Posted on 06/15/2004 6:53:50 PM PDT by RnMomof7
GOL | | | ||
The "World" of John 3:16 Does Not Mean "All Men Without Exception" -
Whenever anyone challenges the confession of Gods particular, exclusive love for His elect by quoting John 3:16, we must regretfully conclude that he holds the doctrinal position set forth above and wishes to confess it publicly, in order thus to overthrow the Reformed doctrine of predestination, limited atonement, total depravity, effectual grace, and the preservation of saints (which is only an elaborate way of saying, salvation by grace alone the gospel). The word, world, in the gospel of John does not mean all men without exception. Proof: John 1:29: "Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world." Did Christ by His death take away the sin of all men without exception? If He did, all men without exception shall be saved.This last text points out that the word, world, in the gospel of John does not always have the same meaning. In John 3:16, the world is loved by God, with a love that gives the Son of God for its sake; in John 17:9, the Son of God refuses to pray for the world. The saints must not come to an understanding of the world of John 3:16 by a quick assumption, but by careful interpretation of the passage in the light of the rest of Scripture. What then is the truth about the world of John 3:16? Loved by God with Divine, almighty, effectual, faithful, eternal love, the world is saved. All of it! All of them! Redeemed by the precious, worthy, powerful, effectual death of the Son of God, the world is saved. All of it! All of them! The salvation of all the persons included in the world of John 3:16 is due solely to the effectual love of God and the redeeming death of Christ for them; whereas the persons who perish were never loved by God, nor redeemed by Christ, that is, they are not part of the world of John 3:16. The world of John 3:16 (Greek: kosmos, from which comes our English word, cosmos, referring to our "orderly, harmonious, systematic universes) is the creation made by God in the beginning, now disordered by sin, with the elect from all nations, now by nature children of wrath even as the others, as the core of it. As regards its people, the world of John 3:16 is the new humanity in Jesus Christ, the last Adam (I Corinthians 15:45). John calls this new human race "the world" in order to show, and emphasize, that it is not from the Jewish people alone, but from all nations and peoples (Revelation 7:9). The people who make up the world of John 3:16 are all those, and those only, who will become believers (whosoever believeth"); and it is the elect who believe (Acts 13:48). This explanation of John 3:16 is not some strange, new interpretation dreamed up by latter-day hyper-Calvinists, but the explanation that has been given in the past by defenders of the Faith we call Reformed, that is, by those who confessed the sovereign grace of God in the salvation of sinners. This was the explanation given by Frances Turretin, Reformed theologian in Geneva (1623-1687): The love treated of in John 3:16. .. cannot be universal towards all and every one, but special towards a few... because the end of that love which God intends is the salvation of those whom He pursues with such love.. . If therefore God sent Christ for that end, that through Him the world might be saved, He must either have failed of His end, or the world must necessarily be saved in fact. But it is certain that not the whole world, but only those chosen out of the world are saved; therefore, to them properly has this love reference... Why then should not the world here be taken not universally for individuals, but indefinitely for anyone, Jews as well as Gentiles, without distinction of nation, language and condition. that He may be said to have loved the human race, inasmuch as He was unwilling to destroy it entirely but decreed to save some certain persons Out of it, not only from one people as before, but from all indiscriminately, although the effects of that love should not be extended to each individual, but only to some certain ones, viz, those chosen out of the world? (Theological Institutes)About the word, world, in Scripture, Abraham Kuyper, the Dutch theologian (1837-1920) wrote: For if there is anything that is certain from a somewhat more attentive reading of Holy Scripture, and that may be held as firmly established, it is, really, the irrefutable fact, that the word, world, in Holy Scripture, means "all men" only as a very rare exception and almost always means something entirely different.Essentially the same is the interpretation of Arthur W. Pink (1886-1952): Turning now to John 3:16, it should be evident from the passages just quoted that this verse will not bear the construction usually put upon it. "God so loved the world." Many suppose that this means, The entire human race. But "the entire human race" includes all mankind from Adam till the close of earths history: it reaches backward as well as forward! Consider, then, the history of mankind before Christ was born. Unnumbered millions lived and died before the Savior came to the earth, lived here "having no hope and without God in the world," and therefore passed out into eternity of woe. If