QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS
PREDESTINATION AND FREE WILL
DR. JIM DIXON
ROMANS 8:29-39
FEBRUARY 17, 2008
The kingdom of Tyno Helig was destroyed in the 6th Century AD. It was destroyed by volcanic eruption or by earthquake or perhaps a combination of the two but the city was thrown into the Sea along the coast of what is now Wales, what is now the United Kingdom of Great Britain. Helig Palace went into the sea. King Glannawg who ruled the Kingdom of Tyno Helig died. In the generations that followed, people said that he was so debauched, that he was so promiscuous, that he invited the judgement of God and that this earthquake that destroyed Tyno Helig was actually the judgement of God.
In the year 1939, British archeologists began their quest to find under the sea the ruins of Helig Palace and the city of Tyno Helig. They began to search all up and down the coast. They found nothing but natural rock outcroppings and natural rock formations beneath the water. Today most historians believe that Tyno Helig, that the Kingdom of Tyno Helig, was mythological, that it was stories passed on in legend over generations but that it never really existed. It was mythological, kind of like Plato’s Atlantis or Hilton’s Shangri-La or Coleridge’s Xanadu. Mythological.
Of course, today there are some people in this world who believe the Kingdom of Heaven is mythological, that it doesn’t really exist. If you are a Christian, if you are a follower of Jesus Christ, then the Bible says your life must be centered and focused on the Kingdom of Heaven. It was Jesus, the Bible tells us, who came preaching the Gospel saying, “Repent. The Kingdom of Heaven is at hand.” It was Jesus who taught in parables and in so many of His parables Jesus began by saying, “The Kingdom of heaven is like… ” or “The Kingdom of heaven may be compared to… ” It was Jesus who said, “Seek first the Kingdom of Heaven.” Through the centuries the Church of Jesus Christ has struggled with how we get into the Kingdom of Heaven. Do we get into the Kingdom of Heaven by choice? Do we get into the Kingdom of Heaven through our own free will? Is it a question of our own volition? Or do we get into the Kingdom of Heaven by His choice, by election, by predestination? Is it the sovereignty of God? Do we choose Jesus or does Jesus choose us?
Of course, many of you have asked questions about this subject. Free will. Predestination. How it all fits together. You’ve written perhaps more questions on this subject than almost any other and it surprises me. Questions like this: “Can you explain God’s sovereignty and how it balances with free will? What about free will versus predestination?”
“Since God is omnipotent, doesn’t He already know if we are going to accept Jesus as Lord and Savior before we are born?”
“Given that God has a grand plan for each and every one of us, how do we balance His will with free will?”
“What are the Five Points of Calvinism? What does Cherry Hills Community Church think about them? I think they have something to do with predestination.”
“I’m sure it’s been asked. I’m confused regarding Arminianism, Calvinism, infralapsarianism. I’m not sure of its importance regarding salvation but again, I am confused.” Lots of questions like that. This is obviously an extremely difficult subject. It’s a difficult subject and the Church of Jesus Christ has debated these issues for the greater portion of 2,000 years. I think on some of these issues it feels like we’re in a fog. I don’t think I’m going to take you above the fog today. I am hopeful that maybe some sunlight will shine through.
We’re going to begin by looking at what the Bible has to say about free will and then we’re going to take a look at what the Bible has to say about predestination and the sovereignty of God and then finally what the Bible has to say about discerning the will of God.
So, free will. What does the Bible have to say about free will? Some years ago, I worked for awhile at Camarillo State Mental Hospital in California. The year was 1968. I was finishing my undergraduate major in psychology. It was required that we do what they called practicum which meant that for a number of months I needed to go to Camarillo State Mental Hospital. For three months I worked with a teenaged girl who was diagnosed with paranoia and then for three months I worked at Camarillo State Mental Hospital on the schizophrenic ward with men, women, and children who had been diagnosed as schizophrenic. They sat in this incredible facility. Those with schizophrenia were just kind of in an imaginary world. There were TVs on the wall in color and then people sitting all around and nobody looking at the TVs. They were talking to people who were not there. They were living in imaginary worlds.
