Posted on 06/17/2013 6:59:32 AM PDT by marshmallow
Can’t we all just get along?
That was the question that Southern Baptists, torn between Calvinists and non-Calvinists, seemed to be asking as they opened their two-day annual meeting in Houston.
Frank Page, president of the Southern Baptist Convention’s Executive Committee, created a 19-member advisory committee that produced a report in time for the meeting called “Truth, Trust and Testimony.”
Southern Baptists have been divided over Calvinism since their denomination began in 1845, but Page said Monday (June 10) that disagreements had reached a tipping point.
“The truth is, I see an anti-Calvinism now that frightens me; it’s a vitriol that is nasty,” he said, adding he also has friends who were concerned about “extreme Calvinists.” ‘’So it was my opinion that we need to deal with this. . Trust is hitting a new low.”
Calvinism, based on the teachings of 16th-century Protestant Reformer John Calvin, differs from traditional Baptist theology in key aspects, particularly on the role of human free will and whether God chooses only the “elect” for salvation.
The 3,200-word report calls for mutual respect among the differing factions, saying opponents should talk to each other rather than about each other, especially on social media. Churches and would-be pastors also need to be honest about whether they embrace or shun Calvinism, it said.
(Excerpt) Read more at articles.washingtonpost.com ...
“That make sit His choice; He chooses everyone, and our choice, whether to respond or not.”
Yet the scripture says:
Joh 15:16 Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you, and ordained you, that ye should go and bring forth fruit, and that your fruit should remain: that whatsoever ye shall ask of the Father in my name, he may give it you.
This is not a tenuous thing where Christ’s choice can be rejected by the individual, otherwise it would be pointless to say that He chose anyone at all. The purpose here is to transform us so that we bear fruit, and not a response to us having the possibility to bear fruit. We are chosen not because of our works, but before we had done “either good or evil,” “ not according to our works, but according to his own purpose and grace, which was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began.”
“Ye have not chosen me,” Christ declares. You, personally, have not chosen Jesus Christ. He corrects them from falsely believing that they came to Him of their own accord, that they believed through their own “flesh and blood.”
This is the same point Christ makes when He responds to Peter’s confession in Matt 16:17. “Flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven.” It is not possible for sinful man to even conceive of these things; he must have his soul quickened and a new heart placed in to him so that he should believe.
Jer_24:7 And I will give them an heart to know me, that I am the LORD: and they shall be my people, and I will be their God: for they shall return unto me with their whole heart.
So what part of a man is capable of choosing God in your system? Is there some spark of goodness in a man that merely needs a little help to surface?
Christ goes on, “but I have chosen you.” He emphasizes the fact that they did not really choose Him. It was Christ who chose them, which directly led to their following. Because “the sheep hear my voice, and follow me.”
“And ordained you, that ye should go and bring forth fruit, and that your fruit should remain.” How can anything man do remain? Our depravity makes it impossible for us to to any good work that can remain eternally:
Isa 64:6 But we are all as an unclean thing, and all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags; and we all do fade as a leaf; and our iniquities, like the wind, have taken us away.
Therefore, if our work is to remain, it is necessary that the work comes from God, and not of ourselves. It is “ordained... that your fruit should remain: that whatsoever ye shall ask of the Father in my name, He may give it to you” (John 15:16). The purpose of God’s choice is to obtain a people who will produce fruit, but not that they were already capable of it. “As he saith also in Osee, I will call them my people, which were not my people; and her beloved, which was not beloved.”
If at the final evaluation, it was your choice to choose Christ, then Christ certainly did not choose you; or, He is choosing you based on how “enlightened” you are in being one of the few human beings alive who “seeks God,” when Paul declares that “none understand, none seek after God. They are together become unprofitable.”
Christ does not speak of any of the elect as being able to say no. He declares:
Joh 6:37 All that the Father giveth me shall come to me; and him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out.
And again:
Joh 6:39 And this is the Father’s will which hath sent me, that of all which he hath given me I should lose nothing, but should raise it up again at the last day.
