Non-Calvinists, why is your God so small?

[Pastor Larry]

Originally posted by Missionary to Germany:
Who can be saved? Every single person who believes on the Lord Jesus Christ. ... It is possible for everyone to be saved, if they simply accept God's FREE offer of salvation.

Every Calvinist believes this. In fact, it is a cornerstone of biblical soteriology. Anyone who will come to Christ will be saved.

Your difficulty is that you cannot accoutn for the will to come to Christ when Scripture tells us that men are dead in trespasses and sins and unwilling to come. Therefore, you are overlooking these Scripture to make your point. Calvinists affirm all of Scripture by taking both of these issues into account.

 

[Pastor Larry]

Originally posted by Helen:
The doctrines of Calvinism are only precious to those who think they are the elect. It is certainly not the Good News to anyone else. ... The good news from heaven was for all the people. The news from the Calvinists is not.

It's a different news...

No it's not. It is good news for all people. But not all people like God so they don't accept it as good news.

Consider your own position: Most people reject your own opinion of what the good news is ... the same as with calvinism. Therefore, you are in the same place as your accuse calvinists of being. Again, you show a fundamental misunderstanding of the issues. The news of salvation and the call of the gospel goes out to all people without exception. We can account for why people respond to that good news. You have not shown that your position can deal with the biblical passages that expressly say they can't. And therein lies a big difference. We take all of Scripture into account without minimizing or overlooking part of it that doesn't fit.

 

[Pastor Larry]

Originally posted by Helen:
[QB]In other words, it was Pharaoh's decision to harden his own heart at first. After that the Lord did it for him/to him.[QB]

Could Pharaoh have changed his mind? If so, then God would have been wrong by saying he would harden it. If not, then Pharoah had no free will. In either scenario, you have a significant problem that cannot be overlooked.

[ November 26, 2002, 09:52 AM: Message edited by: Pastor Larry ]

 

[Sularis]

Here's what I not being a Calvinist think we all
agree on

- Jesus is God
- Jesus died for sins
- That death was sufficient for all - but will
not be applied to all (whether by choice or
election that's arguable)
- Man cannot and does not by himself make the
choice to be saved (the methods have not been
settled)

Here's what we don't agree on

- God loves everyone (my view)
- God loves only the elect (Calvinist)

- God calls everyone, but not everyone answers
(my view)
- God calls only the elect, and they all respond
(Calvinist)

- God allows us to make choices and that despite
what we choose His will is still carried out
(my view)
- God doesnt allow us any choice because if we
had a choice, God would be unable to handle it
(Calvinist)

- God elects based on foreknowledge of our
choices and the purpose of the elect is to
ensure that his plan is carried out despite our
choices. Not every Christian is elect - but
the elect have a special purpose (like
Paul/Martin Luther) (my view)
- God elects based on foreknowledge of those who
would accept Him anyways. (Not all Calvinists)

- God does not predestine every single item in my
life - because if He does - I have to have a
little chat with Him concerning being betrayed
and physically injured by Christians. However
I do believe that God is more then willing once
we ask Him to suggest either a single choice or
a series of choices that He would prefer us to
take (my view)
- God has predestined every jot and tittle of our
lives - not a breath goes by that He hasn't
foreordained and doublechecked (Calvinist view)

I'll try wrap a quick little story bit here - Im going to use Ken, Preach, Larry, and Helen as examples since I hope they have more of a sense of humour, and are 'manly' enough to take it

Ken is born - with sin nature but no sin
Ken decides he wants to go in toy store after his mother (Helen) says no toy store today - that they would go in toy store tomorrow
Ken gets upset - breaks away from his mommy goes into toy store
Ken is now damned to hell

A few years pass before people start thinking to talk to Ken about salvation

Ken listens to the talks
Ken feels wierd tugging on heart
Ken doesnt like feeling so....
Ken starts trying to avoid Sunday School and church
Ken goes Goth and other things once he hits puberty
Ken is still damned and now has been for several years