Some of these people could come out of their imaginary worlds if they really wanted to and if they had strong incentive, and so Camarillo Mental Hospital implemented what they called a “token colony.” A token colony was kind of an environment where tokens or metal coins were distributed if the people performed good conduct or good behavior. They could use these tokens then in exchange for goods at the store at the Camarillo State Mental Hospital or for other goods and services that they might enjoy. There was a vast facility, a huge gymnasium and Olympic-sized swimming pool. They could use these things for tokens and they only got tokens through good conduct. It was a token colony and it was based on the teachings of B.F. Skinner.
B.F. Skinner was a famous psychologist who taught behaviorism and wrote that famous book called “Walden Two” which is a book that kind of describes a future paradise. B.F. Skinner was a determinist and he didn’t believe in free will. He believed that free will was an illusion, that whenever you think you have made a choice, you really chose what you had no choice but to choose. In other words, the choices we make are determined by a complex history of stimulus response reinforcement in combination with our own personal biochemistry. So, whenever you think that you’re making a choice, it’s just an illusion. You could not have chosen anything other than what you did choose. Determinism. Of course, B.F. Skinner wanted us to use determinism to create “Walden Two,” to create a kind of perfect world and that’s what they were trying to do at Camarillo State Mental Hospital. It didn’t work. In fact, the hospital is shut down today.
The issue is, “Do we have free will?” The Bible says, “yes.” The Bible is not deterministic. Even if you believe in predestination, foreordination and the sovereignty of God, if you’re biblical you cannot be deterministic because deterministic means you don’t believe in free will. The Bible is not deterministic.
So, you come to Genesis 1, 2 and 3 and the Bible certainly teaches that free will is a gift of God, given by God first to angels and then to man. Some angels abused their free will and fell in the angelic fall. And then you have in the Genesis account the coming of Satan to tempt mankind. The whole story in the Eden account presupposes the existence of free will. In fact, it is free will that is being tested. And so, as the devil comes and he seeks to test humanity, he wants to get Adam and Eve to abuse their free will and make a choice in violation of the will of God and they are free to do so. They are free to do so and they fall. You look at God and His decision to create this universe and indeed all the complexity of life now existent and you can question God but when you think about it God really only had three choices. God could have decided not to have created it. He could have created nothing or He could have created galactic systems but with no life or at least with no intelligent life. He saw no glory in that. God could have created complex life forms but they could have been robotic, puppets on a string, automatons. They could have been life forms without free will and God saw no beauty in that so God made this decision and that decision was to give this gift of free will to man. God knew, God foreknew, what would happen. God did not simply know the risk. He knew what would happen and yet He gave the gift anyway. I don’t know about you but as I stand here today and I’ve reflected throughout my life, I like the decision God made to give that incredible gift of free will even though it has brought pain. What a gift it is.
Of course, were we not free, there would be no culpability. God would not hold us accountable. But God does hold us accountable because we are free—in the aftermath of the fall, perhaps less free than we were before, because we are now born with the taint of sin. And yet the Imago Dei remains. The image of God is still with us at least in a residual way and we do have at least some measure of free will.
I don’t know about you, but I know that throughout my life there have been times when I was free to do the right thing and I did the wrong thing. Has that ever been true of you? There have been times in my life where I knew I was free to do the good thing and I did the bad thing. It’s not just the sin of Adam that’s imputed to me. It’s my own sin. What’s true of me is true of everyone in the world today. We can only be saved by grace.
The Bible assumes free will. You look at the parables of our Lord Jesus. Almost all of them make no sense without the assumption of free will. You have the Parable of the Talents and the judgement of the returning king and the three stewards. The one steward who is judged and condemned because he buried his talent. Of course, the story makes no sense if there were no free will. The assumption is this guy chose to bury his talent and he could have chosen, as Jesus said, to invest his money with the bankers but he chose to bury his talent. Therefore, he was culpable and held accountable.
The same is true of the Parable of the Pounds. You look at the Parable of the Prodigal Son. He left home and came back home, all by free will. Apart from that assumption, the parable would make no sense. Look at the Parable of the Good Samaritan where you have the wounded man on the Jericho Road. A priest and Levite walk by and they are blame-worthy because they could have stopped. The whole assumption of the parable is they could have stopped. They could have helped this wounded man but no, they just chose to move on. The Samaritan is called “good” because he chose to stop. He chose the good and there’s this assumption of free will behind the parable.
