ANNOUNCER: The following program is sponsored by
generous friends and partners of Real Life.
ANNOUNCER: Welcome to Real Life with Jack Hibbs.
JACK: You are not going to go to heaven because of your
Hebrew blood. You're going to go to heaven because you've
been washed in the blood of the Lamb of God. It doesn't matter
if you're a Jew or Gentile, male, female, bond, servant,
rich or poor. It doesn't matter. And that's such great news.
ANNOUNCER: Today's message by Jack Hibbs called Free Moral
Agency explores our God-given freedom to exercise choice and
the responsibility it entails. Get out
your Bibles. Real Life starts now.
ANNOUNCER: Is God different than He used to be? More tolerant of
sin? More politically correct? In today's world, many are
trying to reshape God to fit modern ideas, leading to
confusion about His true nature. This confusion has even seeped
into some churches. In "The Eclipse of God," bestselling
author Erwin Lutzer reveals how our culture is trying to make
God more inclusive and accepting of things that the Bible clearly
says are wrong, but God's character hasn't changed. His
truth remains the same, and He calls us to stand firm in it
even as the world around us shifts. Pastor Jack Hibbs says,
many people hold to a horribly distorted view of God. Pastor
Lutzer shows us how to engage with the culture lovingly,
boldly and effectively. This book comes at a critical hour.
"The Eclipse of God" will be sent to you when you make a gift
of any amount to Real Life today. Visit jackhibbs.com or
call 877-777-2346 to get your copy. Order now.
(MUSIC)
JACK: Listen, free moral agency. I mean, it sounds like a
Department of the Defense or something, right? Free moral
agency. No, listen, it's actually a compartment of your
life. You and I have been given a gift by God and that is built
into the human. When God made us in His likeness, that you and I
possess what is known as free moral agency. You say, Jack,
what does that mean? It's actually something that you
enjoy every single day. In a free moral agency aspect of who
we are is that we choose what we want for breakfast, we choose
what we want for lunch, we choose who we want to hang out
with, we choose where we want to go. And free moral agency is
what God has given you and I. It's a little bit, look at it
this way, as built in sovereignty that God gave to you
and I because unlike angels, angels were not created in the
image of God. It doesn't say that in the Bible. The Bible
says that God created angels to be His ministering spirits.
They're different than you and I. Greatly different. You and I
have been created in the same moral likeness of God. That
means that we have the capacity to love and to... to hate. In
God's case, to hate is to hate perfectly evil. But we have
emotion. We have the ability to pick and choose and God built
that into us. And so this is a very powerful thing. So you
don't like when somebody tells you what to wear or you've got
to stay within these guidelines. Notice that we have in our
fallen condition almost a reaction to that. But when we
hear God speak to us, we want to follow Him as a believer. When
we hear God say, go left, go right, we want to yield that
free moral agency over to Him. That's called love, my friends.
That's called loving God and walking with God. And so in
creation, you and I as humans, we hold this very unique,
beautiful aspect of life. Now, there's a big debate between
those who hold to the Armenian view and the Calvinistic view in
Christianity regarding this free moral agency. Which one is it?
Do we have a choice or not? Are we pre-programmed and that's
just the way it is or not? Well, listen, let's get our Bibles
open because we want the Bible to speak to us and let's dive
into a study, free moral agency, right in the book
of Romans. We'll see you on the other side.
JACK: Matthew chapter 23, verse 37. Matthew 23:37, oh,
Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Jesus says, the one who kills the
prophets in stones, those who are sent to her, how often I
wanted to gather your children together as a hen gathers her
chicks under her wings. Church, are you with me? What does it
say? But you were not willing. Verse 38, behold, or look, your
house has left you desolate. In other words, the temple... the
temple's over. It's over. It's old. It's done. Forget it. Jesus
is saying, I'm not propping up religion anymore. I'm done with
this. You had the scriptures. You should have known them.
