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Posted on 05/13/2002 10:08:33 PM PDT by drstevej
Summary Evaluation of Arminian Theology
Arminianism stresses a number of important features. The emphasis on man’s responsibility is surely a biblical factor: man must believe to be saved (John 3:16; Acts 16:31, etc.). If man refuses to believe, he is lost (John 5:40; 7:17). Arminianism’s emphasis on the universality of the atonement is also biblical (1 Tim. 4:10; 2 Pet. 2:1; 1 John 2:2).
Several features within Arminianism should be evaluated.
(1) Arminianism denies the imputation of sin; no one is condemned eternally because of original sin. Man is condemned because of his own sins. This appears at variance with Romans 5:12–21.
(2) Though variously interpreted, Arminians generally teach that the effects of the Fall were erased through prevenient grace bestowed on all men, enabling individuals to cooperate with God in salvation. There is, however, no clear indication of this kind of prevenient grace in Scripture.
(3) Arminians teach that the Fall did not destroy man’s free will; furthermore, they teach that prevenient grace moves upon the heart of the unbeliever, enabling him to cooperate with God in salvation by an act of the will. While it is true that man must bear responsibility in responding to the gospel (John 5:40), man’s will has been affected because of the Fall (Rom. 3:11–12; Eph. 2:1); man needs God’s grace in order to be saved (Eph. 2:8; Acts 13:48; 16:14).
(4) Arminians relate predestination to God’s foreknowledge of man’s actions. They stress that God knew beforehand who would believe, and He elected those. In Arminianism, election and predestination are conditioned by faith. The word foreknowledge (Gk. prognosis), however, is basically equivalent to election (cf. Rom. 11:2; 1 Pet. 1:20). The data of God’s foreknowledge originates in advanced planning, not in advanced information.
(5) Arminianism stresses human participation and responsibility in salvation: recognition of sin, turning from sin, repentance, confession, and faith. For Arminianism, repentance involves change of actions, forsaking sins, whereas the biblical word repentance (Gk. metanoia) means “change of mind.” Although the stress on human responsibilities is significant, if it involves multiple conditions for salvation, this stress becomes a serious matter because the purity of salvation-by-grace-alone is then at stake. The sole condition of salvation stressed in scores of Scriptures is faith in Christ (John 3:16, 36; Acts 16:31; Rom. 10:9, etc.).
(6) Arminianism teaches that believers may lose their salvation because the human will remains free and so may rescind its earlier faith in Christ by choosing sin. Frequently this view is based on controversial passages like Hebrews 6:4–6 and 2 Peter 2:20–22. The clear emphasis of Scripture, however, is that the believer has eternal life as a present possession (John 3:16; 1 John 5:11–13) and is kept secure by Christ (John 10:28) because of what He has done (Rom. 5:1; 8:1).
I think 'dismissive' isn't a strong enough word for my opinion toward Predestination as taught by Calvin, rather, I think 'outright rejection' would be more accurate.
I will never believe that God creates human beings only to condemn them. That is cruel. God isn't cruel. God is pure love.
THINK...If it was that God looked into the future and saw the men that would meet all his requirements to be saved there would be no need to predestine them.
Did you select your parents, the place of your birth? Your race or sex? Your intellect? Your parents financial situation? Our live choices are limited by the circumstances of our birth..If you had been born in the bush in africa you would not be posting on FR right now most likely..
I am not arguing that God created me with his choices of ethnicity and temperment in mind. I am arguing specifically that God emptied Himself on the cross for each individual--everyone. No one being exempt. Exclusion is human in nature. The concept of playing favorites with some, while the rest are damned is most definately human, not Divine. The nature of divinity is wrapped in the concept of love and mercy--so infinite that the human mind cannot conceive it.
On NOW at RadioFR!
7pm/10pm - The "Banana Republican", our own Luis Gonzalez, has a spirited interview with...none other than JACK THOMPSON!
This is a CALL IN SHOW! Talk to BATMAN JACK THOMPSON!
1-866-RadioFR! (866-723-4637)
Having gone back and reading your post in a cooler frame of mind, I found I was a bit hasty in my understanding of your post. So, forget I posted that, and we'll go from there. I hope.