You look in the Bible and even when you look in the Book of Acts and you look at the sermons of Peter and Paul. Have you ever done that? Have you ever gone through the Book of Acts just looking for the sermons of Peter and Paul? There are a couple of big ones. Acts, chapter 2, we get a sermon from Peter and it’s worth reading he concludes his sermon with these words. “Save yourself from this crooked generation.” The final words of the Apostle Peter to this massive audience of thousands. “Save yourselves from this crooked generation.” Doesn’t there seem to be at least the presumption of free will there? There seems to be and that’s hard for me because I tend towards Calvinism. Of course, that sermon by Peter doesn’t fit in Calvinism so well but we’ll get into that in just a few moments.
You look at a sermon by Paul in Acts, chapter 17. Paul is speaking in Athens before the Aeropagus. How does Paul conclude his sermon? He concludes his sermon by saying, “God commands all men everywhere to repent.” Wow! That doesn’t sound very Calvinistic either. “God commands all men everywhere to repent.” There’s some kind of an assumption of freedom or presumption of freedom that seems to be there. We find this throughout the Bible.
In the Bible condemnation comes to us because we misuse our freedom. I think in light of the fall and the taint upon the Imago Dei, none of us are free to be perfect. We’re born tainted and none of us are free to be perfect but we are free to be better. Is that not true? And therefore can be blame-worthy, culpable.
Let’s see what the Bible has to say about predestination, election and the sovereignty of God. In our passage of scripture for today in Romans, chapter 8, we have a very controversial verse. “Those whom God foreknew He also predestined.” That’s what the Bible says. That’s what the Apostle Paul says. “Those whom God foreknew He also predestined.” There are two Greek words here. The word “proginomai” or the word “proginosko” in a different form and then the word “proorizo”. These are the two Greek words. One means, “to foreknow for knowledge,” “proginosko.” Proginosko meaning, “knowledge” or “to know” and with the prefix “pro” “to know beforehand,” “to know in advance, foreknowledge.” The concept behind this word is kind of like the concept of a psychic. If a psychic were to say, “Hey, tomorrow at 1:15 on Colfax Avenue there’s going to be an accident and two people are going to go to the hospital,” that would be foreknowing, foreseeing, foreknowledge. Nobody would blame the psychic. No one would say the psychic caused it. No one would say the psychic foreordained it but simply that the psychic foreknew it and this word, “proginosko” means, “God is the ultimate psychic. God foreknows everything. God foresees everything. He stands outside of time and space. God transcends the time-space continuum. God sees the beginning. God sees the end. It’s all there for God.
This other word, “proorizo” comes from “horizo” is the word from which we get the word “horizon.” It means, “to establish a boundary.” It means, “to set in stone.” It means, “to establish permanently” but it’s proorizo so it means, “to do this beforehand, to set and establish beforehand.” This is the concept of foreordination or predestination and this verse in Romans 8 also uses this verse with regard to God. God is not just the ultimate psychic. He doesn’t just see everything before it happens. He causes it. Proorizo.
Here’s the debate. Within the Christian world today, as it has been for centuries and two millennia, is God’s foreordaining based on His foreknowledge or is His foreknowledge based on His foreordaining? On one side you have Calvinists and on the other side you have Arminians. Calvinists follow the teachings of John Calvin, the great Protestant reformer who wrote “Institutes of the Christian Religion.” It’s a multi-volume work and I would recommend it to all of you who are perhaps struggling with insomnia. And yet I must say it’s a great work and Calvin was a great man. He lived between 1509 and 1564. Then James Arminius, who was also called Jacob Arminius and sometimes Yacabus Arminius, lived after Calvin. Their lives only overlapped by four years, 1560 to 1564, but he was another great theologian. They have developed millions of followers who argue to this day.
On the side of Arminius are those who believe that God foreordains on the basis of what He foreknows so God being the ultimate psychic looks into the future, sees everything and then He just predestines certain things on the basis of what He foreknows. Okay? So, that’s foreordination based on foreknowledge. Arminianism.
But Calvin said no. Calvin said, “God only foreknows because God has foreordained.” God has foreordained. God has predestined the future and therefore He knows it. He knows it because He’s caused it and so, His foreknowledge is based on his foreordination.
Now when you come to Romans 8, the Greek could be translated either way. Those whom He foreknew He also predestined. You can’t prove from the Greek which came first, foreknowledge or predestination. So, you have the argument to this day and of course it has developed over time and exists in this congregation. It’s a tough one and the justice of God and the freedom of mankind hangs in the balance.