And again:
Joh 10:27-29 My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me: (28) And I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand. (29) My Father, which gave them me, is greater than all; and no man is able to pluck them out of my Father’s hand.
So what do you offer in response to this? A man-glorifying exaltation that says that Christ draws only those who are “enlightened” enough to respond to the work of the Holy Spirit? That God’s work on a soul is insufficient, but must be completed by a man? And that His choice isn’t made “before either having done good or evil,” but actually after foreseeing what would be done after they had begun to work good or evil?
Regrettably, it IS one or the other. You've demonstrated Cassian's viewpoint-the "point of decision". This was exactly his position. It is the Catholic's position and the Arminian's position. God opens the heart but people have a right to refuse.
Augustine's position would be that God opens the heart and when one sees and understand the truth, they repent. They do this on their own accord and will. But they repent for they see and understand the glory before them. This is why we say Christians are "called" by God.
Acts 17:27-30 27 God did this so that they would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from any one of us. 28 ‘For in him we live and move and have our being.’ As some of your own poets have said, ‘We are his offspring.’ 29 “Therefore since we are God’s offspring, we should not think that the divine being is like gold or silver or stone—an image made by human design and skill. 30 In the past God overlooked such ignorance, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent.
1 Timothy 2:3-6 3 This is good, and it is pleasing in the sight of God our Savior, 4 who desires all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth. 5 For there is one God, and there is one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, 6 who gave himself as a ransom for all, which is the testimony given at the proper time.
Deuteronomy 30:19-20 19 I call heaven and earth to witness against you today, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and curse. Therefore choose life, that you and your offspring may live, 20 loving the Lord your God, obeying his voice and holding fast to him, for he is your life and length of days, that you may dwell in the land that the Lord swore to your fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give them.”
Luke 13:34 O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it! How often would I have gathered your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing!
Isaiah 55:1-7 “Come, everyone who thirsts, come to the waters; and he who has no money, come, buy and eat! Come, buy wine and milk without money and without price. 2 Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread, and your labor for that which does not satisfy? Listen diligently to me, and eat what is good, and delight yourselves in rich food. 3 Incline your ear, and come to me; hear, that your soul may live; and I will make with you an everlasting covenant, my steadfast, sure love for David. 4 Behold, I made him a witness to the peoples, a leader and commander for the peoples. 5 Behold, you shall call a nation that you do not know, and a nation that did not know you shall run to you, because of the Lord your God, and of the Holy One of Israel, for he has glorified you.
6 “Seek the Lord while he may be found; call upon him while he is near; 7 let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts; let him return to the Lord, that he may have compassion on him, and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon.
It seems to have escaped the attention of most Calvinists that God WANTS to save people.
The more I interact with Calvinists, the more I see Catholicism in attitude.
The same appeal to extra Biblical writings.
The same demand of adherence to *correct* doctrine.
The same austere, harsh, condemning, unloving, capricious God.
The same propensity to slap labels on others.
The same tendency to go to an extreme in regard to election vs free will.
The same arrogance and lack of compassion towards those on the outside.
Present company excluded since you identify as a Calvinist.
You have not demonstrated those qualities.
“It seems to have escaped the attention of most Calvinists that God WANTS to save people.”
It seems to have escaped your attention that God does save people. According to you, He only saves the worthy, those who have the sense to be “enlightened,” as you put it, so that they repent and believe. According to the scripture, He saves the unworthy, all the time, and not because they had that spark of goodness in them that sought the Lord or knew how to properly respond to God’s grace and jump through the right hoops. But because God reached down and plucked someone who was dead, and brought flesh to their bones and gave them a heart of flesh, and breathed into their bodies a living soul, as His own peculiar people from a fallen race.
Yes, God reaches out to the lost all day, every day; He commands them to repent, everywhere, but unless God snatches you, you will never by your own “free will” believe. Is that the fault of God? Or is it the fault of man?
Joh 6:43-44 Jesus therefore answered and said unto them, Murmur not among yourselves. (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.
But as to why God does not infallibly save all men, but rather plucks only a part of man to be saved, that is a question that is best not to speculate on, if you do not wish to err.
