Featured Major Contradiction in 1686 Westminster Confession

That isn't the issue of the OP, nor is it Germain to the topic. We are not discussing what I understand, we are discussing what you misapply.

Did I even address this part of the WC? NO - I can in later posts, but YOU have to recant on that part I did post as you having misappropriated and misapplied it. Until you do, there is really nothing much to gain by attending to the rest - which can be done, iff you recant on the section I posted about.

SEE, RIGHT HERE you get it wrong. YOU are applying what the responsible work of the Holy Spirit through the church in THIS AGE AND NOW in deterring sin and the work of evil and forcing it into determining eternal damnation.

THAT IS NOT the point of that part of the WC. YOU obviously haven't gotten that and until you do, there is little validity of the OP.

I can deal with you about the rest, BUT you first must admit that you did not appropriate a proper part of the WC to your argument.

Are you ready to do so?

Do you in fact see now that the part I quoted you took out of context, misapplied it, and attempted some faulty argument/conclusion from that part of the WC?

If you do, then we can work on the next part.

 

Perhaps this passage from 2 Thessalonians will help:

5 Do you not remember that while I was still with you, I was telling you these things? 6 And you know what restrains him now, so that in his time he will be revealed. 7 For the mystery of lawlessness is already at work; only he who now restrains will do so until he is taken out of the way. 8 Then that lawless one will be revealed whom the Lord will slay with the breath of His mouth and bring to an end by the appearance of His coming; 9 that is, the one whose coming is in accord with the activity of Satan, with all power and signs and false wonders, 10 and with all the deception of wickedness for those who perish, because they did not receive the love of the truth so as to be saved. 11 For this reason God will send upon them a deluding influence so that they will believe what is false, 12 in order that they all may be judged who did not believe the truth, but took pleasure in wickedness.​

See here how the "lawless one" and by extension the heathen is restrained (deterred) until the Holy Spirit (he), and because of the indwelling nature of the Holy Spirit in believers, certainly the church is taken away (some disagree with the church being taken away - that is for another discussion).

The point is that Scriptures support this part of the WC in which I was posting in contention with you and shows that your statement of this section of the WC has no Scriptural validity.

 

Wow, talk about making a mountain out of a molehill. There is no fatal flaw here, although there is some flawed reasoning on your part.

1. We do not know who is elect and who is not. So we are to preach the Gospel to all people.

2. The command of God to preach the Gospel to every creature certainly includes proclaiming the judgment of God. To not do so would be gross disobedience.

3. Men are deterred from evil by many things. Some are deterred by fear of being caught. Some are deterred by their natural conscience. Some are indeed deterred by fear of God's judgment, but that deterrence does not mean that they are saved. Many would never commit the sin of murder for fear of the consequences but that does not prevent them from hating another in their heart, which Jesus equated to murder.

 

Again, you are bringing up the "supposed" contradiction of the WC, but I am centered solely upon that which I quoted.

You state, "I believe in using judgment as a deterrent because Jesus and Paul both did: "knowing therefore the terror of the Lord we persuade men" 2 Cor 5:11;..."

Do you disagree then that the work of the Holy Spirit and by extension through the church has been a deterrent of evil in which the tribulation age folks will rejoice over being rid of such restraint?

 

Assuming that you agree on the deterring work of the Holy Spirit and church that is continuing in this age, then it is important that I post the next part in which you use to contend against your view.

quote from WC 1689:

9. Free Will

God has indued the will of man, by nature, with liberty and the power to choose and to act upon his choice. This free will is neither forced, nor destined by any necessity of nature to do good or evil.

Man, in his state of innocency, had freedom and power to will and to do that which was good and well-pleasing to God, but he was unstable, so that he might fall from this condition.

Man, by his fall into a state of sin, has completely lost all ability of will to perform any of the spiritual good which accompanies salvation. As a natural man, he is altogether averse to spiritual good, and dead in sin. He is not able by his own strength to convert himself, or to prepare himself for conversion.

When God converts a sinner, and translates him into a state of grace, He frees him from his natural bondage to sin, and by grace alone He enables him freely to will and to do that which is spiritually good. But because of his remaining corruptions he does not only (or perfectly) will that which is good, but also wills that which is evil.

The will of man will only be made perfectly and immutably free to will good alone in the state of glory. ​

I am not certain anyone other than extreme non-cal (Pelegian- Universalist) would find great disagreement with this part of the WC.

Of course, the OP did not point this out, but attempted to extrapolate conflict were there was none.

Cal view is not impacted by this part of the WC, either.