We look at TULIP. TULIP is a summation of Calvinism and by looking at TULIP we will also understand Arminianism so let’s take a moment and look at TULIP. TULIP is an acronym. Each letter has significance. TULIP. This is a summation of Calvinism. Remember TULIP was not developed by Calvin. Calvin had already died. There are some who would argue that Calvin wouldn’t even have agreed with TULIP even though Calvinists do. TULIP was developed by the followers of Calvin in response to the teachings of Arminianists. Arminianists had come out with five points. Now Calvinists, after Jacob Arminianist, they came out with their five points in refutation.
The first is “T”. What does “T” mean? Total depravity. The human race is totally depraved. Now by this the Calvinist does not mean there’s no good in us. There’s no Calvinist except for a hyper-Calvinist who would say there’s no good in us. Calvinists admit that the Imago Dei still exists; it’s at least residual in all of us and there’s some good in everyone. Some good in me. Some good in you. Some good in everyone in the world.
Total depravity means to the Calvinists that we cannot save ourselves. We cannot merit heaven. We cannot earn salvation. We’re all tainted by sin. We’re born with the taint and the taint of sin follow us throughout whole life. They say this in response to Arminians because the first point of the Arminians was people are born in innocence, a little bit of Pelagianism. Pelagianists taught that babies are born without the taint of sin and if left alone they will just turn into a beautiful garden. Calvinists said, no, there are some weeds there. So, this is total depravity. The Calvinists would say, “Hey, the taint of sin is total also in the sense that it touches every part of our being.” There is goodness in us but there is no part of Jim Dixon that doesn’t have the taint of sin. My logic, my mind, my reason is tainted by sin. My heart, my emotions, tainted by sin. There’s goodness in both, but there’s also the taint of sin. I can’t trust completely my own faculty of logic. I can’t trust completely my heart. There’s total depravity. The Bible does seem to say this so that’s the “T” of TULIP.
Let’s look at the “U.” The “U” means “unconditional election and for the Calvinists this means that God chose people for salvation. Out of a world of lost humanity God chose to save some and He did this for reasons of His own. He didn’t do it on the basis of foreknowledge. He didn’t look into the future and see who’s naughty and nice. He didn’t look into the future and see who was going to choose Him. He just chose people unconditionally. This is in response to the Arminian teaching, the second point of Arminianism that God chose on the basis of foreknowledge and God chose on the basis of merit and worth. The Calvinists said, “No, God’s election is unmerited favor. It’s grace.” It’s a tough subject and you can kind of find Bible verses that could take you in both directions.
Limited atonement. That’s the “L” of TULIP. Limited atonement. The Calvinist believes that when Christ died on the cross, He atoned only for the elect. The Arminian believes that when Christ died on the cross, He atoned for everybody. Now, in a sense it doesn’t make any difference because both Calvinists and Arminians would agree that even if He atoned for everybody, practically the only ones who benefit from that atonement are those who believe. You have to appropriate the blessings of the cross through faith, by grace through faith.
There are some Calvinists who would say, “Well, in a sense Christ died for everybody and there’s unlimited atonement but in terms of effectual atonement, it was limited. Again, when you go to the Bible you can find passages that would fit Arminianism and passages that would fit Calvinism. There are times in the Bible where the Bible seems to say that Christ died for the elect. Christ died for His people. Christ died for the Church. Limited atonement. Then you find other passages that speak of His death as global. “God so loved the world He gave His only begotten Son.” John 3:16. I John 2:1. “Jesus is the expiation for our sins and not for our sins only but also for the sin of the whole world.” Sounds like unlimited atonement, doesn’t it? So, you can find Bible passages that seem to fit both of these. Isn’t that a bummer?
Then the “I” in TULIP. The “I” in TULIP is irresistible grace. The Calvinist believes that irresistible grace is when the Gospel is preached, the elect respond, and grace is given. They cannot resist it. The Arminian believes “Well, when the Gospel is preached, grace is offered to everyone and you CAN resist it.” Calvinists would say, “Well, there’s common grace that can be resisted but salvific grace, the grace that calls to heaven and salvation and eternal life, that, once given, cannot be resisted. Both Calvinists and Arminians agree you can’t believe without grace but Arminians would say “whenever the Gospel is preached grace is given to everyone and it can be rejected.” The Calvinists would say, “No. Grace is only given to the elect and they cannot reject it.” Do you understand the difference? Again, I could show you some Bible passages on both sides of that one.
