Where will you spend eternity? Will you accept God's gracious gift? Salvation by Grace through faith is what God has done for you. Jesus love you enough to pay your entire sin debt! Someone has to pay for it! Will you allow Jesus to cover your sin debt with his precious blood. For by Grace are ye saved through faith (Trusing in what Christ alone has done for you)." -- Charles Stanley, The Life Application Bible

If I were to break Stanley's argument down to a set of propositions, I would find his gospel as thus:

1. God loves everyone without distinction

2. God gave everyone the ability to believe Him

3. God needs a person to believe Him before He can save them

4. All people must choose to believe

5. Jesus has already paid everyone's debt, but the debt isn't paid unless they believe it's paid.

Stanley's weak as water god is a very confused god indeed. He supposedly gave everyone a gift that couldn't be refused -- that is, free will -- yet at the same time, his other gift -- salvation from an inescapable eternity of unimaginable torture -- can indeed be refused by using the power of the first gift. Thus, according to Stanley's propositions, God loves everyone so much that He gave us all the ability to slap Him across the face before sending ourselves to Hell.




Stanley's god is neither the cause nor the finisher of salvation. Therefore, he receives no glory from either. In truth, Stanley's true god is himself, while his weak as water god is less than a man.

But wait, he preaches salvation by grace through faith, doesn't he?

He certainly has the wording right, I'll give him that. But he doesn't mean what the Bible means by justification by grace through faith.

What's most appalling about this is the fact I discovered Stanley's Life Application Bible posited in the Reformed section of a local Christian book store. Seems quite a few people can't tell the difference between lies and what many of the Reformed are saying these days.

The fact that God gave certain men the foresight to gather five specific biblical propositions under the heading of one acronym for the purposes of challenging a false gospel, does not change the fact that all five propositions are God's propositions. They are five biblical propositions. And nowhere in the New Testament is the gospel anywhere absent these five propositions. If they were good enough to challenge both the Gnostic and Jewish heresies of the first century, and if they were good enough to challenge a major heresy in the seventeenth, then they are good enough to challenge every false gospel, because all false gospels have at their heart the idea that men and women can stand righteous before God based upon the power of their free-willed woven works.

Stanley says God loves everyone without distinction. TULIP says God has chosen a certain people from before the foundation of the world, and that Jesus died only for them. They alone are the only people who shall be saved.

Stanley says God gave everyone the ability to believe. TULIP says all men are born guilty before God, unable to believe.

Stanley says God needs a person to believe Him before He can save them. TULIP says God's call is irresistible; He does not need man's will, for His call cannot be resisted no matter what man wills.

The God of the Bible is the God of TULIP. He is the sovereign God of the universe, the God whose will cannot be resisted, the God whose word shall fully accomplish all that He pleases. He is the God of a salvation that He has fully secured according to His own good pleasure, just as He is the God of a final judgment He has also secured. Not one of those who are not His elect shall be saved.

There is no Gospel apart from TULIP's propositional statements. This doesn't mean TULIP can never be distorted in the attempt to persuade Christians to follow a false gospel, but it does mean all gospels preached apart from TULIP's propositional statements are 100% false gospels. If I'm not proclaiming the gospel within the confines of TULIP's propositional statements, then I'm not proclaiming the gospel at all. The New Testament knows nothing of preaching the gospel apart from preaching TULIP's propositions at the same time. There is just no such thing.

It is not, where will you spend eternity? It is, God decided everyone's eternity from before the foundation of the world. It is not, Jesus loved you enough to pay your sin debt. It is, Jesus loves only His elect, and He atoned only for their sins. It is not by grace you are saved through faith. It is, by grace only His elect are justified through faith, and only His elect He shall call, and only His elect He shall justify, and not one of His elect shall He ever lose. And it most certainly is not, will you accept God's gracious gift? Rather, the Lord commands everyone, believe His gospel!