Smart Christian Channel Video Response (01)

Summary

Grace in Focus
Episode Summary: Smart Christian Channel Video Response (01)
Date: May 11, 2026
Hosts: Bob Wilkin & Sam Marr
Podcast by: Grace Evangelical Society

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Overview

In this special episode, Bob Wilkin and Sam Marr take a deep dive into a video from the Smart Christian Channel titled "Free Grace vs Lordship." The episode is the first in a multi-part series critiquing common arguments for Lordship Salvation, especially as presented by the referenced video. The hosts focus on key passages related to assurance, perseverance, and the distinction between justification and sanctification—while emphasizing the distinctives of Free Grace Theology.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Framing the Debate: Free Grace vs. Lordship Salvation

• The hosts respond to a video that attempts a fair critique of both positions, but ultimately favors a form of Lordship Salvation (01:11).
• The Smart Christian Channel presenter is described as fair-minded, “ironic” (peaceful and non-hostile), and using careful Greek exegesis (01:54, 04:06).
• However, he assumes that genuine faith will necessarily result in good works, and that those who fall away were never “true believers” (02:10).
• Assurance and eternal security are notably absent from the video’s discussion, something Bob and Sam consider critical.

Quotable:

"He does hold to, maybe you’d say, a mild form of Lordship Salvation...if you are born again, then you will be fruitful, you will do good works."
– Bob Wilkin (02:10)

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2. Importance of Clarity and Interpretation

• The hosts appreciate the careful and respectful tone of the video but feel the presenter's interpretations are misguided—especially regarding assurance and the meaning of “reigning” with Christ (03:24, 06:46).
• They emphasize that true exegesis should keep the issues of justification and sanctification distinct, rather than blending all “hard” verses into salvation requirements.

Quotable:

"We're gonna spend so much time on this because this is a guy who is...a very convincing speaker. People are going to watch his video and say, 'Wow, this guy made really good points.' So I think we should offer the same thing, but from our perspective and with a better understanding of Scripture."
– Bob Wilkin (03:24)

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3. Examining 2 Timothy 2:11–13 – Assurance or Uncertainty?

• Passage at Issue: 2 Timothy 2:11–13 (04:29–06:25)
  • "If we died with him, we will also live with him. If we endure, we will also reign with him. If we disown him, he will also disown us. If we are faithless, he remains faithful, for he cannot disown himself."
• Key Interpretive Dispute: Does "denying" or "disowning" mean loss of salvation, or loss of rewards?
  • The Lordship viewpoint seems to read “reigning with him” as equivalent to entering heaven, thus requiring endurance for salvation.
  • Bob and Sam insist “reigning” refers to degrees of reward among already saved believers.

Quotable:

"He assumes that reigning means being in heaven or getting into the kingdom...what he's saying is you have to endure in order to go to heaven."
– Bob Wilkin (06:25)

• Greek word nuance: “Deny” (arneomai) is cited as the word used for Peter’s denial, highlighting that denial is not the same as disownment (05:26–05:43).
• Parallel Texts: Matthew 10:32–33 is brought in as background, suggesting “denying” relates to reward, not salvation (05:44–06:25).

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4. Implications for Assurance and Evangelism

• The Dilemma: If “perseverance” is required for assurance, no one (not even Paul in 1 Corinthians 9:27) can know their eternal destiny (07:26–07:33).
  • Lordship’s approach undermines evangelism and assurance—a key critique.

“Do you think it's really appealing to come up to people and say, 'I don't know where I'm going when I die, and if you have a few minutes, I can help you be unsure of your eternal destiny too?’”
– Sam Marr (07:41)

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5. The Heart of the Disagreement: Is God’s Faithfulness to Himself or to Us?

• The Smart Christian Channel presenter argues (08:22) that 2 Timothy 2:13 (“he remains faithful, for he cannot disown himself”) simply refers to God’s attribute of faithfulness, not his faithfulness towards believers’ security.
• Bob and Sam counter that this faithfulness guarantees eternal life to all who have believed, even if they become “faithless” in the future. They claim the Lordship view misapplies the passage, seeing only condemnation (09:10–12:10).