Ken somehow makes it into college with Larry and Preach - they decide to go to a Christmas Eve service - free food and good songs
Ken hears a sermon about Jesus
Ken and Preach and Larry all get wierd feeling like the ones Ken had before
Preach "decides" for conversion instantly - and later becomes a died in the wool "Calvinist"
Preach is now saved, Ken and Larry are damned
Larry decides to go back and hear more with Preach
Ken does not
Ken is damned, Larry is damned, and Preach is saved
After a while Larry decides to convert because of that continued "feeling" - but because Preach is so persuasive, Larry also becomes a "Calvinist".
Preach and Larry are now both saved - Poor Ken is still damned
Preach being "hyper" never bothered to evangelize Ken or Larry - but Larry being less hyper feels an obligation to evangelize - Preach decides to humour Larry, and they start working Ken over.
This working over doesn't do anything for Ken really - except he agrees to go to church to ease the pressure from them.
Ken goes to church gets the feeling, and promptly decides never to go back again
Ken is looking like he's damned forever
But God through Larry and Preach being annoying finally get Ken to explain why he doesn't want to attend church
After a deep pyscho-analysis that turns up some things better left unmentioned in all 3 of them; Ken decides to go back to church once more - and if He gets the feeling to ask God "Wassup!?!"
Ken goes to church the next Sunday - and after a long exchange of "Wazzup!" - God says I love you Ken you heathen bum you (after all Ken is still damned so God is conflicted about loving Ken)
Ken goes Woah
Ken gets saved
Now everyones not damned except Helen who I didnt really mention much in the story

Of the three - I would say perhaps two elected
Ken and Preach

Larry sought after - and explored the call - His decision was not instantaneous or based on an unusual experience

Born sinful - but sinless
sin
Through the action of the Gospel - the Holy Spirit moves and calls each person to repentance and salvation
accepted saved goes to heaven
denied - might get another chance if not hell

If Holy Spirit does not call man can search and search - but are unable to make the final step

 

[Pastor Larry]

Originally posted by Sularis:
- Man cannot and does not by himself make the choice to be saved (the methods have not been settled)

I don't think we all agree on this.

- God loves everyone (my view)
- God loves only the elect (Calvinist)

Most of us believe that God loves everyone.

- God calls everyone, but not everyone answers
(my view)
- God calls only the elect, and they all respond
(Calvinist)

God calls everyone. You fail to distinguish the general call with the effectual call.

- God allows us to make choices and that despite what we choose His will is still carried out (my view)
- God doesnt allow us any choice because if we had a choice, God would be unable to handle it (Calvinist)

It is not about what God is able to handle. It is about who God is and what the nature of the situation is. Your view of God is reactive; our view of God is proactive. Scripture establishes that God has an eternal will (whether by decree or by simply knowing what man will do). That will is established in eternity past and therefore, unless you are an open theist, man's choices cannot change from what God knows.

The claim that "God is not able to handle it" is patently false.

- God elects based on foreknowledge of our choices and the purpose of the elect is to ensure that his plan is carried out despite our choices. Not every Christian is elect - but the elect have a special purpose (like Paul/Martin Luther) (my view)
- God elects based on foreknowledge of those who would accept Him anyways. (Not all Calvinists)

I am not even sure what this means. God's foreknowledge in Scripture is determinative. Calvinists agree on that. It is not "those who would accept him anyways" because no one "will accept God anyways."

 

[romanbear]

Hi everyone

;
You know it seems that people hear the gosple and it goes in one ear and out the other.

The most quoted verse I know of is John 3:16 the first few words are ("FOR GOD SO LOVED THE WORLD") to me that say's each and everyone of us.
Act 16:31 And they said, Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved, and thy house. This verse sure sounds like we all have to make a choice.We have to believe.If you don't make a Choice you'll go the other way.If you haven't made a choice please, choose Christ.

Romanbear
Peace

 

[Eric B]

As far as the Biblical record is concerned, the only time we can be sure man hardens his own heart is when the Bible says so. And the only time we can be sure God hardens man's heart is when the Bible says so. It says both. So I don't see how anyone could argue that it's all man or all God.

I would agree with this, and I didn't say it was all man or all God. "Hardening" and "blinding" had different degrees (God hardens the group; or individuals harden themselves; or God hardens individuals after they harden themselves), and not realizing this is what causes this assumption of reprobation when seeing "hardening" mentioned in the scriptures.

Well, I believe hardening and passing over by God are exactly the same thing: it is not intervening, but leaving them as they are--intransigently opposed to God. And mankind's intransigent opposition to God comes from the fall and from the resulting rebelliousness of each individual heart, not from any action taken by God, so only mankind is to blame for it.

