Featured Is Everything Predestined?

Austin you are just digging a deeper hole for yourself. I have posted my views and yet you continue to post falsehoods, that is really not a Christian attitude that you are presenting. Here are my views again:

The Righteousness of God Through Faith

I believe man has the capacity to respond willingly to God’s means of seeking to save the lost, NOT that man would seek God if left alone.

I believe our gracious God is actively working in and through creation, conscience, His bride, His Holy Spirit filled followers, and His Word to aid humanity in their conversion.

I believe salvation is wholly of God in that He owes no man forgiveness or eternal life, even if they freely repent and humbly submit to Him as Lord and Savior.

Asking for forgiveness no more merits that forgiveness than the prodigal son’s return home merited the reception he received from his father.

The false belief that forgiveness is somehow owed to those who freely humble themselves and ask for it leads to erroneous conclusions.

Faith in Christ Jesus is not a work, it is not meritorious but it is God's condition for salvation.


Are you still going to continue with the falsehoods?
These are your words Austin "This is your humanist conclusion as you continually feel at liberty to judge God."
You have made the claim that I have humanist views more than once on this board and have yet to back it up. Are you saying that I am not a Christian? Your use of the term humanism in regard to me would indicate that.

It is time for you to backup your false accusations or apologize for your your misrepresentation of my Christian views.

 

Dave I think that the problem of the Calvinist position comes about when you say that God has predestined that the people would reject salvation but then claim that they did it freely. In reality the person had no choice in the matter.

One either has free will or they are predestined it can not be both.

 

The difference is that you are not causing the grandchild to throw the frisbee into the pond. Your Calvinism has God causing those that reject His truth reject it. The Calvinist TULIP/DoG points this out clearly.

Only those that are included in the Unconditional Election will partake of the Limited Atonement and will be drawn to God by His Irresistible Grace. So all men do not have an equal chance to know or trust in God.
The Calvinist theology precludes this, but they just do not want to acknowledge this fact. The Gospel call in Calvinism is not a well meant or sincere offer.

Dave as you have said "if you know someone who hears the gospel and rejects it the Calvinist really does believe that they heard the gospel and rejected it." But that is not the problem is it? A non-calvinist would say the same thing. The real problem is that from the Calvinist view the person had no option except to reject the gospel offer whereas in the non-calvinist view the person chose via his free will to reject the gospel offer.

This is not rocket science but it does require some ability at logical thinking.

 

BINGO! That is exactly right and that is Calvinism at least a school of thought within Calvinism.

This gets to the core of the issue. That is not a correct view of the Calvinist doctrine. But if, after all the gyrations and arguments I have used to show you that, if you still think that it is, then you should reject Calvinism. I think it would be harmful to you to embrace Calvinism. In my opinion, the greatest problem with Calvinism is that the metaphysical gyrations we go through to prove it, even if they are correct, apparently are unsuitable for everyone. Whether you are a Calvinist or not, you are only responsible to hear the Word and to do whatever it tells you to do and to believe. How you get to that point is important to the extent that you want to go there, but it is not important to your salvation or to your relationship with God. At least that's my view on it. I myself have trouble accepting the "L", limited atonement even though I fully understand and agree with the logical progression that gets you there. So I don't accept it and get flack from other Calvinists.

 

It can be both. It may be ridiculed as a "mystery" or as "parallel lines" that do converge somewhere, or as something that just can't be explained but scripture points out both. Both sides then begin to twist and modify scriptures that trouble them by appealing to Greek meanings, or dispensational differences, or context but the fact remains plenty of verses indicate true free will and God being in complete control and free to save or harden as He sees fit. Now this is going to be the big shocker: Guess what you have when you try to write a statement of faith that includes both of these truths?
The Westminster Confession of Faith
You are under no obligation to believe it but those guys weren't idiots.

 

@Van I leave room for the limitations we have as human beings to know the mind of God. There are ample scriptures that indicate:
1. We are prone to sin and lean toward sin and don't tend to want to obey God.
2. God truly invites and/or commands people to repent and follow his laws but we won't for very long, no matter our promises.
3. God sometimes hardens people and blocks people from repenting, understanding or believing.
4. You can come if you decide to.
5. You cannot come on your own.
6. There is an elect. It may be corporate, but it's still made up of individuals. That means there is a non-elect.
7. God has plans that will be done and done the way He wants it done, exactly, even if it doesn't match your free will.
8.. God appeals to men to obey and seems to let them choose, as they freely will.

And you could let your mind go and come up with 100 more such ideas clearly taught in scripture - which, as a human, they don't seem to work out perfectly to me at least.

