This document discusses several topics related to church history and theology, including: 1) Predestination and free will, comparing them to electrons in a bar of silver having free movement but an overall predetermined voltage. It asserts they can coexist with God controlling history while allowing free will. 2) Different levels of spiritual sensitivity among people and how that affects their ability to be saved. 3) Debates around Easter and other religious festivals, with differing views on whether the specific names or traditions matter. 4) The radical New Testament view that rejects praying to specific gods, using religious names for days/months, and observing human religious systems in favor of a direct relationship with God.

1. Church History - 6
Final Questions Of Interest

3. Predestination – Two Trains
• Gk: pro-orizo – to sketch out beforehand like
the drawing of an architect
• The directions of the Two Trains are
determined beforehand, sketched out in
advance.
• It has been pre-arranged that all who follow
Christ will go to Heaven
• It has been pre-arranged that those who
follow the Devil will end up in the Lake of
Fire
• But who you follow is up to you – which is
why we must preach the gospel to those
who are lost to give them the chance to join
us on the Heaven-Bound Train

5. The Salvation Bell Curve
• People have differing levels of spiritual sensitivity –
spiritual senses such as our heart and our spiritual
eyes and ears…
• Some are very spiritually sensitive and take to the
gospel quickly (John the Baptist)
• Other are greedy, cruel and hardened
(Pharaoh, Judas)
• The bulk of people are ‘somewhere in-between’
during revivals they become more spiritually
sensitive and follow God but during apostasy they
become deceived and fall away.
• The ability of people to be saved is directly
proportional to their ability to receive and
understand God’s Word
Matthew 13:14-17, Acts 28;25-28, Hebrews 5:14

6. Predestination vs. Free Will
• In the bar of silver the individual freefloating electrons move randomly and
have free will
• But the voltage of the overall bar of
silver is precisely determined
“predestined”
• God can control history very precisely
despite our individual choices and
without over-riding our free will and our
ability to choose Him and to love Him
• Predestination and free will can co-exist
at the same time!

7. Predestination Summary
• God can control history while allowing
us a free will choice
• The biggest choice we make is whether
we will believe in Jesus and follow Him
• This choice has a predestined result –
Heaven for one choice, Hell for the
other and there is nothing in-between
• Our ability to make that choice depends
on our spiritual sensitivity to God so we
must open our hearts and minds to
Jesus and listen to him as His disciples!

8. Easter & Other Festivals…
• Two views:
a) Psalms 16:4 MKJV Their sorrows shall be
multiplied who run after another god. I will
not pour out their drink offerings of blood;
and I will not take their names on my lips.
b) Is not a rose just as sweet by any other
name? (In other words what you call God or
a festival does not matter)

9. The Radical NT View
• The New Testament does not have the
disciples praying using the specific name
of a God – like Baal or even to Elohim or
to YHWH or to Jehovah
• God does not dwell in temples made by
human hands! (Even the Jewish Temple)
(Isaiah 66:1,2 Acts 7:48, 17:24
• It goes far beyond tribal or national
religions
• The apostles pray to the Father, in the
name of Jesus, and in the power of the
Holy Spirit – e.g. Ephesians 3:14-21

10. The Radical NT View - 2
• Even the names of the days of the week are
converted to ‘neutral’ numbers e.g the first
day of the week, the seventh month etc.
• Neither Jewish or pagan names are used
• All festivals seen as a danger to
faith, especially when part of a religious
calendar
• Galatians 4:10, 5:1-11
• Colossians 2:8-23
• We do not observe the systems of human
religion, we instead have a direct
relationship with the Father.

11. Host Of Heaven
•
(
, cebhā' ha-shāmayīm): The expression is employed in the Old Testament to
denote (1) The stars, frequently as objects of idolatry (Deu_4:19; Deu_17:3; 2Ki_17:16;
2Ki_21:3, 2Ki_21:1; 2Ki_23:4 f; Jer_8:2; Jer_19:13; Zep_1:5), but also as witnesses in their
number, order and splendor, to the majesty and providential rule and care of Yahweh (Isa_34:4;
Isa_40:26, “calleth them all by name”; Isa_45:12; Jer_33:22); and (2) The angels (1Ki_22:19;
2Ch_18:18; Neh_9:6; compare Psa_103:21).
•
(1) Star-worship seems to have been an enticement to Israel from the first (Deu_4:19;
Deu_17:3; Amo_5:26; compare Act_7:42, Act_7:43), but attained special prominence in the
days of the later kings of Judah. The name of Manasseh is particularly connected with it. This
king built altars for “all the host of heaven” in the courts of the temple (2Ki_21:3, 2Ki_21:5).
Josiah destroyed these altars, and cleansed the temple from the idolatry by putting down the
priests and burning the vessels associated with it (2Ki_23:4, 2Ki_23:5, 2Ki_23:12).
•
(2) In the other meaning of the expression, the angels are regarded as forming Yahweh's “host”
or army, and He himself is the leader of them - “Yahweh of hosts” (Isa_31:4, etc.) - though this
designation has a much wider reference. See ANGELS; ASTRONOMY; LORD OF HOSTS;
compare Oehler, Theol of Old Testament, II, 270ff (ET).

12. Emergent Church
• Tries to re-invent church so it is ‘more
relevant’
• Unfortunately tends to question the
Scriptures and their authority
• At its best is very accepting of the
marginalized in society
• But tends to merge with the New Age
and other beliefs
• Has basically become a branch of the
old ‘liberal’ theology of the 1920’s