Posted on 05/20/2005 3:29:00 AM PDT by Gamecock
You don't have to try to convert me just to proved that Calvinists are evangelistic...
Never let facts get in the way of biased pot-shots aimed at God fearing Christians.
The only effect that has on Reformed evangelism is that of not making false promises to sinners. The command to repent and believe is universal. That only the elect, having been regenerated by the Holy Spirit, will respond and believe is immaterial since nobody knows or claims to know who among those not professing belief are elect and who are not. It's not our job to know, it's our job to fulfill the Great Commission.
If you are lost, according to Calvanism, you cannot make a choice about your decision to be saved, you have to be "called" by God to make that decision.
Essentially you're saying "you cannot choose whether or not you will choose what you are going to choose." That's a philosophical question, not just a Calvinist one :)
All men have a choice when presented the Gospel. They can accept it or reject it. The question is who will choose which and why.
Headline: "Satan Pulls Fast One, Recruits Prototype Man Out from Under God. God Caught Off Guard."
Calvinism is a superior evangelistic tool because it's the truth. The predestined soul, upon hearing truth, responds.
Only through misunderstanding of predestination would one think Calvinism ineffective. The soul called by God must still hear the truth. This is the job of the evangelist ... merely to speak the truth.
The first problem that Calvanism presents to the person who believes in "free will" is that the scripture obviously shows man with free will. This is clearly shown by what we see with the Adamic fall. Secondly, if there were no "free will" toward service then there would be no reward in service, in that, you serve because you are elected to, not because you freely choose God's purposes and will above that of either the world, the flesh, or the devil.
Calvanism, creates a class of people that they say God has decided should go to hell. They call that an expression of God's love? How about the poor sinner who knows nothing, spends his/her life in agony or misery and then is still forced into eternal damnation because he/she was not among the elect? The argument then that this concept is in line with a "loving God" becomes a fools argument.
It is clear that nothing like this is an expression of the love of God. You will then say to me that the love of God is defined by whatever He does. I will then respond to you that God has already defined His definition of love, and that is found in 1 Cor. 13. What about those attributes speaks of deciding that there are some people you will send to eternal damnation, because they are not the elect, without even a slight chance of exercising the desire to repent???
The scripture tells us that God has given to every man the measure of faith, and that we each (every living human, ie the cosmos) has the ability to be saved if we so desire to obey our creator.
Nothing could be further from the definition that God gives of the attributes of love and mercy in His word than the things that are proposed by the belief in Calvanism. Calvanism is, and has always been a doctrine seeped in error, and has been responsible for many many social ills in this country, europe, and in Africa.
It is time to get rid of it and to move to an understanding of the scripture that is reinforced by the scripture itself.
By the way, you may preach all that you want to but what do you say for your "altar call?" "Whoever is the elect come forward?" "The rest of you sinners can't come forward because you are on the way to hell, and that by the determination of God, not by your own sin or decision to reject the Christ of God."
***By the way, you may preach all that you want to but what do you say for your "altar call?"***
The Divine Service of the Holy Altar Call
I. The Preface
The Evangelist shall say: “Poor, helpless Jesus has been knocking on the door of your heart for so long, wanting so badly to come in.”
II. The Uncomfortable words
“If you’ve been putting off this decision, remember that you could walk out this door after the service and get hit by a truck”.
III. The Prayer of Consternation
“Oh, Lord Jesus, if there’s anyone in this room who’s never gotten saved by saying the Sinner’s Prayer and inviting You into their heart, vouchsafe to remind them that this could be their only chance.”
IV. The Sursum Handus
“I want every head bowed, every eye closed, no one looking around. Nobody’s going to see you if you slip up that hand. If you’ve never asked Jesus to come into your heart and be your personal Lord and Saviour, you’re on your way to Hell. So slip up that hand. I see that hand. Yes, I see that hand, too.”
NOTE, that the organist, in the event the Evangelist has not finished his plea by the time she has played sixteen stanzas of “Just As I Am”, shall continue playing something very slowly while he pleads.
V. Benedictus Qui Venit (Blessed Is He That Cometh Down the Aisle)
“If you want Blessed Assurance that you’ll go to Heaven when you die — If you want to be there When the Roll Is Called Up Yonder — you just come forward as we sing the seventeenth and final stanza of “Just As I Am.”
(Found somewhere on the web.)
Another point concerning Calvanism and sin. If you have no free will to serve God, then you have no free will to sin against God. So then, who then is the author of sin? Is it the individual, who without a will to do either good or evil sins, or is it a higher being who makes them do what they do.
You can easily see the falacy of Calvanism in the concept of sin. How can you say someone is a sinner if they have no will to sin? How can you say someone is responsible for that which is forced upon them. So, no one having the ability to either serve or not serve God leaves us with the option that only God can cause you to either do good or to sin??? The great falacy in Calvanism is that it is a fools argument. It leaves man both helpless and unable to do either good or bad, unless you are saying man has the power to disobey God through his free will, but not the power to obey God through his free will???
Calvanism breeds confusion. The great evils that have been brought upon us through the expression that Calvanism brings are once again being revisited on this and other nations. We shook this false teaching off of us several centuries ago, and now it appears that we have an army of Calvanists willing to bring us back to its foolishness.