 

After having read several of your posts, one cannot help but wonder what your major in seminary was. Also, you seem very hung up on Calvinism, although you claim to disagree with it. If you have not noticed, every post of yours with few exceptions uses the name Calvin or Calvinism. What fascinates you about this system of belief? Is not the Bible with the illumination of the Holy Spirit sufficient?

In case you have forgotten, this world is evil, from the time sin entered. It infected everything, not just human beings. If not for the presence of the Holy Spirit in a Christians life, evil would be rampant. It is possible, although not conclusive, that the departing of the Holy Spirit could bring about the Tribulation.

It is the church's mission, on this earth, to tell others the Good News, and do the work of the Lord. The Holy Spirit is the active agent in restraining evil. Remember Christ said when He was here, that the gates of hell would not prevail against His church. He did not mean in our own power. While the church and the Holy Spirit work together, the fact remains that without the Holy Spirit, the church could do nothing for the Lord.

As a final point, I wanted to ask, do you think you actually have a good grasp of the five points of TULIP. You repeatedly stress the point of being ordained for hell. Within the five points, that is not what is meant.

 

This next section is possibly the most unpalatable of all sections for most non-cals.

It states:

"3. God's Decree

God has decreed in Himself from all eternity, by the most wise and holy counsel of His own will, freely and unchangeably, all things which shall ever come to pass.

- Yet in such a way that God is neither the author of sin nor does He have fellowship with any in the committing of sins, nor is violence offered to the will of the creature , nor yet is the liberty or contingency of second causes taken away, but rather established.

- In all this God's wisdom is displayed, disposing all things, and also His power and faithfulness in accomplishing His decree.

Although God knows everything which may or can come to pass under all imaginable conditions, yet He has not decreed anything because He foresaw it in the future, or because it would come to pass under certain conditions.

By the decree of God, for the manifestation of His glory, some men and angels are predestinated or foreordained to eternal life through Jesus Christ, to the praise of His glorious grace. Others are left to act in their sin to their just condemnation, to the praise of His glorious justice.

Those angels and men thus predestinated and foreordained, are particularly and unchangeably designed, and the number of them is so certain and definite, that it cannot be either increased or diminished.

Those of mankind who are predestinated to life, God chose before the foundation of the world was laid, in accordance with His eternal and immutable purpose and the secret counsel and good pleasure of His will. God chose them in Christ for everlasting glory, solely out of His free grace and love, without anything in the creature as a condition or cause moving Him to choose.

As God has appointed the elect unto glory, so, by the eternal and completely free intention of His will, He has foreordained all the means. Accordingly, those who are elected, being fallen in Adam:

- are redeemed by Christ,

- are effectually called to faith in Christ by His Spirit working in due season,

- are justified, adopted, sanctified,

- and are kept by His power through faith unto salvation;

- neither are any but the elect redeemed by Christ, effectually called, justified, adopted, sanctified, and saved.

The doctrine of this high mystery of predestination is to be handled with special prudence and care, in order that men who are heeding the will of God revealed in His Word, and who are yielding obedience to it, may, from the certainty of their effectual vocation be assured of their eternal election.

So shall this doctrine provide cause for praise, reverence, admiration of God, and also provide cause for humility, diligence, and abundant consolation to all who sincerely obey the Gospel." ​

Perhaps those that would contend against the cal. view have argued on the BB more over the matters that this part contains than any other. The absolute sovereignty of God is not in question, it is how that sovereignty is held and to what degree that sovereignty has control over every aspect of the universe.

Because such argument(s) seem part and parcel of the BB, I do not expect to provide a defense one way or another.

What does matter is that the OP has been shown as holding a view that is not valid or applicable to the WC.

 

The obfuscation is in your own mind. I'll just leave it at that because you won't admit you might be wrong regardless.

 

It was made clear in my post that only the power of the Holy Spirit restrains evil. The Holy Spirit resides in each Christian. A collection of Christians make up the local church. All local churchs with saved people make up the Kingdom of God. They do not prevent evil, but they do restrain evil. Think about what the world would be like without the Holy Spirit and the local NT churches around the world.

Within the individual Christian, the presence of the Holy Spirit guarantees that the person is a Christian. He has a new nature. He is not committing sins he otherwise would have if he had never been saved. On top of that, the Christian affects those around him, either to Christ and salvation, or maybe, if not that, second thoughts about doing what is wrong. This world is a better place because Christ left us with the Holy Spirit.

As far as Chapter 3 of Eternal Decrees and Confessions, I do not read or rely on them for an understanding of the Lord.

