Why Do People Hate Calvinst?

Uh no. Those can be proven by scripture. Perseverance cannot. If you can prove it, please post some scripture.

 

Baloney. Calvinists teach that regeneration must precede faith. They also teach correctly that justification follows faith. Therefore, if a person must be regenerated before they can have faith, then for some moment of time they are spiritually alive and spiritually dead at the same moment. You cannot be justified until you believe the gospel. It takes time to hear the gospel, and it takes time to understand it. Only after hearing and understanding the gospel can you believe it. And only after you believe the gospel are you justified, forgiven of your sins.

So, for that amount of time it takes to hear the gospel, understand it, and believe on Jesus, if you are regenerated you are spiritually alive, but also spiritually dead in your sins at the very same time. This is impossible.

And Calvinists go far beyond this. They say a person can be regenerated for years before they express faith in Christ. I showed that earlier from an associate of Sproul. So a person like this would be spiritually alive and spiritually dead in their sins for years at the same time. Incredible.

This is tremendous error and all the double talk in the world will not explain it away.

 

I believe ministers should be up front about their beliefs and let the chips fall where they may.

I saw another thread about "why do people fear the word Baptist". I think people do not hate calvinsim as much as they just fear it. It is the evil two-head monster that dwells somewhere out there in the shadows. If more of us were frank about our beliefs it might go a long way toward dispelling the silly notions that people have about it. (we must be charitable in our upfrontedness).

I started a new Bible study in my workplace recently, and I told them on the first day that I am a Calvinist and to my suprise, no one fainted and they all came back in subsequent weeks. But I do realize that a Bible study does not carry the same dynamics as a Church does.

C'ss and A's can get along if they determine that they are going to do just that. But actually forming a covenanted community - a Church - well, that's a different story. The C view of God is significantly different from the modern A (which closer in some ways to P than A) view of God and I don't see any way they can be reconciled in a formal body.

 

Like many doctrines, its not dependent upon a particular word found in the Bible. Some commonly excepted examples of these would the doctrine of the Trinity, the doctrine of the Second Coming, the doctrine of the rapture. So, while looking for the word in particular isn't a bad place to start, just be careful not to let the lack of the a particular word in Scripture become too important in your analysis.

Well partly that has to do with your view of the end times. For an amil posttrib, these passage could be seen as referring to Matt 25 and Rev 20 where the unrighteous are condemned. Thus they are related to salvation to some extent. But, thats largely beside the point of your question since these verses are not central to the doctrine of PotS.

So lets try to address your question more directly. First of all, let me clarify what is meant by PotS. Simply put, PotS holds that those who are truly saved (a regenerate person, true believers, those who have saving faith, the elect, etc...all the various ways in which a "saint" can be described) will never fully and finally fall away from faith. The believer may wander and becomes weak in faith and temporarily fall away from fellowship with Christ, but never completely and they will always return.

So now that its been defined, how do Cist's arrive at this doctrine? Well, there are lots of things that go into arriving at this doctrine. For a full answer you would need to have an explanation of some of the other parts of Cism - particularly the relationship of faith and free will. But let me instead just give you some of the key verses:

