Why the Church Must Defend the Faith (and Why It Doesn’t)

In this bonus episode, we examine the biblical necessity of apologetics and why it is often neglected in today’s church.

Drawing from 1 Peter 3:15 (ESV) and a key insight from Van Til’s Apologetic, we show that defending the Christian faith is not optional—it is a responsibility given to every believer, and especially to church leaders.

We also explore:

• Why apologetics is neglected
• What Scripture commands
• How the Reformers approached defending truth
• Why this issue is critical today

• 1 Peter 3:15
• Jude 3
• Acts 20:28–30
• Titus 1:9
• 2 Timothy 2:15
• 2 Corinthians 10:5
• Colossians 4:5–6

From Van Til’s Apologetic (p. 29):

“The obligation to defend the Christian faith rests upon all believers… and especially upon those charged with defending the flock.”

• Apologetics is commanded in Scripture
• It is the responsibility of all believers
• Pastors have an even greater responsibility to defend the flock
• The modern church often neglects this duty
• Defending the faith is an act of love and obedience

• Martin Luther
• John Calvin
• J. Gresham Machen
• R.C. Sproul

“Apologetics is not optional—it is obedience.”

• Share this episode
• Study Scripture deeply
• Equip yourself to defend the faith

📖 Jude 3 (ESV)

“Contend for the faith that was once for all delivered to the saints.”

Soli Deo Gloria

Episode 69: What Comes First—Faith or Regeneration? (John 3)

Does faith produce new birth, or does new birth produce faith? Special thanks to my friend and brother in Christ John L of the Reformed Reference Podcast. Check it out here: https://open.spotify.com/show/4xnDbJFrb1gpwHfyEabZoG

John 3:3–8

• Ephesians 2:1–5
• Romans 8:7–8
• 1 John 5:1
• James 1:18
• 1 Peter 1:23
• Romans 10:17
• John 5:25
• John 11

• Regeneration is a sovereign act of the Holy Spirit
• Man is spiritually dead and unable to believe on his own
• Faith is the result of new birth, not the cause
• The Spirit works through the Word, not apart from it
• The gospel is essential in God’s ordinary means of salvation

This episode responds to arguments found in:

👉

Which argues:

• Immediate regeneration apart from the Word

We affirm:

• Monergistic regeneration

But reject:

• Separating regeneration from the Word entirely

“The Spirit runs along the tracks of the Word.”

👉 Regeneration precedes faith
👉 But never apart from God’s Word

🔑 Main Question📖 Key Scriptures (ESV)⚖️ Doctrinal Summary📄 Episode Interaction🚂 Key Phrase🎯 Final Takeaway

Episode 21: Would Heaven Still Be Heaven If My Loved Ones Are Not There?
Episode Focus: Election, heaven, justice, love, assurance
Audience: Christians wrestling emotionally with the doctrine of election and the fate of loved ones

In Episode 21, we address one of the most personal and emotionally difficult questions raised against the doctrine of election:

“If I am elected by God for eternal life, but my wife or children are not, would I really be happy in heaven knowing they are in hell?”

This is not a theoretical or argumentative question—it is a deeply human one. In this episode, we approach the issue pastorally and biblically, showing that Calvinism does not require emotional coldness, indifference, or joy over judgment. Instead, Scripture presents a God who is perfectly just, genuinely compassionate, and utterly trustworthy.

This episode helps listeners think clearly about heaven, justice, love, and God’s goodness—without speculation, fear, or fatalism.

• Does Calvinism teach that believers should be indifferent to the lost?

• Will heaven erase love for family and friends?

• How can eternal joy coexist with God’s justice?

• Can we trust God’s goodness when outcomes are painful?

• Why Scripture forbids speculation about who is elect

• Biblical examples of godly sorrow for unbelieving loved ones

• God’s own attitude toward judgment and repentance

• How heaven perfects love rather than removes it

• Seeing God’s justice clearly in glory

• Trusting the character of God when answers are incomplete

• The difference between earthly grief and eternal rest

• Deuteronomy 29:29 — The secret things belong to the Lord

• Romans 11:33–36 — God’s wisdom and purposes are beyond human scrutiny

• Romans 9:2–3 — Paul’s anguish for unbelieving Israel

• Romans 10:1 — Paul’s prayer for their salvation

• 1 Timothy 2:1 — Prayer for all people

• Ezekiel 18:23 — God takes no pleasure in the death of the wicked

• Ezekiel 33:11 — God desires repentance rather than judgment

• 2 Peter 3:9 — God’s patience toward sinners

• Revelation 21:4 — God wipes away every tear

• 1 Corinthians 13:12 — Knowing fully as we are fully known

• Revelation 15:3 — God’s judgments declared just and true

• Genesis 18:25 — Shall not the Judge of all the earth do what is just?

