The Millions Who Never Had a Choice

[steaver]

Natural revelation is enough to make a man a theist, but looking at the stars does not give you the knowledge contained in the gospel, and faith comes by *hearing*.

Natural revelation is enough to damn you, but not enough to save you.

What revelation was available to save Adam and his family?

 

[Internet Theologian]

Oh I get it now! Sorry, usually when someone types OP they are referring to the Original Post. Yes, I was missing that part.

No problem brother.

As for the OP the tenets of Arminianism are well known just as are those of so-called Calvinism. It is apparent not all have heard, an issue we do not completely understand this side. It is a fact some have died throughout history never hearing the Gospel. We should be thankful that we have heard, and as Psalm 56:13 shows, realize why he rescued us, as the last half of the passage given relates.

 

[steaver]

All of this bickering just clogs up the thread, and it makes it impossible to have a meaningful discussion. Please stop. Deal with the statements and question raised, please.

You (Stever) are acting a bit childish. Why not take your last 25 posts, print them and let your wife, children, and your pastor and elders read them?

This is why I haven't been here in ages. Many of you guys act like fools and it ruins the discussion and debate for everyone.

Stricter moderation would be a good thing.

I do not post anything I would not let my children read , nor my Pastor, nor my congregation that I attend. In fact they have access to this board. Not sure what you are finding offensive in my post. Maybe give an example, you say the last 25, I don't see anything personal.

 

[Iconoclast]

Prove that anyone has died and never heard the gospel.

prove that anyone has died and never eaten okra

prove that anyone has died that had not spoken with space aliens

prove that anyone has died and not heard about spiderman

 

[steaver]

No problem brother.

As for the OP the tenets of Arminianism are well known just as are those of so-called Calvinism. It is apparent not all have heard, an issue we do not completely understand this side. It is a fact some have died throughout history never hearing the Gospel. We should be thankful that we have heard, and as Psalm 56:13 shows, realize why he rescued us, as the last half of the passage given relates.

The answer to the OP lies in the definition of "the Gospel". What gospel did the Israelites have while wondering in the desert? What gospel did Adam and his family have?

 

[Internet Theologian]

prove that anyone has died and never eaten okra

That's hilarious and just as valid (invalid?) as his statement!!! Circular reasoning and/or affirming the consequent fallacy, his adding nothing to the thread other than being snide.

But I am awaiting an answer to the OP from non-cals/Arminians. Not all have heard, that is a fact.

 

[thatbrian]

You mean, brother, just how others are bickering, or how you are bickering here as well, and elsewhere in this thread? Or, are only others considered as 'childish' and 'fools'? In my opinion you're acting out of control here with your tongue via the keyboard. Get a grip and apply your own words to yourself.

Concerning your OP there is no good answer to come forth from the Arminian camp, and quite frankly the OP is question begging. I get it, you get it, their theology is amiss and inconsistent.

This wasn't directed at you. It puled your quote by mistake.

 

[Iconoclast]

That's hilarious and just as valid (invalid?) as his statement!!! Circular reasoning and/or affirming the consequent fallacy, his adding nothing to the thread other than being snide.

But I am awaiting an answer to the OP from non-cals/Arminians. Not all have heard, that is a fact.

You have judged rightly sir!
It is a waste of a post...it does not add anything constructive.....it offers no answer at all.....and yet- we will see it again and again.

It is like when a small child closes their eyes and thinks they are invisible to others...lol

 

[Internet Theologian]

This wasn't directed at you. It puled your quote by mistake.

OK brother. I apologize for what I said. Have a good day.

 

[Iconoclast]

I take the 'quite shockingly' statement as sarcasm, which can only mean this is his normal mode. People get into that mode, and only God can bring them out of it as they are blinded thinking they are in the right. It is what John referred to as 'walking in darkness' (1 John 1:6) and Paul called 'works of the flesh' (Galatians 5:19-21). Nothing the OP said was arrogant whatsoever, so the accusation is unfounded and untrue. It is a commentary on his heart from where the false accusation originated.

yes.....a clear insight. If someone repeats a lie over and over....does it then become a truth?