Quotable:

“It’s not denying that we’re believers, it’s denying us what the first half says...If we endure, we'll reign. If we don't endure, we won't reign…11 and 13 are twin pillars of eternal security."
– Sam Marr (11:42)

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6. Systemic Problems in Lordship Interpretation

• Bob highlights a recurring problem: Lordship theology interprets all exhortations in the NT as salvation texts, flattening the distinction between reward and salvation (12:10–12:22).
  • "Every verse in Scripture is a nail and all they've got is a hammer." – Bob Wilkin (12:22)

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Notable Quotes

• “Disown sounds a lot harsher. And it sounds a lot more like you’re no longer a child of God or you’ve lost your salvation.”
  – Bob Wilkin, discussing translation nuances (05:18)

• “Almost every commentator says that Second Timothy 2:12 is Paul’s interpretation of Matthew 10:32,33...If we endure, we shall also reign with him. That is explaining, if we confess him, he will also confess us.”
  – Sam Marr (05:44)

• “Even if we're faithless, he remains faithful, for he cannot deny Himself. He's already promised us the free gift of eternal life.”
  – Sam Marr (11:42)

• “Lordship Works based theology has a systemic problem of interpreting every single verse in the New Testament as being related to salvation.”
  – Bob Wilkin (12:10)

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• [01:11] Introduction to the Smart Christian Channel video and its approach
• [04:26] Beginning of 2 Timothy 2:11–13 discussion
• [05:13] Greek word study: “deny”
• [05:44] Comparison with Matthew 10:32–33
• [06:25] “Reigning” as a rewards issue vs. salvation issue
• [07:26] The problem of assurance under Lordship Salvation
• [08:22] Is God’s faithfulness about our security?
• [09:12] Bookends of assurance and security in 2 Timothy 2:11/13
• [12:10] Lordship’s interpretive “hammer and nail” problem

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Tone & Language

The episode maintains a collegial, earnest, and occasionally humorous tone, expressing strong conviction in Free Grace Theology while respectfully engaging alternative views. The hosts blend biblical exposition, original language insights, and practical theological implications.

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Conclusion

This episode launches a thorough, multi-part critique of Lordship Salvation as presented in contemporary evangelical circles, using a representative YouTube video as a springboard. Bob and Sam endeavor to show that foundational New Testament passages (like 2 Timothy 2:11–13) support the Free Grace position and the promise of assurance, contrary to Lordship claims. The discussion sets the stage for deeper scriptural engagement in future episodes.

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Next Up:
Previewing John 3:16 and John 3:36—do they support Lordship Salvation?
Stay tuned as the series continues!

Transcript

[Announcer]

The following is a listener supported ministry from the Grace Evangelical Society. Welcome to Grace in Focus. The Free Grace position and the Lordship Salvation position. Is there any way that they are essentially the same and can therefore be considered compatible? Why or why not? Let's have a discussion about this today and we're glad that you're with us, friend. Grace in Focus is a ministry of the Grace Evangelical Society located in North Texas. Our website is faithalone.org there you can find out about our online seminary with full scholarships available for students maintaining good academic standing and it is a place where you can earn an M. Div. Degree. The application and registration window is open now for our fall semester and we'd love you to go to our website and find out more about the Grace Evangelical Theological Seminary. There are also a lot of other things there that you might want to look at about us. That's faithalone.org and now with today's discussion, here are Bob Wilkin and Sam Marr.

[Bob Wilkin]

Alright Bob, we've got something a little bit different today. Rather than just answering questions from the email, we were sent a video by someone from a channel called Smart Christian's Channel and the video is titled Free Grace vs Lordship. I watched the video. It's a good video. I like the way he explains because he has grapeshire up. I don't know if he's using logos or what, but he's got the English and the Greek up and he's showing exactly what he's talking about. He does his best to give an honest critique of both lordship and free grace. He says let's not use insults like cheap grace or I can't remember what he says about lordship. So he's trying to give a fair shake of both sides. But he does hold to maybe you'd say a mild form of lordship salvation. Because what he believes and what he makes very clear in the video is the act of regeneration, being born again or whatever that is by faith alone. It's Christ doing it. It's just by faith, by belief. Works don't play a part in the salvation, but you have to have good works to as a result of that, if you are born again, then you will be fruitful, you will do good works. You will. A lot of verses that we're gonna look at, those verses have to be true about you, otherwise you didn't truly believe in the first place. He uses the word true believer because he he strongly believes there are true believers and there's false believers. You think you did, but if you fall away that means you didn't. And he doesn't get into assurance. He doesn't get into eternal security in this video. So that's not his priority. He's just trying to explain what do these two things believe. And he kind of makes it like a Kumbaya. We should really be agreeing on these things, free grace and lordship. But at the end of the video it's kind of like free grace. You're right about one of these things and wrong about 50 others. And Lordship, you're right about everything. So yeah, that's what he's convinced of. So that's what he's talking about. But we'll go through most of what he said and I've got some quotes from him from his video.

