Why does God let us sin?

[Humble Disciple]

Unlike our Wesleyan brothers and sisters, Calvinists don’t believe that sinless perfection is possible in this lifetime.

On the other hand, if you live your entire life without any evidence of regeneration, that’s reason to doubt that you were truly saved in the first place.

Sometimes God holds back His sanctifying grace from His elect ones, leaving them to manifold temptations, so they will humble themselves and draw closer to Him.

This is from the 1689 London Baptist Confession, a doctrinal standard of Reformed Baptists, as adapted from the Westminster Confession:

The most wise, righteous, and gracious God doth oftentimes leave for a season his own children to manifold temptations and the corruptions of their own hearts, to chastise them for their former sins, or to discover unto them the hidden strength of corruption and deceitfulness of their hearts, that they may be humbled; and to raise them to a more close and constant dependence for their support upon himself; and to make them more watchful against all future occasions of sin, and for other just and holy ends. So that whatsoever befalls any of his elect is by his appointment, for his glory, and their good.
( 2 Chronicles 32:25, 26, 31; 2 Corinthians 12:7-9; Romans 8:28 )
1689 Baptist Confession Chapter 5

The joy and beauty of Calvinism is that salvation is of God’s grace from beginning to end. We didn’t initiate saving faith, and therefore we need not fear losing it:

I, John Piper, was dead in my trespasses and my sins. I was unable to change my life. I did not love God. I did not trust God. I did not want God. I found God boring. And, therefore, I was enslaved to my own sin. God was not beautiful and he wasn’t satisfying, and that is the condition of everybody until God moves.

And so, Reformed theology says: The only solution to this hopeless condition that I was in and that everybody is in, is that God is sovereign and by his free grace overcomes our blindness. He raises us from the dead. He gives us eyes to see the beauty of Christ so that we freely and joyfully embrace him as our supreme treasure.

For example, 2 Corinthians 4:6 says: “God, who said, ‘Let light shine out of darkness,’” — way back there in creation — “has shown in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.” That is how I got saved. My heart was dark. It was dead. It was rebellious. It had all the wrong preferences.

And God said: Let there be gospel light in John Piper’s heart. And by a miracle, in a moment, I saw Christ differently. He was compellingly true and beautiful and satisfying — and I was saved.
The Bible calls me now a “new creation” (2 Corinthians 5:17) so that Ephesians 2:8–9 is true: “By grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works” or of anything we did. So, faith is a gift. We don’t create it with our free will.

Here is where it gets controversial — and I am just going to close with this statement — We don’t create it. We don’t create faith with our free will. If left to our free will, we will all choose the pleasures of the creation over the beauty of the Creator. Our free will is a slave to sin.

Just read Romans 6:16–17 and you will see that we were enslaved to sin, enslaved to unrighteousness. Only the sovereign grace of God can set us free so that we see Christ for who he really is and embrace him as our supreme treasure. That is what I mean by Reformed theology.
https://www.desiringgod.org/interviews/what-is-calvinism

 

[rockytopva]

I have heard that the main difference between Baptist and Methodist is that the Baptist do not believe in backsliding but the Methodist practice it!

While I love Methodism I see no signs of sinless perfection these days.

 

[Humble Disciple]

I have heard that the main difference between Baptist and Methodist is that the Baptist do not believe in backsliding but the Methodist practice it!

While I love Methodism I see no signs of sinless perfection these days.

What Calvinism teaches is that if God's elect were to backslide, the Holy Spirit will intervene in their lives to restore them to saving faith. If the backslidden are never restored to faith, then they were never truly saved in the first place. Wesleyan Arminians, on the other hand, believe that God's elect can irrevocably fall away.

 

[Humble Disciple]

As John Calvin explains below, the people in Isaiah 61:21 are God’s elect who enter the Kingdom of God, not by their own free-willed efforts, but by God’s planting and the work of His hands, for the glory of God alone.

Isaiah 60:21
Also your people shall all be righteous;
They shall inherit the land forever,
The branch of My planting,
The work of My hands,
That I may be glorified.

And indeed all that relates to the heavenly life was neither produced in us by nature nor obtained by our own strength, but flows and proceeds from God alone.

What is here said universally concerning the whole body (the church) every person ought to apply to himself in particular; for we are God’s “planting” before the world was made, (Ephesians 1:4,) and were afterwards ingrafted into Christ, and called, that we might have the testimony of our election and planting.

