really is.
The key point in this whole discussion is that works are the evidence of a decision to follow Jesus and make him Lord of your life.
I always compare it to sitting down in a chair… how do you know that you made a decision to sit down in that chair?
It’s probably not because you remember the mental process it took to sit down. The best evidence that you made a decision to sit down in the chair is that you’re seated there now—that’s proof that at some point you made a decision to or not.
In the same way, the best evidence that you put your faith in Christ as your Lord and Savior is that you are living a life of works that demonstrate that he is Lord.
What Jame is saying is that if what my mouth says about what I decided and my posture says differ, my posture is a more reliable indicator. Your posture is the evidence of your decision to sit. In the same way, your obedience is your evidence of faith in Christ and recognition of his Lordship.
You are saved by faith alone, but the faith that saves is never alone
As we’re recording this, our church is in a series on the book of James, and coincidentally, one of our teaching pastors–Curtis Andursko–just addressed this question in his sermon on James 2. I thought he did a great job explaining this, and he even addressed the “Paul in Romans versus James” confusion directly.
For Paul, justified: made right with God,
For James, it means the the reality of your faith is proven before others
Paige Benton Brown talked about how Paul was writing more like an OBGYN—he was talking about how we are born into true faith.
James is writing like a pediatrician—his goal is to talk about how we are living out that faith.
Both Paul and James both point to a couple places in Abraham’s life where we see this kind of obedience.
In Genesis 15, God covenants with Abraham
And in Genesis 22, God asks Abraham to sacrifice his son, Isaac (and of course, God takes him right up to the point of obedience and then he provides a ram)
Paul points out that Genesis 15:6 occurred before that dramatic act of obedience. All there was a promise and Abraham believed it.
James points to Genesis 22 as the proof that Abraham had really decided to really trust God and follow him because now he is willing to sacrifice his son in obedience.
Bottom line: James and Paul do not contradict—they harmonize. And that’s actually a really good principle to take whenever the Bible seems to contradict itself. Usually the greatest spiritual truth is found beneath something that looks like a contradiction.
Want to ask J.D. a question? Head to our Ask Me Anything hub to submit your question.
As always, don’t forget to rate and review this podcast!
Find Pastor J.D. on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook.
11 min
September 04, 2023What Is the Occult? Is It Real?
This week, Pastor J.D. answers a listener question from Kelly who asked, “What Is the Occult? Is It Real?”
Show Notes:
The occult IS real.
It can refer to different things… witchcraft, worshiping pagan gods, and attempts to communicate with demons and demonic forces…
It’s difficult to figure out the exact statistics, but a 2018 article in Newsweek cited studies that estimated there are about 1.5 million practicing witches in the U.S. alone…
Last fall, NBC News cited a 2014 Pew Research Center study increased that projection several times over in assessing that 0.4% of Americans identified as pagan, Wiccan or New Age.
Which may not seem like a lot, but even that number from 2014 means there’s been a significant increase in people who believe these things, and again, that’s just in America alone.
Other parts of the world and other cultures have deep ties to witchcraft and the occult — witch doctors are still very prevalent (and very powerful) in many parts of Africa, for example.
Flirting with the occult is wicked.
For many, they say worshiping Satan is a way of resisting unjust tyrannical authority—even in that, I can start with a point of agreement that many people have usurped religion to gain unjust authority, Jesus himself was crucified by those doing that. So even there, for the convinced Satanist, I can find a point of agreement to start from. Ironically, they are giving Satan credit for resisting that authority when he’s the one creating it. Satan filled Judas and the Pharisees. Jesus resisted.
More often, Satan shows up in false religion…
Paul said in 1 Corinthians 10:20: “I imply that what pagans sacrifice they offer to demons and not to God. I do not want you to be participants with demons.”
In other words, the sacrifices made to pagan gods were really sacrifices made to demons who were behind those gods.
In America, he’s in materialism and power (angel of light)
Matt 6:24 talks about not being able to serve two masters. Our modern Bibles translate that word as “money,” but in older translations, like the KJV, they use the word “Mammon.” “You cannot serve God and Mammon.”