[Sam Marr]

And it'll probably take more than one show because since there's so many different passages he's got, this may be five shows.

[Bob Wilkin]

Yeah. Before we get into it, I want to say this too. I think part of the reason why we're gonna spend so much time on this is because this is a guy who is very. I think he's a good student of God's word. He has an exegetical approach. These aren't just talking points. This is what he is convinced of. And I think he's a very convincing speaker. So people are going to watch his video and say, wow, this guy made really good points. I think he's right about this. So I think we should offer the exact same thing, but from our perspective and with a better understanding of Scripture and a more accurate interpretation of some of these verses. Yeah.

[Sam Marr]

And from what you're saying, the guy's pretty ironic. In other words, he doesn't come across as a hostile kind of guy.

[Bob Wilkin]

No, he's very gracious, he's very cool headed about these things. But I think he's just misguided in a lot of the passages that he's talking about.

[Sam Marr]

Right.

[Bob Wilkin]

So let's start with 2 Timothy 2, 13. This is the first one.

[Sam Marr]

Yeah. We probably had to do 11 to 13.

[Bob Wilkin]

Right. I think this is the first one really that he gets into in his video. And I've got the NIV pulled up.

[Sam Marr]

Yeah. Because the NIV translation, it's a bad one. But I think it does support his interpretation.

[Bob Wilkin]

Right. I don't remember. I'd have to go back and watch the video. I don't remember which version he uses. I don't think he even uses the NIV because I don't remember him talking about it. But Starting in verse 11, it says here is a Trustworthy saying, if we died with him, we will also live with him. If we endure, we will also reign with him. If we disown him, he will also disown us. If we are faithless, he he remains faithful, for he cannot disown himself. And that's the. The NIV translates it disown. What does the NKJV say?

[Sam Marr]

Yeah, NKJV says if we deny him, he will also deny us.

[Bob Wilkin]

Right. So disown sounds a lot harsher. And it sounds a lot more like you're no longer a child of God or you've lost your salvation.

[Sam Marr]

And by the way, if this guy's pulling up the Greek, he should be pointing out that I believe it's our neomai that's used here for deny. And the same word is when Peter denied Jesus three times, so did Peter disown Jesus three times? I don't think so. He denied him.

[Bob Wilkin]

Yeah.

[Sam Marr]

And by the way, in Matthew 10:32 and 33, did this speaker, by the way, bring up Matthew 10:32 and 33? That's where Jesus said, he who confesses me before men, him will I confess before my Father who is in heaven. He who denies me before men, him will I deny before my Father is in heaven. Almost every commentator says that second Timothy 2:12 is Paul's interpretation of Matthew 10:32,33 with the first line, if we endure, we shall also reign with him. That is explaining, if we confess him, he will also confess us.

[Bob Wilkin]

Right. And that's where he spends. He doesn't spend a whole lot of time on this passage, but that's what he talks about, that if we endure, we will also reign. And he doesn't talk about what reigning with him means. He assumes that reigning means being in heaven or getting into the kingdom. And so what he's saying is you have to endure in order to go to heaven.

[Sam Marr]

That's the prevalent view in evangelicalism today.

[Announcer]

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[Sam Marr]

Most people hold that view. But if you hold that view, you do not know where you're going when you die.

[Bob Wilkin]

Right?

[Sam Marr]

Because you have to admit that if the Apostle Paul was unsure in First Corinthians 9:27 that he would persevere, then we don't know if we're going to persevere. And if we don't know if we're going to persevere, and only those who persevere are those who are going to reign with Christ, which in his view means get into the kingdom or go to heaven when you die, then I don't know where I'm going. By the way, that leads to a terrible way to evangelize. Do you think it's really appealing to come up to people and say, I don't know where I'm going when I die, and if you have a few minutes, I can help you be unsure of your eternal destiny too? Yeah, I don't think that would be real and comforting. But let's explain Second Timothy.