Rom 9:19-28 Thou wilt say then unto me, Why doth he yet find fault? For who hath resisted his will? (20) Nay but, O man, who art thou that repliest against God? Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it, Why hast thou made me thus? (21) Hath not the potter power over the clay, of the same lump to make one vessel unto honour, and another unto dishonour? (22) What if God, willing to shew his wrath, and to make his power known, endured with much longsuffering the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction: (23) And that he might make known the riches of his glory on the vessels of mercy, which he had afore prepared unto glory, (24) Even us, whom he hath called, not of the Jews only, but also of the Gentiles? (25) As he saith also in Osee, I will call them my people, which were not my people; and her beloved, which was not beloved. (26) And it shall come to pass, that in the place where it was said unto them, Ye are not my people; there shall they be called the children of the living God. (27) Esaias also crieth concerning Israel, Though the number of the children of Israel be as the sand of the sea, a remnant shall be saved: (28) For he will finish the work, and cut it short in righteousness: because a short work will the Lord make upon the earth.
“The same appeal to extra Biblical writings.”
Like this one?
Joh 6:37 All that the Father giveth me shall come to me; and him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out.
Or like this one?
Joh 17:9 I pray for them: I pray not for the world, but for them which thou hast given me; for they are thine.
Or maybe like this one?
Php 1:29 For unto you it is given in the behalf of Christ, not only to believe on him, but also to suffer for his sake;
Did the Father give you to the Son, or did you give yourself to the Son by choosing Him?
Joh 15:16 Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you, and ordained you, that ye should go and bring forth fruit, and that your fruit should remain: that whatsoever ye shall ask of the Father in my name, he may give it you.
Can any whom the Father gives to the Son wrest themselves free? Is your obstinacy greater than God?
Joh 10:27-29 My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me: (28) And I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand. (29) My Father, which gave them me, is greater than all; and no man is able to pluck them out of my Father’s hand.
Did these people here receive it from the Father to believe, or did they not receive it from the Father to believe?
Joh 6:64-65 But there are some of you that believe not. For Jesus knew from the beginning who they were that believed not, and who should betray him. (65) And he said, Therefore said I unto you, that no man can come unto me, except it were given unto him of my Father.
And last question, are all these verses in your Bible, or are they just in the extrabiblical eeevil heartless Calvinist Bible which says things like “Nay, for who are thou that repliest against God?” or “all those who were ordained to eternal life believed”?
And one last last question. Suppose you were God, and you were faced with a humanity that will not believe or do good no matter how much you reason with them? Would it be WRONG to breath life into this dead race and claim them for yourself against the raging of the Devil and his children? Or is it holier to let them all die alike, as long as they all had the same opportunity?
And one last last last question. Was God wrong to pick Abraham specifically and offer the promise ONLY to his seed, instead of, say, to the seed of some bloke in Greece or the New World who for thousands of years didn’t know a thing about the religion of Abraham or the promised Messiah?
Oh yeah? Where'd I say that? Link please......
But as to why God does not infallibly save all men, but rather plucks only a part of man to be saved, that is a question that is best not to speculate on, if you do not wish to err.
Because there's no answer for it in Scripture.
IOW, just shut up and take it and forget all about God being a loving heavenly father, wanting to have fellowship with His creation, being merciful and willing to abundantly pardon, and that He's done everything He can to save mankind even to the point of commanding men to repent and choose.
If people were clay pots, sure, no problem with inanimate objects being made for dishonorable use.
They're living beings into whom God has breathed the breath of life, living souls who will suffer torment for eternity without God.
It is totally inconsistent with the nature and actions of God to make people only for destruction without giving them a chance to repent and be saved.
If indeed He creates people fitted only for destruction, then He WANTS them to suffer torment for eternity. After all, Calvinists say that His will is always done.
But whoops, there's that pesky verse that says.....
1 Timothy 2:3-6 3 This is good, and it is pleasing in the sight of God our Savior, 4 who desires all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth. 5 For there is one God, and there is one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, 6 who gave himself as a ransom for all, which is the testimony given at the proper time.