Then “P,” perseverance of the saints. Perseverance of the saints means, “once saved, always saved.” The Calvinist believes that if you’re elect, you can never be lost. It is predestined. You are saved forever. Once saved, always saved. Eternal security.
I told you that biblically I lean towards Calvinism and I do but the Arminians would say, “Well, no, you can lose your salvation. You can really come to Christ and then became apostate and lose your salvation.” Again, you can find passages kind of on both sides of this issue.
Let me give you a little example. Perseverance of the saints, John, chapter 10. Jesus said, “I know My sheep. They hear My voice. They follow Me. I give them eternal life. No one is able to snatch them out of My hand. My Father is greater than all and no one is able to snatch them out of My Father’s hand.” Sounds like eternal security. Even our passage of scripture today, “Those whom He foreknew He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son. Those whom He predestined He also called. Those whom He called, He also justified. Those whom He justified, He also glorified. What are we to say to all this? “If God be for us, who can be against us? Who is to condemn? Is it Christ who died and was raised from the dead and who is seated at the right hand of the Father who intercedes for us? Who can separate us from the love of God? From the love of Christ? Can tribulation or distress or persecution or famine or nakedness or peril of sword? No! I am convinced, I am sure, neither death nor life nor angels nor principalities nor things present nor things to come nor powers nor heights nor depths or anything else in all of creation can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.” Sounds like eternal security. It sounds like that. Because I lean towards Calvinism, I believe in eternal security but there are passages that are tough. They sound a little more like James Arminius would have said.
Hebrews 6. Hebrews 10. Let me give you an example of how difficult this is. Let’s look at Hebrews 6 for just a second. What does Hebrews 6 say? It says this. “It is impossible to restore again to repentance those who have once been enlightened, who have tasted the heavenly gift, who have partaken of the Holy Spirit, who have tasted the goodness of the Word of God and the powers of the age to come if then they commit apostasy since they crucify the Son of God on their own account and hold Him up for contempt. For land which has drunk the rain that often falls upon it brings forth vegetation. Useful to those for whose sake it was cultivated receive a blessing from God but if that land bears thorns and thistles having drunk the rain, it is useless and near to being cursed. Its end is to be burned.” Kind of a scary passage.
Calvinists and Arminians examine this. They debate this. Who’s right and who’s wrong? The Calvinist says, “Well, I don’t think this is really describing a person who’s been saved, just somebody who kind of “seems” to be saved but they’re not really saved. This is not really a Christian here. The Arminian comes back and says, “Well, now wait a minute. This seems to be describing somebody who’s really saved. It says it’s impossible to restore again to repentance. This person never repented. This person who had once been enlightened, the light had come in. The word enlightenment in the early church was used for baptism. This person had tasted the heavenly gift, had partaken of the Holy Spirit, had tasted the goodness of the Word of God and the powers of the age to come and then this person committed apostasy, a falling away from the faith. I think this person was a Christian and became apostate. The Calvinist says, “Oh, okay. Maybe so. Maybe this really is a Christian but if it is a Christian then this person’s not really lost. The passage doesn’t say that this person is really lost. You’ve got to look deeper at the agricultural illustration, land which has drunk the rain that often falls upon it brings forth vegetation useful to those for whose sake it was cultivated receives a blessing from God but if that land which has drunk the rain bears thorns and thistles, it is useless. It is near to be cursed. It is near to being cursed. Its end is to be burned.” But is it the burning of hell or is it the burning of purification?”
People in the agricultural world knew that you didn’t burn land in order to throw it away. You didn’t burn land in order to condemn it. You didn’t burn land in order to destroy it. You burned land to purify it that you might use it again, that it might bring forth fruit again, that you might be able to bless it and heal it. That’s why you burned it and so, this passage isn’t talking about the fire of hell but the fire of purification. You see the argument. It’s kind of like volleying and then each side of the net on and on and on and that’s the kind of stuff we’re dealing with. I’m saying to you that as I study the scriptures, I lean towards Calvinism but I don’t bend the knee to Calvinism. I hope you understand the difference.