God "loved" them, where is the slightest proof thereof? Scripture declares "Who (God) in times past (from the tower of Babel till after Pentecost) suffered all nations to walk in their own ways" (Acts 14:16). Scripture declares that "And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not convenient" (Rom. 1:28). To Israel God said, "You only have I known of all the families of the earth" (Amos 3:2). In view of these plain passages who will be so foolish as to insist that God in the past loved all mankind! The same applies with equal force to the future . . . But the objector comes back to John 3:16 and says, "World means world. "True, but we have shown that "the world" does not mean the whole human family. The fact is that "the world" is used in a general way.. . Now the first thing to note in connection with John 3:16 is that our Lord was there speaking to Nicodemus, a man who believed that Gods mercies were confined to his own nation. Christ there announced that Gods love in giving His Son had a larger object in view, that it flowed beyond the boundary of Palestine, reaching out to "regions beyond." In other words, this was Christs announcement that God had a purpose of grace toward Gentiles as well as Jews. "God so loved the world," then, signifies, Gods love is international in its scope. But does this mean that God loves every individual among the Gentiles? Not necessarily, for as we have seen the term "world" is general rather than specific, relative rather than absolute. . . the "world" in John 3:16 must, in the final analysis refer to the world of Gods people. Must we say, for there is no other alternative solution. It cannot mean the whole human race, for one half of the race was already in hell when Christ came to earth. It is unfair to insist that it means every human being now living, for every other passage in the New Testament where Gods love is mentioned limits it to His own people search and see! The objects of Gods love in John 3:16 are precisely the same as the objects of Christs love in John 13:1: "Now before the Feast of the Passover, when Jesus knew that His time was come, that he should depart out of this world unto the Father, having loved His own which were in the world, He loved them unto the end." We may admit that our interpretation of John 3:16 is no novel one invented by us, but one almost uniformly given by the Reformers and Puritans, and many others since them. (The Sovereignty of God)We can only marvel that Reformed men and women are so soon removed from the truth of Gods sovereign, particular, electing love in Jesus Christ, which truth has not only been confessed "by the Reformers and Puritans" before them, but has also been confessed by the Reformed church herself in her Creed, the Canons of Dordt. Who hath bewitched them? As for us, we are determined, out of love for the truth, to oppose the lie of a love of God in Jesus Christ for all men without exception; to try to rescue those who have been taken captive by this doctrine; and to preach and testify, near and far, in season and out of season, a love of God for the world that saves the world, a death of the Son of God that redeemed the world, a purpose of God for the saving of sinners that is accomplished, and a salvation of enslaved sinners by the sovereign power of the grace of God alone for the comfort of every believer and the glory of God. This article was printed from Grace Online Library - www.graceonlinelibrary.org Please note that every attempt has been made to obtain the proper permission to use all of the material posted on our site. If you intend on reproducing this printed article, you may need to obtain the proper permission. |
Bump
I didn't finish this piece, but I've read a few of these Calvinist screeds and I just have to say that the more I read about Calvinism the less attractive I find it. What is your purpose in posting this stuff?
No one ever said that the gospel was easy to hear or ordained to tickle the ears of everyone . There are plenty of place where you can read an easy gospel. It just will not be posted by a Calvinist. So avoid us
From the article:
"We plead with our Reformed brothers and sisters..."
[One must assume that the writer is writing to people in the "Reformed" denominations.]
This, now, is their position:
[One must assume that he means the above described persons.]
Only the first three bullets could possibly be considered legitimate doctrinal positions of the persons set forth above. The final three bullets are conclusions which the writer has chosen to make, but which he attributes to the people he is castigating. The last two are particularly egregious:
On the other hand, the reason why the others are saved is not that God loved them, desired their salvation, and gave His Son to die for them (for He also loved those who perish, desired their salvation, and gave His Son for them), but that they, by their free will, chose to believe.
But, he saved the worst for last:
In conclusion, the damnation of the wicked is the defeat and disappointment of God, whereas the salvation of the believers is their own work.
Clearly, these "doctrinal position(s)" were made up, by the writer, and are not the actual doctrinal positions of any "Reformed" Christians.