If a person does not scripturally answer a calvinist...but calls them a name...is that to be considered an answer?

 

[thatbrian]

I was hoping that the Arminians would be able to make the connection from my OP that very thing they complain most violently about concerning Calvinism is how a loving God would only save some and not others.

If you haven't seen that yet, I'm saying: Your theology has the very same issue.

God has placed people in time and location that He know would never hear the gospel. He chose for some to hear, and He chose for some not to hear. Not a few people - billions.

 

[thatbrian]

OK brother. I apologize for what I said. Have a good day.

No worries.

 

[steaver]

I was hoping that the Arminians would be able to make the connection from my OP that very thing they complain most violently about concerning Calvinism is how a loving God would only save some and not others.

If you haven't seen that yet, I'm saying: Your theology has the very same issue.

God has placed people in time and location that He know would never hear the gospel. He chose for some to hear, and He chose for some not to hear. Not a few people - billions.

What gospel did Adam and his family have?

 

[Iconoclast]

[QUOTE="InTheLight,

My position is not the same issue as the Calvinist belief that God condemned people to Hell from before the foundation of the world.

Let's look ITL;

People are condemned in my belief system because they are sinners and have rejected the gospel or never heard of it

.
1]they are sinners

2]and have rejected the gospel

3]or never heard of it

This is no different from Calvinistic teaching at all.

Chapter 6: Of the Fall of Man, Of Sin, And of the Punishment Thereof
1._____ Although God created man upright and perfect, and gave him a righteous law, which had been unto life had he kept it, and threatened death upon the breach thereof, yet he did not long abide in this honour; Satan using the subtlety of the serpent to subdue Eve, then by her seducing Adam, who, without any compulsion, did willfully transgress the law of their creation, and the command given unto them, in eating the forbidden fruit, which God was pleased, according to his wise and holy counsel to permit, having purposed to order it to his own glory.
( Genesis 2:16, 17; Genesis 3:12,13; 2 Corinthians 11:3 )
2._____ Our first parents, by this sin, fell from their original righteousness and communion with God, and we in them whereby death came upon all: all becoming dead in sin, and wholly defiled in all the faculties and parts of soul and body.
( Romans 3:23; Romans 5:12, etc; Titus 1:15; Genesis 6:5; Jeremiah 17:9; Romans 3:10-19 )

3._____ They being the root, and by God's appointment, standing in the room and stead of all mankind, the guilt of the sin was imputed, and corrupted nature conveyed, to all their posterity descending from them by ordinary generation, being now conceived in sin, and by nature children of wrath, the servants of sin, the subjects of death, and all other miseries, spiritual, temporal, and eternal, unless the Lord Jesus set them free.
( Romans 5:12-19; 1 Corinthians 15:21, 22, 45, 49; Psalms 51:5; Job 14:4; Ephesians 2:3; Romans 6:20 Romans 5:12; Hebrews 2:14, 15; 1 Thessalonians 1:10 )

4._____ From this original corruption, whereby we are utterly indisposed, disabled, and made opposite to all good, and wholly inclined to all evil, do proceed all actual transgressions.
( Romans 8:7; Colossians 1:21; James 1:14, 15; Matthew 15:19 )

5._____ The corruption of nature, during this life, doth remain in those that are regenerated; and although it be through Christ pardoned and mortified, yet both itself, and the first motions thereof, are truly and properly sin.
( Romans 7:18,23; Ecclesiastes 7:20; 1 John 1:8; Romans 7:23-25; Galatians 5:17 )

In your system God doesn't save people because He doesn't feel like it.

God does not have feelings or passions like men do. So...why this caricature?

Why does the Calvinist God prevent millions from hearing the gospel?

Sin prevents men even if they hear the gospel physically, from welcoming it.
God has not purposed to save all from among fallen mankind. He has purposed to save a multitude IN his Son.

Are they all part of the condemned from before the foundation of the world crowd?