I think there is mystery in the Bible and mystery to subjects like this. You see, in the Church of Jesus Christ, there are many confessions, confessional statements. I hold in my hand the Westminster Confession of Faith which is one of the founding documents of the Evangelical Presbyterian Church and indeed reformed theology in general, the Westminster Confession of Faith. There are other confessions, the Augsburg, the Heidelberg, many reformed confessions. They’re good reading, pretty much. They’re worth reading and they contain a systematic theology. They try to systemize and summarize the Bible. Then when they’re finished, they kind of have God in a box. Then as you go back and you have become a Calvinist and you have bent the knee to the Westminster Confession of Faith, you come back and you study the Bible and you run every passage of the Bible through the grid of your systematic theology. Right?
I don’t do that. I want to look at the Bible holistically, but I don’t want to force Bible passages through some kind of a grid so I’m more of a credalist than a confessionalist. You see, in the Church of Jesus Christ there are not only confessions like this but there are creeds like the Apostle’s Creed, The Nicene Creed. Our denomination has a creed and it’s called “The Essentials of the Faith” and it lists ten doctrinal affirmations that are consistently affirmed in the Bible and it’s a creedal statement. At Valor High School across the street, we have a creedal statement and again it’s an affirmation of faith which contains ten essential doctrines extracted clearly from the Bible. It’s a creedal statement. It tends to be brief. Confessional statements are long and they’re systematic theologies. Creedal statements are simply brief summaries of Christian truth.
I will bend the knee to the Apostle’s Creed. I will bend the knee to the Nicene Creed. I will bend the knee to our denominational’s creedal statement and to Valor’s creedal statement. Most of all I bend the knee to Jesus and I bend the knee to the Bible but I do believe these creeds accurately summarize doctrines in the Bible. But, you see, I think confessions go a little too far. I think they’re useful. They’re good to study but they just go a little too far and so, I won’t bend the knee to the Tulipian theology of the Westminster Confession of Faith. I think it’s a good acronym. I think it’s a good systematic theology. I think there are scripture verses that could support it but there are also scripture verses you also kind of have to dance around if you’re Tulipian and so, I don’t bend the knee to it.
I don’t know whether that’s helpful to you. Maybe it’s not but I do think it’s important to think about these things. I think it’s important to study them. There’s one thing I do love about the Westminster Confession of Faith. I love the way that they openly embrace what I would call “double speak.” I take that to mean they openly embrace mystery. Here’s a statement of Article III of the Westminster. I read last time out of the original Westminster. I’m reading this one out of a modern version because I think it might be a little clearer although it still involves double speak.
“From all eternity and by the completely wise and holy purpose of His own will, God has freely and unchangeably ordained whatever happens. This ordination does not mean, however, that God is the author of sin. He is not. It does not mean that He represses the will of His created beings. He does not. Or that He takes away the freedom or contingency of secondary causes. Rather, the will of created beings and the freedom of contingency of secondary causes are established by Him.” I call that double speak. It creates some cognitive dissonance. It doesn’t have rational symmetry. You have, on one hand, God ordaining everything. On the other hand, people are free and they abuse their freedom and God didn’t have anything to do with that sin. You see? Double speak and it’s all there because they kind of find both in the Bible.
I would submit to you: God is awesome and God is profound. The Bible says, “His ways are not our ways. His thoughts are not our thoughts. As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are His thoughts higher than our thoughts and His ways and our ways. There’s mystery.
I love what my pastor said when I was growing up. Dr. Clarence W. Kerr was Pastor at Glendale Presbyterian Church, I’ve heard others say this too but he said, “When you get to heaven, you’re going to approach the gates and you’re going to see above the gates Whosoever Will May Come.” As you go through the gates and enter heaven itself, you’ll turn back and you’ll see, “I Chose You from Before The Foundation Of The World.” I kind of like that. I’m not saying it has rational symmetry. I’m just saying I kind of like that.
There’s a mystery with which we live out our Christian faith and, in a sense, I love predestination. I love it because God has predestined that I will be conformed to the image of His Son, Romans 8. That gives me comfort. I feel so messed up sometimes. I know it’s promised and predestined. I’m going to be conformed to the image of His Son. Isn’t that cool? I think it’s awesome. If you’ve ever looked at the works of Michelangelo—44 sculptures—you can go to Rome today and you can go to building in Rome which I’ve done. If you go to that building in Rome, you’ll see 30 unfinished sculptures by Michelangelo. He only finished 14 of the 44 he started. Thirty are just kind of like he quit midway through it. Jesus doesn’t do that. He’s not going to quit on me. He’s not going to quit on you. It’s predestined. I will be conformed to the image of His Son and I love that and I hope that you love that too.