Yaro Brock

I’ll work twice as hard to make it a quarter easier.

[Yaro Brock @YaroBrock]

@techNmak This is rare. SMH.

[Yaro Brock @YaroBrock]

The Bible teaches three things at once.

1. We must repent.
“God… now commands all people everywhere to repent” (Acts 17:30).

2. The natural man does not want to repent and cannot do so.
“For the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to God’s law; indeed, it cannot. Those who are in the flesh cannot please God” (Rom 8:7–8).
“The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned” (1 Cor 2:14).

3. God can change the heart so that we can and certainly will repent.
“I will give you a new heart… and remove the heart of stone” (Ezek 36:26).
“God may perhaps grant them repentance” (2 Tim 2:25).

These fit together without any contradiction.

The objection usually comes from the claim that God cannot command something we are unable to fulfill. But Scripture never teaches that. It is an assumption read into the text, and it collapses when you look honestly at the human condition in Adam:
“And this is the judgment: the light has come into the world, and people loved the darkness rather than the light” (John 3:19).
“You were dead in trespasses… and were by nature children of wrath” (Eph 2:1–3).

Jesus' command shows what we must do in order to receive salvation.

As those who are "in Adam" we do not have the ability to obey such a command.

God, in His mercy, supplies our lack.

It is like this:
The mortgage company can demand the payment.
Your bank account can be empty, regardless of the need.
And your friend can put the money in your account.

Same logic. There is nothing contradictory about that.

[Yaro Brock @YaroBrock]

@Saganismm “In our world,” said Eustace, “a star is a huge ball of flaming gas.”
“Even in your world, my son, that is not what a star is but only what it is made of.”

[Yaro Brock @YaroBrock]

@sciencegirl Catterdoodle

[Yaro Brock @YaroBrock]

A man is his nature. His identity is being part of the single organism called mankind (the Hebrew word “Adam” literally means mankind). What we are comes first, and what we do flows out of that.

Mankind is such that, even though we were not physically with Adam when he sinned, we have become the kind of beings who make that same choice every day. We share his nature. We are by nature children of wrath, none does good, no not one, and we are unable to please God (Ephesians 2:3, Romans 3:10-12, Romans 8:7-8). That is not because we personally authored Adam’s sin, but because we were born already wired that way.

So “responsibility” is not really the basic category. The issue is fitness. Outside of Christ, a person is a vessel fit for destruction, not for eternal life (Romans 9:22, Romans 6:23). What they are, as beings, is simply not suited to share in the age to come.

And the big hang-up here is that many assume the wicked must be tormented forever, so there has to be some extra layer of personal responsibility to justify endless misery. But Scripture says the wicked perish, are destroyed, and finally lose life itself. God destroys both body and soul in Gehenna (Matthew 10:28). They are raised, judged, and then cut off from life, not kept alive forever just to suffer (John 3:16, 2 Thessalonians 1:9).

[Yaro Brock @YaroBrock]

@Truth_matters20 I’ll take you one further. Faith is a byproduct of union with Christ.

[Yaro Brock @YaroBrock]

@stfuesh The English Patient

[Yaro Brock @YaroBrock]

@JCRyle Union

[Yaro Brock @YaroBrock]

You’re saved by being united to Christ. When that union happens, you move into a new realm where the law no longer has jurisdiction over you. That’s why there’s no condemnation for those who are in Him.

And that’s why fasting, praying, or any other work doesn’t put you into Christ or take you out of Him. Salvation is about union, and that union comes by faith. Even the faith you exercise is itself a gift that flows from being joined to Him.

So if you believe in Christ, that belief is the evidence that He has united you to Himself. Don’t lean on your works. Lean on the confidence that your faith is the sign you belong to Him. “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus” (Rom. 8:1).

[Yaro Brock @YaroBrock]

@rabbriansamuel The Mosaic Law and the Jewish people were shadows of the substance that was to come. Namely, Christ and His body, the Church. Your identity is either in Christ or in Adam. Abraham is no trump card.

[Yaro Brock @YaroBrock]

@SpringSteps Agreed. The problem was the content of the notes.

[Yaro Brock @YaroBrock]

@w_bitterman Union with Adam or Christ.

