Pastor John I am anticipating your chapter that will be published in the forthcoming book

titled, From Heaven He Came and Sawed Her, Definite Atonement in Historical, Biblical, Theological

and Pastoral Perspective, edited by David Gibson and Jonathan Gibson.

It should be out from Crossway in November.

Your chapter is, I think the most persuasive thing I've read on the Definite Atonement

of Christ, and I was wondering if you would just in three or four minutes introduce Definite

Atonement to us.

Explain why it's so important to you and what's at stake for the church.

It is important.

Sometimes it's called limited atonement, which is an unfortunate designation because

it seems to minimize or diminish the work of the Atonement when in fact what we're arguing

is not for something less than others believe but for something more.

What I mean by that is this, the Bible speaks about God loving the world and he speaks

about Christ being the savior of all, especially those who believe.

I think in that little phrase what I want to say is Christ dies in a sense for all but

not in the same sense for all.

In the sense that he dies for all, we mean that he dies in such a way that you can offer

his death to all without exception and say to him, with no calm, here is Christ.

I offer Christ to you if you will believe Christ.

Christ is yours, everything he bought from the Father for eternal life.

He bought for you if you will have it so that big if you will have it enables us to

preach the gospel indiscriminately to every single person on the planet and say this

...