Why did they do that? Follow this: Jesus spoke in Aramaic, and “Mammon” is the Aramaic word for money. The New Testament is written in Greek, so, when the Gospel writers wrote down Jesus’ words, they translated him from Aramaic to Greek. But for this one word, Mammon, they left it in Aramaic.
Why? Well, when you are translating something, what kind of words do you not translate? Names. You don’t translate names, you transliterate them. The early church said the disciples wrote down this as a proper name because they understood that Jesus was not just talking about a THING here; he was talking about personal power. A demonic power. Something that comes into your heart with a will.
Satan has a unique power over money. It’s part of his domain. It’s not that you can’t have any of it—no, the world works on it and it has great power for good—it’s just you should realize that it will always be fighting to have you, to possess your heart. God and money will ALWAYS be pulling you in opposite directions.
You will love the one and hate the other; or hate the one and love the other. With demonic energy it beckons you, Christian, to transfer your trust from God to it. You may never verbalize it, but in your heart you’ll think: “I don’t need to trust God for the future; I have Mammon.”
On the personal level, we find him questioning identity
Satan begins his temptation of Jesus with an attack on his identity because Satan knows if he defeats him there, he’ll be powerless against all other temptations.
In the great temptation, Satan is not out in the wilderness showing Jesus pictures of naked women or offering him drugs.That comes later. He starts by making Jesus question who he is and how God feels about him.
Satan is in the desire cultivation business
Your enemy’s main tactic is not always to directly attack you. Sometimes he is just quietly and subtly cultivating sinful desires in you, reinforcing them until they become second-nature to you and you can’t escape them.
Here’s what ethicist and author Russell Moore says, “Sometimes the Bible uses the language of predator and prey to describe the relationship between tempter and tempted, but often the Scripture also speaks of temptation in the language of rancher and livestock. You are not just being tracked down—you are also being cultivated.”
Kelly, yes the occult is real and yes, we should resist it—even “mild” forms of it. We also have to recognize that our enemy is more often than not going to approach us in those forms. He’s going to come to us in distortions of biblical truth, tempting us to reshape our views of God rather than what the Bible says, he’s going to repeat the same lie in the garden of Genesis 3. He’s going to try and get you to change what you think about God. He’s going to be there to make you question your identity. Satan is playing the long game.
I know this is heavy and it might make you wonder how we can escape an enemy who is so wise. The Bible gives one answer to that and the answer is Scripture itself.
Want to ask J.D. a question? Head to our Ask Me Anything hub to submit your question.
As always, don’t forget to rate and review this podcast!
Find Pastor J.D. on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook.
17 min
August 28, 2023What Does It Look Like to Live Ready for Jesus’ Return?
This week, Pastor J.D. finishes a two-part series about Jesus’ return. The second question is: “What does it look like to live ready for Jesus’ return?”
Show Notes:
Let me give you four things that will change in you if you are in a state of readiness for Jesus’ return:
Spiritual alertness
How would you live differently today if you knew Jesus were coming back tonight?
I talked about my church growing up, and it’s a little bit funny to poke fun at now… but one thing my church had that I think we’re missing: the earnest expectation of his return…
What if you knew Jesus was coming back today? Wouldn’t it make you ask the question: Am I ready? Am I living today in a way that I’d be happy to see him tonight?
It genuinely could be today… this may be your last chance to repent; last chance to share the gospel.
Mission urgency
If you know the world has an end, and it could be soon, doesn’t that rearrange your priorities
Life is consumed by vacation, hobbies, possessions and bucket lists
Listen, I’m not a guy who believes God never wants us to have things we enjoy, or that he’s not glorified by our secular work. But I also know life is painfully short, and when the master returns I want to have invested my talents to the fullest for his kingdom… and not be found sitting on them.
There’s nothing wrong with a little R&R, hobbies or nice things. But many of us work just so you can go on vacation. That’s the end game. A disciple of Jesus takes occasional vacations so he can work more for Jesus kingdom.