I kind of figured "hardening=passing over" might be the ultimate answer, but no one had said it yet. Still, there is no denying God's active participation in this process, whatever it is (look at your side's take on the Pharaoh dispute going on in this thread right now. What else would be the point of constantly leveling at us Rom.9:19 "You will say to me 'why does He still find fault; for who has resisted His will?). We were just criticized, above, for "making God reactive instead of proactive", but that is what you're saying (God is only judging because man fell and rebelled. Now, God didn't cause this, but He is punishing [i.e. reacting to] it!)

God did not make man the way he is. That is a result of the fall. And he is not helpless, either. He is just so hostile to God that he never will submit to Him. Obstinate, stubborn, but not helpless. Inability to respond positively to God comes only from this firmly entrenched willful opposition to God. So anyone who is finally damned is not damned because God makes them helpless, but because he refuses to submit to God.

I did not really mean that God "made" him that way, but in responding to the whole "vessels of wrath" premise, (that appears to be saying God made some people some way) that is the first way of putting it I could think of. But by leaving people that way, in order to damn them, that is what I was getting at. These people, by being preteritioned in past eternity were made "doomed", were helpless to do anything about it, and as Scott E pointed out, had no real chance at all. They might as well have been "made that way".

[ November 27, 2002, 06:38 PM: Message edited by: Eric B ]

 

[romanbear]

Hi Siegfried;
You wrote;
If God loves everyone equally, why doesn't he work a little harder to convince everyone to repent and be saved? Is he really doing all he can? Why did he even allow the people who would reject him to be born? Why doesn't he kill them in infancy before they become accountable.
________________________________________________________________
Genuine love only comes when we have a choice.If you force people to love you .you will not have true love. Wouldn't you rather have someone love you because they want to?.
Don't you think they would love you more than someone whom you forced?.
The whole thing with unconditional election is that you have no reason for life at all.Why bother with the creation in the first place if God is going make you love Him anyway?.To answer another question you ask in the quote above.Why doesn't he try a little harder.
He died for you what more do you want.
He gave all he had, his life.
He rose again.and showed you that you can have eternal life.
He gave us the disciples and the Bible.
He showed us the purest form of Love there is and gave us an example of how to obtain everlasting life.
The whole Bible is about decision. If we don't have to make a decision why have a Bible.The whole purpose of Having a Bible is to show us the right decisions to make. Why did Jesus have to die?.He died to save us from our sins.He laid down His life for us.That we might be saved from our sins.He wants us to make that choice and choose Him. He knows that it's the only way He'll ever have anyone to Love Him.He gave the angles a choice to either follow after Satan or stay with Him.He also gave us a choice have you made one for Him?

Romanbear
Peace

 

[Helen]

Thanks, guys. It seems to me that 'our God' isn't 'too small' at all...

 

[KenH]

Originally posted by romanbear:
The whole Bible is about decision.

Actually, the whole Bible is about Jesus Christ and the redemption that has been purchased by Him through the actions of God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. The Bible, as well as salvation, is God-centered, not man-centered. The whole Bible is about God's work of redemption, not about man's decision by his corrupted will in which there can be no salvation.

Ken

 

[KenH]

Originally posted by romanbear:
The whole thing with unconditional election is that you have no reason for life at all.

If it was not for God's election unto salvation, there would be no salvation. Man cannot save himself. God must rescue man, by God's choice, by God's free will.

Truly, and it is so sad , non-Calvinists have such a small view of God, for they believe that God is subservient to man's corrupted will.

Ken

 

[Helen]

Originally posted by Ken Hamilton:


Truly, and it is so sad , non-Calvinists have such a small view of God, for they believe that God is subservient to man's corrupted will.

Ken

Baloney, Ken! When I allowed my children to choose something when they were little, it did not make me subservient to them. And if I, as a mere human, can keep control in a choice situation, what makes you think that God, being God, cannot?

 

[KenH]

Man's will is corrupted by the Fall in the Garden of Eden. Before regeneration, man's ability to choose is restricted by this. It is by liberation, or regeneration, into the light of Jesus by the Holy Spirit that man is enabled to use his will to come to Jesus in repentance and faith.

Ken

 

[Helen]

I know that is what you believe. Nevertheless, however it is, God is in control. My children's wills were immature, illogical, self-centered, uneducated -- but I still let them have some choices...

