Posted on 02/11/2010 7:29:41 AM PST by Mr Rogers
Calvinism's Exhaustive Determinism and Old Testament Scriptures
Submitted by WilliamBirch on Thu, 01/28/2010 - 9:16am
"I don't see how anyone could read the Old Testament and not conclude that Calvinism is right," was the assessment of one Calvinist professor recently. By "Calvinism" he meant the notion of God's exhaustive predeterminism of all things by decree.
This professor was merely being consistent and honest about his own beliefs. He has done nothing immorally or ethically wrong with making such a statement to his students. My only hope is that his students do not take their professor's word on the matter but study, like a good Berean, for themselves (consulting opposing ideas and exegesis) to examine Scripture every day to see if what the professor says is true (Acts 17:11).
This professor is also defending a confession nearly four centuries old: "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."1
Given the statement above, we then ask, In what manner did God foreordain whatsoever comes to pass ~ by foreknowledge of what free creatures would do? The Confession answers: "Although God knows whatsoever may or can come to pass upon all supposed conditions, yet hath He not decreed anything because He foresaw it as future, or as that which would come to pass upon such conditions."2 So, everything which comes to pass does so because God has preordained for it to come to pass. And when creatures behave in a certain manner, they do so "freely" by God's foreordained decree. God preordained what they should do; they do it "freely" and they will be held accountable for what they "freely" do (even though it was God who preordained what they should "freely" do).
Now this, according to the professor and all Calvinists, is affirmed in the Old Testament so much so that one wonders how anyone can read it and not conclude that Calvinism is right. If this is true, then there are certain ideas, certain conclusions, consistent affirmations, which should not appear in the pages of the Old Testament. Remembering that all events were strictly foreordained by decree, not by foreknowledge of future free will acts but by the exhaustive determinism of God's plan, note the following from the prophet Jeremiah:
This is what the LORD says: "What fault did your fathers find in me, that they strayed so far from me? They followed worthless idols and became worthless themselves. They did not ask, 'Where is the LORD, who brought us up out of Egypt and led us through the barren wilderness, through a land of deserts and rifts, a land where no one travels and no one lives?' I brought you into a fertile land to eat its fruit and rich produce. But you came and defiled my land and made my inheritance detestable. The priests did not ask, 'Where is the LORD?' Those who deal with the law did not know me; the leaders rebelled against me. The prophets prophesied by Baal, following worthless idols. Therefore I bring charges against you again," declares the LORD (Jeremiah 2:5-9 NIV).
But if The LORD has "unchangeably ordained whatsoever comes to pass," then why is the LORD complaining about Israel's unfaithfulness? Did He not foreordain their unfaithfulness? Yes, He must have foreordained their unfaithfulness if God "unchangeably ordains whatsoever comes to pass." Is the LORD not the Sovereign? Can any person or group of people do anything which the LORD has not foreordained for them to do? Hence if Israel was unfaithful, it is due to God's foreordaination.
And yet we find the LORD declaring:
My people have committed two sins: They have forsaken me, the spring of living water, and have dug their own cisterns, broken cisterns that cannot hold water. Is Israel a servant, a slave by birth? Why then has he become plunder? Lions have roared; they have growled at him. They have laid waste his land; his towns are burned and deserted. Also, the men of Memphis and Tahpanhes have shaved the crown of your head. Have you not brought this on yourselves by forsaking the LORD your God when he led you in the way? (Jeremiah 2:13-17 NIV).
Even the LORD Himself confessed that the reason why He had acted thus with Israel is due to their own stubbornness and unfaithfulness ~ unless one is willing to admit that it was God who foreordained their unfaithfulness so that He could punish them for the sins that He foreordained for them to commit. But yes, that is exactly what Calvinism teaches. God did not foreknow the willing unfaithfulness of Israel and thereby decree whatsoever should come to pass. No, in order to be considered sovereign (according to Calvinism), God must have foreordained all things by decree, not by foreknowledge.
A question needs to be asked: What exactly is rebellion? For if the Israelites were rebelling against the LORD, then that means that they were rebelling against a command which God had ordered to be kept. If God is sovereign, in the manner in which Calvinists define sovereignty, then no one can ever disobey God's foreordained plan ~ which by necessity must include rebellion. By their rebellion, they were actually, "freely," obeying God's strict, foreordained decree.