[Bob Wilkin]

I want to mention. The other thing he does talk about is on verse 13, where it says, if we are faithless, he remains faithful. The reason he goes here is because he's attacking the free grace argument that if I believe in Jesus Christ, I receive everlasting life later my life, I can lose my faith, become an atheist, agnostic, Muslim, whatever, and everlasting life doesn't depart from me. I'm still born again, I'm still regenerated, still have everlasting life. He's saying in light of this verse, that can't be true, because right here it says, if we are faithless, he remains faithful and he can't disown himself. He's just saying when it says he is faithful, all that means is that's an attribute of God. God is always faithful. No matter what, night and day, rain or shine, he's faithful, but it doesn't have anything to do with him being faithful towards us.

[Sam Marr]

Right, but there's so many problems with this view.

[Bob Wilkin]

Right.

[Sam Marr]

For example, verse 11, if we've died with him, we shall also live with him. Well, every believer has died with him. Romans, chapter 6 and Galatians 2:20, many other passages. The moment we believe in him, we've died with him. Therefore it's guaranteed we shall also live with him. There's no maybe about it. And then verse 13, it's been said that verses 11 and 13, our bookends on this passage, verse 13, if we are faithless as believers, he remains faithful. He cannot deny himself what this person is interpreting. He can't deny that if we deny him, he will deny us. Well, that's true, but the other part is also true. That if we've died with him, we shall also live with Him. He can't deny the fact of John 3:16, that whoever believes in him will never perish, but has everlasting life. So he's taking. He remains faithful to condemn us, but it's faithful to keep us secure. And by the way, verse 12, as I mentioned, is explaining Matthew 10:32 and 33, which are eternal rewards verses. What they're saying is if we endure to the end of our lives in our confession of Christ, which primarily refers to being part of a local assembly that's clipped, clearly proclaiming and glorifying Christ, if we do hold fast in our confession, then he's going to confess us before the Father in terms of eternal rewards. It'll be, well done, good and faithful servant, you've been faithful Little have authority over 10 cities or have authority over five cities. That's where it says, if we endure, we shall also reign with Him. But the second half is the denial of ruling with Him. If we deny him, he will also deny us. It's not denying that we're believers, it's denying us what the first half says, because these two halves are antithetically parallel. If we endure, we'll reign. If we don't endure, we won't reign. He's totally misunderstood. 11 to 13. 11 and 13 are twin pillars of eternal security. And verse 12 is saying, if we endure, we're going to reign with him forever. That's a reward. If we don't endure, we. We're not going to reign with him forever. We're going to miss out on the reward. But even if we're faithless, he remains faithful, for he cannot deny Himself. He's already promised us the free gift of eternal life. So this first verse that he's citing, not too promising for the way he's going to handle these other verses, because these verses actually strongly support the free grace position. Of course, all verses do, but some are harder to explain than others. But this not hard to explain. It's hard to mess this one up.

[Bob Wilkin]

Yeah. Lordship Works based theology has a systemic problem of interpreting every single verse in the New Testament as being related to salvation.

[Sam Marr]

Right.

[Bob Wilkin]

There's no separation. Every verse in Scripture is a nail and all they've got is a hammer. A.

[Announcer]

There's.

[Bob Wilkin]

There's nothing else. And we're gonna see that through all of these because so many of the passages we're gonna look at are great encouragements to believers about how to live righteously or how to follow in Christ's example or how to store up rewards in heaven and he's gonna miss it every single time.

[Sam Marr]

That's right. Well, let's keep grace in focus.

[Announcer]

Be sure to check out our daily [e-mail] they are short and full of great teaching just like what you've heard today. Find [e-mail] resources blog. We would love to hear from you. Maybe you've got a question, comment or some feedback. If you do, please don't hesitate to send us a message. Here's our email address. It's radioaithalone.org that's radioaithalone.org and when you do very important. Please let us know your radio station call letters and the city of your location on our next episode. John 3:16 John 3:36 do either of these support lordship's salvation? Come back and join us again. And until then, let's keep grace in focus.

[Bob Wilkin]

The proceeding has been a listener supported

[Announcer]

ministry from the Grace Evangelical Society.