Featured John 6.44

I don’t know Barry, I still think that you refuse to admit that there is an election by God that was part of the salvation package.

 

The arguments of God’s justice and fairness comes out from both sides. For the non Calvin it’s about God’s unfair behavior of choosing one over another. For the Calvin it’s apparent that logically there could not be any involvement of the atonement for the non elect as it would be impossible.

Think about the fact that there are more percentages of deaths from CV19 than people who have been saved since Adam, CV19 23 per 1 million population. So very few of the human race have been will be saved.

 

I wondered once about when I was saved. I accepted the Lord’s offer of propitiation at 4-5 years old.

 

I think that it is a culmination of passages that deal with being elected to salvation that produces the teachings of Calvin and others. In order to refute them it’s going to take an honest evaluation of how they came to believe and teach their positions.

 

Good point. We all need some open-minded objectivity to receive things we hadn't thought of before, as long as it stands the test of truth. But what are those standards of truth - or are we disagreed on that itself to begin with? Just musing aloud...

My 2 cents here is that calvinism is frowned upon and rejected by many only because it makes God out to be seemingly schizophrenic in the specific doctrine of sovereign predestined reprobation/condemnation only to then later desire them to be saved? That simply isn't Biblical. But I do find sovereign predestined salvation as Biblical - however since it's always necessarily packaged as an all-or-nothing deal, some are forced to accept the error with the good and others are forced to reject the good with the error. I would desire all of us to unite over accepting the good while simultaneously rejecting the error.

Not once? I mean, you could always interpret verses differently but wouldn't you even concede that there are some valid grounds for those who believe otherwise - or do you hold all others completely irrational to imagine a whole doctrine out of something that's not once mentioned in the Bible?

I get that John 6:44 is used often by the calvinists - however i was personally convinced of individual election (and not reprobation) in my own reading of Rom 9-11.
Rom 11:5 Even so then at this present time also there is a remnant according to the election of grace.
The facts - there is a remnant, It is according to election, and this election is of grace (not works v.6).

For this election to be of grace and not works, it must necessarily be independent of anything man does - which is assuredly established if such election occurred before man had done any good or evil or even was born (Rom 9:11).

This remnant that has been elected is very much in the context of salvation as seen in Rom 9:27, 10:1, 11:11, 14 just as the remaining are mentioned in the context of non-salvation in Rom 9:3, 29, 10:21, 11:1, 7. Wouldn't you agree that simply on the surface, it's harder to interpret election completely disassociated from salvation in this context? Probably you do have a way to do so, and I'm willing to engage, but wouldn't you say these verses do present sufficient grounds to put these two together by a simple mind, unadulterated by the calvinist-arminian debate?

 

I disagree. To say it doesn't support reformed theology is to use it out of context.

 

You would have a hard time making this argument. What does it mean to be saved? Answer that and you will see election absolutely has to do with salvation.

 

No this is completely wrong. We are not elected after conversion. That would make it that it would be possible that some who are converted would not be adopted. We were elect to adoption before the foundation of the world. In other words, it was already a done deal. Adoption happens simultaneously with conversion, not after.

 

I guess we are in the business of persuasion (at the least, that ought to be the intent on a debate forum). So, let's set out a template of conversing that would refrain from being overly defensive while actively seeking to engage each other's arguments. We could work our way up from the facts and truths that we do agree on, while debating the roots of differences one at a time?

You first presented the claim that election is not about salvation. I presented a bunch of verses to show that they are associated at the very least within the same context. I was expecting you'd respond to my counter-argument before moving on to a different line of argument - however I do not insist it in case you believe this new line of argument of yours could spare ourselves time down the earlier one (I don't believe that's the case though).

So you say it's the jews who are the objectors in Rom 9 who're not happy about the Gentiles receiving the Gospel? But that's not precisely true, right? It's not ALL jews who object - it's only the non-elect jews (whatever you take that to be). And the objection is not primarily against Gentiles being grafted in (though it could include it) - the root complaint is that God would never reject His children (osas?) and cut off those branches in the first place (Rom 9:1-6).

In any case, you also claim that it's about Israel's election to a special purpose and that purpose is not salvation per se.
Rom 9:27 Esaias also crieth concerning Israel, Though the number of the children of Israel be as the sand of the sea, a remnant shall be saved:

Paul quotes this verse to explain to the objector (as you say, the jew who's being cut off), that God has already spoken to this situation by prophesying in the OT that only a remnant of Israel who're elected by grace before they were born or did any good or evil are saved while the rest are accursed from the true vine of life. Do you see this differently and if so, which part specifically?
Keeping it limited to simply the jews, this still evidences the special purpose of such election was indeed unto salvation and that it was before they had done anything to qualify for it. How do you explain it differently? (I'm going along with your thought process and am not applying these texts to us today in what I've written in this post.)