Ladies and Gentlemen, Brethren Moderators:

    I am here to again continue my affirmative argument and reply to some of the things that my opponent said. He said that I was complaining at some of the things he was saying. He said that he couldn't help it. I want to ask him if he were doing that contrary to his will? Is he doing that contrary to his will? He said a while ago, that he could have been somewhere else besides here. I suppose then, that he is here contrary to his will. Is that a fact? I want to say to my worthy opponent that if he did not have to come here today, and if I didn't have to come here today—and we are both here—I want to ask you how you could be anywhere else. I say that it is foolish and silly. He said that I was complaining about it, but that there was no use because he couldn't help it. He keeps charging consequences on the doctrine of my belief in the predestination of all things contrary to the rules.

    ELDER WEST: The proposition says, "whatsoever comes to pass." How could that be charging consequences when the proposition says, "Whatsoever comes to pass?"

    ELDER RHODES: Wait a moment. I was not through. He even brought in unpleasant things in this debate, and even brought in the lowest criminals one could think of, as if I believed that. I say that if that is not charging consequences, I hope that God will be my helper to quit this debate. I do not any more believe that predestination is causative in these things than he does, and I have argued that all the way through. Just as he said, he didn't have to come here. The Lord moved him to come here. He asked me if the Lord moved me to come here. I want to say, my friends, that the Bible says, "The preparation of the heart in man, together with the answer of the tongue, is alone of the Lord." Solomon said, "He beset me before and behind. He is in all of my downsittings." You are sitting down, aren't you? Why are you not standing up? "He is in all of my downsittings and in all of mine uprisings. He beset me before and behind." I want to say, my friends, the reason why my opponent is here today is because God fixed it that he would be here and I hope that he is not here contrary to his will.

    I have never said that anyone has been moved by the Spirit of God to perform wickedness, and he well knows that, and I want to say just here that I believe that if he had come down to brass tacks in his argument, he would believe the same thing. I say that God's predestination is not the moving or leading cause that causes them to do these things, just as I say that by His powerful Spirit He will not reach down and get him by the hair of the head and bring him here today; but the secondary cause is that he challenged me for this debate about six months ago, and felt it was his duty to be here. God could have prevented it if it had been His will to do so. If it had been according to His purpose, he would have prevented it. There is one man who was to have been here but is not here. He purposed to come. He wired for a reservation in EI Dorado and wanted to come. I don't know what happened, but he is not here. I want to say, my beloved friends, that he knows, as well as I do, that I do not believe that God's predestination is causative in this or in any other sense.  

We spoke of Adam's sin. I want to ask you, Elder West, how there could have been a redeemed sinner, redeemed home to glory to magnify God's blessed and holy name if Adam had not sinned? Did God give the law to Adam in order that he keep sin out of the world? If he gave it to him in order to keep sin out of the world, it reminds me of the idiot who made a slip-gap in his fence to keep hogs out of his field of corn. I want to say, beloved friends, that I can take the Bible and prove to you that sin could not have entered into the world if Adam could have kept the law. It could not have entered the world, and you know that as well as I, and it says, "Moreover, the law entered that the offense might abound."—Romans v. 20.

Now, I want to notice a few things that he said. He asked whose will was done, the will of the Lord or the will of the wicked in the crucifixion of Christ. I want to say, my friends, that I believe that the Lord's will was supreme in it, and yet they delighted to kill him. They delighted to kill him. They wanted to kill him. Why did they want to kill Him? To fulfill the Scriptures? No, sir. They did not know they were fulfilling the Scriptures, and yet they were. "And after all the people of the world, and the wicked being in God's hands"—that is a plain statement of the Scripture.

He said that he would rather be a Campbellite. Well, I suspect, just to tell the truth, since he introduced it, he is more kin to them. You know, blood is thicker than water. I am satisfied that is the truth. On this proposition he is exactly like them; just exactly like they are. I have had the very same clauses thrown at me in a Campbellite debate to try to decoy me and detour me from the subject, by charging consequences. "If God did so and so, this, that and the other, how any other thing would make God this, or make God that." That is not the proposition at all. The proposition is as to whether or not God purposed, predestinated, or appointed all things. That is what the proposition is. He said he would rather be a Campbellite than act ugly. That is why he has acted ugly, by charging me with these consequences.

He asked me if God's foreknowledge and predestination were the same. I want to ask him if God's foreknowledge or if His predestination ever stopped short of each other? In other words, does He foreknow more than He predestinated? Or does He foreknow less than He predestinated, and if predestination is causative, the same thing would apply to your foreknowledge. The same thing would apply to appointment and the same thing would apply to purpose. .

Now, he said there was one thing that he wanted me to notice and that was about Adam's eating. I think I have noticed that sufficiently.

