Understanding the Facts

"Unregenerate man is fully capable of understanding the facts of the gospel: he is simply incapable, due to his corruption and enmity, to submit himself to that gospel. And he surely responds to God every day: negatively, in rebellion and self-serving sinfulness, The Reformed assertion is that man cannot understand and embrace the gospel nor respond in faith and repentance toward Christ without God first freeing him from sin and giving him spiritual life (regeneration)."

— James White

We have sinned and can sin the Same Way

 “When we see anyone sin, we should first weep over ourselves in their calamity, because we have either fallen like them or we can fall." -Gregory the Great

+in the adulterer, I see my lust +in the murderer, I see my hate +in the thief, I see my coveting We either are sinning, have sinned, or can sin the same way. Christ have mercy. And he does, for he is mercy incarnate.

Thirteen Things the Unsaved Cannot Do

 13 THINGS AN UNSAVED PERSON CANNOT DO

1. HE CANNOT THINK AS GOD DOES:
"For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the LORD. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts." (Isaiah 55:8-9)

2. HE CANNOT UNDERSTAND GOD:
"You thought that I was just like you..." (Psalm 50:21). "Can you discover the depths of God? Can you discover the limits of the Almighty? They are higher than the heavens above--what can you do? They are deeper than Hell below--what can you know?" (Job 11:7-8)

3. HE CANNOT SEE SPIRITUAL THINGS:
"Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again he cannot see the kingdom of God." (John 3:3)

4. HE CANNOT KNOW HIS OWN HEART:
"The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?" (Jeremiah 17:9)

5. HE CANNOT PROPERLY DIRECT HIS OWN PATHS:
"I know, O LORD, that a man's way is not in himself, Nor is it in a man who walks to direct his steps." (Jeremiah 10:23).
"There is a way that appears to be right, but in the end it leads to death." (Proverbs 14:12)

6. HE CANNOT FREE HIMSELF FROM THE CURSE OF THE LAW:
"For as many as are of the works of the law are under the curse; for it is written, Cursed is every one that continueth not in all things which are written in the book of the law to do them." (Galatians 3:10)

7. HE CANNOT RECEIVE THE HOLY SPIRIT:
"...the Spirit of truth. The world cannot accept him, because it neither sees him nor knows him." (John 14:17)

8. HE CANNOT HEAR (receive & understand) GOD'S WORDS:
"He who is of God hears the words of God; for this reason you do not hear them, because you are not of God." (John 8:47)
"The person without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God but considers them foolishness, and cannot understand them because they are discerned only through the Spirit." (1 Corinthians 2:14)

9. HE CANNOT BIRTH HIMSELF INTO THE FAMILY OF GOD:
"Which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man but of God." (John 1:13)
"For he says to Moses, 'I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.' It does not depend on human desire or effort, but on God's mercy." (Romans 9:15-16)

10. HE CANNOT PRODUCE REPENTANCE AND FAITH IN CHRIST:
"For by grace are you saved through faith; and that (faith) not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: Not of works, lest any man should boast." (Ephesians 2:8-9)
". . . for all men have not faith." (2 Thessalonians 3:2)
"For unto you it is given . . . to believe on him . . ." (Philippians 1:29)
"...in the hope that God will grant them repentance leading them to a knowledge of the truth. (2 Timothy 2:25)

11. HE CANNOT COME TO CHRIST:
"No man can come to me, except the Father which hath sent me draw him . . . Therefore said I unto you, that no man can come unto me, except it were given unto him of my Father." (John 6:44, 65)

12. HE CANNOT BELIEVE ON CHRIST:
"But you do not believe because you are not of My sheep." (John 10:26)

13. HE CANNOT PLEASE GOD:
"Those who live according to the flesh have their minds set on what the flesh desires....Those who are in the realm of the flesh cannot please God....if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, they do not belong to Christ." (Romans 8:5, 8-9)

Confounded with Shame

 

STAINS IN OUR BEST

"Our prayers have stains in them, our faith is mixed with unbelief, our repentance is not so tender as it should be, our communion is distant and interrupted. We cannot pray without sinning, and there is filth even in our tears."

~C.H. Spurgeon

FEWER PEOPLE

‎"If the gospel were more faithfully preached, there would be fewer people professing to believe it."
-- A.W. Pink

IT WOULD MANIFEST

‎"Remember this--there is not a worse nature in hell

than that which is in you, and it would manifest itself

accordingly--if the Lord did not restrain it!"
 