I'm going to stop posting for the night, but here's Clarke on the issue.
On the subject of the foreknowledge of God, some observations have been made at the conclusion of the notes on the second chapter of Acts. On the subject of the prescience and predestination mentioned here, #Ro 8:29, 30, vast volumes have been written, and the Christian world greatly agitated and perplexed. These doctrines of men have very little place in the texts in question.After a long and serious investigation of this business, I am led to conclude that, whether the doctrine of the decrees be true or false, it does not exist in these verses.
No portion of the word of God has been more unhappily misunderstood than several parts of the Epistle to the Romans; because men have applied to individuals what belongs to nations; and referred to eternity transactions which have taken place in time.
We have already seen that one grand aim of the apostle in writing this epistle was: 1. To prove, to both Jews and Gentiles, that they were all under sin, and that neither of them had any claim either on the justice or beneficence of God; yet he, of his own free mercy, had revealed himself to the Jews, and crowned them with innumerable privileges; and, 2. That, as he was no respecter of persons, his mercy was as free to the Gentiles as to them, being equally their God as he was the God of the Jews, and therefore had, by the Gospel, called them to a state of salvation; and to this display of his mercy the two verses in question seem particularly to refer, and show us not what God will do for some selected individuals, but what he has already done for nations.
After having shown that the whole Gentile world was groaning and travailing in pain together, waiting for the manifestation of the sons of God, he shows that it was, according to the affectionate purpose, proqesin, of God, that the Gentiles should be also called into the glorious liberty of the sons of God-into equal privileges with the Jews. He therefore represents them as objects of God's gracious foreknowledge. That the word proginwskw, which literally signifies to know, or discern beforehand, and to know so as to determine, signifies also to approve, or love before, to be well affected to, is not only evident from edy yada in Hebrew, but also from the simple verb ginwskw, in Greek, by which it is translated, and to which the compound verb repeatedly answers, without any extension of meaning by means of the preposition, as its use among the best Greek writers proves: and it is evident that the apostle uses the word in the sense of loving, being graciously affected to, #Ro 11:1, 2. I say then, hath God cast away his people, which he FOREKNEW, on proegnw; to whom he has been so long graciously affected? By no means. As, therefore, he had been so long graciously affected towards the Jews, so has he towards the Gentiles. His call of Abraham, and the promises made to him, are the proof of it. The Jews, thus foreknown, were called into a glorious state of salvation, and endowed with privileges the most extraordinary ever bestowed on any people; as their whole history testifies. But is God the God of the Jews only? Is he not also the God of the Gentiles? Yes, of the Gentiles also, #Ro 3:29; and to prove this is the main subject of the ninth chapter. Now, as he is the God of the Gentiles, he foreknew, had from the beginning a gracious purpose to them as well as to the Jews; and, being thus graciously disposed towards them, he determined prowrise, from pro, before, and orizw, to bound, define, &c., he defined, circumscribed, and determined the boundaries of this important business from the beginning, that they also should be taken into his Church, and conformed to the image of his Son; and, as Jesus Christ was to be their pattern, it must be by his Gospel that they should be brought into the Church; and consequently, that bringing in could not take place before the revelation of Christ. Having therefore thus foreknown and thus predestinated them ALSO, he called them ALSO by the Gospel; he justified them ALSO on their believing; and he glorified them ALSO, dignified them also with the same privileges, blessings, honours, and Divine gifts: so that they were now what the Jews had been before, the peculiar people of God. The apostle, therefore, speaks here not of what they should be, or of what they might be, but of what they then were-the called, the justified, the highly honoured of God. See Clarke's note on "Ro 8:30".