We may be closer on this issue than you think. My point is, that without the Holy Spirit, we would be in a fix. John 16 says:

5 "Now I am going to him who sent me, yet none of you asks me, 'Where are you going?' 6 Because I have said these things, you are filled with grief. 7 But I tell you the truth: It is for your good that I am going away. Unless I go away, the Counselor will not come to you; but if I go, I will send him to you. 8 When he comes, he will convict the world of guilt in regard to sin and righteousness and judgment: 9 in regard to sin, because men do not believe in me; 10 in regard to righteousness, because I am going to the Father, where you can see me no longer; 11 and in regard to judgment, because the prince of this world now stands condemned. 12 "I have much more to say to you, more than you can now bear. 13 But when he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all truth. He will not speak on his own; he will speak only what he hears, and he will tell you what is yet to come. 14 He will bring glory to me by taking from what is mine and making it known to you. 15 All that belongs to the Father is mine. That is why I said the Spirit will take from what is mine and make it known to you."

And in 2 Cor 2:

10 these are the things God has revealed to us by his Spirit.
The Spirit searches all things, even the deep things of God. 11 For who knows a person’s thoughts except their own spirit within them? In the same way no one knows the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God. 12 What we have received is not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, so that we may understand what God has freely given us. 13 This is what we speak, not in words taught us by human wisdom but in words taught by the Spirit, explaining spiritual realities with Spirit-taught words.[c] 14 The person without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God but considers them foolishness, and cannot understand them because they are discerned only through the Spirit. 15 The person with the Spirit makes judgments about all things, but such a person is not subject to merely human judgments, 16 for,

“Who has known the mind of the Lord
so as to instruct him?”[d]
But we have the mind of Christ.

 

No obfuscation of the contradiction deliberate or otherwise or avoidance of the topic is being used.

Evil ACT(S) come from evil hearts. And if evil acts are deterred, then the evil in ones heart being deterred is at the root - one cannot have one without the other.

The work of the Holy Spirit and by extension the believers deter the evil of the heart and acts from running a muck throughout the world. That this work is being done now as in the past does not prevent nor continue in the same manner after the revealing of the "man of sin."

This part of your post is not well thought out. Historically, many who fear judgment have been deterred from evil. Historically, many who fear judgment have struggled even within their own heart over thoughts of evil. For you to state, "The preaching of judgment as a deterrent ... nor preventing them from committing such" is just not an accurate statement.

This section of the WC (in which I initially quoted) has to do with the general warning of the judgment and justice of God to the people of God and as the believers have the Holy Spirit within are by new creature nature a rebuke (deter) to heathen of sin, righteousness and judgment. How many have said, "I will go to hell for ..." knowing the terror awaits them and caring not, and yet some heathen do care and seek human justice.

It has NOTHING to do with "free will" free choice or whatever "freedom" is the currant rave. Men are "condemned already" and have no freedom of choice or will outside of Christ. (both non-cals and cals have variants of this statement)

Some do, some don't.

The more wicked the heart, the less likely the person will care for anyone or anything - even them self (psychopathic person).

You need to reread the "free will" and "God's decree" section of the WC. It does not conform to what you are presenting it as stating. But then, because you are not Calvinistic in thinking, the "God's decree" section would be held in somewhat of contempt as it has numerous times on the BB.

BTW, though not in the WC, there is another consequence of the final judgment: ALL knees shall bow and proclaim Jesus as Lord. (Romans, Philippians, Isaiah). Until the final judgment this proclamation in Scripture remains unfulfilled.

It might be of interest to you for your view of the WC to understand that the framers of the WC were not tribulation and millennial thinkers as we might consider but were more a-mill thinking. They had not the knowledge nor understanding of the destructive properties of modern warfare, satellites, internet, ...

So, the last judgment is not proceeded by a tribulation age nor a millennial reign of Christ in the WC. That may account for a bit of error in your thinking.

There are many variations on this theme and some on the BB are a-mil. I am not.

 

But that IS the issue of part of the posts, and it is good to see you finally admit that work is part of the living of a believer.

But to the latter part of the paragraph of your post:

Deterrent does not even come close to equating to salvation. (see red light speed sign illustration)

The last section of the WC has everything to do with justice and judgment, and the eternity of heathen, believers and angels.

The last statement of the last section is an affirmation that believers should not be overwhelmed, weary, ... but assured that in the final accounting there is a great day for which to look forward with anticipation, and some dread - for who wants all their live and living displayed for all to see?


You desire it to be in contrast to other sections of the WC, which it is not, and your attempt to make it seem as though has failed.

However, you can't accept (though in this post you admit it could be true) is that the believers through the work of the Holy Spirit are a hindrance to the work of the evil one(s) and will be until that man of sin is revealed.

As such, there is NO conflict and no contradiction as you supposed in the OP.