Aren't good deeds suppose to be done so that the “right hand doesn't know what the left hand is doing”?
Maybe only one hand can get on the Internet or read the paper.
As to my being sure about the rest of my family, hmmmm, I could say that you need to meet my family. I don't see into their hearts nor understand completely what has transpired between them and God. I just know what He has promised in the Word and so I can either believe Him, or not.
It is more important that each person come to God themselves. We each individually need to recognize that we ourselves don't measure up to God's standards (haven't you even once been disappointed with your behavior, so of course you, and I, don't measure up to God's standards?) and that we need forgiveness. That forgiveness is in the person and work of Jesus Christ. All a person, any person, need to is pray, "Lord Jesus, I need you. I recognize that I am a sinner in need of a savior. I open the door of my heart and receive you as Savior and Lord. Amen."
The bible says that God is not a respecter of persons so it is a very good chance that their children and gradcildren are going to hell and there is not a thing the calvinist can do about it.
Isn't that a lovely picture of God?/sarc
Since you and I both live in the Ozarks, I'll do four things.
First, I'll invite you to Gospel of Grace Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church in Springfield, Mo., where you will hear sermons on most Sundays that place a heavy emphasis on the need of all people, regardless of whether they profess to be Christians or not, to be aware of our total depravity, our extreme wickedness based on original sin and compounded by our own actual sins, our desperate need for a sovereign Savior to enter into a personal relationship with us even though we of our own wills hate Him and the demands of His Word, and our tremendous propensity to deceive ourselves and be proud of our own actions instead of regarding all our righteousness as filthy rags.
Second, I'll say that if what you're hearing is an accurate report of what you've heard from Calvinists, either 1) you haven't been talking to many Calvinists or 2) you're talking to professing Calvinists who are opposed to Puritan theology.
Third, I'll invite you to read Jonathan Edwards’ “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God” and ask whether you think he was encouraging people to presume that they and their children were elect.
Fourth, because it sounds like you may be running into Calvinists who may have a spiritual pride problem (there are some such people in every church), I'd encourage you to encourage them to go re-read the first few Lord's Days of the Heidelberg Catechism with its Scripture citations, including Q/A2: “What must you know to live and die in the joy of this comfort? Three things: First, how great my sin and misery are; second, how I am set free from all my sins and misery; third, how I am to thank God for such deliverance.”
The fact is that as professing Calvinists who believe they are elect, the people you're talking to are not being very good witnesses if they're actually saying to you what you report them as having said. Maybe they've not explained themselves very well; maybe you've misunderstood them. But what you're reporting as the only thing you've heard from Calvinists most definitely is **NOT** an accurate representation of the classical Reformed faith, especially in its Anglo-Scottish Puritan form or Dutch Nadere Reformatie (Second Reformation) form.
A final word to Calvinists reading this: I don't know who fungoking is talking to, but we need to make sure people don't say things like that about Calvinists after talking to us. “Total Depravity” or “T” is the first of the five points of Calvinism, or TULIP. If we don't remember that total depravity is in our own hearts, not just the hearts of other people, we are Calvinists in our heads but Pelagians in our hearts. God will not deal kindly with us if we are correctly accused of believing we are somehow free or even less affected by the horrible burden and curse of sin into which all mankind was plunged by Adam's fall.