It is strange that so obvious a meaning of the passage should not have been noticed; but the word doxazw, which we render to glorify, and by which we understand eternal beatification, which it is very seldom used to express, being taken in this sense in the passage in question, fixed the meaning of the preceding terms; and thus the whole passage was applied to things eternal, which had reference only to things in time. This seems to me to be the true key of the passage, and the whole scope of the epistle, and especially of the context, which shows that this is the sense in which it should be understood. The passages understood in this way illustrate the infinite mercy and wisdom of God; they show that whatever appearances his providential dealings may assume of partiality towards any particular people, yet he is equally the Father of the spirits of all flesh; hateth nothing that he hath made; is loving to all; that his tender mercies are over all his works; and that he is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come unto the knowledge of the truth and be saved. Hence, whatever he did for the Jews he purposed to do for the Gentiles: if he foreknew, predestinated, called, justified, and glorified the former; he ALSO foreknew, predestinated, called, justified, and glorified the latter; having brought them into the same state of salvation, with a vast extension of blessings and higher degrees of honour. As the Jews forfeited their privileges, and now, instead of being glorified, instead of being highly honoured, and rendered illustrious, they are degraded, brought down, and rendered contemptible; because they have not made a proper use of their election, they are now reprobated; so a similar reverse awaits the Gentiles if they sin after the similitude of their transgression; and it is against this that the apostle so solemnly warns them, #Ro 11:20-22: Because of unbelief they (the Jews) were broken off-thou (the Gentiles) standest by faith. If God spared not the NATURAL BRANCHES, take heed lest he also spare not THEE. Behold the goodness and severity of God! on them which FELL severity; but toward THEE goodness, IF THOU CONTINUE in his goodness; otherwise THOU ALSO shalt be CUT OFF.
5. This is also a lesson of solemn instruction to Christians in general: God has called them into a glorious state of salvation, and has furnished them with every requisite help to enable them to work out that salvation with fear and trembling. As it is an awful thing to receive the grace of God in vain, (whether that grace imply the common benefits of the Gospel, or those especial blessings received by believing souls,) so every person professing godliness should be jealous over himself lest he should trifle with matters of eternal moment; for, should he even neglect so great a salvation, his escape would be impossible. #Heb 2:3; and if so, to what severe punishment must they be exposed who despise and reject it?
"God of his own good pleasure ordains that many should be born, who are from the womb devoted to inevitable damnation. If any man pretend that God's foreknowledge lays them under no necessity of being dammed, but rather that he decreed their damnation because he foreknew their wickedness, I grant that God's foreknowledge alone lays no necessity on the creature; but eternal life and death depend on the will rather than the foreknowledge of God. If God only foreknew all things that relate to all men, and did not decree and ordain them also, then it might be inquired whether or no his foreknowledge necessitates the thing foreknown. But seeing he therefore foreknows all things that will come to pass, because he has decreed they shall come to pass, it is vain to contend about foreknowledge, since it so plain all things come to pass by God's positive decree." (Calv. Inst., b. 3, c. 23, s. 6.)
"The devil and wicked men are so held in on every side with the hand of God, that they cannot conceive, or contrive, or execute any mischief, any farther than God himself doth not permit only, but command. Nor are they only held in fetters, but compelled also, as with a bridle, to perform obedience to those commands." (Calv. Inst., b. 1, c. 17, S. 11.)
"[Adam] fell not only by the permission, but also by the appointment, of God." (Calvin Responsio ad Calumnias Nebulonis cujusdam ad Articulum primum.)
"God not only foresaw that Adam would fall, but also ordained that he should." (Calvin's Inst., b. 3, c. 23, sec. 7.)
"He sinned because God so ordained, because the Lord saw good." (Calvin's Inst., b. 3, c. 24, sec. 8.)
"I confess it is a horrible decree; yet no one can deny but God foreknew Adam's fall, and therefore foreknew it, because he had ordained it so by his own decree." (Calv. Inst., b. 3, c. 23, sec. 7.)
"They deny that the Scripture says God decreed Adam's fall. They say he might have chose either to fall or not; and that God fore-ordained only to treat him according to his desert: As if God had created the noblest of all his creatures, without fore-ordaining what should become of him!" (Calvin's Inst., b. 3, c. 24 sec. 7.)
See I think this is where we may get into Protestant/Catholic theology more than Calvinism/Arminism...Most Protestants would not accept a Universal atonment. We may disagree with the how..but we would agree that Christs death on the cross while sufficent for all is only effective for those that come to the cross.
