----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Mark K LaCour" <lacour1@...>
To: <soundofgrace@...>
Sent: Monday, September 06, 2004 3:34 PM
Subject: Re: [soundofgrace] Re: Adam and the garden


> CHAD:  Come to think of it, what's the difference between this and an
> employer who pays me $___________ on the condition that I accomplish a
> job?  My employer is gracious?  If I do my work, he *owes* me.  That's
> not grace.  That's justice.  If I graduate from high school, the
> philanthropist *owes* me.  That's not grace.  That's justice.
>
> MARK:  Piper answers this in his illustration, but I'll amplify.  If I
> accomplish my job (requirement), it was through the grace of my employer
> who helped me every step of the way.

Nothing like turning the idea of "earn" on its linguistic head.  This is 
nonsense.  But then again, Daniel Fuller (from whence this kind of "logic" 
comes,) isn't exactly orthodox.

>I "overcame" laziness (1 Jn. 5:4)
> and "labored" at my job (1 Cor. 15:10) and persevered by my employer's
> grace (Gal. 2:20) and met the requirements of what I was commanded to do
> on my job (Rom. 8:4).  God doesn't owe me, but He does say He will reward
> me.  This is where your analogy breaks down.  You see everything as
> earned wages, when it's not.

Everything is earned wages when it comes to the employer and the 
philanthropist.

>You falsely dichotomize between requirement
> and effort

Bingo.  It's not a dichotomy, it's an antithesis.  Such is the antithesis 
between merit/grace and law/gospel.  Collapse the two... and you're buddies 
with N.T. Wright.

> thinking that simply because there's a requirement in the mix
> that there can't be any grace in there as well.

Precisely.

>What can't be in the mix
> is human effort ALONE.

Wow.  Now we're talking infused grace where we co-operate with the Spirit. 
This is Romanism.

>Since Adam was perfect in a perfect
> environment, did he still need the grace of God, for example, in naming
> the animals (Gen. 2:19)?

No.  This was part of his dominion requirement, something which he did of 
his own free will.

>Wasn't it God's grace to bring him the animals to
> name?

Not necessarily.  It was part of the communion the image-bearer enjoyed with 
the Creator.  And it would seem the Creator is making it as easy as possible 
for Adam to earn, at the very least, another day in the garden.  That's not 
grace.  That's generosity.

>Why does God give a greater grace to the humble (1
> Pet. 5:5)?

Humble is a noun there not a verb, and the sentence structure is an 
indicative, not an imperative.  Those who get grace have already been made 
humble (1 Pet. 1:23).  Their "humility" is not causal at all in receiving 
God's grace.

>If only the humble can receive "greater grace," how did they
> get that way?  Woke up humbled?

They were born again first.  Humility is a characteristic that flows from 
being a New Creation.

>They OBEYED the very next verse which
> Peter commands his readers to heed ("Therefore, humble yourself" -- a
> command).

Yep.  Those who have been given humility in the New Creation are to exercise 
it.  The already humble (Matthew 5:3 is an indicative, not an imperative) 
are to be humble.  This is classic New Testament eschatology: *be* what you 
*are* (something Piper, in an ironic twist of theology, affirms).

Chad Bresson
Xenia, OH