Yet we find God Himself admitting that human beings have the ability to reject His authority. The LORD said: "Indeed, long ago you threw off my authority and refused to be subject to me. You said, 'I will not serve you.' Instead, you gave yourself to other gods on every high hill and under every green tree" (Jer. 2:20 NET Bible; cf. Jer. 2:29). But how could the Israelites reject God's sovereign authority? How could they refuse to be subject to Him, since He has strictly foreordained all that comes to pass? God (allegedly) foreordained their rebellion, which they (allegedly) "freely" committed, and then God punished them for it.
But even God's punishment for their sins did not result in their repentance: "In vain I punished your people; they did not respond to correction" (Jer. 2:30 NIV). Respond to correction? But Calvinism teaches that God sovereignly grants repentance to whom He pleases. How could God complain about their lack of response to repentance when He did not grant them repentance (nor foreordain their repentance)?
What we discover is that God made Himself vulnerable to Israel: "Indeed they have followed sinful ways; they have forgotten to be true to the LORD their God. Come back to me, you wayward people, I want to cure your waywardness" (Jer. 3:21-22 NET Bible). But was God genuinely granting them repentance?
Yes, the LORD has this to say to the people of Judah and Jerusalem: "Like a farmer breaking up hard unplowed ground, you must break your rebellious will and make a new beginning; just as a farmer must clear away thorns lest the seed is wasted, you must get rid of the sin that is ruining your lives. Just as ritual circumcision cuts away the foreskin as an external symbol of dedicated covenant commitment, you must genuinely dedicate yourselves to the LORD and get rid of everything that hinders your commitment to me, people of Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem. If you do not, my anger will blaze up like a flaming fire against you that no one will be able to extinguish. That will happen because of the evil you have done" (Jer. 4:3-4 NET Bible).
Is God sovereign? Yes, God is utterly sovereign. Has He foreordained what every person should do by a mere decree? No, absolutely not. If so, then, as the Old Testament proves, God would certainly be schizophrenic ~ foreordaining that a person rebel against Him and then complain and punish the person for obeying His foreordained decree to rebel against Him.
And God was by no means finished in His complaining: "Oh people of Jerusalem, purify your hearts from evil so that you may yet be delivered. How long will you continue to harbor up wicked schemes within you?" (Jer. 4:14 NET Bible). Calvinism must answer: As long as the decree of God has already foreordained.
Why did God punish Israel? "So then, Jeremiah, when your people ask, 'Why has the LORD our God done all this to us?' tell them, 'It is because you rejected me and served foreign gods in your own land'" (Jer. 5:19 NET Bible). Were they not just fulfilling that which God had foreordained? "But these people have stubborn and rebellious hearts. They have turned aside and gone their own way" (Jer. 5:23 NET Bible).
Gone their own way? So, they did not go the LORD's way but their own way? Does that, then, mean that there were two ways: the LORD's way of obedience and righteousness and their own way of disobedience and unrighteousness? "'There is no limit to the evil things they do. They do not plead the cause of the fatherless in such a way as to win it. They do not defend the rights of the poor. I will certainly punish them for doing such things!' says the LORD" (Jer. 5:28-29 NET Bible). "The LORD said to his people: 'You are standing at the crossroads. So consider your path. Ask where the old, reliable paths are. Ask where the path is that leads to blessing and follow it. If you do, you will find rest for your souls.' But they said, 'We will not follow it!'" (Jer. 6:16 NET Bible).
Calvinism would have us believe that God foreordained by decree that the Israelites "freely" rebelled against the LORD (and that they could not have chosen any other path but rebellion), while the LORD stood by and commanded them to choose the righteous path. More specifically than that, Calvinists would have us believe that "God influences the desires and decisions of people. . . . But we must remember that in all these passages it is very clear that Scripture nowhere shows God as directly doing anything evil, but rather as bringing about evil deeds through the willing actions of moral creatures."3
But the question begging to be asked is, How does a "free" agent "freely" do something which God has foreordained for him or her to do? How can God be guaranteed that a "free" agent will "freely" decide to do that which He has foreordained, unless He eliminates all choices, thereby guaranteeing the outcome which He decreed? And if God eliminated all choices, in order for the "free" agent to "freely" do that which God decreed, then the agent was not "free" to choose the contrary whatsoever. Hence genuine "freedom" is a farce.
