Calvanism Application

[Jarthur001]

God exists in all parts of time at once...so I don't understand your question. There is no looking forward or backward with God.

The year now is 2009. Can God go back to the year 1960?

 

[Pastor Larry]

God "elects" to save any/all who will yield to God, rather than trying to their own God, over their own life.

Can you show any place that Scripture speaks of election as you use it here? If you can, you will be the first. When Scripture speaks of election, it is never in the sense that you use it. You are making up a usage that Scripture does not have.

I do not believe we were saved before the foundatiion of the world but I do believe we were elect before the foundation of the world "IN CHRIST"

But you say God "elects" to save any/all who will yield to God, rather than trying to their own God, over their own life. Surely you can see the obvious contradiction. If we are elect before the foundation of the world and if election is based on us yielding to God, you have an insurmountable problem.

Then are you saved before the foundation of the world

No, we didn’t exist before the foundation of the world.

You do not receive the effectiveness of your election until you are "In Christ" We must still believe even though it is the faith of Christ that saves. Our believing is the direct result of our being convinced of the truth through the Holy Spirit and the word.

This is all true except the part of the “faith of Christ.” The rest is standard Calvinism that the Bible teaches.

These words in bold that weren't in quote in your post are my words from post 164. If you agree then we have no argument

You see it means that our election is in Christ. We didn't exsist so He stood in to represent us so we could be elected just as He stood in and received the punishment for our sins.

We don’t agree. Election is to salvation and Christ wasn’t elected to salvation.

I can only go by what you your self have said in post 157 You said;
Quote:
Originally Posted by Pastor Larry
The Bible says we were chosen before the foundation of the world. So if you don't believe that, you don't believe the Bible. Other than that, I don't know what you are saying here. You are saying we can be elect before we are born in Christ. Is that correct? So to be elect doesn't mean to be "in Christ."
This should prove that you have left "IN CHRIST" out of the sentence. There is no untruth it's what you said.

No, I didn’t leave in Christ out of the sentence in the sense in which you charge. You said something that was untrue. Don’t do it again.

You believe that all that we are elect before Salvation

Since the Bible says we were election before the foundation of the world, it has to be before salvation.

but we are not elect until we are in Christ.

The Bible never says this.

Well if you don't mind I'll stay with the understanding given to me.

You shouldn’t. You have an understanding that contradicts the Scripture. You should abandon it immediately.

 

[Pastor Larry]

Election cannot be grace.

So when man receives something he doesn't deserve and didn't do anything to get, it isn't grace? What is it?

Limited Atonement cannot be love.

So when God pays for sin, it isn't loving?

Irresistible grace cannot be free will.

So when man freely rejects or freely chooses Christ, it isn't free will?

And if man is so unable to recognize his fallen state, why are there so many religions in the world ? Man knows he's a sinner. Catholic confession, Muslim pilgrimages, Buddhist chants, and all manner of Pagan sacrifice, all tell me man knows they are no good.

These are man's attempt to satisfy the inner knowledge of God. They are created precisely because they do not accept what God says about them. They make up their own understanding of God.

 

[Bro. Curtis]

So when man receives something he doesn't deserve and didn't do anything to get, it isn't grace? What is it?

If I give one homeless guy a free meal, complete with seconds and desert, and tell three other ones to starve, have I shown grace ?

So when God pays for sin, it isn't loving?

Not the way you say it is. Favoritism isn't love. Love would be equal. God is no respecter of persons.

So when man freely rejects or freely chooses Christ, it isn't free will?

Ummm, what ?

These are man's attempt to satisfy the inner knowledge of God. They are created precisely because they do not accept what God says about them. They make up their own understanding of God.

But it sounds to me like they know they have fallen. Like I told Ann, I'm not going to debate what I believe. The doctrine of Limited Atonement can only be described as either...


God loves you - Some restrictions apply.

God MAY love you. I just never know.

A Calvinist could never look a stranger in the eye, and say with certainty "Jesus died for YOU". Their doctrines prevent it.

I do not serve such a God. My God's grace is offered to everyone, to accept it, or reject it. Christ's death is universally offered for sacrifice. Few will receive it, but not because God prevents it.

 

[MB]

No one has claimed to be born saved. What needs to be asked....