[Yaro Brock @YaroBrock]

The question sounds fair on the surface: if faith is a gift, why judge someone for not believing? If a kid gets no Christmas presents, you don’t blame him for not opening any. But that analogy assumes something the Bible never assumes – that human beings begin as neutral children waiting to receive a gift. Scripture paints a very different picture.

Humanity begins in Adam. That is an identity, not a decision. His guilt is ours, and his nature is ours – an instinctive bent away from God. Paul calls us “children of wrath” by nature, not by choice (Ephesians 2:3). He also says no one in the flesh can please God (Romans 8:7-8), and spiritual things are “spiritually discerned” (1 Corinthians 2:14). In other words, unbelief is not a lack of presents under the tree – it is the natural posture of a heart that does not want God. That is why faith cannot come from us. It has to be given.

That’s what makes Romans 9 decisive. Paul raises the exact objection your friend raises: “Why does He still find fault? For who can resist His will?” (Romans 9:19). Paul doesn’t soften the question. He sharpens it. The answer is that God is the Creator, and He has the right to form vessels for honor and vessels for dishonor (Romans 9:21). In Adam, humanity is already oriented toward dishonor. God is not taking innocent, neutral people and deciding to withhold gifts. He is dealing with a real humanity that is already guilty in its father and already bent in rebellion.

The judgment, then, is not for failing to produce faith. Faith was never natural to begin with. The judgment is for what we are in Adam – sinful, self-oriented creatures who genuinely prefer darkness to light (John 3:19). God’s justice in destroying the wicked flows from what they are, not from what they failed to receive. No criminal can claim innocence by saying he didn’t receive a pardon. The guilt is still real.

At the same time, the gift of faith shows the other side of God’s character. Paul says God creates vessels of mercy “in order to make known the riches of His glory for vessels of mercy” (Romans 9:23). In other words, the contrast between mercy and judgment reveals something about God that would not otherwise be seen – His patience, His righteousness, His grace, and His power. Salvation is a showcase of His mercy. Judgment is a showcase of His justice.

And for those who die outside of Christ, Scripture teaches the penalty is death – destruction, not endless conscious torment (Romans 6:23, Matthew 10:28). The “eternal fire” language draws from Isaiah’s imagery of Edom’s symbolic burning, where destruction is decisive rather than ongoing. God’s judgment is real, but it is not cruelty. It is the end of a life lived in Adam, and the removal of what cannot endure in His kingdom.

So the heart of the answer is simple. God does not judge people for failing to receive a gift. He judges them for being what they are in Adam – rebels, lovers of self, and rejecters of His light. And He has mercy on whom He will have mercy. The miracle is not that some perish. The miracle is that any are saved at all. Faith is a gift precisely because no one in Adam could ever produce it. That is why salvation is grace from beginning to end.

That’s the point Romans 9 drives home. The issue is not presents at Christmas – it’s identity. In Adam all die, and in Christ all who are united to Him live (1 Corinthians 15:22). God gives life to whom He wills, and He loses none of them.

[Yaro Brock @YaroBrock]

If you believe, you will be saved - full stop. That’s good news. But the fact that God is the one who grants that faith, even while we were rebels, makes it better news. Scripture is blunt about where we start: slaves to sin, unable to please God (Rom 6:17; Rom 8:7–8). No one in the flesh can submit to Him. Spiritual things are spiritually discerned, and the natural person can’t grasp them (1 Cor 2:14).

So the wonder isn’t simply that faith saves. The wonder is that God gives faith to the very people who would never reach for Him on their own. He united us to Christ in death so that we would walk in newness of life - counted righteous because we are joined to the Righteous One (Rom 6:3–5; Phil 3:9).

That shift changes everything. When I was Arminian, one of the most painful thoughts was the idea that God merely made salvation possible and then left the decisive part - the part that determines my eternal fate - to me. It felt like His love came only so far, and then stopped. The distance between us felt immense.

But when I came to see that He sought me specifically, that He overcame my resistance, gave me a new heart, and ensured my faith (Ezek 36:26; John 6:37, 44), the gospel became personal in a way it had never been. He didn’t wait for me. He came for me. And that realization allowed me to truly love Him in a way that had been impossible before.

[Yaro Brock @YaroBrock]

@aspin3 @RevReads289 Thank you for your thoughtful defense of your position. I’ll be back on tomorrow and happily continue. Good night friend.