If only the writer had read the article you posted yesterday, he would have known that this kind of attack was not appropriate. The following is a direct quote, from that article, with a minor modification: "[NON]-." 1) GET YOUR FACTS RIGHT:
You cannot expect [NON]-Calvinists to take you seriously if they can hardly identify themselves in what you write.
2) GIVE COMPLETE REFERENCES FOR WHAT YOU ARE SAYING: [NON]-
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-religion/1152724/posts
Maybe you should send him a copy of the first article, and ask him to provide a source for the above "doctrinal positions," so we can see that someone actually believes them.
DG
p.s. The above is obviously (I hope) intended to be a sort of verbal irony. Although my point is serious, I hope that you, (and other defenders of Calvinism) will be able to see that the admonitions of yesterday's article apply not only to your opponents, but also to the defenders of Calvinism.
p.p.s. It is instructive that I, personally, tried to avoid this quagmire. If GeRPiLs had not used these tactics (and worse) against me, we could now be getting along, and building each other up, instead of trying to tear each other down.
My old pastor once gave exegesis of John 3:16 in a way I had never thought of. The "so loved" in this verse can also be read as "in this way". The point being that God had a particular and peculiar way with regard to the cross and the redemption there attained for us. When I read Isaiah 55 the words "My ways are not your ways neither are your thoughts my thoughts" seem to bear this out. This understanding more than explaining what the world means seems to shed more light on this strawman of potential universalism. The world obviously cannot mean all men unless scripture is not consistant with itself.
Interesting. So, that IS the objective-- to be avoided by non-Calvinists. Hmmmm.
pony
A hyper-Calvinist is someone who either:
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"History teaches us that hyper-Calvinism is as much a threat to true Calvinism as Arminianism is. Virtually every revival of true Calvinism since the Puritan era has been hijacked, crippled, or ultimately killed by hyper-Calvinist influences. Modern Calvinists would do well to be on guard against the influence of these deadly trends."
Obviously, there are a lot of hyper-Calvinists amongst the GRPL.
As for John 2:2 and others - let's get something straight - all of creation groans under the weight of sin and waits for the redemption of the world. When Adam fell we died spiritually but the entrance of sin into God's creation was pervasive to all of creation.
Romans 8:19-21 - 19The creation waits in eager expectation for the sons of God to be revealed. 20For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope 21that[9] the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the glorious freedom of the children of God.
The whole of creation most certainly benefits from Christ's death upon the cross - it is we as humans, however, that have been called to choose based upon our particular dispensation of free will. This is where my belief in election comes in and understands that all have rejected (including the elect). All were given the opportunity to reject - how else could they reject something that was not offered to them in the first place?
God's love indeed extends to all mankind.
What we need,when these calvinist articles are posted are inputs by those who understand the greek, aramaic and latin texts from which these verses including the passages of predistination have been translatied into English. When I read the surrounding contextual verses in John and the predistination passages as well, I don't see how hypercalvinists can justify what they are saying. So what does the greek actually say?
One can turn the article back on itself and say that what the Calvinists are actually saying about John 3:16 For God so loved the World(of the predestined elect) that he gave his only begotten son, that who-soever believeth in him(that is when those of the elect come to that time in his or her life as pre-detirmined by God) shall not perish(it was never in doubt any way!) but have eternal life!
The verse just can't be interpreted that way!
Agreed.
If you believe that God loves everyone without exception, then you must believe God's Word contradicts itself:
Psalm 5
4For You are not a God who takes pleasure in wickedness,
Nor shall evil dwell with You.
5The boastful shall not stand in Your sight;
You hate all workers of iniquity.
6You shall destroy those who speak falsehood;
The LORD abhors the bloodthirsty and deceitful man.
What is your purpose in posting this stuff?
Truth!
Clarification: I'm in agreement with this statement.
I Timothy 2:5 For there is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus;
I Timothy 2:6 Who gave himself a ransom for all, to be testified in due time.
Frapster.
GRPL member #55.
I don't appreciate you stirring the pot - the scripture (and therefore God) speaks quite unfavorably about such behavior.
No, the objective isn't to avoid non-Calvinists. However, since you find God's Truth so distasteful to sugary sweet tastes, the Elect sister was simply advising you to save yourself some discomfort and seek easy believism and politically correct religion instead of the hard Truth.
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