Predestination

The first of two messages on unconditional election. Pastor Martin gives a simple statement of the doctrine from the Westminster Shorter Catechism, then establishes its biblical basis first through the explicit testimony of key words (elect, foreknow, predestinate) and key passages (Matthew 11, John 6, John 17, Acts 13, Romans 9, 1-2 Thessalonians), and begins the implicit testimony drawn from God's pattern of dealings with Israel, the doctrine of sin, and the doctrine of God's sovereignty.

Pastor Martin opens the study of the cardinal blessings by establishing the importance of the biblical doctrine of calling. He traces three lines of thought: first, calling's strategic place in the plan of redemption as the nexus link in the golden chain of Romans 8:29-30 that joins eternal foreknowledge and predestination to justification and final glorification; second, its dominant place in the pursuit of Christian maturation as Paul prays the Ephesians would know the hope of their calling and exhorts them to walk worthy of it; and third, its central place as a distinct designation of the people of God — they are 'the called ones.' He illustrates the golden chain with the cables of the George Washington Bridge anchored in the Jersey and Manhattan palisades, and closes appealing to both saints and strangers to give themselves to close, careful thought over this doctrine.

Pastor Martin opens a new section on adoption, arguing that adoption is an even higher blessing than justification — as a judge's son rescuing a criminal only illustrates justification, but the judge adopting the pardoned criminal as his own heir pictures adoption. He then traces adoption's centrality through four spheres: God's eternal purpose (Ephesians 1), Christ's temporal activity (Galatians 4), the initial application of salvation (John 1, Galatians 3-4), and the final application of salvation (Romans 8, 1 John 3, Revelation 21). He closes by rebuking the notion of universal fatherhood and urging believers to enjoy this pinnacle privilege.

Pastor Martin begins to unfold the nature of adoption by first carefully distinguishing the fatherhood peculiar to adoption from three other biblical senses of divine fatherhood: the eternal Father-Son relationship within the Godhead, the general fatherhood of creation and providence, and the theocratic fatherhood God sustained to the nation of Israel. Only the fatherhood revealed in Ephesians 1:5 and Galatians 4:4-6 — dependent on the Father's predestination, the Son's redemption, and the Spirit's attestation — is the fatherhood of adopting grace. He closes by urging unbelievers to renounce the family of the devil and pleads for the Spirit of adoption to light up these privileges in believers' hearts.