Wicked men are not God’s planting; and therefore Christ declares that “they whom his heavenly Father hath not planted shall be rooted up.” (Matthew 15:13)

That I may be glorified. At length he adds the end of the “planting,” that we may celebrate the perfections of God, (1 Peter 2:9) and may show forth his glory, as Paul beautifully explains. (Ephesians 1:12)
Isaiah 60 - Calvin's Commentary on the Bible - Bible Commentaries - StudyLight.org

If we continue on to Isaiah 64:4-7, we see man’s total inability to do anything pleasing to God due to original sin, not even to call on the name of God without His grace.

In order to be saved, we need to be worked on by God like a potter works on clay.
(Isaiah 64:8, Romans 9:21-23)

We can be assured that God’s elect will be gathered from all nations and tongues, that they shall come by His irresistible grace, and see His glory. (Isaiah 14:24, Isaiah 46:10-11, Isaiah 55:11, Isaiah 66:18)

 

[Humble Disciple]

Because God is an irresistible, sovereign God, His grace is an irresistible and sovereign grace. God and God's grace cannot effectively and ultimately be resisted by the most obstinate of sinners. When God's grace operates to save the sinner, that grace shall triumph in the salvation of that sinner. He will be saved. God will have the victory.

Not the power of the devil, not the power of the wicked world, not the power of the sinner himself, shall be able to prevent, overthrow, or frustrate the work of God's grace. The God of the Scriptures is the God Whom Isaiah says in Isaiah 46:10 "... declares the end from the beginning, and from ancient times the things that are not yet done, saying, My counsel shall stand, and I will do all my pleasure."
Chapter 5 - Irresistible Grace

 

[Silverhair]

What Calvinism teaches is that if God's elect were to backslide, the Holy Spirit will intervene in their lives to restore them to saving faith. If the backslidden are never restored to faith, then they were never truly saved in the first place. Wesleyan Arminians, on the other hand, believe that God's elect can irrevocably fall away.

Actually what Calvin teaches is quite shocking. According to calvin God "implants the living root of faith" so it is not really they believe but God believes for them.
Calvin states this clearly "We may add, that the reprobate never have any other than a confused sense of grace, laying hold of the shadow rather than the substance, because the Spirit properly seals the forgiveness of sins in the elect only, applying it by special faith to their use" So the reprobate never has faith implanted by God so never has a chance to be saved and this is Gods doing.

"Still it is correctly said, that the reprobate believe God to be propitious to them, inasmuch as they accept the gift of reconciliation, though confusedly and without due discernment; not that they are partakers of the same faith or regeneration with the children of God; but because, under a covering of hypocrisy, they seem to have a principle of faith in common with them. Nor do I even deny that God illumines their minds to this extent, that they recognize his grace; but that conviction he distinguishes from the peculiar testimony which he gives to his elect in this respect, that the reprobate never attain to the full result or to fruition. When he shows himself propitious to them, it is not as if he had truly rescued them from death, and taken them under his protection. He only gives them a manifestation of his present mercy. In the elect alone he implants the living root of faith, so that they persevere even to the end. Thus we dispose of the objection, that if God truly displays his grace, it must endure for ever. There is nothing inconsistent in this with the fact of his enlightening some with a present sense of grace, which afterwards proves evanescent" Calvin Institutes Bk 3 Chp 2 Pt A Sec 11

So what we see here is, according to Calvin, God implants faith in some but not all but those that do not have faith will be condemned for not having it. Furthermore since God implants this faith and even the reprobate think they are saved, at least for a time anyway. So those that believe may at any time have that faith removed, it proves evanescent {Vanishing; subject to vanishing; fleeting; passing away; liable to dissipation Webster} Now everyone that follows the calvinist view has to wonder, am I one of the ones that will have my faith vanish, is my faith evanescent? Try as they might they can never be sure. That is the reality of Calvinism.

 

[Silverhair]

Unlike our Wesleyan brothers and sisters, Calvinists don’t believe that sinless perfection is possible in this lifetime.

On the other hand, if you live your entire life without any evidence of regeneration, that’s reason to doubt that you were truly saved in the first place.

Sometimes God holds back His sanctifying grace from His elect ones, leaving them to manifold temptations, so they will humble themselves and draw closer to Him.