Today was the day. And besides all this, now because you've
rejected, you've exercised your choice to stick with tradition
rather than putting faith in me, in Christ, and in the Word of
God. Your temple, it's done. No need for it anymore. For I say
to you, verse 39, you shall see me no more till you say blessed
is He who comes in the name of the Lord. And did you know that
the Bible records that in the last days... Everybody
listening? Are you with me? The Bible says that at the end of
the tribulation period, those remnant of living who are Jews
who believe will cry out and say, blessed is He who comes in
the name of the Lord. I want to remind you all again, Romans
8:29 says, for whom He forknew. He also predestined. He knows
everything. He can't learn anything. He sees down the
corridors of time. And He knows exactly what decision you would
make when the gospel would be presented to you, if you'd say
yes or no, if you'd blow it off or not. You can't blame it on
anybody. It's so powerful that I can't blame it on my past. I
can't blame it on my mom or my dad. I can't blame it on anybody
else. It's so powerful that it's God saying to you, what are you
going to do with me? In the moment, in the right now, He's
asking some of you, what do you say to these things? This guy up
here has just been given nothing but Bible. Forget about him.
Listen to my Word, Jesus would say, it's my Word. What are you
going to do about me? Do you really want Him? Him... I'm
sorry, Him being the Jesus of the Bible, not him being the
Jesus of the New age movement, the Jesus of the gurus, the
Jesus of the cults. No, God Jesus. Jesus, the son of God.
Jesus, the one who you and I so could not help ourselves, that
He went to the cross and died in our place for us so He would pay
the debt of all of our transgressions and sins and then
die in His body, die and be buried, but on the third day be
resurrected for our righteousness. And He says, I
did that for you. And listen, if he were to say to you, look, I
did that for you. Listen, if you're pre-programmed, there's
no praise or worship in that. Right? Think about it. It's
almost like a petulant spoiled child. They always get this.
They always get that. They always get this. They always get
that. And they never once say thank you because they think
this is the way the world is, until it's gone. And the way
things are going, it's all going to be gone soon and our faith is
going to be thrusted upon an ancient dream or a living
reality, and that living reality will be Christ. Will get us all
the way through the tribulations of life and into His presence
because He's committed Himself to us. It's not your great
commitment to Him. We often say, we're hanging on. How's it
going? We're hanging on to Christ. Oh, that's cute. That's
like your 2-year-old thinking they're mowing the lawn. All
they're doing is they're riding on your back. He's hanging on to
us. And by the way, He never lets go. Ephesians 1, verse 3
says... Ephesians 1:3 says, blessed be the God and Father of
our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual
blessing in the heavenly places in Christ, here it is, just as
He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world. That we
should be holy and without blame before Him in love, having
predestined, remember, foreknowledge precedes,
predestined us to adoption as sons by Jesus Christ to Himself
according to the good pleasure of His will. One more here. 2
Timothy 1, verse 9, who has saved, or this God who has saved
us and called us with a holy calling, not according to our
works but according to His own purpose and grace which was
given to us in Christ Jesus, here it comes, before time
began, but has now been revealed by the appearing of our savior,
Jesus Christ. Isn't that beautiful? Another point under
this here, and that is verses 3 and 4, involves love,
compassion, and mercy. So we're not only grieved and sorrowful
about those in our lives who are lost. Which by the way, I should
add this. When he says that in verse 3, for I could wish that I
myself were accursed from Christ, this is Paul speaking,
for my brethren, he's talking about his Jewish brothers and
sisters, my countrymen according to the DNA, according to the
flesh who are Israelites... Wait, Paul, what'd you just say?
Paul. This is Paul. No wonder why he's grieved. No wonder why
he's sick to his stomach. He's sickened and he's saying, is
there any way for me to be cut off from eternal salvation so
they can have it? How can you... how can you say that, Paul?