Are you investing the resources of your life with the expectation of his return?
Hope in suffering
Jesus’ return promises us that pain and suffering won’t last forever; all pain is temporary.
There’s a Christian philosopher named Cornelius Plantinga who said, “The second coming of Jesus Christ is good news for people whose lives are filled with bad news. If you a slave in Pharaoh’s Egypt or in the United States in the early 19th century; if you are an Israelite exiled in Babylon, or a Kosovar exiled in Albania; if you are a woman living in a culture where when your husband gets mad at you he can lock you up in a closet or threaten to have his buddies come and rape you… then you don’t yawn when somebody mentions the return of Jesus Christ.”
I might add, if your son just died of cancer; if your marriage just dissolved; if you’re lonely; if your body is wracked with chronic pain—lift your eyes! It doesn’t last forever. It could be tonight. If your life just hasn’t turned out… “the promise of the second coming shows us the ‘good ole days’ are always ahead of us.”
Power to forgive
In Tim Keller’s book, Forgive, he points out that Jesus gives you the power to forgive.
I’ve seen people who really struggle with bitterness helped by grasping Jesus’ imminent return.
When someone wrongs us, we want justice. So we run to the judgment seat of the world and we hop on it. We know what they deserve and we want to help them get it. “Go, God. Give it to him.” We want to be God’s adviser.
But listen, we weren’t meant for that throne. It’s too big for us. And it distorts us.
Have you ever seen how bitterness destroys someone? Someone is mad at someone else and it colors their whole disposition toward that person, where everything that person does becomes tarnished.
Or maybe even they begin to be prejudiced toward whole groups of people.
A woman who is angry at her husband thinks all men are bad; someone who suffers injustice at the hands one person in a people group thinks everyone in that people group is bad…
We weren’t meant for that throne. The doctrine of the second coming helps us stay off of it because we know, he’s coming back; he will bring justice!
And so I can endure injustice for the time being because he’ll set all things right.
One thing we have to agree on: We ought to be expecting the return of Jesus anytime and we ought to live like it is today.
Want to ask J.D. a question? Head to our Ask Me Anything hub to submit your question.
As always, don’t forget to rate and review this podcast!
Find Pastor J.D. on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook.
12 min
August 21, 2023What’s Going to Happen in the “End Times?”
This week, Pastor J.D. answers a question submitted from Brandon. He asked, “What’s going to happen in the ‘end times?'”
Show Notes:
I grew up in a church a little obsessed with the Second Coming.
On our Sunday School walls we had posters with dates and pictures of dragons and names of politicians.
We had our annual prophecy conferences (which were the best attended events of the year);
For special Sunday night services we watched the Billy Graham movies about the Tribulation.
We had our rapture board games and rapture bumper stickers, “In case of rapture, this car will be unmanned.” And we made rapture jokes like there was no tomorrow.
As a kid, I lived in perpetual fear of being left behind.
If for any reason I couldn’t find my parents or they didn’t respond in the house when I called them, I’d run through the house yelling “Mom, mom” just sure I’d see her clothes had fallen neatly into a pile on the floor…
I had this recurring dream where the rapture happened—this is not a joke—and I got lifted up to the top of the house and then as everyone else went on up to meet Jesus I would drop back down to the earth, revealing that my worst fear had come true: My faith in Christ wasn’t strong enough to get me all the way to heaven. And when the roll was called up yonder I’d be here.
And then, when I was in high school, a little book came out that got instant popularity: 88 Reasons why Jesus is Coming Back in 1988.
The guy who wrote it said, “Jesus said we can’t know the day or the hour, but he never said we couldn’t know within a 3-day window.”
It was a big deal at my Christian school… “We’re going to sit here and wait.”
Of course that day came and went. And then next year the author released 89 reasons Jesus would come back in 1989—he said he had explained he had miscounted the Gregorian calendar, which, of course, happens to the best of us.