Now, what do you do with that?
You could look to an extreme human philosophy like Pelagianism or hyper-Calvinism and choose whatever system most satisfies you. The simpler and more extreme your system is the easier and more humanly consistent it is. Complete causative determinism and complete random free autonomous will does not have "logical problems" if you don't worry about scripture. You could reject scripture as either being inaccurate or as not being intended for us to study in an exact manor. Or, you admit that there are limitations that the human mind cannot reconcile. I choose the latter. So does the WFC, so did Spurgeon, so does MacArthur.

 

God COMMANDS lost spiritually dead man to Repent, not to make an anonymous choice. Jesus said "you will not come unto Me." If a lost spiritually dead soul "doesn't believe in Total Depravity" does it mean that they are not Totally Depraved? That their mind doesn't hate God? That the only choice they have the spiritually dead choice of making is that the "will not" come to Jesus on their own?

If the carnal man doesn't "believe" in Total Depravity, does it mean he can perfectly understand and decern Spiritual things?

That he can wrap his carnal mind around God and condemn a God that Predestinated all things?

And, yet, is not the author of sin?

Once a man decides to eliminate God in their sin-cursed, spiritually dead "reasonings with a mind effected by the fall of Adam", can they simply replace God and be a God unto themselves and tell their Creator the way it is?

REPENTANCE IS A GIFT OF GOD

The three following passages prove thi

"Him did God exalt with his right hand to be a Prince and a Saviour, to give repentance to Israel, and remission of sins" (Acts 5:31).

"And when they heard these things, they held their peace, and glorified God, saying, Then to the Gentiles also hath God granted repentance unto life" (Acts ll:18).

"The Lord's servant must not strive, but be gentle towards all, apt to teach, forbearing, in meekness correcting them that oppose themselves; if peradventure God may give them repentance unto the knowledge of the truth" (2 Tim. 2:24,25).

The meaning of this is simply that repentance is wrought in man by the quickening power of the Holy Spirit, as we have already noted.

Intellectual Assent.

This goes a step farther, bringing mental acceptance of the things revealed of God and Jesus Christ.

Thus one who believes in the existence of God comes to believe Him to be such a being as the Bible reveals Him to be, and one who believes that such a person as Jesus lived comes to believe that He was the Son of God and that He died as a sacrifice for sin. This is a step toward saving faith, but it is not such faith.

Campbellism teaches that saving faith is nothing more than the foregoing. It relies on such passages as 1 John 4:15 and 5:1.

But these passages must be understood in the light of all other Scripture, and other Scripture certainly forbids that the belief spoken of in these passages should be understood as being mere intellectual assent to the deity of Christ. Saving faith is not merely of the mind (intellect), but of the heart (emotions). See Rom. 10:9,10. The belief spoken of in the above passages is such as is produced in the heart by an experimental knowledge of Christ's power.

Then two facts as to the circumstances under which these expressions were uttered throw light upon them.

A. The danger of professing belief in the deity of Christ was such in apostolic days that none would do so unless prompted by true faith in Him.

B. Christianity presented such a contrast to Judaism and Paganism that none would believe in the deity of Christ without true faith in Him. Those who had not this faith would regard Him as an imposter.

FAITH HAS NO MERIT IN ITSELF

Faith is merely the channel through which God's justifying and sanctifying grace flows into the soul. Faith is no more meritorious than the act of receiving a gift is meritorious. Faith in no way is a substitute for our obedience to the law, nor does it bring about a lowering of the law so that we can meet its demands. Faith is once referred to as work in the Scripture (John 6:29), not that it is of the law, but only that man is actively engaged in its exercise.

"As a gift of God and as the mere taking of undeserved mercy, it is expressly excluded from the category of works on the basis of which man may claim salvation (Rom. 3:28; 4:4, 5, 16).

It is not the act of the full soul bestowing, but the act of the empty soul receiving. Although this reception is prompted by a drawing of the heart toward God, inwrought by the Holy Spirit, this drawing of the heart is not yet a conscious and developed love: such love is the result of faith (Gal. 5:6)" (A. H. Strong Systematic Theology, pp. 469,470).

From T.P. Simmons.

If some wording is c&p, does that make it untrue, if someone doesn't "believe" in Total Depravity?

If "ifs and buts were cake and nuts, oh what a day it would be."

If someone always adds to every scripture, as simply evidence of their Total Depravity, is what they then say ex cathedra?

So, we add, "salvation" into that verse, instead?

When you start this stuff?

Reading what's there?