So I have to ask you if you believe that everyone alive or that has ever lived will go to heaven...or do you believe that there are conditions to be saved? (Just trying to figure out the differences of language here JM)
Eph 1:3 Blessed [be] the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly [places] in Christ:
4 According as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before him in love:
5 Having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself, according to the good pleasure of his will,
6 To the praise of the glory of his grace, wherein he hath made us accepted in the beloved.
7 In whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of his grace;
8 Wherein he hath abounded toward us in all wisdom and prudence;
9 Having made known unto us the mystery of his will, according to his good pleasure which he hath purposed in himself:
10 That in the dispensation of the fulness of times he might gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven, and which are on earth; [even] in him:
11 In whom also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestinated according to the purpose of him who worketh all things after the counsel of his own will:
12 That we should be to the praise of his glory, who first trusted in Christ.
13 In whom ye also [trusted], after that ye heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation: in whom also after that ye believed, ye were sealed with that holy Spirit of promise,
14 Which is the earnest of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession, unto the praise of his glory.
15 Wherefore I also, after I heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus, and love unto all the saints,
16 Cease not to give thanks for you, making mention of you in my prayers;
17 That the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give unto you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of him:
18 The eyes of your understanding being enlightened; that ye may know what is the hope of his calling, and what the riches of the glory of his inheritance in the saints,
19 And what [is] the exceeding greatness of his power to us-ward who believe, according to the working of his mighty power,
20 Which he wrought in Christ, when he raised him from the dead, and set [him] at his own right hand in the heavenly [places],
21 Far above all principality, and power, and might, and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this world, but also in that which is to come:
22 And hath put all [things] under his feet, and gave him [to be] the head over all [things] to the church,
23 Which is his body, the fulness of him that filleth all in all.
We had a day like that Sunday...GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR
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Check out Jonathan Edwards, The Justice of God in the Damnation of Sinners."BTW, Edwards was the President of Princeton and considered one of America's greatest thinkers. Worth a read.
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God's justice will appear in your greater destruction. Besides the guilt that you would have had if a Saviour never had been offered, you bring that great additional guilt upon you, of most ungratefully refusing offered deliverance. What more base and vile treatment of God can there be, than for you, when justly condemned to eternal misery, and ready to be executed, and God graciously sends his own Son, who comes and knocks at your door with a pardon in his hand, and not only a pardon, but a deed of eternal glory; I say, what can be worse, than for you, out of dislike and enmity against God and his Son, to refuse to accept those benefits at his hands? How justly may the anger of God be greatly incensed and increased by it! When a sinner thus ungratefully rejects mercy, his last error is worse than the first; this is more heinous than all his former rebellion, and may justly bring down more fearful wrath upon him.
It is one thing to not be able to understand the full mind of God, which I readily admit I cannot comprehend. It is quite another thing to use the mind and reasoning skill God gave man to reject a man-made doctrine such as predestination (at least as the Calvinist proclaims it) that defies basic logical principles than man can readily understand. Is God a God of reason and order or a God of chaos and disorder?
I always find it interesting that Calvinists claim man cannot know the mind of God and at the same time are so adamant that they have a monopoly on understanding the mind of God. Which is it?
Your last comment is a straw man. You are basically stating that because one cannot disprove something, one must accept it as true. This is a logical falacy. BTW, when did you stop beating your mother? You say you never beat your mother. Well prove it.
Your reasoning skills could use a little work.
Man has a sinful nature. Man is not absolutely evil in all that he does, something which you appear to agree about. That being the case, certainly you must agree with the concept of Natural Law. If man is not completely and utterly evil in all that he does, there obviously must be a free will to some degree. If there was no free will, there could be no evil, for how would one recognize that an act was evil if there was no Natural Law? It is not just the Christian who can recognize good and evil, is it?
As for your quote from Matthew, it does not say that only evil comes from the heart of man, but only that it is the source of evil. It can also be the dource of good deeds as well, can't it? If you disagree, then you would have to claim that a non-Christian is completely and absolutely evil, a very difficult argument to make in light of reality and scripture.
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