[Yaro Brock @YaroBrock]

It’s true that Scripture consistently calls it their faith. Jesus praises the woman’s faith, the centurion’s faith, and He rebukes the disciples for unbelief. No argument there - people really do believe, and the Bible speaks in those ordinary terms.

But the deeper question isn’t whether humans exercise faith. The question is whether fallen, fleshly, spiritually dead humans can produce saving faith from within themselves. And here the Bible gives a very different picture.

Paul says “the natural man does not accept the things of the Spirit… and cannot understand them because they are spiritually discerned” (1 Cor 2:14). He also says the mind in the flesh is “hostile to God,” is unable to submit to Him, and “those who are in the flesh cannot please God” (Rom 8:7–8). Since faith itself is pleasing to God (Heb 11:6), that rules out the flesh as its source.

Jesus makes the same point: “No one can come to Me unless the Father draws him” (John 6:44), and “No one can come unless it is given to him by the Father” (John 6:65). Coming to Him is believing in Him (John 6:35). So believing is something given.

He even tells the Pharisees, “You cannot hear My word” (John 8:43). Not “will not,” but cannot - a statement of inability. Acts 16:14 shows how that inability is overcome: “The Lord opened her heart to pay attention” to Paul’s preaching. Only then did Lydia believe.

All of this explains why regeneration matters. The new birth gives a new heart (Ezek 36:26–27), new desires, and the spiritual capacity to see Christ as beautiful rather than foolish. Only then does a person freely and sincerely believe.

So yes - it’s their faith. Scripture speaks that way because that’s the human side. But the reason they believe at all is because God made them alive (John 3:3–8; 1 John 5:1). The Bible consistently supports the idea that saving faith is not a natural human product but the fruit of God’s gracious work in the heart.

[Yaro Brock @YaroBrock]

I see your point. Paul absolutely contrasts faith with “works of the law,” so faith itself is not a work in the category he’s dismantling (Rom 3:27–28; Rom 4:5). I’m with you there.

But the moment you say faith originates in us - by our will, our insight, our spiritual sensitivity - you’ve created a new category of boasting. If I provided the decisive ingredient that someone else lacked, then I really do have something to point to. Paul’s whole argument collapses at that point.

Romans doesn’t unpack the origin of faith because its focus is on the mechanism of justification - faith as the instrument that receives Christ. But other passages fill in the source. Believing is “granted” (Phil 1:29). Those who believe “were appointed” (Acts 13:48). The new birth is “not of the will of man” (John 1:13). And “no one can come to Me unless it is given him by the Father” (John 6:65).

So Romans explains how God justifies. The rest of Scripture explains why no one can boast - not even in believing. Faith is the empty hand, but even the open hand is the result of grace.

[Yaro Brock @YaroBrock]

Logically, if you produce something, you can boast about it. That’s Paul’s point in Rom 3:27–28—boasting is ruled out because the whole saving package comes from God, not from you.

Faith isn’t a work precisely because it isn’t self-generated. Rom 4:5 makes that explicit: the one who does not work is the one who believes. Trusting is the opposite of working - but if the trust itself arose from your willpower, it would still be something you contributed.

That’s why Scripture goes out of its way to say that salvation is “not of yourselves” (Eph 2:8–9), that believing is “granted” (Phil 1:29), and that we are born again “not of the will of man” (John 1:13). Even the act of relying on Christ is not an achievement.

So faith is opposed to works because it simply receives - but it’s still part of the gift. Otherwise we’d have something to boast about, which is the very thing Paul is eliminating.

[Yaro Brock @YaroBrock]

I get what you’re trying to say, but the grammar actually pushes the other direction.

In Eph 2:8, the neuter “that” (touto) can’t refer only to “salvation” or only to “faith,” because both of those nouns are feminine. The neuter demonstrative normally points back to the entire preceding idea taken as a unit—the whole reality of being saved by grace through faith. That whole thing is “the gift of God.”

That doesn’t make faith the same thing as salvation; it simply means faith is not self-generated. It belongs inside the gift—not outside it.

Then Paul immediately adds, “not of works” (Eph 2:9), which lands most naturally on the part someone might wrongly claim credit for - faith itself. The point is: you didn’t produce the response that brings you into Christ any more than you produced the grace that saves you (Phil 1:29; Acts 13:48; Rom 3:24–27).

Salvation is by grace, and the faith that receives that grace is also from God - so no one can boast. That’s Paul’s entire argument