Back to the order of the clauses, Jeremy Myers at GES has drawn a comparison between 27-28 and Romans 8:29-30, saying:

“Nearly everyone agrees that there is a progression taking place here[in Romans]. I doubt very much that any Calvinist would want to argue that we can shuffle the order of this list so that foreknowledge and calling comes after justification.”

Every translation I’ve looked at has the same order in John 10.

I do see how if you are right, it would be true that the “attributes” could be reordered. But since i see the list as being at least a progression if not a chronological one, I see the order found in the translations to suffice.

God bless.

I am going to give you some notes on the Mark 8 passage, but I may post them on my blog site. They would consume too much space on this site.

By the way, my book thoroughly addresses your questions above.

LM

Consider the parallel in Mark 8:34-38

v. 34 – ‘He summoned the multitude with His disciples’
i.e.- this is a general call addressed to a crowd

If this were a call to go to the next level – we probably should expect Jesus to state that so the crowd would not get confused as to what He was talking about. He makes no distinction.

Then He gives the call to self denial and taking up one’s cross

Does this have any bearing on salvation?

According to Jesus it does

Mk. 8:36 – ‘What does it profit a man if he gain the whole world and forfeit his soul [psuche]?

i.e. – if you don’t turn [repent] from your natural tendency to worship self – you will forfeit your soul

It seems absurd to me to hear people accuse LS of confusing Jesus’s calls to discipleship with calls to salvation. We are only confused if Jesus was.

The real problem is that the no lordship / FG position takes the words of Jesus and forces them into a theological grid that does not allow Jesus the natural force of His comments. He knew how to use language and communicated what He wanted to say.

Listen to J.C. Ryle on Luke 9:23, 24:

“The command of our master is clear and plain: ‘If any man will come after Me let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow Me.’

“Now what do we know of all this? Surely this is a question which ought to be asked. A little formal church going, and a decent attendance at a place of worship, can never be the Christianity of which Christ speaks in this place. Where is our self-denial? Where is our daily carrying of the cross? Where is our following of Christ? Without a religion of this kind we shall never be saved. A crucified Savior will never be content to have a self-pleasing, self-indulging, worldly minded people. No self-denial – no real Grace!” [Expository Thoughts on the Gospels - Luke vol. 1, p. 310]

A 2nd level call to discipleship after salvation cannot be sustained in the Scriptures and is not a part of historic orthodoxy in dealing with the gospels. It is a novel view that lacks any exegetical support.

The word disciple [mathetes] referred to a learner, follower, student, apprentice

It had no deeper connotation than that

Acts 11:26 – ‘The disciples were first called Christians at Antioch.’

Will someone please hand me a baseball bat?

There are several observations that can be made from John 10:26-28 (I’ll throw in 28 just for good measure). For example, all the sheep which belong to the Shepherd believe in the Shepherd. There are no sheep that belong to the Shepherd who do not believe in the Shepherd. We can also see that all the sheep which belong to the Shepherd follow the Shepherd. There are no sheep that belong to the Shepherd who do not follow the Shepherd. Additionally all the sheep which belong to the Shepherd are give the gift of eternal life (a gift which cannot be returned, revoked, or removed). There are no sheep that belong to the Shepherd who are not eternally secure.
From these initial observations we can then argue that there are no sheep who believe in the Shepherd who do not also follow the Shepherd. We can also argue that there are no sheep who either do not believe in or do not follow the Shepherd who have been given eternal life (this does not imply that their acts of believing and following are the source of their eternal life).
For the sake the topic of the article being commented on the only real question that needs to be answered is, “what does ‘follow’ mean?” The two options that are on the table are ‘to have faith in the Shepherd,’ or ‘to be a disciple of the Shepherd.’ Nate in the main article gives more that sufficient support for follow, being used in a context such as John 10:26-28, meaning ‘to be a disciple.” So, I guess the next question that would have to be answered is, “is it possible that Christ, through the normal use of language, chose to make follow mean ‘to have faith in,’ instead of ‘to be a disciple of?’”
It appears that we would all have to allow for the possibility. However, possibility is no the same as probability. In my humble opinion it is highly unlikely that John would quote Christ where He chose to define a word in a discourse as important as the one in John 10 in a way that is different from how He defined it almost every other time He used that word (especially in the Gospel of John)? I don’t believe that follow can be define any differently here that it can every other time it is used in a religious context for the simple fact that when John wrote his gospel he strove for clarity not confusion because he was writing so that people might believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God (John 20:31).