If God's will is always done, they why are any people NOT saved? After all, God wants it. It says so here in His word.
One of the things that makes this debate so contentious at times is that both sides can quote Scripture to support their arguments. Both sides have "problem" verses which don't fit well into their system of theology.
A gracious friend of mine who pastors in a strict Presbyterian denomination gave me an insight to this dilemma. I've always found it helpful. Scripture speaks to the conversion process from two different perspectives: God's and man's. As he told me (without any sense of moral superiority BTW), the Calvinist tends to focus on those verses which take God's perspective on the issue while the Arminian tends to focus on those verses which take man's perspective. From man's perspective, it looks like a free will choice is being made but alot is occurring behind the scenes which God controls.
Yup. And some people won't acknowledge that.
A gracious friend of mine who pastors in a strict Presbyterian denomination gave me an insight to this dilemma. I've always found it helpful. Scripture speaks to the conversion process from two different perspectives: God's and man's. As he told me (without any sense of moral superiority BTW), the Calvinist tends to focus on those verses which take God's perspective on the issue while the Arminian tends to focus on those verses which take man's perspective. From man's perspective, it looks like a free will choice is being made but alot is occurring behind the scenes which God controls.
I agree. Man's natural inclination is to reject God. God needs to bring a lot of pressure to bear on some to bring them to a point of salvation.
What I mainly take exception with is the theology which states that God chooses to save only some and after dying for the sins of the whole world and commanding all men everywhere to repent, that He doesn't give everyone the opportunity.
It's the only way I can see to reconcile those verses.
However, it does NOT mean that I think man has absolute free will to choose or not, and that is what I inevitably get accused of if I don't agree lockstep with certain strains of Calvinism.
Some try to make it black and white and almost nothing in this life is.
FWIW, I agree more with Calvinist position than not, however, I refuse to identify as Calvinist. I am a Christian, a follower of Christ and my obligation is not to agree lockstep with Calvinist doctrine and convince people of that but to live a life reflecting Christ to a lost and dying world and sharing the good news of salvation through faith in Him.
It seems that too many self-identified Calvinists have lost sight of the great commission and are more intent on making more Calvinists than leading people to Christ.
That is one of the main points of Christ's teaching the Prodigal Son. He was dead, but is alive! While dead, he chose for himself to approach the Father. It was only after that decision, and the beginning of that journey did the father meet the son and walk with him back home.
Because of God's grace, every man can make that choice.
There is no other discussion, because that Grace has already been administered, and is reality.
Thank you for that.
That pretty much expresses what I was thinking and explains why I believe that men can choose.
God makes it rain on the just and the unjust. God’s grace is poured out on the unregenerate and is demonstrated by the fact that they are still alive on this planet and not burning in hell at the moment.
“Because there’s no answer for it in Scripture.”
We know there is a purpose, for it says “according to the purpose and grace of God given to us before the world began.” But what the exact reasoning is, why He remakes one man to bear fruit over another, we do not know (since it certainly isn’t based on our merits), except that it is His right to do so, and we are told we have no right to gainsay it:
Rom 9:19-20 Thou wilt say then unto me, Why doth he yet find fault? For who hath resisted his will? (20) Nay but, O man, who art thou that repliest against God? Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it, Why hast thou made me thus?
“IOW, just shut up and take it and forget all about God being a loving heavenly father,”
Hasn’t it occurred to you yet that God can be a loving heavenly Father, and yet your conception of how that is can be absolutely wrong? You say “but then there’s pesky verses like this...”, but not quite as pesky as my verses and questions, right? Isn’t your objection simply another version of “If God is love, why does he send people to perpetual ‘torture’ in hell?” To which the common reply is, “Yes, God is love, but He is also justice.” And to your objection I reply, “Yes, God desires the salvation of all, but He is also Sovereign in whom He elects and whom He damns.” Is that really a contradiction as you would like to believe? Cannot God be loving, and full of justice, and absolutely sovereign all at the same time without any one attribute negating the other?