Do you believe that it is Christ that places us In Christ or is it our will that places us in Christ?

We can't place our selves in Christ because Salvation is all of God. He chose us we did not choose Him. This isn't to say we do not have a will because we do. The only choice we have in our Salvation is to rebel. Some say it is a choice between Christ and rebellion. It isn't. It's a choice to rebel or not to rebel. Not to rebel isn't choosing Christ it is a passiveness. If we are convinced of Christ it is the work of God. If we are convicted it is a work of God. If we submit because of the convincing and the conviction it is a work of God. Some are convinced and convicted yet they still hide in the darkness and will not come to the light. This is the only choice, there is no other. It's called rebellion. It why so many hate Christianity, They hold the truth in unrighteousness. Rom 1:18.
MB

 

[Jerome]

"They puzzle their heads about Predestination and Free Will; they do not mind sitting down over some problem that the archangel Gabriel could not solve, and pose themselves over that; but the simple truth, "Believe and live" — they have no time for that" ---Charles Spurgeon

 

[Pastor Larry]

If I give one homeless guy a free meal, complete with seconds and desert, and tell three other ones to starve, have I shown grace ?

Yes, of course you have. The homeless guy didn't deserve the mean. When you gave it to him, it was grace.

Furthermore, what if the other three homeless guys didn't want the meal anyway?

You see, that is the Bible's teaching, that those who reject do so of their free will. They are not forced to be hungry (in your analogy). They do it freely.

Not the way you say it is. Favoritism isn't love. Love would be equal. God is no respecter of persons.

So if I give my son a birthday present and don't give a birthday present to the neighbor's son, have I ceased to be loving? If I provide my son a place to live and food to eat, and don't do it for the neighbor's son, have I ceased to be loving? Of course not. I think you are drawing your definition of love, not from Scripture, but from your own mind. Scripture never defines love as treating all people equally.

Ummm, what ?

Whoever rejects Christ does so freely. God doesn't force anyone to reject him. Whoever accepts Chrsit does so freely.

But it sounds to me like they know they have fallen.

Of course, most people know they aren't perfect. The reason for false religion is they don't accept the extent of their depravity and they don't accept God's solution for it.

The doctrine of Limited Atonement can only be described as either...


God loves you - Some restrictions apply.

God MAY love you. I just never know.

This is false. The doctrine of limited atonement can only be described as God loved you and paid for your sins. We can know that God loved us. No restrictions apply.

Again, what you fail to note is those who are not elect do not want God's love. They do not want payment for sin that God has made. They freely reject him.

A Calvinist could never look a stranger in the eye, and say with certainty "Jesus died for YOU". Their doctrines prevent it.

Really? As a Calvinist, I didn't know that. And I am a pretty die hard Calvinist, and I can look someone in the eye and say "Jesus loved and died for you." Perhaps you misunderstand Calvinism.

I do not serve such a God. My God's grace is offered to everyone, to accept it, or reject it. Christ's death is universally offered for sacrifice. Few will receive it, but not because God prevents it.

So how is this different than Calvinism? You haven't said anything here that Calvinism rejects (except that you don't serve such a God ... If the Calvinists are right, as they almost unquestionably are, this is the only God that exists to be served).

I think we are seeing with you the problem that so many have demonstrated, that they take their own logic and impose it on the Scripture and on Calvinism, and then say what it must mean or must not mean. That is a flawed methodology.

As a Calvinist, I fully affirm that Christ died for the sins of the world. If he decided to save everyone who ever lived, Jesus' sacrifice was enough for it. There is no other sacrifice.

But I don't limit the atonement as you do, to a mere provision. Rather than such a limited view of the atonement, I affirm that Christ's death did more than provide something. It actually accomplished something ... the appeasement of the just wrath of God for the sins of believers, God's elect.

So you clearly have a smaller, more limited view of the atonement than I do.

 

[Jarthur001]

We can't place our selves in Christ because Salvation is all of God.

Agreed. Which means to argue that God elects a group to be saved is a bogus claim. Election is people that makeup a group/the elect.

He chose us we did not choose Him.

Again...I agree. Which is to say if we believe some that claim God chose a group, (believers), is bogus as well, for then the chosen of God are already chosen based on mans part, and therefore God choice does not matter at that point and would change nothing even if he did not chose us, for the choice was made already, not by God but by man.