[ November 27, 2002, 08:23 PM: Message edited by: Helen ]

 

[KenH]

But the relationship between parents and children(both are sinners) is not an exact match with the relationship between God(who is absolutely perfect, absolutely sovereign, absolutely righteous, etc.) and humans(who are corrupt).

For me, this is enough discussion for the rest of tonight through Thanksgiving Day.

Happy Thanksgiving Day to you Helen and your family, to all other non-Calvinists who read this and their families, and to all Calvinists who read this and their families.

 

[Helen]

Originally posted by Ken Hamilton:
But the relationship between parents and children(both are sinners) is not an exact match with the relationship between God(who is absolutely perfect, absolutely sovereign, absolutely righteous, etc.) and humans(who are corrupt).

And that is the exact reason we don't have to worry about God having total control and still allowing us choices. If we, as sinners and corrupt beings can maintain control as parents, how much more can He maintain control no matter what choices He gives us?

A blessed Thanksgiving to all of you, too.

 

[Siegfried]

Originally posted by Helen:
A blessed Thanksgiving to all of you, too.

Amen to that.

Most of all, I'm thankful that God regenerated my spirit with the instantaneous effect that I wanted to and did put my faith and trust in Christ for salvation.

Apart from that act of regeneration God did in my life, I know that my heart's desire never would have turned me to God, for I was hopelessly lost in my depravity.

No man, least of all myself, ever seeks after God. Paul said it well.

 

[ScottEmerson]

Originally posted by Siegfried:
No man, least of all myself, ever seeks after God. Paul said it well.[/QB]

God seeks after all men. The Bible says it well. It is God who makes the first step to draw all people.

 

[romanbear]

Hi Ken;
I didn't write what I wrote to upset you, I wrote it because, I love all my neighbors even though. I don't know you.There once was a rich man that came to Christ and asked.
Mat 19:20 The young man saith unto him, All these things have I kept from my youth up: what lack I yet?

Mat 19:21 Jesus said unto him, If thou wilt be perfect, go and sell that thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven: and come and follow me.

Mat 19:22 But when the young man heard that saying, he went away sorrowful: for he had great possessions.

Wouldn't you say this man made a choice.Jesus offered him the chance to follow him and he turned it down.His fortune was to great for him to give up for Jesus.You can believe that if this man didn't change his mind he went the other way.

Mat 19:23 Then said Jesus unto his disciples, Verily I say unto you, That a rich man shall hardly enter into the kingdom of heaven.

Mat 19:24 And again I say unto you, It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God.

Ken have you ever asked the lord to come in to your heart and save you from your sins.If you have then you made a choice. If not maybe you should think about it.I'm not trying to pick an argument with you but, wouldn't you like to know for sure.Wouldn't you like to know that you have a place in heaven with the Lord.Regardless of what someone else has taught you.You can have peace of mind, like you never thought possible.You can have happiness, even when surrounded by doom and gloom.You won't ever be afraid of Death again Because to die becomes gain.I don't mean you will go out and commit suicide, you just won't be afraid of death anymore.All you have to do is make a genuine commitment to Jesus and your life, your thoughts, and the way the world looks, will change. Life will be beautiful even when others are terrified.Oh sure there will be trials but, as long as you keep your eyes on Jesus you'll pass everyone.Even if you don't pass all you have to do is repent.Yes our God is a mighty God much more mightier than you ever thought.When I accepted Christ, He not only forgave me of every dirty roten thing I ever did. He also forgave me for all time, past, present, and future.Because I believe on him and have commited my life to him I have blessed assurance in my rewards.

The reason I've brought this up is because, I care what happens to you. My Lord and Savior has commanded me to Love my neighbors and everyone on this planet is my neighbor.This includeds you.May Christ speak to and open your heart.,

Romanbear

Peace

 

[romanbear]

Hi Scott Emerson;

_______________________________________________________________
QUOTE; from scott emerson.
God seeks after all men. The Bible says it well. It is God who makes the first step to draw all people.

_______________________________________________________________
You are soooooo right

!
I have never met anyone, when hearing the story of Jesus that wasn't drawn, if he was listening that is. Sadly there are a lot of people who just won't listen. Even when some listen They feel embarassment and won't admit it.I hope they speak to Jesus on there own.They don't have to speak to me or let me know anything about it.What's important is that they speak to Jesus.Repent and commit.
May God Bless.
Romanbear

Peace