Featured Question about Calvinism

The question is why would you want to be? I agree with what you said and I do not consider myself to be an Arminian just a bible believer. I have never liked labels as they are usually used as a pejorative. Look at the division that it has caused on this board.

Now you do not need to be insulting Dave. The fact that you clearly do not know what the WCF/LBCF says is your problem. You can not have God determine all things and then turn around and make the statement that He just allows it to happen. Calvinist theology is chock full of contradictions as you have just shown. Calvinists do not seem to be able to grasp the difference between God determining all things and making a man sin which would make God the author of the sin and God giving man a free will and knowing he will sin and holding him responsible for that sin.
Sproul is writing from a flawed calvinist view. Your trying to prove your calvinist view is right by trusting in calvinist writers.

The only ones that think scripture supports the TULIP/DoG are committed calvinists. Just a simple reading of the TULIP doctrine will show it's flaws. TULIP calls into question the character of God.

The YRR need another theology that has someone tell them what to think and after finding the flaws in calvinism have just traded one bad theological view for another. Thankfully not all are doing that as many are just coming back to the bible and leaving all the baggage behind.

I am just encouraging @AFJ to study the bible as the Holy Spirit guides him.

 

If you want to come on and display your ignorance publicly that's your right. The problem is that someone might get on a site with the WCF and read it. It's carefully worded so that God is not the author of sin, those predestined to be lost are "passed over" and left in their own sinful condition, and no one's free will is violated. You don't have to agree with them but you reflect on yourself when you make ignorant statements that can be refuted on the same computer on which you view this stuff in 10 seconds.
Instead of instructing me on the WCF, which you have obviously not read, why don't you go read some Wiersbe, who you recommend, and once again, have not read. He describes man's natural condition just like a Calvinist, as being spiritually dead and unable to be able to respond to God without the Holy Spirit. To quote that famous theologian Andy Griffith, "You beat everything, you know that".

 

This is why Calvinists, and the WCF can appear to be unclear and worded ambiguously. The problem being that once God declares that in the future Kevin is going to Hell then in a sense it either must be so or God could be wrong. But what if God specifically promises Kevin that "if you come to me you will be saved". Is that promise invalid, based on predestination? That's something we simply can't answer as humans unless you allow both to be true as the confessions state. A lot of Calvinists so camp on the decrees that they feel the direct promises and appeals are thus not valid.

 

Hi AFJ,

Great Question!

I have a sort of off topic response. You correctly assert that most Christians agree that God is all-knowing of future events. But that assuredly does not support the validity of the premise. The real issue is "Does the Bible, contextually interpreted, teach God is all knowing, which is to say God knows everything imaginable, past, present and future?"

Is Jesus God and did He know the time of His Return. Does God forgive and "remember no more forever" our sins? Did God say to Abraham, who was about to sacrifice his son, "now I know?"

Consider Matthew 24:36.
Consider Hebrews 8:13, 10:17, and Isaiah 43:25
Consider Genesis 22:12

What if when scripture says God is "all knowing" the scope or extent of the assertion is not "everything imaginable" but whatever is in view contextually.

In John 21:17 scripture says Jesus knows "all things" but the contextual scope is all things about Peter or about those individuals that Jesus encountered. He knew their thoughts and motives.

What if the actual biblical doctrine is God knows everything He chooses to know, and can choose to not know what He chooses not to know, such that He provides us the opportunity to choose life or death, rather than predestining our choice.
This is the Biblical Doctrine of Inherent Omniscience.

 

You really do show just how nasty calvinists can get when their sacred cow of calvinism is challenged. You are more concerned about defending that theological view than you are of Gods' word.

God from all eternity did, by the most wise and holy counsel of His own will, freely, and unchangeably ordain whatsoever comes to passa) yet so, as thereby neither is God the author of sin,(b) nor is violence offered to the will of the creatures, nor is the liberty or contingency of second causes taken away, but rather established.(c) : WCF Chapter III. Of God’s Eternal Decree.