• Psalm 145:17 — The Lord is righteous in all His ways

• Romans 8:38–39 — Nothing separates believers from God’s love

Calvinism does not teach joy in judgment or emotional detachment from loved ones. Scripture shows that believers may grieve deeply now, pray earnestly for their families, and trust fully that God will do what is right.

Heaven does not make us less human—it makes us whole. In glory, believers will not rejoice in condemnation, but they will rest completely in the perfect justice, wisdom, and goodness of God.

As Scripture reminds us:

“Shall not the Judge of all the earth do what is just?”
— Genesis 18:25 (ESV)

Bonus Episode 7

Title: If Election Is True… How Do I Know I’m One of the Elect?

In this bonus episode of The Closet Calvinist Podcast, we tackle a deeply personal and often troubling question:

👉 If election is true, how can I know if I’m one of the elect?

Rather than speculating about God’s hidden will, Scripture directs us to look somewhere far more certain—to Christ Himself.

This episode walks through what the Bible actually teaches about assurance, showing that confidence in election is not found by looking into eternity, but by examining our faith in Christ and the evidence of new life.

We also explore how the Reformers addressed this question pastorally, pointing believers away from fear and toward the promises of God.

• Ephesians 1:4–5
• Deuteronomy 29:29
• John 6:37
• John 3:16
• Acts 16:31
• 1 John 5:1
• 2 Corinthians 5:17
• 2 Peter 1:10

• Election is a biblical doctrine, but it belongs to God’s revealed will, not His hidden decree
• We are not called to figure out if we are elect before believing
• Assurance comes from looking to Christ, not inward speculation
• Faith in Christ is evidence of election, not the cause of it
• Spiritual fruit and new life confirm God’s saving work
• The elect are those who come to Christ and trust in Him alone

The Reformers consistently pointed believers to Christ for assurance:

• John Calvin emphasized that assurance is found in union with Christ
• Martin Luther taught that faith itself is evidence of election
• John Owen connected election to effectual calling
• Charles Spurgeon reassured that trusting Christ is proof of being elect
• George Whitefield urged sinners to come to Christ as the confirmation of election

👉 You don’t discover your election by looking into God’s secret will—you discover it by coming to Christ in faith.

If this episode encouraged you:

• Share it with someone struggling with assurance
• Leave a review to help others find the podcast
• Continue to rest in the finished work of Christ

“Whoever comes to Christ will never be cast out.” (John 6:37, ESV)

🎙️ Episode Summary📖 Key Scripture References (ESV)📌 Key Takeaways📚 Reformation Insight🎯 Bottom Line🎧 Connect & Share

Bonus episode 6

Title: IsSola Scriptura Bibliolatry?

• What Sola Scriptura actually teaches
• The definition of bibliolatry
• Scripture as God’s Word
• Jesus’ use of Scripture as final authority
• The danger of elevating tradition
• The Reformation defense of Scripture

• 2 Timothy 3:16–17
• John 17:17
• Matthew 4:4, 7, 10
• Mark 7:6–13
• Acts 17:11

• Martin Luther
• John Calvin
• John Owen
• Charles Spurgeon
• George Whitefield

👉 Sola Scriptura is not bibliolatry—it is submission to God speaking through His Word.

Episode 19 (Part 5 of 5): P — Perseverance of the Saints
Series: The Five Points of Calvinism (TULIP)
Episode Focus: Assurance, God’s preserving grace, the security of the believer
Audience: Christians asking whether salvation can be lost

In Episode 19, we conclude our five-part series on the Five Points of Calvinism by examining P — Perseverance of the Saints.

This doctrine teaches that those whom God truly saves, He will also keep. Perseverance is not grounded in human faithfulness, but in God’s preserving power. While true believers may struggle, doubt, and stumble, Scripture teaches that God ensures they will never finally fall away.

