God ordains some for Salvation and some for reprobation ( either by passing over or decree depending on the doctrinal stand of the Calvinist)
Please elaborate, I'm not familiar with this disctinction.
Some Calvinists are single predestaniarns and some are double. I suspect the single variety would be the most common.
Here is the distinction. Single predestination means that God sovereignly elected some to salvation and simply passed over the others.
A double predestinarian believes that God sovereignly elected some to be saved and other to be lost.
It is distinction without a difference to my mind, but I guess single "feels " more acceptable to some
To me, one of the clearer verses supporting the doctrine of election. Still, if predestination is based on foreknowledge, and the good pleasure of His will is to save us, it doesn't *necessarily* mean what you think it means. Of course, any good refutation of Calvinism would have to spend a considerable amount of time on this verse.
Here is what I see as the problem of election by foreknowledge.
By its very nature it is a salvation without grace. it must be 100% a salvation of works.
All mankind being on equal footing ( "totally depraved" ), some will manage to see and understand the gospel and will to repent and believe. Others will not even understand the gospel or seek after it .
God looks down the tube of time and sees who will select Him, He then elects them and sends them His grace. This is not according to His will , it is according to the will of the man that wills it.
It also means God becomes the debtor of man. God sees man choose correctly so he must give the man the reward for his choice. God owes it to him.
The definition for Mercy is not giving someone what they deserve . By the very method of election by foreknowledge the man does deserve it because he chose correctly .No grace or mercy in that scenario .
I think I see what you are getting at, but... if God grants the repentance, does the man really repent, or is it just God that repents for him? If the latter, how is that really repentance? If the former, how is that not wordly repentance? Your verses about granting repentance could be interpreted as meaning that God granted an effecacious repentance - that repentance leads to salvation is what is granted.
Here is what faces you. If repentance to salvation is not given to you ,then the Bible lies..that simple.
Yes, the repentance is efficacious. Worldly sorrow can not bring repentance to salvation. That is shown it two clear scriptural examples. Essau and Judas . Essau sought it with tears and Judas with returning the money, yet there was no repentance for them .
You ask a question: if God grants the repentance, does the man really repent, or is it just God that repents for him?
Funny thing is that God took the punishment for your sin for you and that seems ok right? (yes we can all be selective in out doctrinal application)
The real answer is God granting is not God doing , it is God giving .
Remember the day you were saved, and see if it lines up with my experience . (we will of course have different times and places)
I was praying and trying to understand the work of Jesus and how that related to me. I asked God to show me Jesus ( not physically but spiritually) In one second what I saw was all my sin , my memory fades as to exactly how ( 27 years ago) I do not remember if it was an impression or actually seeing .. but I do remember one second I was a woman that thought she was a pretty decent person , and the next I was driven to my knees in repentance. I knew how a holy God saw me.
I did not ask to repent it was given to me to repent . I suspect in one way or another , every saved man or woman had such a moment before they were saved. Suddenly they knew they were sinners in need of a Saviour...when 10 minutes before that was not what they thought at all.
Our salvation is an almost split second event , God regenerates you , gives you a new heart that changes all you priorities and there fore changes your will, God shows you His holiness and your sin to bring you to repentance , you repent and then as never before you desire to belong to the God of creation...
You have repented and you have believed. But it was the work of God that brought you to that place . His grace enabled you to do in that second, what you had now desire or been able to do before .
There are two scriptures I love that show this.
Isa 6:1 In the year that king Uzziah died I saw also the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up, and his train filled the temple.
Isa 6:2 Above it stood the seraphims: each one had six wings; with twain he covered his face, and with twain he covered his feet, and with twain he did fly.
Isa 6:3 And one cried unto another, and said, Holy, holy, holy, [is] the LORD of hosts: the whole earth [is] full of his glory.
Isa 6:4 And the posts of the door moved at the voice of him that cried, and the house was filled with smoke.
Isa 6:5 Then said I, Woe [is] me! for I am undone; because I [am] a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips: for mine eyes have seen the King, the LORD of hosts.
Isa 6:6 Then flew one of the seraphims unto me, having a live coal in his hand, [which] he had taken with the tongs from off the altar:
Isa 6:7 And he laid [it] upon my mouth, and said, Lo, this hath touched thy lips; and thine iniquity is taken away, and thy sin purged.
Isa 6:8 Also I heard the voice of the Lord, saying, Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?
Then said I, Here [am] I; send me.
Isa 6:9 And he said, Go, and tell this people, Hear ye indeed, but understand not; and see ye indeed, but perceive not.
The other is Pauls conversion (which we are all familiar with
Don't you mean they are granted repentance? And granted belief? Brought implies a guiding, which would imply some following - which would be a work. God just elects them, and *bang* they are new creatures, which naturally and invariably repent and believe, because that is the type of thing they are programmed for.
I do not see the great distinction. God grants us ( gives us some thing we do not deserve) and he brings us .
If you bring a cake to a church social did you guide it or did you carry it?
We see every step of salvation as totally of God.
I only saw two - choose this day whom you will serve...
That was a statement of Joshua's salvation . It was a call to the nation of Israel to return to God, it was not an individual altar call. His statement was clear, he had under the sovereignty of God led the nation into the promised land , now the nation had to decide if it would follow God or the idols of the heathens. ( that was one , what was the other ??)
Man chooses and then God rewards the correct choice . Where is Mercy in that ?
It looks saturated in Mercy to me. That there is a way abounds in Mercy, when we all deserve punishment. That the way is a free gift you merely accept, requiring no works, and no righteousness on the part of man.