Listen, I love you guys, but not that much. For me to say, God,
send me to hell so long as they can go. You know what God would
say to that? And he's going to say it to Paul. But listen,
before I say it, he also had to encounter with one other person
that said the exact same thing. Moses. You guys, and I'll just
paraphrase it, in Exodus 32, mark it down, Moses said, God,
if you're not going to save these people and rescue them,
then blot my name out of your book of life and put their name
in. And do you know what the answer is to both these guys?
The answer to Moses and the answer to Paul from God is the
same thing, it doesn't work that way. It doesn't work that way.
Stop right there. Press pause, everybody. Here's the thing. The
only love I can imagine coming close, and Lisa and I have felt
this, at least at this stage of our lives thus far. We remember
when our daughter became violently immediately sick. She
was eight months old. She was rushed to Children's Hospital of
Orange County and the pediatric hematologist came out and said,
I give your daughter 50% chance to live, at best. We don't know
what she has, but because of that, she's in quarantine and
she's been quartered. They had to quarter her. They had to tie
all... the four extremities to the four posts of the hospital
bed and strip her down to her little body because if you
touched her skin she would bleed through her pores. Her blood
cells were lysing, her blood cells were breaking apart and
falling apart, and they were, the blood cells... her
hematocrit dropped so violently low that the skin couldn't even
hold the blood back. The blood was leaving her veins and her
arteries and floating to the level of the skin and coming out
of her pores. So if you touched her chest or her cheek or her
nose, blood would come out. 50% chance or less to live, and then
what do you do? If you've ever been there... Listen, there are
people, I'm not going to name them, but there are people who
lead you into worship here, up here, and they come up here
and they lead you in worship and you don't know anything
about their life. You have no idea that when they're done
here they go back to the hospital because their son, for
example, has been in the hospital more than he's been
home over the years of his life and he could die at any time
from his cancers, but they're leading you in worship. But you
don't know that because we don't want to burden you with that.
But when the doctor says she's got less than 50% chance, and
she's in quarantine, eight months old, do you know what you
say? This is what you say. God, seriously, let's make a deal. No
funny business. You're God. Whatever she has, give it to me.
Take it off of her. Have you ever prayed that prayer? Does
your husband have cancer? Is it your wife? Is it your kids? Is
it your parents? I know no other love. Listen, there is a love
that is among warriors. If a hand grenade is tossed a US
marine throws himself on it before he ever thinks. He's been
programmed to do that. He's been trained so well and hard that
when that grenade lands on the ground, he doesn't say, oh, a
grenade. He yells grenade as he's throwing his body onto it
and he's been taught how to embrace the grenade so that he
saves his brothers. That's powerful. The only other thing I
know is that when a parent, for example, says, God, give me that
cancer. I cannot stand to see my child go through this, or my
wife, or my husband. Greater love is no man than this, than a
man lay down his life for his friends. But what if your
friends have hated you, cursed your name, done all manner of
wrong against you, and Jesus still loves us. Jesus still goes
to the cross. You see, the scope of God's sovereignty involves
love and compassion and mercy. These are the things that God by
the Spirit lives out in our lives, and it's very powerful.
But that is a tortured thing. I wrote myself this note, that I
have not seen this level of anguished, tortured love in this
world except in the life of a parent whose mourning for a
wayward son or daughter, or a sick or ill son and daughter.