All men sinned and died in Adam and were condemned.

From that mass of fallen humanity....God in Holy love , wisdom and righteousness Has purposed to save all he can wisely save. Not one of them will be lost. The better question might be....do you believe the God of all the earth will do right? gen 18;25

When he determined who to save and by what means....did He not do what was perfect in every way?

 

[Iconoclast]

What gospel did Adam and his family have?

Gen 3:15

 

[steaver]

Gen 3:15

Ok, so when Adam heard this, he then was saved? And what about Adam's family? Are you assuming Adam told this to his family and then they were saved? Did Adam just tell Abel but not Cain?

 

[steaver]

The answer to the OP lies in the definition of "the Gospel". What gospel did the Israelites have while wondering in the desert? What gospel did Adam and his family have?

Everyone go ahead and take some time to mull this over and then give an answer. This pertains directly to the OP's premise that millions have had no gospel at all given to them. Icon presented Gen 3:15 without any explanation of how the hearing of these words alone saved Adam or his family. Did Cain and Abel hear these words? Hebrews states the Israelites had the gospel preached to them in the desert. Is this found in the OT? Where? So we have to define what the "gospel" is to each generation from Adam to present. Is it exactly the same throughout from the beginning of Creation? We are stuck so much in the present when we speak of the gospel, the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Adam never heard of this gospel. Cornelius never heard of this gospel. So let's define the gospel which saves from Adam to now!

 

[InTheLight]

I was hoping that the Arminians would be able to make the connection from my OP that very thing they complain most violently about concerning Calvinism is how a loving God would only save some and not others.

As Internet Theologian has said, the OP is question begging. Arminians (or non-Cals) do not violently complain that God only saves some.

If you haven't seen that yet, I'm saying: Your theology has the very same issue.

Well, frankly I'm not seeing the issue. You are (apparently) admitting there is an issue with your theology and want to transfer that problem onto other's theology. Your analogy that people go to Hell because "God is saving some but not others" is NOT the same as "people aren't being saved because they haven't heard the gospel". It is a false analogy. It's simply not the same thing.

God has placed people in time and location that He know would never hear the gospel.
He chose for some to hear, and He chose for some not to hear. Not a few people - billions.

I take it that is your attempt at sarcasm.

Your so-called problem for non-Cals--how do they reconcile the idea that while people have free will, millions are not able to exercise that free will, is not a problem. Consider:

Suppose I posit that tax cuts spur economic growth. You object to that idea by asking me to reconcile the inconsistency in the fact that for thousands of years, and even right up until today millions of people have never had a central government to carry out such a policy, therefore, in your mind, tax cuts don't spur economic growth.

Or, the ratio of the circumference of a circle and its diameter is a number called pi. This discovery was one of the foundations in the advancement of mathematics and by extension, inventions and technology. Reconcile the inconsistency that untold millions of people throughout history and even up to today don't know what the number pi is or what it represents. Therefore, according to your argument, pi must not exist.

 

[Iconoclast]

Ok, so when Adam heard this, he then was saved? And what about Adam's family? Are you assuming Adam told this to his family and then they were saved? Did Adam just tell Abel but not Cain?

Hello Steaver,

We are not told in detail everything that was said to Adam and Eve with all those things that pertain to redemptive history but one thing we see from the early chapters in Genesis after Cain killed Abel when Eve conceived in the Genesis 4:26 she says God has appointed me another seed so we have the indication that they will looking for the promised seed.

 

[steaver]

Hello Steaver,

We are not told in detail everything that was said to Adam and Eve with all those things that pertain to redemptive history but one thing we see from the early chapters in Genesis after Cain killed Abel when Eve conceived in the Genesis 4:26 she says God has appointed me another seed so we have the indication that they will looking for the promised seed.

Could be. So is this the gospel at that time for them to believe? They certainly new nothing of Jesus Christ crucified and raised again, which is what we generally think of when we hear "gospel". Also, Hebrews points to the Israelites as having been preached the gospel in the desert. Where is this recorded in the OT? Or isn't it?