You say that verse somehow negates all the others I have presented, but doesn’t it only show that God does offer repentance and forgiveness to sinners all day long?
“O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets, and stonest them which are sent unto thee, how often would I have gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, AND YE WOULD NOT!” (Matt 23:37)
This is the sad condition of all humanity! There is no spark of goodness in man just waiting for God to shake it up and give it a “fair” chance to emerge. We are evil, thoroughly! There is nothing good in us! The supposed goodness of man is all vanity, all subterfuge, all lies! Tell a “good” sinner that he is guilty before God and to repent, that all his good works are dirty rags in God’s sight and cannot save him, and watch their pleasant demeanor transmute into a devil’s sneer. I’ve gone about it in the most delicate way possible, yet I still hear the scoffs and mockery to such ideas. Such was the case with my own beloved mother! Watch the righteous hypocrite cross himself as he drives by the church on the way home to abuse a woman, or smoke and drink and swear. Such is the case of my own dear brother! As the scripture says, “there are none good. There are none who understand, they have all gone astray, there are none who seek after God.”
You will never find me exalting the will of man, because I know that the will of man is enslaved to his sin. Nor would you ever find me singing a song for the supposed righteousness of any, because I know, from personal experience (myself!), that it is all a filthy lie. I’d consider myself accursed if I ever, after having seen these truths, accuse any man of having a fragment of righteous potential with which he can respond to the grace of God. I consider man wholly corrupt, and I know that unless God is the sole author of salvation from start to finish, then no man can ever hope accomplish it no matter how much light is shined into his eyes and reason whispered into his ears.
Joh 10:26-29 But ye believe not, because ye are not of my sheep, as I said unto you. (27) My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me: (28) And I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand. (29) My Father, which gave them me, is greater than all; and no man is able to pluck them out of my Father’s hand.
In regards to 1 Timothy 2:3-6, I would be interested in your interpretation of the verses. In what way does God desire all people to be saved? Is it a kind of cheering for the sinner, but being unwilling to cause the person to choose Him? Is God waiting to see what the sinner chooses, or does He already know what each and every person will choose?
If He does know, is He then desiring something that He knows will not happen?
Thanks in advance for answering.
You know, Catholics and Calvinists never cease to amaze me in the wild, far out accusations they make about someone from a simple statement they make.
It’s pretty straightforward. God desires all people to be saved.
It hardly says that He condones sin.
Goodness, He created man for fellowship with Him. He died for him. He determined the times and places for us to live so that we might seek Him and perhaps reach out and find Him. He calls us, convicts the world of sin and righteousness and judgment.
Of course He wants it.
For the lengths He’s gone to to save people, why would He not want to see them saved?
Of course God knows ahead of time what people are going to choose. Those whom He foreknew......
Can Calvinsts not separate the sinner from the sin and love the sinner and hate the sin?
It doesn’t seem so with the callous attitude they have towards those they perceive as not being the *elect*.
When I said cheering for the sinner, I didn’t mean encouraging sin, but rather hoping that the sinner would choose right (cheering them on). Thanks for the smarmy reply though, it seems to be a pattern.
“In regards to 1 Timothy 2:3-6, I would be interested in your interpretation of the verses. In what way does God desire all people to be saved? Is it a kind of cheering for the sinner, but being unwilling to cause the person to choose Him? Is God waiting to see what the sinner chooses, or does He already know what each and every person will choose?”
The word “will” here, in the Greek, can be translated also “desire, wish, prefer.” It is not a decree, otherwise what He decreed would happen. We can also say that He desires that all are happy, or prefers that none are sick, as it is consistent with his nature, though He does not decree these things. Why He does not decree salvation or prosperity for all, or only decrees it for part, is God’s prerogative.
Rom 9:15-16 For he saith to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion. (16) So then it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that sheweth mercy.
“We agree that the Gospel should be proclaimed to everyone, but we differ as to whether or how every hearer will be enabled to respond,” the report says.
Seems this is God’s problem and not ours...we are just told to proclaim it....not worry about anything else.
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