Matthew 10:22
And ye shall be hated of all men for my name's sake: but he that endureth to the end shall be saved.
1 John 3:10
In this the children of God are manifest, and the children of the devil: whosoever doeth not righteousness is not of God, neither he that loveth not his brother of God.
John 10:27-29: "My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me. "And I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; neither shall anyone snatch them out of My hand. "My Father, who has given them to Me, is greater than all; and no one is able to snatch them out of My Father's hand.
Romans 8:1: [There is] therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.
Romans 8:38-39: For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Romans 11:29 For the gifts and the calling of God [are] irrevocable.
Hebrews 3:14: For we have become partakers of Christ if we hold the beginning of our confidence steadfast to the end.
1 John 2:19: They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would have continued with us; but they went out that they might be made manifest, that none of them were of us.
Philippians 1:6: being confident of this very thing, that He who has begun a good work in you will complete [it] until the day of Jesus Christ;
2 Timothy 1:12: For this reason I also suffer these things; nevertheless I am not ashamed, for I know whom I have believed and am persuaded that He is able to keep what I have committed to Him until that Day.
Hebrews 13:20-21: Now may the God of peace who brought up our Lord Jesus from the dead, that great Shepherd of the sheep, through the blood of the everlasting covenant, make you complete in every good work to do His will, working in you what is well pleasing in His sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory forever and ever. Amen
1 John 3:9: Whosoever is born of God doth not commit sin; for his seed remaineth in him: and he cannot sin, because he is born of God.
John 17:2,12: "as You have given Him authority over all flesh, that He should give eternal life to as many as You have given Him. "While I was with them in the world, I kept them in Your name. Those whom You gave Me I have kept; and none of them is lost except the son of perdition, that the Scripture might be fulfilled
1 Corinthians 1:6-8: Even as the testimony of Christ was confirmed in you: So that ye come behind in no gift; waiting for the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ: Who shall also confirm you unto the end, that ye may be blameless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ.
1 Thessalonians 5:23-24: And the very God of peace sanctify you wholly; and I pray God your whole spirit and soul and body be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. Faithful is he that calleth you, who also will do it.

 

I get the idea that we are preserved in Christ, but those verses say nothing about us having to persevere. We are kept safe by Christ, not ourselves.

 

Not exactly precise. Instead, they hold that regeneration is a precondition for faith, thus, in that sense it precedes faith. However, regeneration and faith are inseparable in terms of time. IOW, if you are regenerate you have faith, even if its not "fully formed", its still "saving faith". Thus, while regeneration is a precondition for faith, few Cists would argue that it precedes faith in time. Yes, Cists are often very imprecise in how they explain it, but question them closely or look carefully at their reasoning and I believe will find this to be the case. In short, states of regeneration "preceding faith" or "coming before faith" etc. by Cists should be taken as logical progressions, or statements of necessity conditions, not of spaces of time.

In case you think I am spouting baloney, consider whether or not you have the same basic approach with faith and justification. You agree that faith precedes justification. Yet would you say that there is an appreciable amount of time between the point of having faith and being justified, or would you hold that justification happens effectively at the same moment as when one has saving faith? If the former, can you at least accept the logical soundness of the latter position? If not, then how do you see the latter position as being unsound?

Two problems with this. First of all lets assume there is an appreciable amount of time between regeneration, faith and justification. Even if this is true, it still doesn't lead to the conclusion that one is both spiritually dead and alive at the same time. For the Cist, lack of justification is not what makes spiritually dead. Justification has to do with your rightness before God in terms of His justice. So, theoretically, one can be spiritually alive and yet still unjustified (which is not equivalent to spiritually dead).

In actuality, the typical view is that regeneration, faith and justification come effectively simultaneous. The language of "this precedes that, etc." is that of logical progression, not spaces in time.

I would disagree that it necessarily takes time to understand it. I see nothing preventing the HS from giving instant understanding of all that is essential to be saved.

This rests on the assumption that understanding takes time. I see no logical necessity for that, esp. since understanding the action of the HS.

Well I have given an explanation. Now your turn to show me how my reasoning is unsound.

 

1. Perseverance and Preservation of the Saints are two sides of the same coin. We persevere because we are preserved. We do not *have* to persevere, we will though.

2. The doctrine of Perseverance in no way holds that we are kept safe by ourselves. Perseverance is a result of salvation, not a condition for salvation.

3. What may be causing the confusion of point 2 is that, while Perseverance is not seen as a condition for salvation, it is seen as a condition for the *assurance of salvation*. So, persevering does not mean you are saved, nor if you stop persevering for a time is your salvation in danger, nor is it necessary that you keep persevering in order to stay saved. However! if your life is not evidencing faith in Christ, then you have no basis for having any *assurance* you are saved. FWIW, This is the probably the main distinctive between the doctrine of PotS and doctrines which equate to "once saved always saved".