That is as clear a statement as you will find. In other words, God decreed whatsoever comes to pass, and in doing so, God (a) is neither the “author of sin” that He unchangeably ordained from eternity past, and also (b) His decree did not eliminate free-will but rather “established” it.

So Dave which is it? God " unchangeably ordain whatsoever comes to pass" thus no free will and God is the author of all the sin and evil or "nor is violence offered to the will of the creatures, nor is the liberty or contingency of second causes taken away, but rather established" thus free will and man is responsible for his sins. That is the obvious contradiction in your WCF. Calvinists love to play both sides of the chess game as that is the only way they can win.

Wiersbe does not say that the Holy Spirit has to be the decisive factor as you require. God has used many means to draw people to Himself but in the end it is the man that must choose to trust in Him.

Calvinism is not the standard Dave. Your view of God and His salvation are distorted by your loyalty to your calvinism.

 

I do get offended when you come on a thread going into a very specific aspect of philosophy and pull this attack dog stuff against Calvinism. It was not the subject, nor was the subject whether you have to be a Calvinist.

No one asked you to like it or agree with it. Just don't misquote it. "Ordain" is not the same as "decree" and if it says God is not the author of sin, while you may not agree with the statement, it clearly is stated and while you can refute it you cannot deny that the statement is there.

Wiersbe's commentary on the Bible is on-line. Read his stuff on Ephesians. He was a moderate Calvinist.

A point regarding Calvinism was the subject of this thread. I don't know why you would come on here with this off topic stuff and bad attitude. Contribute something or stay out of the conversation. If God knows something will happen in the future, which we all concede he does, and he announces that it will happen in a point in time, then the question is is it possible that free will can at that point change what will be. God has announced that something will happen. That does not mean that what will happen is according to what God would like his created beings to do, it may, but it certainly means he has decided to at least allow it to occur. That, by the way is why the WCF used the word "ordain". But the question is whether God can simply look ahead and see what will happen without at the same time ordaining that it will happen.

 

That's what you have to come to terms with in your own mind. Some Calvinists say that this is set and there is no offer of the gospel to a non-elect person. But other Calvinists, and I'm talking about real Calvinists, like Edwards and Owen, constantly talk about real offers of the gospel to everyone. Calvinism is not monolithic.
You can reject Calvinism and go with a full on free will system where the elect are simply those who believe. Then you have another whole divergence where the question is what is free will? Does the Holy Spirit have anything to do with coming to faith? If so, does he convince or bring faith about or persuade? Can this be resisted? Is this influence decisive? If it is enough to be decisive then is it sovereignly selective or given to everyone in some measure. If it is decisive and sovereign in application then are you not back teaching a sovereign selection just like Calvinistic election?

 

The Son deliberately limits His omniscience on behalf of His Father. Mark 13:32, Acts of the Apostles 1:7, And he said unto them, It is not for you to know the times or the seasons, which the Father hath put in his own power.

 

The reason we have theology is that scripture also says other things with just as much authority. If scripture also says to examine yourself, to see whether you are in the faith, there is at least implied that you can read that and act on it. Same with all the calls for repentance and belief. You end up in the situation that Scrooge finds himself in at his future gravesite where he asks " why show me these things if I am beyond all hope. Please tell me I can sponge away the writing on this stone". In other word, from his standpoint, at least, change his future. Those are also legitimate questions and because of the way some Calvinists handle such questions people like @Silverhair legitimately ask whether Calvinism can also mess things up. It can, and by doing so may slander God and his love and intention towards people. So that's why the nuanced answers in the WCF and arguments of Edwards and other theologians are important.

