Posted on 01/16/2006 12:59:35 AM PST by Gamecock
Most interesting, isn't it? God only picks "winners?"
GOODMORNING AND THANKYOU FOR THE THREAD!
GRACE TO YOU!
Does God know everything without exception or does God not know everything without exception.
It's that simple.
Your doctrine is always structured around rejection of Catholic Doctrine. Even in rejecting us you use our authority. Interesting, no?
Chuck Smith does NOT agree with the Catholic position expressed at the Council of Trent. The Catholic position confesses that God is the ultimate creator of all things, including the human desire to choose God.
I hope Smith was just being sloppy, his analogy is so poor. God doesn't choose us because he knows we will choose him. Just the opposite: we will choose God because it is a characteristic of the way God has created us. God knows who will respond to his call not only because he can foresee the future, but because he knows what he has created.
The Catholic position is not, like Smith's appears to be, a rejection of the fact that God is the author of all first things, but merely that our acceptance of God is not alien to us, which would make our obedience a bondage, but essential to us, which makes our obedience a liberation.
The difference between Calvinists and Catholics is largely a difference over the MEANING of what it means to have free will. Catholics do not use free will to mean that God is not the author of our decision to embrace him!
The Catholic position is that we are created good, and corrupted by evil through original sin. Thus, once the stain of sin is removed, our inherent goodness shines forth. But that goodness is made visible by two things, which both are miraculous: Our goodness depends solely on having been created by God, and the continuous grace through which we resist concupisence. Words that inidicate that we are created good include "purification," and "restored."
What is rejected at Trent is, in part, passivity of the will. Luther was encouraging people to indulge their evil desires, insisting that by doing so, they could experience that God loved them unconditionally, and would grow in their faith which would result in their evil desires being stripped away. The Catholic Church was asserting that doing God's will required struggle, an active resistance against evil through resisting temptation and seeking grace. Luther rejected this as "salvation through works."
What I don't understand is if God picks winners, if He picks people who were going to choose Him anyway......what was the point of His picking them?
I mean, it's not like they needed His help to choose Him.
That's not how synergism works. God makes the first move, always. We either let Him in or we shut the door.
I think the Arminian (and perhaps the Catholic?) position sees election as some kind of ratification of the foreseen choice, whereas Calvinists see election as causative of conversion.
So I am a winner because I chose Him first? Hmmm, lets follow this logic ... In other words then, according to Smith's analogy, God only chooses the one who has physically trained himself better, or is naturally stronger than the one who lost the race, so to speak. Or, to bring this same analogy into the spiritual realm, God chooses the one who contributed more towards his/her salvation - One man, while still in his old nature, either created a right thought, generated a right affection, or originated a right volition that led to his salvation while the other man, did not have the natural wherewithal to come up with the faith that God required of him to obtain salvation (to "win the race').
The quote taken by the author here is taken in a dishonest manner in my opinion. The concludions he draws from tht analogy are dishonest as well.
If you read the whole sermon it is clear that Smith is confessing that it is God who does the choosing yet man is responsible.
Chuck Smith preaches 15,000 sermons and this guy gets a transcript of one paragraph in one of them to try to accuse Chuck Smith saying something he simply did not say. The author's conclusions about the meaning of what Chuck Smith said are either wholly ignorant or wholly dishonest or both.
Gamecock, you can do better than this article.
The illustration was undeniably heterodox. God chooses winners? No, he makes losers winners. Chuck Smith was definately wrong in this sermon. Dreadfully wrong.
That said, I'd challenge any preacher to preach 15,000 sermons and not say something heterodox at any point in time. This doesn't make him some sort of heretic - it just means he screwed up on this one.
kosta-"God makes the first move...We either let Him in or we shut the door."
If God chooses everyone or give everyone the same and equal chance simply because God wants all men to be saved, then doesn't it amount to us making some better decision than someone else? Wouldn't that classify us as a "winner" as the author points out? The only difference the author should have stated was:
Author-"So I am a winner because I chose Him first?"
Ok, but what's the purpose of this Ratification-Election? Why does God need to ratify anything if the choice was going to be made?
At least in Calvinism Election serves a purpose. Without it no one would "choose" God.
The analogy chosen by Smith was obviously a bad one. But the conclusions drawn from that analogy by the author are patently dishonest.
The fact is that if you come to Christ you are a winner. Do you deny that? You have been chosen by Christ. If you don't come to Christ, you are a loser. Do you deny that? That is the conclusion to be drawn.
How else could "God chooses winners" be taken?
(sheesh, I almost typed "God cheeses winners....thank goodness for preview!)
I absolutely deny that. I came to Christ a loser, and remain a loser. I am only a winner insofar as Christ, through his grace, made it possible for me to cooperate with his grace.
If you don't come to Christ, you are a loser. Do you deny that?
Those that reject Christ are no more "losers" than those who do. This is Pelagianism - not the phony Pelagian spectre that some paranoid Calvinists see lurking behind every Wesleyan, Pentacostal, or Catholic, but the real deal.
I hope you misread what I said in ignorance and not in dishonesty. I did not say that God has chosen you because you are a winner, I said that you are a winner because God chose you.
You did exactly with my statement what the author did with Smith's.
I misconstrued nothing. I have no antipathy towards Cassianianism or Wesleyanism, but this goes well-beyond either moderate non-Calvinist viewpoint. This attributes election to someone's "winner-ness," and is the sine qua non of Pelagianism.
(You will note that I have carefully never called you - nor Chuck Smith a Pelagian. I don't believe either you nor he are for a minute. But your statement is undeniably Pelagian - the real thing.)
You better read Pastor Smith's quote again. Here is the relevant section:
Would you pick out a bunch of losers? You would be stupid if you did. Of course you wouldn't you would pick the winners, because you know in advance who is going to win the race.
The people aren't winners because chose them, God chose them because they are winners. Otherwise it would be impossible for God to choose a loser.
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