 

Theory #1: this is less about the particulars of Calvinism, and more about examples of behavior that people now generalize towards all Calvinists (unfairly, I would say). People tend to generalize from a handful of well-known examples.
There have been several churches in the South who have had "stealth calvinist takeovers." In other words, a pastor came in, and quietly manipulated the church towards a very calvinistic stance. It's not the theology, it's the deception.

I'm intimately aware of one church with whom this has happened: it was the church I grew up in (high-school years), and the one my parents attended for 25+ years.

This has happened in several churches in our area. Now...IMO, people generalize from those few examples (unfairly, as most churches aren't this way)...and hostility towards Calvinism/Calvinists are born.

Theory #2: More simple, and more about Calvinist doctrine itself--people have a real problem with limited atonement. When they find out that "God so loved the world" doesn't really mean "the world," but a subset of that group--well, it doesn't sit well with them. When it is explained to them that the passage, "It is not God's will that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance,"--well, when they find out that the "all" doesn't REALLY mean "all," they get a bit upset. Wonder why.

 

Particular redemption is recurrrent throughout Scripture.

The doctrines of Hell and Judgment doesn't sit well with a lot of folks also.

The Lord's will is never thwarted. However,the "all" dosn't mean each and every person,past present and future including the multiplied hundreds of millions who have never heard the Gospel.

That's what happens when folks rely on tradition and a surface-level understanding of Bible passages.

 

1. Not all Cists would argue such on those verses. Many have ways of dealing with the passages which have "the world" meaning "the world" and "all" meaning "all".

2. More at your point though, it is strange that people have such a reaction since most non-Cists positions tend towards the same problem. Most every position qualifies what is apparently an absolute or universal when it would disagree with their position. For instance, for any non-Cist who decries Total Depravity is going to almost certainly qualify the universals and absolutes in Rom 3:10-18 (none does good doesn't really mean none and no one seeks God doesn't really mean no one), or FWBs are going to argue that "any creature" in Rom 8:39 does not mean "any" since it doesn't include themselves, etc.

My point is not to fault these positions or defend the Cists who argue against "all" or "any" being as it appears. My point is that most every position will tend to qualify universals and absolute statements. Of course, in all cases, those who hold such positions believe their explanation is sound. So, unless you are one of the rare people who take every single apparently absolute and universal statement in Scripture as fully absolute or universal, then it would be inconsistent to fault Cism for failing to do so. Plank before splinter and all that

3. Conversely, any who hold that "whole world" in I John 2:2 must be every person is going to run into some serious doctrinal difficulties. Either "whole world" must be qualified in some way, or else "propitiation" must be. Ditto to Rom 8:32 and John 1:29. Again, this is merely to point out that both sides of this debate must qualify universal statements in some manner.

 

Can you show quotes of people who teach what you claim?

I am pretty sure that people here over and over have explained to you that they do not believe in this "gap" between regeneration and faith. "Regeneration precedes faith" simply means that regeneration is the cause of faith, not that it happens at some point in time prior to the point of initial faith.

Think of firing a gun. Pulling the trigger is regeneration and the projectile is faith. They both happen at the same time; however, regeneration is the logical cause of faith, not the other way around.

There are no regenerate unbelievers, period.

 

I would love for universal atonement believers to be consistent. Read these passages and apply the same definition for world as you do in John 3:16:

1 John 5:19
John 17:9
John 15:18 and 19
John 12:19

 