And not playing God???

Why not?

 

From:
Thoughts on the Doctrine of Election
by Buell H. Kazee

"Here are some questions to make us think through this problem:

"1. Is the sinner free, as far as God is concerned, to choose for himself?

"The answer is "yes."

"2. If the sinner is finally lost, is it his own fault or God's?

"The answer is, it is his own fault.

"3. Is the sinner a free moral agent?

"Yes, if by moral we mean decisions on issues among men.

"Man's relationship to man is moral, and he can, in a limited way at least, make decisions in that realm.

"4. Is the sinner a free spiritual agent?

"That is, can he make decisions which concern his relationship to God?

"Not in himself. His will is bound by a nature that is opposed to God, and he cannot will to do God's will."

 

God Predestinated that man would fall into a Natural State of Spiritual Depravity.

That Totally Depraved Nature can not change God's Words concerning their Total Depravity.

"We will not have this man to reign over us."

The Sinner's Depravity

"The depravity of the sinner consists in thus being bound by a nature that hates God and His rule.

"The natural man is devoid of all spiritual goodness, though he does possess some moral goodness.

"Morality consists in obedience to a standard set up by men.

"Spirituality has to do with a standard set up by God, and in this realm the sinner is incompetent.

"Spiritual goodness is foreign to man's nature.

"The depravity of the sinner is set forth in such passages as Romans 8:7, Ephesians 2:1-10, Romans 1:18-32.

"(1) He is by nature a child of wrath (Ephesians 2:3).

"(2) When he had light and knowledge from God, - such as in the beginning of his family life on earth, at the flood and afterward, and at many other incidents of miraculous manifestation of and communication with God, - he rejected that light, dishonored God by making Him after the likeness of men, birds, beasts, and reptiles (Romans 1:19-32).

"Thus, in every case, man proved his hatred of God and became "god-less," turning to other gods of his own and becoming idolatrous.

"(3) God gave him over to a reprobate mind, shut him up to his own way and cut him off from any manifestation of God or communication with Him.

"(4) Man in every case buried himself in trespasses and in sins.

"Not only is he a child of wrath by nature, but, having light from God in miraculous manifestation and communication at various times in history, thus becoming accountable for his sins and knowing better (as nearly all men will readily admit if you ask them), he practiced rebellion against the light and knowledge of God which he had (and which he now has).

"Man knows he should obey and honor God, but in every case he refuses to do it.

"His universal decision is against God's will. To every appeal from Heaven he replies:

"We will not have this man to reign over us."

"Sometimes men argue for "free will" as if the doctrine of election were robbing man of his opportunity to accept Christ and be saved, while ignoring the fact that the thousands who do have the opportunity willfully reject it.

"Thus, there is no question about man's freedom to decide, as far as God is concerned, and there is no question about what his decision will be.

"According to his sinful nature he will exercise his will against God's invitation.

"He is free to decide like a man is free to fall from the top of a house: he will never decide to fall upward.

"It is not God that has taken away man's power to decide in God's favor; it is the sinful nature with which he is born.

"His will is bound to one decision.

"Thus, if there were nothing more than the freedom of man's will to bring him to salvation, NOT A SOUL IN THE WORLD WOULD BE SAVED!

"As Isaiah says, "We have turned every one to his own way," and that is man's decision.

"The only way by which he can be saved, then, is for God to get him to change his mind.

"This is repentence.

"Except men repent, they shall all perish (Luke 13:3, 5).

"We all by nature and by the exercise of our wills belong to the class of "whosoever won'ts."

"God's work through the Word and the Spirit is to draw (not drive) us to Christ. If He did not do this, nobody would be saved.

"The wicked are estranged from the womb; he goeth astray as soon as he is born, speaking lies" (Psalm 58:8).

"Ye will not come unto me that ye might have life" (John 5:40. See also John 8:36-47).

"No man can come unto me except the Father which sent me draw him" (John 6:24).

"So man is born of the spiritual nature of his spiritual father, the devil (John 8:34), and, because he is by nature of a Satanic mind, (though just as Satan knows better so does he), he will not turn to God.

"He is at enmity with God just as Satan is, therefore, God must come to him with a power stronger than that of Satan to break the bondage and deliver the sinner.

"Unless God does this, the sinner does not want to turn to God.

"Thus, if God does not give this "holy disposition" to the rebel mind, nobody would be saved.

"This He does out of free grace, without the sinner's merit, through the preaching of the Word and the power of the Spirit. So far as we can see now, only these will be saved."