Some of us have, maybe you do, have relatives that are far from
Christ, and you would say to God, oh God... In fact, it's so
bad, it hurts you so bad that you would love the rapture to
happen today, but your caveat is, oh Lord, please not today
because they're not right. You have to leave that. That's none
of your business. You have to leave that with God. And then we
end with this, it's verses 4 and 5, and that is the scope of
God's sovereignty incorporates the full counsel of God, God's
full teaching. He says in verse 4, to whom pertained the
adoption? He's speaking about Jews, the Jewish people, the
genetic descendants of Abraham, the glory. Did they not see the
glory in the wilderness wanderings? Did they see the
cloud by day and the pillar of fire by night? And the
covenants... Notice it's plural. This is cool. Are you guys still
with me? Good, good, good. Covenants, plural. That's the
Abrahamic covenant, promise to the Jewish people, and that is
the Davidic promise that is given. There are others, but
those two are the main covenants. That didn't come to
America. It wasn't given to Canada. God revealed Himself to
the Jewish people for a reason, and it's also by the way, why
they're in headline news. They're God's people. It doesn't
mean everything that they do is right. Sometimes they do things
wrong. It has nothing to do with God choosing them. You know
that. He's chosen them. You mean the whole thing? No. The land is
His, and those Jews who believe in Him are His. Not all Jews
will believe in Him. They're not His. Not all Gentiles will
believe in Him. They're not His. He says here, the giving of the
law, the service of God, the promises of whom are the fathers
and from whom... Listen. According to the flesh, Christ
came who is overall the eternally blessed God. Listen,
we're going to end with this. That doesn't mean get up and
leave. It means listen to this. This is amazing. All of the
promises, everything that you and I need for eternity has been
promised to the Jew first. Did you know that? When the gospel
was being preached in Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, what did
the Bible say? Jesus said, don't go to the Gentiles. Go to the
lost sheep of the house of Israel. Isn't that fascinating
words? He didn't say, go and preach to the nation of Israel.
Nope. What did he say? Go and preach to the lost sheep of the
house of Israel out of Israel. There will be those who are
mine. How do you know Jesus? Because I'm... look at it. I -
I... Christ came... Okay, this is fourth grade English. Here we
go. Are you ready? Jehovah Witnesses, Mormons, friends,
listen, this is important. My Jewish friends, Muslim friends,
Hey, listen, for Christians who don't get it, watch this.
According to the flesh, Christ came. Number one, Christ is a
descendant from the fathers. Christ is a descendant from
those who are given all the promises. Are you tracking with
me? You got that. All of this pertaining to the descendants of
Abraham by DNA, we got that. Jesus, according to the
genealogies and scripture is a descendant of Abraham, legally,
bloodline. We got that. But did you get this? Christ came who is
overall... who's the who? You can't flub this up. If you flub
this up, you're never going to graduate junior high. The who is
Christ. It has to be. Christ came. Christ is overall. Christ,
the eternally blessed God. You can't get away. That is a pure
fact. You can wrestle with this for the rest of your life.
You're going to lose. The eternally blessed God is the
manifested... in the flesh, God, the Son having come to die on
the cross for us. That's how you become a descendant of Abraham.
You're not going to go to heaven because of your Hebrew blood.
You're going to go to heaven because you've been washed in
the blood of the Lamb of God. It doesn't matter if you're a Jew
or Gentile, male or female, bond, servant, rich or poor.
Doesn't matter, and that's such great news.
JACK: Well, listen, hopefully free moral agency makes more
sense. You heard and you understand, right? Jesus is God,
the second person of the Trinity. He came to this earth
according to the Old Testament scriptures now. He came and he
took on humanity. God veiled himself in human flesh. He
didn't do that for angels. He didn't do it for animals. He did
it for you and I, for you and I, all of humanity. He humbled
himself. He became obedient to the very cross itself for you
and I. Jesus suffered on that cross for the sins of not only
for you and me, but for the entire world. Therefore, the
Bible tells us He's been highly exalted, of course, and he has
been given a name which is above every name, that at the name of
Jesus Christ, the scripture says, every knee will bow and
every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the
glory of God the Father. So friend, listen. Very personally,
I ask you, what choice are you going to make about Jesus? Say,
I don't want religion. Good for you. I don't either. Well, I
don't want to have to sign up for something. We're not asking
you to sign up for anything. We're asking you to make a
decision for Jesus about Jesus because, listen, this is the
greatest question of all time. I think if God were to ask the
entire world right now through a gigantic global microphone, what
are you doing with my son? That would be a completely justified
question. He wouldn't ask you, are you going to the First
Baptist Church? Are you going to Calvary Chapel? Are you going to
the Catholic church? He wouldn't ask you that. He would ask you,
have you bowed your knee to my son, Jesus? Because He is Lord.