He read from Genesis ii. 16 and 17. I want to read that again, and I still state that my statement was correct:  "And the Lord God took the man, and put him into the garden of Eden to dress it and to keep it. And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat: but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest. thereof thou shalt surely die." "Ye shall not eat of this tree and be free. Thou mayest freely eat." I want to emphasize the word "freely." He could not eat of it and be free, He told him to begin with. That was the only tree that he could not eat of and be free. Now scramble with that.

     Now, back to the argument I made that he gave the sons of men all of these things to be exercised therewith. How could they be exercised therewith if they did not do them? The Lord gave them something to be exercised therewith, and that was "all things that is done under the sun." How could they be exercised with it if they didn't do it? Jeremiah vii. 9 and 10. "Steal and lie," and so on. I want to say, beloved friends, that I could show him some place in the New Testament based on an argument that I have already made-what the Lord said to Peter. He said, “Before the cock crows thrice, thou shalt deny thrice."- John xviii. 27. If Peter could have kept from lying, he would have made a liar of the Lord. Don't you think so? I would rather Peter would have lied a little and cursed and swore a little than for the Lord to have been in that fix.

Now, about these people swearing falsely and coming and standing in His house and saying they were delivered to do these things. That is the very thing that I am telling you about today. As far as that is concerned, their own wicked motives and impulses moved them to do this, and the Lord was not pleased with their motives and with their inclination to do these things. That is what is under consideration. But as far as the Apostle Peter lying, and even swearing and cursing, swearing that he never knew the Lord, I want to tell you that I would rather Peter would have lied than for the Lord to, wouldn't you? Wouldn't you rather he would have lied than for the Lord?

     I want to tell you something else about that little argument right here. I have said that God predestinated or purposed all things whatsoever come to pass, if it be small things or great things. It, was a pretty small thing for the rooster to crow; don't you think? And yet; brethren and sisters, I want to say that the old rooster couldn't have kept from crowing by all of the owls and eagles that could have been thrown around him. Why? Because God had decreed and purposed that he should crow at that time. He predestinated that he should crow and I believe he crowed just like all other roosters do. I believe he just wanted to crow because it was his nature and his disposition to crow. He wanted to crow just like you want to complain; just like you want to charge consequences. He said the reason he did it is because he was delivered to do it. That is right, but he is not doing it against his will. How could sin have entered the world if Adam had kept the law? He asked me if Adam was a natural man. Sure, he was a natural man; just a natural man is all he was. Now, he charges these things and the Apostle Paul says, over in Romans, the third chapter and eighth verse: "And not rather (as we be slanderously reported and as some affirm that we say), Let us do evil, that good may come? whose damnation is just." He is charging me with believing that we ought to do wrong in order that good would come out of it. Sir, I want to tell you that Solomon told the truth when he said it was the whole duty of man to fear God and keep His commandments. It doesn't lessen your duty in the matter, regardless of how things work out, and it says, whoever charges consequences like this, "Whose damnation is just." I hope it is not applicable to my brother. I hope it is not applicable to my opponent, but that is exactly what he is doing, and it is the same thing in toto.  

Now, I believe I am ready to notice some more of my affirmative arguments. He spoke as if God were the author of sin, according to my doctrine. Hebrews v. 9. If Jesus became the author of eternal salvation by the things that He did, did not Adam become the author of sin by the things he did?

ELDER WEST: Will you quote your text, Brother Rhodes?

ELDER RHODES (continuing): "For it became Him, of whom are all things, and by whom are all things, in bringing many sons unto glory, to make the captain of their salvation perfect through sufferings."

     MODERATOR CAYCE (interrupting): I believe you quoted that a little wrong. Did you say Hebrews v. 9?

     ELDER RHODES: "Though He were a Son, yet learned He obedience by the things which He suffered; and being made perfect, He became the author of eternal salvation unto all them that obey Him." Is that correct?

      So, I want to say, beloved friends, here is the essence of all the opposition that he offers me, and should we not, my brethren, try to come just as close together as we can? Should we not want to do so? I do. The only thing that stands between me and my opponent on this subject is the prejudice which I believe is in his heart against the word "predestination." "Foreknowledge". He says God predestinated some things and others He did not. But I want to tell you, brethren, the text that I quoted him over there in Proverbs has to do with all things that are done under the sun. "And He gave it unto the sons of men for them to be exercised thereby." How can they be exercised if they do not do that? Did God predestinate the salvation of His people? He said yes. Then, Jesus suffered and became the author of eternal salvation through predestination? No. But through the suffering that God ordained He should do, and so, my brethren and sisters, "That as sin has reigned unto death, even so might grace reign through righteousness unto eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord."-Romans v. 21.