 

Wow....maybe we ALL should post a slew of quotes without giving credit, and then cherry-pick portions of verses to try and support our own ideology. Calvinists are good at doing this while ignoring Scriptures that don't fit their narrative. Sure you're not all a bunch of Democrats in disguise?

 

In post #10, you wrote:
"God has chosen to only do these things for those that trust in the Son. If one does not trust in the Son why would you expect them to be conformed to Christs image, be justified, be glorified, be adopted, or gain an inheritance? Those all come about because one has trusted in His son."

Every reader can understand what you have declared and know without a shadow of doubt that you lift man's choice as being superior to God's choice. If man does not, then God cannot. THAT is your position and you have made it so very clear.

But, you know you are cornered, and your only option is to call me a liar. Those who are not humanists will see you for who you are.

 

But that is where you are wrong Dave, it does get to the core issue. Dos God predetermine {cause} man to make certain choices or not. You say you reject the L in tulip but that means you hold to the rest
Only those that are included in the Unconditional Election will partake of and be drawn to God by His Irresistible Grace. So logically this leads to a LIMITED salvation. Are all men Unconditional Elected do all men receive Irresistible Grace. If the answer is no then your Calvinist philosophy requires that God condemns the vast majority to hell because they were not included within these limiting factors. There rejection of God had nothing to do with this as it was all predestined by the Calvinist God.

This has been pointed out to you a number of times but you continue to deny this reality and hold to your Calvinist view which is your right. But when you say that Calvinists make a well meant offer of salvation to all that hear them then you have gone a step to far. Your DoG/TULIP scream at them that what they are proclaiming is not what they truly believe. It is logically impossible to hold to the TULIP/DoG and honestly say that Calvinists present a well meant offer of salvation for all.

I can walk up to anyone and tell them that God loves them and wants to save them and know that it is true but the Calvinist has to add, even if to themselves, but only if you are one of the select few that fits within the TULIP framework of salvation.

Calvinism has overstepped their authority and placed a limit on those that can be saved that God Himself has not even done.

 

Dave a will that is predestined by God to reject salvation does not have the free will that you seem to think they have. Free will means that they have the real, not imagined one of Calvinism, ability to choose other then what they actually chose. Are you going to tell me that the person could actually choose other than what God has predestined for them to do?

I am not saying that those that wrote the WCF or LBCF were idiots, but what they were doing was trying to support there Calvinist view. I am always amazed when Calvinists, who claim the bible clearly supports their view, have to punt to mystery as a support of their view.

Salvation for all that will freely trust in Christ Jesus is not a mystery. Calvinism just has to make it one.

 

Van, I admit you confuse me here because of your use of "open theology" and "open theism". I'm not an expert either so bear with me but according to the "internet" theologists, Jonathan Edwards was a practitioner of open theology in that he was open to ideas that may make his particular system uncomfortable, as he sometimes did. Open theism though teaches the following:

"because God loves us and desires that we freely choose to reciprocate his love, He has made His knowledge of and plans for the future conditional upon our actions. Though omniscient, God does not know what we will do in the future. Though omniscient, He has chosen to invite us to collaborate with Him in governing and developing His creation thereby also allowing us the freedom to thwart His hopes for us. God desires that each of us freely enter into a dynamic and personal relationship with him, and he has therefore left it open to us to choose for or against His will." (That's from "The Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy")

Obviously, Edwards, or Calvinism at any level would not agree with the above. And if you notice - they point out, correctly I think, that you guys who really believe in autonomous free will cannot at the same time believe that anyone, even God can truly know what your future choice will be because it is autonomous (totally and truly free with no outside control), and because it has not been decided yet, therefore it does not exist yet and cannot be known. To me, then, you free will advocates have just as much an "absurdity" to deal with as I do.

 

The wages of sin is death.
*Romans 6:23*
For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.

If God gives man over to their lists, then man never chooses God.
*Romans 1:24-25*
Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen.

So, the free gift of God is purely because God chooses to give that gift to those to whom he wills. And, according to the Bible, He willed that gift before the foundation of the world. And, according to the New Covenant (Will of Christ Jesus), it was fully enacted at Jesus death on the cross.

So, for you to imagine that you have any control in your salvation is for you to be an arrogant man who thinks more highly of himself than he ought and who demeans the King who bought you with a price. Sliverhair, you should be utterly ashamed of yourself.

 

I was writing when the above was posted but how would you respond to that. Your definition of free will means, by definition, that no one, not even God can know what you are going to do because as you insist yourself - the very definition means that you could choose something else. Why is that kind of reasoning logical yet what I'm saying is not?