Posted on 12/19/2017 11:42:35 AM PST by Gamecock
Well of course: If God decrees/determines that sin will come to pass, He must give permission/authorization/license for it to come to pass otherwise He would be impotent.
But then people don’t really freely choose to disobey God, they MUST disobey God.
In other words, decree trumps ability, as people are totally depraved and totally unable to choose to obey God (per Calvin) — and MUST sin, thereby incurring separation and wrath forever. They are NOT permitted to exercise faith – there is no authorization from God to believe, indeed no provision for them, per Calvinism’s limited atonement and in contradiction to 1 John 2:2 and 1 John 4:10.
So, apparently, your definition of permission (God permits) does not correspond to what most people understand when they think of the word (though it may be technically correct).
People are able (have God’s permission) to sin, but they are not able (do not have God’s permission) to repent or believe.
Is that how you would characterize it?
If I wanted to obfuscate rather than clarify.
For how I would characterize it, see my previous posts.
So to take your from reference to Institutes I:18, what God permits IS HIS WILL (see below).
Could you clarify why men or angels are guilty of the malice that God effectually wills them to do, and He Himself not guilty?
I agree with Calvin in this statement: “It seems absurd that man should be blinded by the will and command of God, and yet be forthwith punished for his blindness.”
Then he proceeds to defend this absurdity, which is what I am questioning.
Institutes I:18
1. FROM other passages, in which God is said to draw or bend Satan himself, and all the reprobate, to his will, a more difficult question arises. For the carnal mind can scarcely comprehend how, when acting by their means, he contracts no taint from their impurity, nay, how, in a common operation, he is exempt from all guilt, and can justly condemn his own ministers. Hence a distinction has been invented between doing and permitting because to many it seemed altogether inexplicable how Satan and all the wicked are so under the hand and authority of God, that he directs their malice to whatever end he pleases, and employs their iniquities to execute his Judgments. The modesty of those who are thus alarmed at the appearance of absurdity might perhaps be excused, did they not endeavour to vindicate the justice of God from every semblance of stigma by defending an untruth. It seems absurd that man should be blinded by the will and command of God, and yet be forthwith punished for his blindness. Hence, recourse is had to the evasion that this is done only by the permission, and not also by the will of God. He himself, however, openly declaring that he does this, repudiates the evasion. That men do nothing save at the secret instigation of God, and do not discuss and deliberate on any thing but what he has previously decreed with himself and brings to pass by his secret direction, is proved by numberless clear passages of Scripture.
I can't explain Calvinist doctrine cause I'm not a Calvinist.
However, in regard to this question: Or believe that he actually legitimately offers salvation to all men, women, and children (if they do think that, which I find hard to believe).
There's these verses......
Acts 17:29-31 Being then God's offspring, we ought not to think that the divine being is like gold or silver or stone, an image formed by the art and imagination of man. In the past God overlooked such ignorance, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent. For he has set a day when he will judge the world with justice by the man he has appointed. He has given proof of this to everyone by raising him from the dead.”
2 Peter 3:9 The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you,a not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance.
1 Timothy 2:4-5 First of all, then, I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for all people, for kings and all who are in high positions, that we may lead a peaceful and quiet life, godly and dignified in every way. This is good, and it is pleasing in the sight of God our Savior, who desires all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.
Exactly what is the point you are trying to make?
Are you trying to find some charge to lay at God’s feet?
My point was to challenge the statement that “God who permits what He hates in order to accomplish what He loves” as an accurate portrayal of Calvinism or Reformed theology. Though I (a long time ago) enjoyed some of R. C. Sproul’s teachings he was clearly Calvinist/Reformed in his theology. And though the only time I heard Joni Eareckson Tada speak she was excellent (at a Biola University graduation), I am assuming she is Calvinist in doctrine, which may or may not be accurate. May Sproul rest in peace, or, rather, enjoy the immediate presence of God (2 Cor. 5:8), and Joni Eareckson Tada be blessed now and forever.
To state that “God permits what He hates in order to accomplish what He loves,” however, is not a faithful presentation of Calvinistic theology, given any common (or even strained) understanding of what those words plainly imply. My point is to point that out.
I whole-heartedly agree with the scriptures you quote in their plain-vanilla meaning – that God desires all people to be saved, that is His will, and His command which can actually be obeyed or disobeyed.
That is NOT the teaching of Calvinism (as defined by Calvin in his Institutes). Also, see the Westminster Confession, Chapter III. Which partly reads:
I. God from all eternity, did, by the most wise and holy counsel of His own will, freely, and unchangeably ordain whatsoever comes to pass; yet so, as thereby neither is God the author of sin, nor is violence offered to the will of the creatures; nor is the liberty or contingency of second causes taken away, but rather established.
II. Although God knows whatsoever may or can come to pass upon all supposed conditions; yet has He not decreed anything because He foresaw it as future, or as that which would come to pass upon such conditions.
III. By the decree of God, for the manifestation of His glory, some men and angels are predestinated unto everlasting life; and others foreordained to everlasting death.
IV. These angels and men, thus predestinated, and foreordained, are particularly and unchangeably designed, and their number so certain and definite, that it cannot be either increased or diminished.
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