Featured Individual Election Revisited

Why must it be corporate?

 

The question was simple and fair: do you believe you were in him (in Christ) since before the foundation of the world? Yes or no?

 

Really, you think Matthew 23:13 is saying, "The men...were in the process of entering the kingdom, thus desiring God yet were in their natural unregenerate state because they were prevented from entering."
Wow!

 

did someone say that they did?

 

No, it's common sense. If everyone's destiny is already pre-determined, why preach? Why witness? why have Bibles?

2 Peter 3: 9 The Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some count slackness, but is longsuffering toward us, not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance.

 

For that matter, a reformed preacher or a reformed laymen witnessing to anyone unsaved who states that said unsaved can be saved by confessing their sin and trusting in the death and resurrection of Jesus is not being truthful to the sinner if that sinner is not of the elect because according to the theory only the elect have their sins forgiven by the blood of Christ. So you are making an offer on behalf of Christ that you may not be able to deliver on.

 

Many calvies try to limit the above Scripture to Peter's immediate audience; evidently they have trouble with the word "all".

 

That theory, of course, is wrong. To the Jews, Romans, Greex, & Samaritans were the "gentilest" of gentiles, but Jesus Himself openly saved several of each.

Biden wasn't born elected. He BECAME elected. Now, while I'll be the first to say God had, & has, selected certain prople to be of special service to Him, & made them "offers they couldn't refuse", such as He did to Moses, Jeremiah, & Paul, most of us have to look for, and find Him. "Faith comes by hearing, & hearing, from the word of God."

 

What does the text say? Notice the prophetic Woes of God upon these teachers of the law.

Matthew 23:1-13,15-36
Then Jesus said to the crowds and to his disciples, “The scribes and the Pharisees sit on Moses’ seat, so do and observe whatever they tell you, but not the works they do. For they preach, but do not practice. They tie up heavy burdens, hard to bear,and lay them on people’s shoulders, but they themselves are not willing to move them with their finger. They do all their deeds to be seen by others. For they make their phylacteries broad and their fringes long, and they love the place of honor at feasts and the best seats in the synagogues and greetings in the marketplaces and being called rabbi by others. But you are not to be called rabbi, for you have one teacher, and you are all brothers. And call no man your father on earth, for you have one Father, who is in heaven. Neither be called instructors, for you have one instructor, the Christ. The greatest among you shall be your servant. Whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and whoever humbles himself will be exalted.
“But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you shut the kingdom of heaven in people’s faces. For you neither enter yourselves nor allow those who would enter to go in. Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you travel across sea and land to make a single proselyte, and when he becomes a proselyte, you make him twice as much a child of hellas yourselves. “Woe to you, blind guides, who say, ‘If anyone swears by the temple, it is nothing, but if anyone swears by the gold of the temple, he is bound by his oath.’ You blind fools! For which is greater, the gold or the temple that has made the gold sacred? And you say, ‘If anyone swears by the altar, it is nothing, but if anyone swears by the gift that is on the altar, he is bound by his oath.’ You blind men! For which is greater, the gift or the altar that makes the gift sacred? So whoever swears by the altar swears by it and by everything on it. And whoever swears by the temple swears by it and by him who dwells in it. And whoever swears by heaven swears by the throne of God and by him who sits upon it. “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you tithe mint and dill and cumin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faithfulness. These you ought to have done, without neglecting the others. You blind guides, straining out a gnat and swallowing a camel! “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you clean the outside of the cup and the plate, but inside they are full of greed and self-indulgence. You blind Pharisee! First clean the inside of the cup and the plate, that the outside also may be clean. “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs, which outwardly appear beautiful, but within are full of dead people’s bones and all uncleanness. So you also outwardly appear righteous to others, but within you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness. “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you build the tombs of the prophets and decorate the monuments of the righteous, saying, ‘If we had lived in the days of our fathers, we would not have taken part with them in shedding the blood of the prophets.’ Thus you witness against yourselves that you are sons of those who murdered the prophets. Fill up, then, the measure of your fathers. You serpents, you brood of vipers, how are you to escape being sentenced to hell? Therefore I send you prophets and wise men and scribes, some of whom you will kill and crucify, and some you will flog in your synagogues and persecute from town to town, so that on you may come all the righteous blood shed on earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah the son of Barachiah,whom you murdered between the sanctuary and the altar. Truly, I say to you, all these things will come upon this generation.

Van, you have no idea what you are talking about in this passage.

 

Because it is addressing individuals, not corporate.

 

First, because it is commanded. 2nd, you are taking that verse out of context.

 

You implied it.

 

Read Romans. NONE seek God.

 

Assuming again

 

Quote the entire passage...
This way you can hopefully see your error...

2 Peter 3:1-13
This is now the second letter that I am writing to you, beloved. In both of them I am stirring up your sincere mind by way of reminder, that you should remember the predictions of the holy prophets and the commandment of the Lord and Savior through your apostles, knowing this first of all, that scoffers will come in the last days with scoffing, following their own sinful desires. They will say, “Where is the promise of his coming? For ever since the fathers fell asleep, all things are continuing as they were from the beginning of creation.” For they deliberately overlook this fact, that the heavens existed long ago, and the earth was formed out of water and through water by the word of God, and that by means of these the world that then existed was deluged with water and perished. But by the same word the heavens and earth that now exist are stored up for fire, being kept until the day of judgment and destruction of the ungodly. But do not overlook this one fact, beloved, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance. But the day of the Lord will come like a thief, and then the heavens will pass away with a roar, and the heavenly bodies will be burned up and dissolved, and the earth and the works that are done on it will be exposed. Since all these things are thus to be dissolved, what sort of people ought you to be in lives of holiness and godliness, waiting for and hastening the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be set on fire and dissolved, and the heavenly bodies will melt as they burn! But according to his promise we are waiting for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells.

I hope you read the whole. If you did, you see that Peter says "God is patient toward YOU." The people Peter is writing to are the elect. Therefore, God will not allow any of the elect to perish.

2 Peter 1:1-4,10
Simeon Peter, a servant and apostle of Jesus Christ, To those who have obtained a faith of equal standing with ours by the righteousness of our God and Savior Jesus Christ: May grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord. His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of him who called us to his own glory and excellence, by which he has granted to us his precious and very great promises, so that through them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped from the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desire.

Therefore, brothers, be all the more diligent to confirm your calling and election, for if you practice these qualities you will never fall.

May God open your eyes to His authority over all things, including our own salvation.

 

Van butchers Matthew 23, not realizing that Jesus is proclaiming a prophetic WOE on the Pharisees and thus sealing their eternal damnation.