     Now, my beloved friends, I want to say that I believe my opponent is perfectly honest. I am still happy to tell you that I believe that, but he has been so steeped in these things, and so duped by them, because of that prejudice, he is not willing to come out and acknowledge what the Scriptures teach on this particular subject. I don't mean that he is not willing, as far as he thinks, and as far as I feel he can do these things, but I mean that he has been so prejudiced and so blinded that he simply cannot. I hope the Lord will open his ears and his heart.

     Now, I want to resume my argument. Daniel vii. 21: "I beheld, and the same horn made war with the saints, and prevailed against them." He told him that a certain wicked king or beast or power would make war with his saints in the future, if you please. By what was it made certain? Will it take place or not take place? I believe it is taking place today. I believe the very things that Daniel was given to see has, is, and will take place. I believe some of them are taking place today. I believe they will continue to take place. There is no doubt in my mind that Hitler doesn't know that he is fulfilling the purpose of God. In the eleventh chapter of Daniel, in speaking of hIm-128 times it tells us in that chapter of things that shall be and shall not be, and so on, relative to the future; and I want to tell you, brethren and sisters and friends, that the word "shall" could be applied 128 times in one chapter in all classes of things that are to take place to the end of time. Isn't that some predestination? Isn't it some purpose? Isn't it some decree? It says, "For that which is determined shall be done." "Shall be done." Do you think there is any way of escape from the things that are determined? No, sir. The rise and fall of kingdoms and empires were under consideration. Daniel vii. 17: "These great beasts, which are four, are four kings which shall rise out of the earth." These four kings which have not arisen yet. How do the kingdoms arise? They often arise by murder, war and destruction. I want to tell you how they are arising. Tell me by what power is it made certain that they shall arise? I want to say, beloved friends, I would rather and when I say that, I hope that I say it with love from the very bottom of my heart-I would rather believe in a sovereign, eternal, and glorious God that has all power in heaven and earth, in the seas, and all deep places, and able to overrule and make all of these things work to His praise and glory than to believe in one that a lot of things take place that He would rather not.

     Is foreknowledge causative? The fact that God foreknew all things does that cause all things to come to pass without secondary causes? I just ask you that question.

     I want to quote to you now from Romans, the eighth chapter, verses 28 and 29: "And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to His purpose." The Apostle Paul says, "For we know that all things work together for the good to them that love God." How do all things work together for good? I will quote you one more Scripture. It says, "He who worketh all things after the counsel of His own will"; "all things work together for good." That is one of the places where it means "all things." It means everything. It means all things. It says "all things," and where I quoted from, it says how He "worketh all things after the counsel of His own will." That means all things, and I want to tell you, my brethren, that when you get through with these "all things," it means all things. You will not have time to notice the things that do not mean all things. Although it is often spoken, we find how it is said that all the world went after John in the wilderness to be baptized. But Herod with all Jerusalem was troubled at him, and killed him.-Matthew xiv. 10.

     ELDER WEST: Will you give me the citation of the Scripture that "all things went out to John to be baptized?"

     ELDER RHODES: I could be mistaken, but I think that is right. But if not, I stand corrected. Matthew iii. 5.

     I want to say, beloved friends, that if "all things" always meant all things, then Herod was a convert of John the Baptist when he cut his head off. We don't find where he was a convert at all, but these "all things work together for the good of God's people," does mean all things, and I want to say that when Adam ate the forbidden fruit, when he partook in the garden of Eden of the forbidden fruit, it was the very gateway that caused and determined, brethren and sisters, to bring our Redeemer, how He was born as the result of the fact of the curse that God placed upon Eve and said in Genesis iii. 16 that in sorrow thou shalt bear children. So, the Saviour was born, and I want to say that I believe that very thing, and not only that, my friends, but I believe the London Confession of Faith, in my case here, where it says how Adam was included; how it extended to the first fall of man. Now it was recommended as being the most useful document in history since the days of the apostles and was recommended to all Primitive Baptists everywhere who believed it just as I am advocating. You are not here contrary to your will. You are here according to your will.

     ELDER WEST: You refer to the London Confession. I wish you would read what it says.

     ELDER RHODES: I will not have time to do that. I will give it to you in my next speech.

     ELDER WEST: We will extend the time for you to read it and not count that time against you.

     ELDER RHODES: "God hath decreed in Himself from all eternity, by the most wise and holy counsel of His own will, freely and unchangeably, all things whatsoever come to pass; yet so as thereby is God neither the author of sin, nor hath fellowship with any therein, nor is violence offered to the will of the creature." Do you believe that, Elder West? It is recommended to all Primitive Baptists everywhere in America.

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