The Bible is not written in systematic theology and probably for good reason. But you have two choices for dealing with answers that just don't come together in our finite minds. You can just take the scripture at it's word. God is completely sovereign, the elect are already determined - and you will at some point have a choice to make as to whether you will repent and believe and therefore you will indeed in that sense determine your own destiny; or you can begin to try to figure out how both can be true at the same time. I don't think any theological system adequately explains all this.

 

The Son limits His omniscience per His Father's will. John 5:19, Then answered Jesus and said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, The Son can do nothing of himself, but what he seeth the Father do: for what things soever he doeth, these also doeth the Son likewise. God remains fully omniscient. The Son is God's agent. John 14:6.

 

Why should you get offended by my pointing out the logical error of that philosophical view? As I recall @AFJ said "As someone who is not a Calvinist currently, but open to becoming one," so my pointing out the flaws in that view is reasonable. What you call attack dog is far less than what I have seen calvinists do on this board in regard to those that disagree with them. Recall what you said regarding me.

I copy/pasted the text from the WCF so hard to misquote it. So you are comfortable with the contradiction in that WCF statement. I do have to ask why the obvious contradiction does not bother you?
Ordain: To appoint; to decree. Webster's 1828 Dictionary
Decree: In theology, predetermined purpose of God; the purpose or determination of an immutable Being, whose plan of operations is, like himself, unchangeable. Webster's 1828 Dictionary
What was that I quoted from the WCF "...unchangeably ordain whatsoever comes to pass " Of course I do not agree with it as it is not biblical but it is calvinnism.
If God ordains whatsoever comes to pass perhaps you can explain how that does not determine all things that come to pass? Or do you think that ordains just means it is a suggestion?

Do not have to look it up on the net as I have both his NT and OT commentaries on my system. Yes I know that he tends toward calvinism but I do not hold that against him.

You are still writing as if God has to determine all things. If God determines /ordains all thing unchangeably then the person has no option but to do as God has determined him to do. In which case the person can not be held responsible for the determined action. God being omniscient has perfect knowledge of all that will happen, even the free will choices that man will make. Whether the man in time chose A or B God in His omniscience would know what that choice would be. So the choice while free was foreknown by God but not caused by God.
Now if God has determined something to happen in the future He could move men in such a way as to bring it about but to say that all things have to be determined/ordained unchangeably as your WCF insists then logically moves the responsibility back to the one that ordained the action.
Sorry Dave but ordain does not mean allow, even as much as you would like it to. If God looked ahead and ordained such and such then it would happen and since He is omniscient then He would according to your WCF have ordain unchangeably all things which would logically include sin & evil. So we are back again to your WCF making God the author of sin.

 

It means to establish or set something in an established order if you took the time to look up the word as it was used when the WCF was written. So if God causes Joseph's brothers to sell him into slavery that is different than God using the fact that they want to get rid of him (by their own free choice), and then arranging for a caravan to come by at the right time leading to Joseph ending up in Egypt. Joseph's brothers free will was not violated, yet God had ordained that Joseph would go to Egypt and Joseph's brothers worked for God while all the while sinning against God, to accomplish what he ordained. That is why "ordain" is used and why it can be followed by a note that free will does not have to be violated to accomplish what God has ordained.

So no, that is why "ordains" is in there, and why it is made clear that the person has every option to act according to his own free will. You are wrong and your real problem is that it is dawning on you that the WCF was taking all that into account when it was written.

And lastly, in case some jasper came along that still didn't get it, the WCF put in plain language that God was not the author of sin. But there is always somebody who doesn't get the word.

 

If you believe this.

And you believe the above.

Then it would be intellectually dishonest to say you also believe Spurgeon was correct. Am I not correct in saying that you indeed are already a convinced Calvinist? And you have arrived at your decided theology based on the newer arguments from the internet warrior Calvinists who became popular back in 2004 to about 2015. You probably don't have much background in Puritan literature, or even Calvin. That's OK but just know that the modern Calvinists are much heavier into relying on the TULIP than the actual Reformers were and they are more, sometimes much more, deterministic.