Man is a sinner, by his own will he sinned against God. The devil is not the author of sin. Man choose, by his own free will, to disobey God and his commandment. Man is punished for his sin because he has a free will and is able to choose the right from the wrong. If man was not able to choose, then there would be no justice in punishment for doing wrong. You do not hold a child accountable for it's actions in the same way that you do an adult.
It is the argument of a fool that will say that justice is defined by whatever God wants. In other words the God who holds a person accountable without the opportunity to either do good or evil is just in that judgment. That is a twisted and evil view of God and His dealings with man.
You have to go a long way in ignoring the scripture to follow Calvin and his doctrine. You have to go a long way in ignoring what is plain to see all around you to follow Calvanism.
It is "God's will that all be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth."
One more thing. Don't make the fools argument and say that man has the ability of his own will to offend God through sin, but not the ability of his own will to choose to follow God's commandment.
The first problem that you face is that we are not in the same position or condition as Adam prior to the fall. We do not have the moral freedom of will Adam had...our nature is corrupted and we are in slavery to sin. So pointing to Adam before the Fall as a refutation of the CalvInist view of men born in sin after the Fall is rather non-sequitor.
Secondly, if there were no "free will" toward service then there would be no reward in service, in that, you serve because you are elected to, not because you freely choose God's purposes and will above that of either the world, the flesh, or the devil.
Unless you are intending to view faith itself as a work of service meriting reward, then the argument you are making doesn't apply. While the regeneration that produces faith in the elect is monergistic, man's sanctification and walk with Christ are synergistic. We are not instantly sanctified...we continue to grieve the Holy Spirit as, in our struggle against the world, the flesh, and the devil, we still sometimes choose the flesh over the spirit.
Calvanism, creates a class of people that they say God has decided should go to hell.
Not Calvinism...Scripture. Do you believe that Scripture says God has decided all unbelievers will go to Hell? Then your argument doesn't apply...we simply disagree with the extent of God's involvement in how they got there.
They call that an expression of God's love? How about the poor sinner who knows nothing, spends his/her life in agony or misery and then is still forced into eternal damnation because he/she was not among the elect? The argument then that this concept is in line with a "loving God" becomes a fools argument.
God is also a just God. The "poor sinner" you refer to is without excuse. He is by nature a child of wrath, as are we all. Every one of us is born deserving of condemnation. That God chooses according to His good pleasure and will to show mercy and grace upon some while withholding it from others is by no means an excuse to which the reprobate can point. Were that so...were all men to have a rightful claim to the grace of God, then it would cease altogether to be grace and become compulsion.
No...I think you grossly underestimate just how abominable our sin is in the sight of a perfectly holy and just God.
The scripture tells us that God has given to every man the measure of faith, and that we each (every living human, ie the cosmos) has the ability to be saved if we so desire to obey our creator.
"For by the grace given to me I say to everyone among you not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think with sober judgment, each according to the measure of faith that God has assigned." -Rom 12:3 (ESV, emph added)Only poor hermeneutics could make this verse to say that God gives all individual men everywhere without exception a measure of faith. And the problem remains as well that the desire to obey our Creator does not exist in man prior to the regeneration of his heart.
IMO it is kind of a Manchurian Candidate method of evangelism. Everything happens exactly as God has decreed. There is no human element in salvation and no human element in damnation. Everyone is just playing out the program written by God.
It certainly does appear to me that this is the Calvinistic worldview that predominates these threads. I'm sure they will howl about the Manchurian Candidate comparison, but they will not be able to refute it. And the funny thing is that if you believe the Calvinistic theology, my posting of this rant was God's predetermined and decreed will and their howling against my posting of it is likewise the predetermined and decreed will of God. Everything that happens is the predetermined and decreed will of God. Contrary to what Calvinists state, men do not act accoding to their "nature" (that would mean they actually could act in contravention to God's declared will). No. They act according to a pre-arragned script and ad-libbing is not permitted.
Carry on, Gentlemen. Apparently we were all preprogrammed to do so.
I think this may be an interesting thread before it's done.... :)
Only if it was predetermined to be so. Apparently our apathy and our enthusiasm are also predetermined.
How's your album doing? Do you have a link to some excerpts?
Despite it all, we must acknowledge Paul's words. He was glad that no matter anyone's motivations that the gospel would be preached.
I'm delighted that this PCA group is missionizing and evangelizing.
I wish I knew if I was supposed to respond.
I guess, since I did, that I was...
I Corinthians 14:33
That depends on your definition of "interesting." I'm sure some present could make up a few to go along with whatever you want it to mean. They excel at that sort of thing.
I was going to write more today, but i think it was predetermined that you calvanists should remain in ignorance. Of course that only applies if you guys are the ignorant elect. I don't want to deprive others who might not be elected to ignorance of these great words of wisdom. But either way you cannot respond without being forced to respond.
It's all predetermined, isn't it? It's all God's will, isn't it? Even your complaining about it is God's declared and determined will at work, isn't it?
Sorry if my post upsets your applecart. I was predestined to post this. You were predestined to be upset about it.
Nah..they don't upset my applecart. Patience is a fruit of the Spirit.
Marlowe, every encounter I have with you strengthens my personal assurance of salvation. You are a useful tool in the hands of God.
Have a blessed day :D
Don't let your supposed knowledge of predetermined events stop you from giving us all a well-reasoned response to my post. After all, the knowledge that some who are preached to are likely not the elect and will therefore never respond in true faith to the Gospel doesn't stop us Calvinists from preaching it to every man.
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