Arminians do not need to rely on philosophy as a crutch: Scripture clearly supports Arminian theology ~ or rather, Arminian theology affirms the truth of Scripture. God told the Israelites: "Look! I have set before you today life and prosperity on the one hand, and death and disaster on the other. . . . Therefore choose life so that you and your descendants may live!" (Deut. 30:15, 19 NET Bible; cf. Jer. 6:16; 7:3-7). Why would God grant the Israelites these choices if He had already foreordained by decree that which He had predetermined they should choose? How unjust would God have to be in order to foreordain that a person should "freely" choose rebellion, when that person had no other choice but to rebel against God? And how unreasonable would God have to be to then complain about and punish the person who carries out that which He unchangeably and predeterminately decreed for him or her to do?
Do not be fooled into thinking that Arminians deny the sovereignty of God. Nothing could be farther from the truth. What Arminians deny is the Calvinist's erroneous and philosophical insistence that God exhaustively determined everything that comes to pass merely by a divine decree. We do so because the Bible does not teach it.
God will certainly "accomplish all things according to the counsel of his will" (Eph. 1:11 NET Bible). But we are not permitted to go further and affirm that God has decreed all things, not from foreknowledge of genuine free acts, but according to His own counsel and will. He told Israel: "Obey me. If you do, I will be your God and you will be my people. Live exactly the way I tell you" (Jer. 7:23 NET Bible). Israel disobeyed the LORD, and He responded: "I have rejected them because the people of Judah have done what I consider evil" (Jer. 7:30). They even sacrificed their infants by fire to a false god. The LORD responded: "That is something I never commanded them to do! Indeed, it never even entered my mind to command such a thing!" (Jer. 7:31 NET Bible; cf. Jer. 19:5). And yet they did it! How? By God's predetermined decree or by their own wickedness? Arminians affirm the latter, biblical response, while Calvinists espouse the former error.
The Old Testament even affirms that some of God's intentions did not come to fruition, despite Calvinism's promotion to the contrary. The LORD said: "For, I say, just as shorts cling tightly to a person's body, so I bound the whole nation of Israel and the whole nation of Judah tightly to me. I intended for them to be my special people and to bring me fame, honor, and praise. But they would not obey me" (Jer. 13:11 NET Bible).
The prophet Isaiah confessed the same thing concerning the LORD building His vineyard: "What more can I do for my vineyard beyond what I have already done? When I waited for it to produce edible grapes, why did it produce sour ones instead?" (Isaiah 5:4 NET Bible)
I don't see how anyone could read the Old Testament and not conclude that Arminianism is right, and Calvinism is wrong.
1 The Westminster Confession of Faith, in The Life in the Spirit Study Bible, ed. Richard L. Pratt, Jr. (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2003), 3.1:2176.
2 Ibid.
3 Wayne A. Grudem, Bible Doctrine: Essential Teachings of the Christian Faith, ed. Jeff Purswell (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1999), 146-47.
The Israelites were chosen, not as individuals, but as descendants of Israel (and thus Isaac & Abraham). When Genesis 4 has, "6The LORD said to Cain, "Why are you angry, and why has your face fallen? 7 If you do well, will you not be accepted? And if you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door. Its desire is for you, but you must rule over it.", God wasn't mocking Cain, but giving him a genuine warning - that Cain refused to heed.
Likewise, we become 'elect' when we are born again and placed in Christ Jesus. We are not a list of names that God saves or damns per the list, but making real choices in response to the grace God has given everyone.
We all know that just because a human foresees something happening, it doesn’t mean that is what made it happen, but why do we assume that when talking about God? Perhaps when God, the all-knowing creator, knows something will happen, it has to happen? After all, If God cannot be wrong, doesn’t Him knowing something will happen mean it has to happen that way?
Calivinism is all about the sovereinty of God. Did you choose God, while you were dead in sin, or did God choose you? R.C. Sproul’s book, Chosen by God was an eye opener for me. Calvinism is the gospel message. (Now I’m ready for the attacks from the Arminians. Could we please keep the discourse civil?)
I know the ending to the Lord of the Rings - but I didn’t write it or cause it.
But when I sin, am I doing what God compels me to do? If so, I’m obeying him by sinning. If not, then we have more freedom than Calvin admits.
As I said, you’re not God either. If anything is possible with God, why not this? Perhaps God doesn’t consider what you think as sin, the same way you do?