I have since learned that some of how we approached this topic lacked some balance, but, if you’ll let me be charitable for a minute, there is one thing we lived with that I believe our generation is missing and that is the earnest expectation of his return
My pastor would often end our services by saying, “Maranatha.” (The Lord is coming). And then he would say, “And it could be today.” And I really felt like that could be true.
I know we have disagreements about the timing of Jesus’ return, and what phrases like “thief in the night” really mean—friendly disagreement, I hope.
And I have my own convictions, as I’m sure you do.
Instead I want to talk about something we all should have in common:
And that is the need to conduct our ministries with the awareness that eternity is real and the Lord is at hand.
Eschatology is a fancy word for the theology of the end times—might be the one of the most, if not the most, neglected doctrines in the contemporary church. Many theologians seem to find it embarrassing: the crass, uneducated uncle of Christian theology.
But get this: the second coming of Christ is the most talked about doctrine in the Bible.
In the 260 chapters of the New Testament, there are 318 references to it.
(1 out of every 13 verses mentions it.)
And for every 1 prophecy in the Bible concerning Christ’s first advent, there are eight that talk about his second. (We have a whole holiday celebrating his first coming but we barely mention the second.)
Furthermore: Almost every moral command given in the New Testament is tied to the second coming at some point.
My pastor used to say: “How can we call this doctrine non-essential? It’s in every chapter. Every command is tied to it. To miss it is to miss the whole hope and thrust of the New Testament: ‘Surely I come quickly. Even so come, Lord Jesus.’”
I just want a emphasize real quick that there is a commonality all Christians should have and that is the imminence of Jesus’s return.
There are basically four positions:
Some Christians think he is coming back before…
Pre-trib: Tribulation is a 7 year period in which the antichrist and Kirk Cameron do battle… Raptured out before.
Post-trib, or “historic premillennialism”: that is the idea that there is a tribulation coming, God will continue to work in the nation of Israel, but the church won’t be raptured up before. The church will be raptured out afterward. The major problem with this one is that it creates problems for the imminence of Jesus’ return.
Post-millennial and amillennial.
Both of these takes a more metaphorical approach. These positions believes the church has replaced Israel, and all the promises toward Israel have been fulfilled and are being fulfilled in the church. For spiritual purposes, there are no longer Jews and no history for the nation of Israel.
That’s a real problem for me as a Bible interpreter, but let me note the positives:.
Preserves the imminence: Jesus could return whenever.
Help you see the spiritual meanings behind the imagery of Revelation. (my experience vs. reading Beale)
There’s one more beyond those and that’s pan-tribulationists: Which means, “I really have no idea, but I know it will all pan out in the end.” Maybe you are there?
If you’re curious, I would say I am in the pre-tribulation camp. I would say 80% of the time. I’m sympathetic to certain elements of the others, but I typically land on that side.
I‘ll give you three quick reasons for that.
Unconditional and straightforward nature of the promises
(2 Samuel 7:12–16; Genesis 12, 15, 18: actual nation, actual throne occupied by ethnic Jew, actual earthly kingdom).
Much of what was promised has been fulfilled literally (Jesus the Jew on a throne), so I assume that what is left will be fulfilled literally.
The way the book of Revelation was written
Daniel 9:26–27. The 70 weeks are for “my people” Israel.
Some things don’t make sense if Israel is not separate from the church.
For example, Acts 1:6
Romans 9:4, Paul makes a distinction. “The people of Israel. Theirs is the adoption to sonship; theirs the divine glory, the covenants, the receiving of the law, the temple worship and the promises.”
Romans 11:12, 23–24
So what do I mean by all that? The church is similar to Israel in that it is the people of God. Analogously the church is referred to it, as in many ways it fulfills spiritually the promises to Israel. But Scripture demands that their remains a future for the people of God, that is, Israel. For all my post-tribulation friends, you can stay and enjoy it if you want, me and Kirk Cameron are going on to heaven.
Here’s the bottom line: There are various viewpoints regarding exactly HOW the End Times events described in the Bible will take place. I know what I believe, but there are very serious, scholarly brothers and sisters in the church who believe differently then I would about the timing of what will all transpire.