Paul

You asked, “Out of curiosity, since I have not yet had opportunity to read your book, where would you see your views most closely lining up… Hodges, Ryrie, Geisler, or ???? I ask only because it would be helpful to know more of what camp you are coming from when you make the arguments you make.”

My desire is to simply stand where the Bible stands, whether or not that identifies me with a particular system of theology or “camp.”

If you read my Introduction post on my blog site, you will have a better idea of where I am coming from.

LM

Bob Wilkin has said conserning the clause order isse of Chapter 10:

“Both English and Greek definitely do often use word order at times for emphasis. First words and last words are often emphatic. If [not] then any comments on the ordering of words or phrases would be false.

As a case in point, in John 10:28 the Greek word order is as follows: “And I eternal life I give to them…” Clearly eternal life (zwen aiwnion) is put first in the sentence for emphasis. The English translation could and should reflect this (“And eternal life I give to them…”).

The same is true with phrases and clauses. While sometimes the order is not significant, often it is and the context must be consulted to decide.

In this passage if “they follow Me” is a synonym for believing in Jesus, as I suggest, then it clearly is intended to preceed “And I give eternal life to them.” If, as I think MacArthur suggests, this refers to the perseverance that all “true believers” will manifest, then it would seem that they follow Me is put out of logical order for emphasis. Frankly that would seem a very odd use of emphasis. The argument that following the Good Shepherd precedes the giving of life to convey cause and effect is more impressive to me.

Matt, I don’t think treating this passage as a silver bullet seems warranted.

Jodie

“We are justified simply upon faith, but it must be a real faith. We are justified by faith without works, but we are not justified by a faith that is without works. The faith which God sees and upon which He justifies, leads inevitably to works which man can see. God saw the faith of Abraham and counted it to him for righteousness, but the faith God saw was real and led Abraham to works that all could see and which proved his faith. The proof to us of the faith is the works, and we know that he that does not work has not justifying faith.

We must not lose sight of the truth which Paul emphasizes against legalism on the one side—that we are justified on the simple condition of a real faith in Christ. We must not lose sight of the truth which James emphasizes against antinomianism on the other side—that it is only the faith that proves its genuineness by works, that justifies. To the legalist, who is seeking to do something to merit justification, we must say “stop working and believe on Him that justifieth the ungodly.” (Rom. 4:5.) To the antinomian, who is boasting that he has faith and is justified by it, but who does not show his faith by his works, we must say “what doth it profit, if a man say he hath faith, but have not works? Can that faith save him. (Jas. 2:14, R. V.) We are justified by faith alone, but we are justified by that faith alone that works.”
[Torrey, R. A. 1898. What the Bible Teaches, Fleming H. Revell company: New York, Chicago]

Have patience, my brother! We will switch topics soon enough.

NB

Thanks for your thorough reply. I appreciate hearing your view of the passage. I agree with much of what you are saying. I’m not sure I expect to see so much innocense on the part of Christs adversaries by chapter 10.

About 1 Cor 5:17 I hope you some day look into the Hodges/GES view on the miracle of new birth. Hodges’ book on “Six Secrets of the Christian Life” is, in my opinion, very much common ground regarding this debate and is a very beautifully observed small book on living and growing in Christ. He doesn’t give short shrift to what you would call the new creation, and expects new Christians to exibit change. In fact, he has said if they don’t he suspects they may not have been converted and need more evengelism. So his criticisms have been misunderstood.

One thing I think this series, plus the one at Pyro, has taught me is that there has been a small case free grace that has nothing to do with the Free Grace promoted by Bob Wilkin and Hodges. The latter is appropriately self-examiniation oriented, the former perhaps led to the Piper/MacArthur movement.

About “a redeemed person who can permanently apostasize in this life”, I think there are many references to that in the Bible, but I’ll leave off for now.

God bless.