Your attempt at removing that free will merely lessens God.
Which, of course, is an oxymoron, since the definition of sin is to be outside of God's will.
“Did you choose God, while you were dead in sin, or did God choose you?”
God reaches out to us. Are we, by his grace, able to respond?
And are we DEAD in sin? One of Calvin’s errors was to take A metaphor for our state and ignore many others:
Jhn 5:25 “Truly, truly, I say to you, an hour is coming, and is now here, when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God, and those who hear will live.
Rom 4:17 as it is written, “I have made you the father of many nations”—in the presence of the God in whom he believed, who gives life to the dead and calls into existence the things that do not exist.
Eph 2:1 And you were dead in the trespasses and sins
Eph 2:5 even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved—
Col 2:13 And you, who were dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made alive together with him, having forgiven us all our trespasses,
1Pe 4:6 For this is why the gospel was preached even to those who are dead, that though judged in the flesh the way people are, they might live in the spirit the way God does.
Anything else? Slaves or bondservants
Jhn 8:34 Jesus answered them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, everyone who commits sin is a slave to sin.
Rom 6:16 Do you not know that if you present yourselves to anyone as obedient slaves, you are slaves of the one whom you obey, either of sin, which leads to death, or of obedience, which leads to righteousness?
Rom 6:17 But thanks be to God, that you who were once slaves of sin have become obedient from the heart to the standard of teaching to which you were committed,
Rom 6:19 I am speaking in human terms, because of your natural limitations. For just as you once presented your members as slaves to impurity and to lawlessness leading to more lawlessness, so now present your members as slaves to righteousness leading to sanctification.
Rom 6:20 When you were slaves of sin, you were free in regard to righteousness.
Gal 4:7 So you are no longer a slave, but a son, and if a son, then an heir through God.
Blind
Mat 23:16 “Woe to you, blind guides, who say, ‘If anyone swears by the temple, it is nothing, but if anyone swears by the gold of the temple, he is bound by his oath.’
Mat 23:17 “You blind fools! For which is greater, the gold or the temple that has made the gold sacred?
Mat 23:19 “You blind men! For which is greater, the gift or the altar that makes the gift sacred?
Mat 23:24 “You blind guides, straining out a gnat and swallowing a camel!
Mat 23:26 “You blind Pharisee! First clean the inside of the cup and the plate, that the outside also may be clean.
Luk 4:18 “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed,
Rom 2:19 and if you are sure that you yourself are a guide to the blind, a light to those who are in darkness,
2Pe 1:9 For whoever lacks these qualities is so nearsighted that he is blind, having forgotten that he was cleansed from his former sins.
Other
Eph 2:3 among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind.
Eph 5:8 for at one time you were darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Walk as children of light
2Pe 2:14 They have eyes full of adultery, insatiable for sin. They entice unsteady souls. They have hearts trained in greed. Accursed children!
1Jo 3:10 By this it is evident who are the children of God, and who are the children of the devil: whoever does not practice righteousness is not of God, nor is the one who does not love his brother.
Mat 9:12 But when he heard it, he said, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick.
Mar 2:17 And when Jesus heard it, he said to them, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. I came not to call the righteous, but sinners.”
Phl 2:15 that you may be blameless and innocent, children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and twisted generation, among whom you shine as lights in the world,
Can a captive respond to an offer of freedom? Can a blind man imagine healing? Can an abused child desire safety?
When Jesus said, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel.”, was it a real invitation?
The son was dead, but now is alive.
“If anything is possible with God, why not this?”
Because anything is NOT possible with God, if He is the God revealed in scripture. God does not violate his nature - he is who he is, and doesn’t vary.
Calvin would be appalled if he knew his writings were referred to as “Calvinism.”
I heard so much about him I started reading his Institutes.
Some of the most wonderful, Bible exposition possible.
I’m just a grandma, but I wish people would read what Calvin wrote, instead of all the things written about him.
He puts things together in a logical, easy to understand way.
Actually, the son was living with pigs, and decided to return.
“15So he went and hired himself out to one of the citizens of that country, who sent him into his fields to feed pigs. 16And he was longing to be fed with the pods that the pigs ate, and no one gave him anything.
17”But when he came to himself, he said, ‘How many of my father’s hired servants have more than enough bread, but I perish here with hunger! 18I will arise and go to my father, and I will say to him, “Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you.” - Luke 15
I agree. Being of the "Conditional" viewpoint, I find Calvin's view unbiblical - earnestly given, but wrong.
