Reply to Jesusfan, continued.
Next Dr. Erickson leaves scripture and starts making assertions based on man-made inventions. He says, "one biblical evidence that God has selected certain individuals for salvation is found in Ephesians 1:4-5. He [the Father]chose us in Him [Jesus Christ] before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before Him. In love He predestined us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the kind intention of His will. Here we see the usual inference of "He chose us [individually] in Him, but He chose us [corporately] in Him, works better since we had not been created yet. So this passage does provide evidence of election and that the election resulted in individuals being placed "in Him."
Next Dr. Erickson uses a verse out of context, saying Jesus choosing His disciples for the purpose of spreading the gospel, equates with God choosing individuals for salvation. He chose them "out of the world" and Calvinists say they were chosen for salvation before they were in the world when Jesus chose His disciples. So no support from this passage.
And then John 6:37 is referenced which teaches that those the Father gives to the Son will come to the Son, and the Son will not cast them out. This certainly does support individual election for salvation.
Then the usual argument is made that since God chose Jacob and Esau before they had done anything good or bad, that implies God chose individuals for salvation unconditionally. But just a few paragraphs before Dr. Erickson pointed out that God does not interact with people in the same way, the deal given to Jacob was not the deal given to Esau, and neither of those deals necessarily indicates the manner in which God chooses individuals for salvation. So yet again, no actual support for the premise is found in the referenced passage.
But then, in the nick of time, he references Romans 9:16 which says, in effect, salvation does not depend on man's will or exertion but on God's mercy.
Once Dr. Erickson moves past these truths, he simply states as fact without reference to any supporting passages the "inability of humans in their natural state to respond in faith to the opportunity of salvation. In other words the same old fiction without any support whatsoever. He proved "moral disability" we cannot save ourselves, but did not even attempt to prove, in the chapter on predestination, total spiritual inability, he just states it as fact.
Next he engages in the same faulty thinking concerning spiritual blindness. He suggests because of the fall, we have moral disability, which is true, and then suggests this results in spiritual blindness. But the verse cited is 2 Corinthians 4:3-4, which refers not the fall and its consequence, but to Satan, the god of this world, as having blinded people. Thus the onset of the blindness is while we are alive and in the world. So a logical absurdity as evidence provides no evidence.
In summary, I found nothing in Dr. Erickson's book, that provided evidence from scripture for Calvinism 101, I just found the usual citations with the usual flaws.