This isn't to say we do not have a will because we do.

I agree again. We do indeed have a will, but that will is bound by sin and will never choose God in and by itself.

The only choice we have in our Salvation is to rebel.

I sorta agree again. Which is really not a choice if we understand that sin controls man. However, technically it is a choice.

Some say it is a choice between Christ and rebellion. It isn't. It's a choice to rebel or not to rebel.

Not really. We need to make a choice to rebel, we are in rebellion by just being a man and making no choice at all.

Not to rebel isn't choosing Christ it is a passiveness.

Which is rebellion. Christ calls all to believe. If you do nothing you rebel.

If we are convinced of Christ it is the work of God.

As in Holy Spirit...I agree.

If we are convicted it is a work of God.

As in Holy Spirit...I agree.

If we submit because of the convincing and the conviction it is a work of God.

indeed

So...God elects to salvation. We both agree.

 

[Jarthur001]

"They puzzle their heads about Predestination and Free Will; they do not mind sitting down over some problem that the archangel Gabriel could not solve, and pose themselves over that; but the simple truth, "Believe and live" — they have no time for that" ---Charles Spurgeon

Spurgeon was a 5 point Calvinist.

But I thought I knew Spurgeon well. However, I have never read this quote.

Book please and page number.

 

[Pastor Larry]

But I thought I knew Spurgeon well. However, I have never read this quote.

Whatever the source, one of the refreshing things about Spurgeon was that he didn't play these silly little games over words. He was a five point Calvinist because he saw it in Scripture, and he was intensely evangelistic because he saw it in Scripture.

I have long contended, and with good reason, that it is the non-Calvinists who are driven by logic and insist in putting God in a box of their own understanding. They claim that God as he has revealed himself can't be a God of love though God has plainly declared his love and his election. They claim it can't be grace. They claim he makes robots because they cant' figure something out.

We would be better served simply to let the Scriptures say what they say rather than trying to force them from either end.

 

[MB]

Can you show any place that Scripture speaks of election as you use it here? If you can, you will be the first. When Scripture speaks of election, it is never in the sense that you use it. You are making up a usage that Scripture does not have.

Eph 1:4 According as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before him in love:

But you say God "elects" to save any/all who will yield to God, rather than trying to their own God, over their own life.

Is this a quote?. I don't understand that, it looks like gibberish to me. I didn't write it.

Surely you can see the obvious contradiction. If we are elect before the foundation of the world and if election is based on us yielding to God, you have an insurmountable problem.

No I don't the scripture says;
Eph 1:4 According as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before him in love:

No, we didn’t exist before the foundation of the world.

This is all true except the part of the “faith of Christ.” The rest is standard Calvinism that the Bible teaches.

I don't believe that at all. You see I deny total depravity as Calvinism claims it is. There is no inability only a love for darkness.
I deny Unconditional election because it involves Particular election which isn't true. We have all been elected in Christ and only in Christ is it effective.
I deny limited atonement because He died for us all.
I deny Irresitible grace because we all can and some of us still do, rebel.
As for perseverance of the Saints I deny that as well. We do not have to persevere because once saved we are sealed and preserved.

We don’t agree. Election is to salvation and Christ wasn’t elected to salvation.


No, I didn’t leave in Christ out of the sentence in the sense in which you charge. You said something that was untrue. Don’t do it again.

We are chosen in Christ and In Christ only.
Eph 1:4 According as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before him in love:

Since the Bible says we were election before the foundation of the world, it has to be before salvation.

It's before the foundation of the world In Christ. There is no choosing out side of Christ.

The Bible never says this.

Yes it does;
Eph 1:4 According as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before him in love:

You shouldn’t. You have an understanding that contradicts the Scripture. You should abandon it immediately.

No it doesn't it contradicts you. The Bible says;
Eph 1:4 According as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before him in love:
MB

 

[gb93433]

Whatever the source, one of the refreshing things about Spurgeon was that he didn't play these silly little games over words. He was a five point Calvinist because he saw it in Scripture, and he was intensely evangelistic because he saw it in Scripture.

That is the way it ought to be.