This is from the 1689 London Baptist Confession, a doctrinal standard of Reformed Baptists, as adapted from the Westminster Confession:



The joy and beauty of Calvinism is that salvation is of God’s grace from beginning to end. We didn’t initiate saving faith, and therefore we need not fear losing it:

You ask "Why does God let us sin?" I find that to be a strange question coming from a determinist. Your calvinist theology requires that God exercise meticulous determination of all thing. This is clearly stated by James White
"God is incapable of knowing an undetermined future, and therefore, for God to be omniscient and all-knowing, no future could be left undetermined, or better yet, unscripted." (James White, Debating Calvinism, p.163)
And your LBCF also makes this clear:
God hath decreed in himself, from all eternity, by the most wise and holy counsel of
His own will, freely and unchangeably, all things, whatsoever comes to pass; LBCF Chp 3

So if God scripts all things as J. Whiite says and Decrees all things as the LBCF says then should you not have asked "Why does God make us sin?"

 

[Iconoclast]

You ask "Why does God let us sin?" I find that to be a strange question coming from a determinist. Your calvinist theology requires that God exercise meticulous determination of all thing. This is clearly stated by James White
"God is incapable of knowing an undetermined future, and therefore, for God to be omniscient and all-knowing, no future could be left undetermined, or better yet, unscripted." (James White, Debating Calvinism, p.163)
And your LBCF also makes this clear:
God hath decreed in himself, from all eternity, by the most wise and holy counsel of
His own will, freely and unchangeably, all things, whatsoever comes to pass; LBCF Chp 3

So if God scripts all things as J. Whiite says and Decrees all things as the LBCF says then should you not have asked "Why does God make us sin?"

If you understood what was being said in those quotes you would not suggest such a question.

 

[Silverhair]

You made a link to an article on irresistible grace

If you understood what was being said in those quotes you would not suggest such a question.

Well since I can read English and they were written in English I do think I understand what they mean. The question is do you? Why don't you tell me what they mean.
Try taking of the calvinist glasses for a change. You seem to think that I don't like calvinists, wrong I just hope that they will start reading a clear text without twisting it to fit with calvinism.

Calvinists want everyone to just accept there definitions of words and their understanding of texts, even when they contradict the clear meaning of the text. Sorry it does not work that way, calvinists do not get to chose what the bible text means. If you want to read things the calvinist way so be it. I will just read that text as it is without adding any twists.

 

[Iconoclast]

You made a link to an article on irresistible grace


Well since I can read English and they were written in English I do think I understand what they mean. The question is do you? Why don't you tell me what they mean.
Try taking of the calvinist glasses for a change. You seem to think that I don't like calvinists, wrong I just hope that they will start reading a clear text without twisting it to fit with calvinism.

Calvinists want everyone to just accept there definitions of words and their understanding of texts, even when they contradict the clear meaning of the text. Sorry it does not work that way, calvinists do not get to chose what the bible text means. If you want to read things the calvinist way so be it. I will just read that text as it is without adding any twists.

I did not say anything about you liking or disliking Calvinists.
I posted that you do not understand the two quotes you commented on.
Neither of them twisted anything, so where is all this twisting going on?
You are welcome to demonstrate these supposed twists

 

[tyndale1946]

The OP asked a question and The Apostle Paul answers it... Am I the only one that will admit it?... It's our nature!... Brother Glen

Romans 7:14 For we know that the law is spiritual: but I am carnal, sold under sin.

7:15 For that which I do I allow not: for what I would, that do I not; but what I hate, that do I.

7:16 If then I do that which I would not, I consent unto the law that it is good.

7:17 Now then it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me.

7:18 For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh,) dwelleth no good thing: for to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not.

7:19 For the good that I would I do not: but the evil which I would not, that I do.

7:20 Now if I do that I would not, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me.

7:21 I find then a law, that, when I would do good, evil is present with me.

7:22 For I delight in the law of God after the inward man:

7:23 But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members.

7:24 O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?

7:25 I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord. So then with the mind I myself serve the law of God; but with the flesh the law of sin.

 

[Silverhair]

I did not say anything about you liking or disliking Calvinists.
I posted that you do not understand the two quotes you commented on.
Neither of them twisted anything, so where is all this twisting going on?
You are welcome to demonstrate these supposed twists

You said I did not understand the quotes. So you tell me what they mean. They must have some secret meaning that the clear text does not reveal. I await your reply.