You can not have it both ways..First you say that God looks down the tube of time and elects based on mans choices, making the man worthy of election (salvation ) ...thus removing the mercy
It looks saturated in the work and right choices of men to me choose right, and then God will save you. Mercy is giving man what he does not deserve, something he can not do or earn on his own. "I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life." What is meant by "Way"? Well, elsewhere, he describes the narrow path and the broad road... The whole image is that of a fork in the road... a choice. One Way leads salvation. That Way is Jesus.
That was in response to the Jews that thought law keeping was "the way" . Today ,that remains a very Catholic reading of that text. I have heard Catholics say that Jesus came to show how to be saved (good works ) . Jesus is more than an example of how to live ..He is life. Jesus is the way . HE IS THE WAY not a way .No one can come to the Father any other way (it is not about our walk, or choices but His) . And it is a narrow way , look around you and see how few comer. But it begs the question who will come that way ? ...you may want to tack onto that scripture a question ..who comes by the way ?
Jhn 6:44 No man can come to me, except the Father which hath sent me draw him: and I will raise him up at the last day..
You may read it a fork in the road, but the only ones with a map are the ones the Father enabled . You seem to think that Calvinists do not believe that man must make a choice ..nothing is further from the truth ...but dead men can not choose what color socks to wear for the funeral . Spiritually dead men can not find the road unless they are regenerated first. We are not "sorta "dead " from the fall. Dead is dead, not sick or weak.
IF? What you said there is exactly what I would have said. But, according to Calvin, he was already made righteous, or he would not have repented and believed.
IF is looking at it from a human perspective not a divine one. Man can do nothing to make himself righteous, man is declared righteous because of the faith that God has given him. No one is "righteous " in himself, we wear the righteousness of Christ because we are in Him . If you have a quote of Calvin that says a man is righteous before he is saved I would like to see it.
Hmm, now we're getting somewhere. I think I have been claiming all along that repentance and belief are require for salvation. Now you seem to think that too. Perhaps were are not so far apart as it seems. I thought I heard you saying that nothing was required on the part of the believer, that God goes *zap* and you're chosen, and redeemed, and that you will then, only then, and always then follow it with repentance and beleif. Did I miss what you were saying?
I would like to see where I ever said that (perhaps you read what you wanted to). Our election occured before the foundation of the world. All of the saved were redeemed at the cross ( unless you want to dismiss scripture). But the method of man coming is taught in scripture, we must repent and believe. How could both things be true? Both were accomplished before the foundation of the earth . Jesus redeemed all those that the Father gave to Him. In Gods time He draws those that were redeemed with His grace and regenerates them . Just as God ordained a time and place for our human birth , He has ordained a time and place for our spiritual rebirth. What God has ordained will always come to pass, so the salvation of the elect is assured..but that is different than being born saved . we are all born as sinner in need of a savior. Calvinists and Arminians are not far apart. The gulf only looks huge until we stop to look at it . The order to a Calvinist is hearing the word/ regeneration (quickening , born again) / faith/repentance . (basically happing at the same time , but repentance 1st according to scripture) salvation Arminians
Hearing the word / belief/ repentance/ regeneration (born again)
We do share a belief that man must repent and believe to be saved. The difference is in the view of man ability. Can a spiritually dead man seek what will save Him?
I have trouble reconciling the two halves of your sentence. Believed to salvation? That sounds right. Given to him to believe? How so?
Phl 1:29For unto you it is given in the behalf of Christ, not only to believe on him,
I think we agree that faith is listed as a spiritual gift right ? It is reinforced by scripture like this
One is not saved by a faith that clicks its heels together and says "I want to go home , I want to go home" Faith to salvation has a divine element to it , it is not just another expression of human faith . Something must precede a supernatural faith, and that thing is grace from God . As Calvinists we do not believe that Gods grace ever fails to accomplish what He wills .So when I say given , it is the same as given repentance . The grace of God works in the person to produce god's desired result.
Acts 16:14, “The Lord opened her heart to give heed to what was said by Paul.”
John 6:65, “This is why I told you that no one can come to me unless it is granted to him by my Father.” (Matt. 16:17; Luke 10:21)
1 Cor. 1:23-24, “We preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to gentiles, but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ, the power of God and the wisdom of God.”
Gods grace is always efficacious
but also to suffer for his sake
If it was given to him first, then he was saved before he believed.
I hope this error is clarified. What is given is the faith that leads to repentance and belief .
He was regenerated first - which is always followed by repentance and belief... but, imagine the unlucky man who died the instant he was regenerated - is he regenerated, or not?
LOL Do you think God is helpless or clueless ? He is the God of creation. He has numbered our days. Just as he set the day of our birth , he has set the day of our salvation. Remember the Isaiah scripture? His word never returns void. It always accomplishes what it was sent for.. in this case it is sent to bring faith. The unregenerate man can not hear or understand the gospel , he is dead.. God sees to it that each of the elect will be regenerated ,hear the word, come to faith ,repent and believe.
Not one will be lost. The world travails now until the time when all the elect are home, then the Judge of the world will return .
Yes. Thus, he is already saved, before he repents and believes, no? And that seems contrary to everything the Bible teaches. That is part of why I haven't yet embraced Calvinism.
Well as you see , you have not really understood reform doctrine. To be saved one must repent and believe. All that repent and believe do by the work of God because they were elect. Not one that God has as His elect will fail to repent and believe.