I have long contended, and with good reason, that it is the non-Calvinists who are driven by logic and insist in putting God in a box of their own understanding.

That is exactly what I saw among some calvinists on the BB in regards to the interpretation of Is. 45:7; Lam 3:38, and Amos 3:6. They simply coud not admit what scripture plainly said in those verses.

We would be better served simply to let the Scriptures say what they say rather than trying to force them from either end.

Absolutely. It sure does help to interpret scripture in light of its historical context.

 

[Jerome]

"They puzzle their heads about Predestination and Free Will; they do not mind sitting down over some problem that the archangel Gabriel could not solve, and pose themselves over that; but the simple truth, "Believe and live" — they have no time for that" ---Charles Spurgeon

But I thought I knew Spurgeon well. However, I have never read this quote.

Google Books
Able to the Uttermost: Twenty Gospel Sermons by Charles Haddon Spurgeon

 

[Jerome]

"Their acquaintance with theology is thoroughly exhaustive; they have learned long ago to count five, to reckon them at their fingers ends, —one, two, three, four, five. These mystic figures comprise all the doctrines of the gospel. They know them, and they double up their fists at the mention of any of those five points, and they are ready to fight anybody about them. They are men of a great deal of wisdom,—seeing men; but I think a man that gets a little nearer to God discovers that he does not know everything; and he is quite clear that he can no more compass the whole of divine truth, than he can hold the ocean in the hollow of his hand." ---Charles Spurgeon

 

[webdog]

The year now is 2009. Can God go back to the year 1960?

Is God bound to 2009? Omnipresence by definition is being in all places at once...time included or He is not truly omnipresent.

 

[gb93433]

1 Cor. 8:2-3, "If anyone supposes that he knows anything, he has not yet known as he ought to know; but if anyone loves God, he is known by Him."

 

[annsni]

Charles Spurgeon was a 5 point Calvinist

Actually, he believed that there is truth in both camps. He was a 5 point calvinist but he also believed in man's free will.

I do not think I differ from any of my Hyper-Calvinistic brethren in what I do believe, but I differ from them in what they do not believe. I do not hold any less than they do, but I hold a little more, and, I think, a little more of the truth revealed in the Scriptures. Not only are there a few cardinal doctrines, by which we can steer our ship North, South, East, or West, but as we study the Word, we shall begin to learn something about the North-west and North-east, and all else that lies between the four cardinal points. The system of truth revealed in the Scriptures is not simply one straight line, but two; and no man will ever get a right view of the gospel until he knows how to look at the two lines at once. For instance, I read in one Book of the Bible, "The Spirit and the bride say, Come. And let him that heareth say, Come. And let him that is athirst come. And whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely." Yet I am taught, in another part of the same inspired Word, that "it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that sheweth mercy." I see, in one place, God in providence presiding over all, and yet I see, and I cannot help seeing, that man acts as he pleases, and that God has left his actions, in a great measure, to his own free-will. Now, if I were to declare that man was so free to act that there was no control of God over his actions, I should be driven very near to atheism; and if, on the other hand, I should declare that God so over-rules all things that man is not free enough to be responsible, I should be driven at once into Antinomianism or fatalism. That God predestines, and yet that man is responsible, are two facts that few can see clearly. They are believed to be inconsistent and contradictory to each other. If, then, I find taught in one part of the Bible that everything is fore-ordained, that is true; and if I find, in another Scripture, that man is responsible for all his actions, that is true; and it is only my folly that leads me to imagine that these two truths can ever contradict each other.

I do not believe they can ever be welded into one upon any earthly anvil, but they certainly shall be one in eternity. They are two lines that are so nearly parallel, that the human mind which pursues them farthest will never discover that they converge, but they do converge, and they will meet somewhere in eternity, close to the throne of God, whence all truth doth spring.

 

[gb93433]

The year now is 2009. Can God go back to the year 1960?

God in His sovereignty is not limited by our finite mind.

 

[Me4Him]

The law has already been fulfilled , by Jesus. It has nothing to do with mans' law.

Where do you think the principles of man's law originated???

Joh 1:3 All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made.

 

[annsni]

Where do you think the principles of man's law originated???

Joh 1:3 All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made.

God made my kitchen table? Is that what you're saying?

That God made the rules of baseball?

I don't understand.