But no matter what, we know that Christ IS going to return, and that we are to be perpetually READY.
Want to ask J.D. a question? Head to our Ask Me Anything hub to submit your question.
As always, don’t forget to rate and review this podcast!
Find Pastor J.D. on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook.
17 min
August 14, 2023If God Draws People to Faith, Why Has God Not Drawn My Lost Family Member?
This week, Pastor J.D. answers a question submitted from Linda. She asked, “If God Draws People to Faith, Why Has God Not Drawn My Lost Family Member?”
Show Notes:
Linda’s question came in response to a message I preached at the Summit Church. I talked about John 6:44, Philippians 2:14, and John 1:12.
Paul says in 1 Corinthians 12:3 that you can’t say that Jesus is Lord unless the Holy Spirit gives you the power to say that. So that leads you to the question, “Why hasn’t God done that for this person that I love or the 950 million people in India?”
This conversation has rules. Think of it like CrossFit. You have to obey the rules—otherwise when you start lifting heavy weights you’re going to get hurt. I want you to walk with me through them because I think they will help.
A lot of this was systematized by John Calvin. I’ve always thought it was helpful that John Calvin identified his favorite verse as Deuteronomy 29:29. It says, “The secret things belong to the Lord our God, but the things that have been revealed belong to us and our children forever.”
What this shows you is that there are secret things when it comes to theology and there are revealed things. The revealed things are where you and I live—they belong to us.
So we have to ask, what is revealed about God’s desire for us to be saved? The first thing that is revealed is what we said right at the beginning: If you came to Jesus, it’s because he drew you.
There’s simply no way to read the verses of the New Testament and not see that if you came to Jesus it’s because he put that desire in you and he drew you to himself. That is what is revealed.
There’s another thing that’s revealed in 2 Peter 3:9, “The Lord is not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance.”
So when I think about my family member that needs Jesus, I’m thinking about 1 Timothy 2:4. I’m saying “Lord, you’ve told me your desire for them to be saved. YOu’ve told me that my prayers make a difference. You’ve told me that you will bless me and generations after me and Lord I’m bringing those promises to you to be revealed.”
In my mind, I don’t see how that and the truth that for someone to come to Jesus, God has to draw them to himself, I don’t how those two things can coexist in the same universe honestly. It seems like one cancels out the other, but Scripture presents both of them.
We have to accept that people only come to Jesus because God draws them and God desires all people to be saved.
I know some of you want a resolution on this.
Well what if this was a secret thing that John Calvin was talking about?
What I want to emphasize to you is that you have to play by the rules. When it comes to think about your own future, your own salvation, that’s where you’re supposed to bring those calvinistic verses in. Those verses are supposed to bring assurance.
And when it comes to thinking about the lost, I apply the second one of those: that he desires all to be saved and prayer actually matters.
One more thing to ask yourself, what if God’s sovereignty was to put me in this situation and to raise the concern in my heart about this person so that I will pray? What if that is his sovereignty expressed? I say that because of a story in Exodus 34 where Moses prays and as a result, God changed his mind. But then Exodus 34 goes on to say God won’t change his mind. When you put it all together you realize that God was the one who put Moses in the situation where he could see what was happening with the children of Israel, so that he would come to God to bring the request that would “change his mind.” In other words, God put Moses in a place to ask the question that would give God the opportunity to do what he wanted to do all along.
So what if these people that are in my life who need God, what if the impulse to pray and share is God sovereignly moving in me so that they can hear and be saved?
So here’s my final answer to Linda’s question: Applying the rules and the revealed things of Scriptures means this—you can trust that God is drawing them. You can trust that if they’re not coming, Jesus is lamenting it. You can trust that your prayers are changing things and God desires for them to be saved. He is going to work on your behalf. Don’t get stuck in the secret things.
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13 min

About The Bullpen with J.D. Greear

From the publisher's feed

Every sermon starts with more than can fit into a message. For years, Pastor J.D. Greear has filled his sermon notes with extra illustrations, questions, insights, and rabbit trails that never made…