This episode walks carefully through key biblical passages to show that perseverance flows naturally from election, atonement, and effectual calling—and provides deep comfort and assurance to believers.

If salvation is truly the work of God, can it ever be lost?

• Do believers stay saved because they hold on to God?
  Or

• Because God holds on to them?

• What perseverance of the saints does not mean

• God as the author and finisher of salvation

• Jesus’ promises regarding eternal life

• The unbreakable chain of salvation

• Why true believers persevere while false professors fall away

• How warnings function as means of preservation

• Assurance rooted in God’s faithfulness, not ours

• Philippians 1:6 — God completes the work He begins

• Jude 24 — God keeps believers from stumbling

• 1 Peter 1:3–5 — Guarded by God’s power through faith

• John 10:27–29 — No one can snatch Christ’s sheep from His hand

• John 6:39 — Christ loses none of those given to Him

• John 6:40 — All who believe will be raised on the last day

• Romans 8:29–30 — Predestined, called, justified, glorified

• Romans 8:38–39 — Nothing can separate believers from God’s love

• 1 John 2:19 — Those who depart were never truly of us

• Matthew 7:21–23 — Professors without saving faith

• Hebrews 3:14 — We share in Christ if we hold fast

• Titus 2:11–12 — Grace trains us to renounce ungodliness

• Hebrews 12:6 — God disciplines those He loves

• James 1:12 — Endurance results in the crown of life

Perseverance of the saints teaches that salvation is God’s work from beginning to end. Those whom God elects, Christ redeems, and the Spirit calls will be preserved by God’s power and brought safely to glory.

Believers do not persevere alone—they persevere because God preserves them.

As Jesus declares:

“I give them eternal life, and they will never perish.”
— John 10:28 (ESV)

🎙️ The Closet Calvinist Podcast Episode 18 (Part 4 of 5): I — Irresistible Grace
Series: The Five Points of Calvinism (TULIP)
Episode Focus: Effectual calling, regeneration, God’s sovereign grace
Audience: Christians seeking biblical clarity on how salvation is applied

In Episode 18, we continue our five-part series on the Five Points of Calvinism, focusing on I — Irresistible Grace, often called Effectual Calling.

Irresistible grace teaches that salvation does not begin with human willingness, but with God’s sovereign work in the heart. Because sinners are spiritually unable to come to Christ on their own, God must act powerfully and graciously to bring His people to faith. This episode walks through key biblical texts to show that grace does not coerce the will—it changes the heart, so that sinners freely and joyfully come to Christ.

If sinners are spiritually unable to come to Christ, how does anyone believe?

• Does God merely invite and wait for a response?
  Or

• Does God effectually call and change the heart so the sinner willingly believes?

• What irresistible grace does not mean

• Human inability and the necessity of divine action

• The difference between the external gospel call and the effectual call

• Regeneration preceding faith

• Biblical examples of God’s effectual grace

• Why irresistible grace produces humility and assurance

• John 6:44 — No one can come unless the Father draws him

• Romans 8:7–8 — The flesh cannot submit to God

• 1 Corinthians 2:14 — The natural person cannot understand spiritual things

• Matthew 22:14 — Many are called, but few are chosen

• Romans 8:30 — Those God calls, He justifies

• 2 Thessalonians 2:13–14 — God calls through the gospel

• Ezekiel 36:26–27 — God gives a new heart

• Jeremiah 31:33 — God writes His law on the heart

• Philippians 2:13 — God works in believers to will and to work

• John 3:3 — New birth required to see the kingdom

• 1 Peter 1:3 — God causes us to be born again

• John 1:12–13 — Born of God, not human will

• Acts 16:14 — The Lord opens Lydia’s heart

• Luke 19:5–6 — Zacchaeus joyfully receives Christ

• Galatians 1:15–16 — Paul’s conversion by divine revelation

• John 6:37 — All the Father gives will come to Christ

• 1 Corinthians 4:7 — What do you have that you did not receive?

• Philippians 1:6 — God completes the work He begins

Episode Takeaway

Irresistible grace teaches that salvation is not the result of human effort or decision, but of God’s powerful and merciful work in the heart. Grace does not force sinners to believe—it transforms them so that they willingly and joyfully come to Christ.

As Scripture declares:

“All that the Father gives me will come to me.”
— John 6:37 (ESV)