To those able to hear, it was:
John 6:65-66
Luke 15:32
snippet from “Bondage of the Will”
“...Since God’s foreknowledge is not uncertain, “free-will” is non-existent
It is fundamentally necessary and healthy for Christians to acknowledge that God foreknows nothing uncertainly, but that He foresees, purposes, and does all things according to His own immutable, eternal and infallible will. This bombshell knocks “free-will” flat, and utterly shatters it; so that those who want to assert it must either deny my bombshell, or pretend not to notice it, or find some other way of dodging it. Surely it was you, my good Erasmus, who a moment ago asserted that God is by nature just, and kindness itself? If this is true, does it not follow that He is immutably just and kind? that, as His nature remains unchanged to all eternity, so do His justice and kindness? And what is said of His justice and kindness must be said also of His knowledge, His wisdom, His goodness, His will, and the other Divine attributes. But if it is religious, godly and wholesome, to affirm these things of God, as you do, what has come over you, that now you should contradict yourself by affirming that it is irreligious, idle and vain to say that God foreknows by necessity? You insist that we should learn the immutability of God’s will, while forbidding us to know the immutably of His foreknowledge! Do you suppose that He does not will what He foreknows, or that He does not foreknow what He wills? If he wills what He foreknows, His will is eternal and changeless, because His nature is so. From which it follows, by resistless logic, that all we do, however it may appear to us to be done freely and optionally, is in reality done necessarily and immutably in respect of God’s will. For the will of God is effective and cannot be impeded, since power belongs to God’s nature; and His wisdom is such that He cannot be deceived. Since, then His will is not impeded, what is done cannot but be done where, when, how, as far as, and by whom, He foresees and wills...”
http://www.reformedreader.org/bow.htm
That's the quandry Calvinism runs into. God has not pre-ordained that any individual will sin, but just that some men or women will sin with their own free will. By the same token, God can "harden" the hearts or minds of whoever He wills to bring about His plan - this is what Paul, I think, meant by his remarks on the potter and the clay.
I am not a Greek scholar, so believe it or not, as you will.
My pastor (who is knowledgeable in Greek) has said that this phrase more properly translates into "give himself to his own desires". God doesn't actually make the person hate God, but allows the person to follow his own heart, and stops trying to convince him.
If Calvinism is true, then God intentionally created sinful men for the sole purpose of destroying them eternally for disobeying his standard which he NEVER did anything to assist them.
That type of god is not a loving God.
If God created men with free will to repent, believe and receive His offer of forgiveness, that is mercy and Love.
Creating an eternal soul that has no chance of any kind ever for any reason to receive forgiveness for their sin against God’s standards is the epitome of evil
Calvinism’s god is not the God of the Bible.
Thank God that Heaven is for those who make the decision to repent, believe, and receive the free gift offred to those who believe.
Making someone believe is no different than preventing someone from believing and then blaming them for not believing.
Real Calvinism, as preached and taught by John Calvin was not so rabid as people tend to want to label (libel?). From my studies, I have yet to find where Calvin actually said that god “imposes” salvation or damnation on mankind.
I believe the “5 points” of Calvinism can be explained in a simple manner - it is all about perspective.
When I was saved, I had a decision to make - though from a functional level, there was NO OTHER choice to make, but Salvation. God knew me and what it would take to bring about my salvation. He then engineered the parts of my life, and used the Holy Spirit to convict my heart at the exact right time. As a function of His divine traits (Sovereign, Omnipotent, Omnicient, Omnipresent, et al), nothing surprises God. Because He exists not just in a single moment in time as we do, but God exists now, yesterday, and tomorrow - all at the same time. Thus He already knows the outcome, because He is the author. He knew us before time began.
We can claim a certain level of “free will”, but that is all constrained by God’s divine sovereignty and will. The decision isn’t quite as simple as “I choose God” and “I choose to reject God”, though that is what the summary result/effect is.
In fact, in reading Calvin’s work, I have yet to read anything that indicates such a dogmatic as “double predestination” as modern hyper-calvinists have developed (and most people think of when referring to “Calvinism”. Jacobus Arminius and John Calvin were not as diametrically opposed as today’s debaters would imply.
And the whole debate can truly be summed up with this question: Is God Sovereign?
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