So please, your choice. I'm trying to encourage you to make
the right choice, and that is to choose Christ. So maybe you want
to do that right now. Maybe no matter where you are in the
world right now, maybe now's the time. Friends, listen, you
cannot sin enough to where God says, sorry, that's too much. My
son's blood cannot cover that. No, no. If right now you are
saying to yourself, God wouldn't want me, that's a lie from
Satan. That's a lie from yourself. It's a life from the
pit. God loves you and He wants you. So friends, listen. Let's
pray together right now. Okay? If you don't mind, I'm going to
leave my eyes open because I want to be just praying and
speaking to you this way, but by all means, you can close your
eyes if you'd like, but... Father, I pray for my brothers
and sisters right now to be in this moment, in this very second
they're going to be calling out to you in their own hearts and
minds, and they're going to be praying, Lord, forgive me of my
sins. I exercise my choice and I choose Christ today. And Lord, I
realized by me wanting you that this is a reality that you knew
before time and eternity ever began. That when I heard the
gospel today, that I would say yes to Jesus. So Lord, thank you
for loving me so much. Thank you for letting me know today that
I'm special to you, that you love me, that you died on the
cross and rose again from the dead, and I praise you now in
Jesus' name, and all God's people said, amen. Friends,
listen, if you've made that decision, if you've made that
prayer, we would love to hear from you. You can go to
jackhibbs.com. And the reason why we want you
to go to that location, jackhibbs.com, that address,
is because we've got so much information there
for you. Until next time, God bless you.
ANNOUNCER: You're watching Real Life, with Jack Hibbs.
ANNOUNCER: Is God different than He used to be? More tolerant of
sin? More politically correct? In today's world, many are
trying to reshape God to fit modern ideas, leading to
confusion about His true nature. This confusion has even seeped
into some churches. In "The Eclipse of God," bestselling
author Erwin Lutzer reveals how our culture is trying to make
God more inclusive and accepting of things that the Bible clearly
says are wrong. But God's character hasn't changed. His
truth remains the same, and He calls us to stand firm in it
even as the world around us shifts. Pastor Jack Hibbs says,
many people hold to a horribly distorted view of God. Pastor
Lutzer shows us how to engage with the culture lovingly,
boldly and effectively. This book comes at a critical hour.
"The Eclipse of God" will be sent to you when you make a gift
of any amount to Real Life today. Visit jackhibbs.com or
call 877-777-2346 to get your copy. Order now.
ANNOUNCER: Life is full of fear, doubt, and worry. The more you
listen to and see the world today, the easier it is to feel
hopeless and helpless. Amidst the confusion, a voice of hope
has emerged, the Real Life network, founded by Jack Hibbs.
The Real Life Network is a free digital media platform. Void of
the noise of secular media that attack people of faith. Click on
the QR code or sign up for free at
reallifenetwork.com. Fast forward your faith.
ANNOUNCER: Welcome to Real Life Radio with Jack Hibbs.
JACK: God's Word will never return void. God's Word is
Spirit, it's power, and it has its effects.
God did not give us a Bible prophecy to
scare us, but to prepare us. You are the light
of the world Jesus said, you are the salt
of the earth. How does that happen?
ANNOUNCER: Jack Hibbs truly believes we are living in some
of the most exciting days in history, which brings some great
opportunities to share with the world a powerful, no-nonsense
presentation to the gospel, to this generation who are
searching for answers and truth. Will you stand with us in
sharing this message in real and practical ways? We ask that you
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ANNOUNCER: The preceding program was sponsored by generous
friends and partners of Real Life.