~~Thomas Brooks;

OUR BEST CANNOT

[The bad news] is that the best efforts of the best Christians, on the best days, in the best frame of heart and mind, with the best motives fall short of that true righteousness and holiness that God requires. Our best efforts cannot satisfy God's justice.

- Michael Horton

THE BEST OF MY DUTIES

"Not only the worst of my sins but the best of my duties speak me a child of Adam." William Beveridge

FRANKLY THEY CAN'T

The gospel commands dead men to rise, dead men to believe, dead men to
understand, dead men to repent. The gospel commands dead people to do
what frankly they can't do. John MacArthur

IT IS CERTAIN

"Man's mind is like a store of idolatry and superstition; so much so that if a man believes his own mind it is certain that he will forsake God and forge some idol in his own brain." (John Calvin)

NOTHING BUT

"Before God's effectual call, a humbling work passes upon the soul. A man is convinced of sin; he sees he is a sinner and nothing but a sinner... Such as were never convinced are never called."

- Thomas Watson

EVIL IDOLATERS

But the most abominable form of idolatry in the world is that which Paul calls “will worship,” the worship of yourself (Colossians 2:23).

Those who attribute salvation in whole or in part to the will, work, or worth of man are the most abominably evil idolaters in the world, for they worship themselves. Freewillism is the worship of self. Legalism is the worship self. Free-will works religion makes man his own savior, for it makes the will, work, or worth of man the determining factor in salvation. Now hear me well. — If your salvation, in whole or in part, is looked upon by you as something that is dependent upon or determined by your will or your works, you are a lost, Christless soul, an idolater. You may talk about God and grace, Christ and redemption, the Holy Spirit and regeneration; but you really worship yourself. You trust in your own decision. Your confidence is in your personal goodness. Your peace is derived not from what Christ has done, but from what you have done.

Don Fortner

ONLY TO DIVINE MAJESTY

More by Luther on free will...

""free-will" is obviously a term applicable only to Divine Majesty; for only He can do, and does (as the Psalmist sings) "whatever he wills in heaven and earth" [Psalms135:6]. If "free-will" is ascribed to men, it is ascribed with no more propriety than divinity itself would be - and no blasphemy... See More could exceed that! So it befits theologians to refrain from using the term when they want to speak of human ability, and to leave it to be applied to God only."

--Martin Luther

ONLY IF

Apart from Christ, we are dead in sin (Eph. 2:1) and wholly disposed to hate God. We only want darkness, and so we freely choose to reject Him. We freely choose to love and to serve Jesus only if the Spirit changes our hearts (John 3:1-8). Otherwise we remain lost.

- Tabletalk, Feb 23, 2007

DRIVEN MAD

"If any man could see his own heart as it is by nature, he would be driven mad: the sight of our disease is not to be born unless we also see the remedy."

~CH Spurgeon.

The remedy is not man himself but Christ Alone. from Shawn Waugh

QUICKENS

"Christ quickens none but the dead. Why do not the papists attain to this grace of justification? They never see themselves wholly dead, but join some life to the natural estate of man. Therefore Christ quickens them not."

- Richard Sibbes

I DID.

Puzzling. How were you born again?

God told me to repent. I did.
God told me to believe. I did.
God told me to be baptized. I did.
God told me to trust Jesus. I did.
God told me to confess my sins. I did.
God told me to accept his offer. I did.

How were you born again? Because of what I did.

Pieces all fit together: Works Salvation.

NO FEAR OF GOD

Romans 3:9-18 is not merely a description of those without the OT and those without a prophet sent from God to explain things in voice and text and time; but even of the Jews with a text, prophet, voice, and time; Even so these things were true of their mind and heart, and the fruit of their decisions:

Romans 3:Romans 3:9-18 (ESV)
What then? Are we Jews any better off? No, not at all. For we have already charged that all, both Jews and Greeks, are under the power of sin, [10] as it is written:
"None is righteous, no, not one;
[11] no one understands;
no one seeks for God.
[12] All have turned aside; together they have become worthless;
no one does good,
not even one."
[13] "Their throat is an open grave;
they use their tongues to deceive."
"The venom of asps is under their lips."
[14] "Their mouth is full of curses and bitterness."
[15] "Their feet are swift to shed blood;
[16] in their paths are ruin and misery,
[17] and the way of peace they have not known."
[18] "There is no fear of God before their eyes."

NO HELP NEEDED

If man has a free-will, then he should not need ANY help from the Holy Spirit, not regeneration, not illumination, not a divinely transmitted offer, and not even a divinely inspired book.