Why I am not a Calvinist.. the ACTUAL topic of this thread

I don't really know where you guys get your theology from? You speak of a sinners always wanting to reject Jesus Christ, this is complete nonsense. I was not saved till I was over 20 years old (I am 56 now), and yet I cannot remember a day when I wanted to reject Jesus Christ, and even though brought up in a Church of England home, never even heard about Jesus! If you ask the nuns of the Roman Catholic church, if they "reject" Jesus, will probably thing you are off your head! As the Apostle Paul says, HOW shall they hear, IF no one TELLS them?

No sinner can ever come to Jesus Christ for salvation, in and off them selves, as they must respond to the convicting of the Holy Spirit, Who would be calling them to Jesus for salvation. Salvation starts from the Lord in the sinner.

God responds to Cornelius, who was seeking Him in prayer, by sending Peter with the Gospel Message for the salvation of his soul. Did you read verses 34-35 in chapter 10 of Acts?

 

I might be wrong here. But does not Calvinism teach that only the elect were actually "redeemed" on the cross by Jesus Christ? And, that from eternity past, God has chosen only the elect, who will come to Him for their salvation? If this is the case, how can Jesus have "died for all mankind", that is, for their sins? There is no point in the argument used by some, who say that all the human race does benefit from Christ's death, and then say that it is that He makes the sun and rain fall on the whole world. This is a useless argument, as for 1000's of years before Jesus came, the sun and rain were blessing the lost!

 

I don't think you'll find it is.

I don't think you'll find I do, but it is for you to prove.

whatever that means.

If by 'the WORLD' you mean all the people in the world then either you or the Bible is mistaken because not all people are convicted. Spend a few hours in door-to-door visitation, especially in Britain and you will see what I mean. 'WORLD' here means both Jew and Gentile.' But the question here is whether the 'DRAWING' is effectual or ineffectual. God's drawing is always effectual.
'And He said to him, "Follow Me." So he left all, rose up and followed Him' (Luke 5:27-28).
"My sheep hear My voice and I know them and they follow Me" (John 10:27).
'But when it pleased God, who separated me from my mother's womb and called me through his grace to reveal his Son in me.....' (Galatians 1:15-16).
'But God.......even when we were dead in trespasses, made us alive together with Christ' (Ephesians 2:4-5).

On the contrary, I have answered you posts assiduously. You have yet to make an effective answer to my posts #12 and #30.
It is necessary, when discussing Bible doctrines to compare Scripture with Scripture. The truth of God's word is not found in 'It is written,' but in 'It is written again' (Matthew 4:6-7). The devil can quote Scripture.

So you admit the doctrine of 'Total Depravity'? Perhaps we're getting somewhere. Yes, the sovereign power of God gives life to the spiritually dead, but it does not give those raised the power to put themselves back to death.

So you believe that God will put His laws in someone's mind and write them on his heart, be his God, and make him one of His people and he may yet not be saved and may yet refuse the Gospel? Sheesh!

Yep! It's true though. You yourself admit that people cannot make themselves good.

Have you never read sermons by Spurgeon, Whitefield and other great Calvinist preachers on this very text? Why on earth would you suppose that Calvinists don't believe it.

I answer your texts one at a time. If you don't like my answers, that's your problem. You have made precious little effort to deal with my texts.

All dealt with in my posts #12 and #30. I can cut and paste them for you again if you like.

I can see that there are two more posts waiting for me, but I have a life outside this forum, so that will be all for now.

 

1 John 2:2 says, "And He Himself is the propitiation concerning our sins, and not concerning ours only, but also concerning the whole world."

where the Greek, "ἱλασμός", means "atonement, sin-offering" (Liddell and Scott Greek lexicon). The LXX uses "ἱλασμός" for the Hebrew "kippur" (atonement, Brown, Driver, Briggs Hebrew lexicon).

"the whole word" is not limited to the saved only, which is seen from the same phrase in chapter 5, verse 19, where the saved are contrasted to the wicked world. The conservative Bible commentary of Jamieson, Fausset and Brown, says this on 1 John 2:2

"Also for the sins of the whole world. Christ's advocacy is limited to believers (1Jn_2:1; 1Jn_1:7): His propitiation extends as widely as sin: note, 2Pe_2:1, "the whole world" cannot be restricted to the believing portion (cf. 1Jn_4:14 and 1Jn_5:19). 'Thou, too, art part of the world: thine heart cannot think, The Lord died for Peter and Paul, but not for me' (Luther)."

 

I live in England and the opposition to the Gospel is here just as it all over the world!

I keep seeing your reasoning in many places, that "world" means "Jews and Gentiles". Did you know that this is exactly the same as saying, the "entire world"? The human race consists of TWO, Jews and non Jews, if you were the one, then you were not the other. When Paul says that he took the Gospel to the Jews first, he means the whole nation of Israel. And when he says that thereafter he was to take the Gospel to the Gentiles, he meant the rest of the human race. I don't see any other way to understand this?

 

The desire of God is not the same as His will though, and Jesus death secured a certain salvation for some, not just a possibility for all!

 

can you provide any Scriptures for this? This sounds very much that God is not sincere in His desire to save everyone, because though He does, yet His will forbids this? Because Reformed theology has done away with human free will and responsibility, they have resorted to such absurd reasoning.

 

We do not do away with human free will and responsibility, but we state that the free will remaining is in bondage to our sin natures, no longer have real and total free will, as there are things now that we will no longer want to even do!

 

my point is why do people have the need to call themselves, "Reformed" or "Calvinist", etc, why not just a Christian or follower of Jesus Christ?

 

where in Scripture does it say that our wills are in bondage?

 

in what way is Jesus Christ the Savior of the whole world? Can ALL then be saved? what does this do to the teaching that God elected some to eternal life, and left the rest?

 

The problem here is that if you understand propitiation rightly, then you have universal salvation. Propitiation is a transaction between the Son and the Father and we can neither ratify nor nullify that transaction. So it must be that "whole world" means something other than everyone without exception.

The Archangel

 

Jesus said that we are enslaved to slave, that ONLY those whom he set free are really free, correct?

 

Yes, would be restricted to meaning just to whom was the transaction actually intended to benefit?

 

This means that after a sinner is saved, that they are "free" from the Old Covenant under the "law", and made alive in Jesus Christ. A spiritual exchange takes place. It has nothing to do with the teaching like that of Luther on the "bondage of the will"