 

[Iconoclast]

You said I did not understand the quotes. So you tell me what they mean. They must have some secret meaning that the clear text does not reveal. I await your reply.

It would be helpful helpful if you go over the quotes and show where you think there an error then I can zero in on a response a little clearer to try to help

 

[Silverhair]

The OP asked a question and The Apostle Paul answers it... Am I the only one that will admit it?... It's our nature!... Brother Glen

Romans 7:14 For we know that the law is spiritual: but I am carnal, sold under sin.

7:15 For that which I do I allow not: for what I would, that do I not; but what I hate, that do I.

7:16 If then I do that which I would not, I consent unto the law that it is good.

7:17 Now then it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me.

7:18 For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh,) dwelleth no good thing: for to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not.

7:19 For the good that I would I do not: but the evil which I would not, that I do.

7:20 Now if I do that I would not, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me.

7:21 I find then a law, that, when I would do good, evil is present with me.

7:22 For I delight in the law of God after the inward man:

7:23 But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members.

7:24 O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?

7:25 I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord. So then with the mind I myself serve the law of God; but with the flesh the law of sin.

The OP asked a question and The Apostle Paul answers it... Am I the only one that will admit it?... It's our nature!... Brother Glen

Romans 7:14 For we know that the law is spiritual: but I am carnal, sold under sin.

7:15 For that which I do I allow not: for what I would, that do I not; but what I hate, that do I.

7:16 If then I do that which I would not, I consent unto the law that it is good.

7:17 Now then it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me.

7:18 For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh,) dwelleth no good thing: for to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not.

7:19 For the good that I would I do not: but the evil which I would not, that I do.

7:20 Now if I do that I would not, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me.

7:21 I find then a law, that, when I would do good, evil is present with me.

7:22 For I delight in the law of God after the inward man:

7:23 But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members.

7:24 O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?

7:25 I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord. So then with the mind I myself serve the law of God; but with the flesh the law of sin.

As a non -calvinist I can agree with what Paul said as I am able to make choices. On the other hand for a calvinist this text poses a problem. Calvinists want a God that has absolute control over whatever happens yet at the same time wants man held responsible of choices he makes.
The OP asked a question but as I said in post #7 when you consider the determinism of calvinism the question is wrong and should be "Why does God make us sin?"
The LBCF & J. White quotes in post #7 say God has to control all things so if I have got it wrong then show me where it is wrong.

 

[Silverhair]

It would be helpful helpful if you go over the quotes and show where you think there an error then I can zero in on a response a little clearer to try to help

Read the quotes, they seem quite clear. You say I got them wrong, show me where. How do you read the clear text? Your the one that has to defend your different reading of the text.

 

[Silverhair]

It would be helpful helpful if you go over the quotes and show where you think there an error then I can zero in on a response a little clearer to try to help

Just to be clear I understand what the quotes say your the one that says the words have a different meaning. So enlighten me.

 

[37818]

Why does God let us sin?

Goes to the reason God made man. And what is behind, Genesis 3:1, Jesus' words in John 8:44 and in Matthew 25:41.

 

[Silverhair]

Goes to the reason God made man. And what is behind, Genesis 3:1, Jesus' words in John 8:44 and in Matthew 25:41.

I do not think that God made man so that he would sin, remember Gen 1:31 "Then God saw everything that He had made, and indeed it was very good...." Now we know that Adam sinned but that was because he had a free will so could make that choice. But since we lost the ability to make choices, according to one theological view, then would it not be that God makes the man sin? See post #7 for why I ask that.

I would like to see a logical answer for this question,"If God controls all things that happen then how can a man do anything outside of what God has decided for that man to do?"

 

[37818]

I do not think that God made man so that he would sin, remember Gen 1:31 "Then God saw everything that He had made, and indeed it was very good...." Now we know that Adam sinned but that was because he had a free will so could make that choice. But since we lost the ability to make choices, according to one theological view, then would it not be that God makes the man sin? See post #7 for why I ask that.

I would like to see a logical answer for this question,"If God controls all things that happen then how can a man do anything outside of what God has decided for that man to do?"

I hold that God is absolute in His omniscience. In the end God is going to have man to be fully sinless, Revelation 21:27.

 

[MB]

God does not let us sin He gave us laws to keep and when we go against them it is sin. Our sin is our responsibility.. He does not make us sin or alow it.
It's called freewill something you no doubt say we don't have that way you can blame it on God because He lets you sin.
MB