Well, all does mean all. But who is Peter talking about when he says that God is not willing that any should perish, but all should come to repentance. All of what? All of humanity? All of the Jews? All of whom? Well, in order to determine that we must view who Peter wrote to. He begins the chapter by telling them he was writing his second letter to them to stir up their pure minds by way of remembrance. In other words, he is writing to the same people to whom he wrote 1 Peter. Well, 1 Peter chapter 1 states clearly the audience to whom he directed that letter as being "elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, through sanctification of the Spirit, unto obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ." Peter was writing to the elect. His audience is the elect of God. According to the context and the shared audience of both letters, all must mean all of the elect, in whose behalf God is exercising His longsuffering. Here's another thing: Peter didn't say God isn't willing that many should perish, but that any should perish. If God has delayed His second coming because He isn't willing that any should perish, then He isn't coming back until all come to repentance. If that means any of the entirety of humanity, then Jesus must not be returning until the entire human race repents. After all, God isn't willing for any of them to perish according to your view. This is a great example of a verse that says too much for you to be able to use it for that purpose.

People love quoting John 3:16, but most people stop there. Jesus goes on to explain, in the subsequent verses, how that the wicked won't come to Him, only he that doeth truth. So much for a free offer of salvation and unregenerate man coming to Jesus to be saved.

 

This is the type of argument that is a bit bizarre and not a little unsettling. It is the type of argument that causes many of the problems because it blatantly (and knowing how long rbell has been here and how smart he is, knowingly) misrepresents the issue.

It's not that people find out that "world" doesn't really mean "world" or that "all" doesn't really mean "all." Nobody, and I mean nobody, believes that the letters "w-o-r-l-d" always means every single person without exception. And nobody, and I mean nobody believes that the letters "a-l-l" mean everything or everybody without exception. Everyone recognizes that it actually has a variety of meanings.

The issue arises when people find out that they were taught it means something it may not mean. Meaning is not determined by those who want to impose a particular conclusion on either side. Meaning is determined by authorial intent. BTW, many people reject Christianity because of the non-Calvinist position, that God loves the world and yet sends people to hell that he loves. That creates a problem for them, and with some good reason.

So to say Calvinists deny that is to assert that Calvinists actually agree with everyone else in the world (pun intended). In fact, this may be the only thing that "all" in the "world" agree on. There are some very difficult, and IMO insurmountable difficulties once you assert that "world" and "all" mean that God acts towards everyone in the exact same way (or however you want to characterize that argument). But that's beside the point here.

The "hate" goes both ways to be sure. There are many Calvinists are just plain old jerks. They misrepresent the other position, and they act like arrogant fools. They need to repent and stop. There are many non-Calvinists who are just plain old jerks. They misrepresent the other position, and they act like arrogant fools. They need to repent and stop. And we see plenty of both sides here at the BB. One of the reasons I don't participate much anymore is because there is such a load of nonsense coming from people who should know better. How many times do you have to tell people, "X believes Y" until they stop saying that "X believes non-Y"? There is an amazing inability to process simple statements and accept that when someone says, "That's not what I believe," that they aren't lying. And there are some egregious offenders here. It's disgusting.

 

John's use of "world" or "whole world" throughout his letters always refers to sinful mankind. The burden of proof is on you to show how world can mean both believers and non believers. As Allan once so accurately stated yes cannot mean both yes and no.

 

So if Jesus did not die for the sins of the entire world would that not make his atonement finite?

If Jesus did not die for the sins of the world then wouldn't that make God rather stupid to call many. Was God so stupid to have called many and then chose less than he called. If God did not call any more than he chose then why does the Bible say he called many? For many are called but few are chosen.

Did God not choose those who chose to follow Him?

I cannot chose anyone to be on my side of a game who does not want to play or be chosen?

I am waiting for a calvinist to interpret 1 Sam 16:14-16 in light of their view of the origin of evil in agreement with calvinism.

 

So when Jesus said, "God so loved the world..." He really meant, "God so loved believers (not unbelievers)?" I totally agree.

I would love for you to square this with the position you took on the free will thread. Jesus states that He loves them and chastens them. You quoted John 3:16. Apparently now you want to confine world to mean believers only. How then can you say that the church of Laodicea weren't born again believers?

 

I have no idea how you got that from my post. The calvinist game of obfuscation continues. World and whole world means all sinful men. This is the context John uses these phrases in his letters.