Posted on 08/01/2005 8:16:45 PM PDT by buckeyesrule
You are correct that He must necessary have knowledge of the person before He can choose that person. However, you are making two critical errors here:
1. When saying that He "chooses according to His good pleasure" it is meant that He chose as it so pleased Him to choose. That is, He was pleased to make the choice He made. It does NOT necessarily mean that He chose based on some pleasurable attribute of the person. It simply means that it pleased Him to choose as He did.
2. He is not pleased by the object of His choice (that is, in the transitive sense) but rather pleased by the choice itself.
Therefore, it was something in the persons that He knew that either pleased Him or displeased Him.
See above.
I don't think you will find a Weslyan who would disagree with that statement. Indeed no God respecting Weslyan would dare to state that there was any "attribute" within a person that inclined God to choose that person. It is not even the person himself, but what God foresaw IN that person. That being the person of Jesus Christ.
The dilemma that the Calvinist has is that if God chooses without regard to anything in that person and it is not because of foreseen faith, then God is either choosing arbitrarily, or he actually is a respecter of persons.
The Arminian/Weslyan believes that God is a respecter of the One who dwells within his elect and not of the elect themselves.
Isn't it an odd coincidence that He just happened (1) to foreknow each one, and (2) to have been pleased (according to his good pleasure) by only those who were to be believers?
And isn't it a coincidence that the bible says, "those He foreknew He predestined..." and "elect according to the foreknowledge of God..?"
It just works for me, Fru.
"all the wonders He contains within His person(s)."
Amen!
The verse you are quoting says that Jesus is the propitiation for the sins of the whole world. Meaning, that forgiveness of sin is only found in Him, and all who would have their sins forgiven must come to Him. That, once again, does not address ability of the sinner to come, it merely states that Jesus is who he must obtain forgiveness from, because there is no other. The sinner's ability to avail himself of this forgiveness is a whole other matter.
Christ is the atonement for our sins, and not for ours only, but for the whole world
Please show me the verse that states this. Your statement is at odds with your professed Calvinism. By this statement, you make the atonement general and non-specific, where as you ought to know that the Bible teaches that the atonement is particular and specific. It is a Penal Substitutionary atonement, wherein Jesus bore the ACTUAL punishment for SPECFIC sins, and sinners.
What is clear is that God loves even the reprobate, and that Jesus Christ died also for the non-elect.
This statement is in direct contradiction to your professed Calvinism.
Exactly. God was IN CHRIST reconciling the world unto Himself.
From the day I was saved, I have never understood it differently.
FWIW, the freeper name "Jonathan Edwards" appears to be available.
I think it's a more easily understood scriptural argument. Occam's razor, if you will.
That makes no sense.
The Arminian says that first the sinner must invite God to dwell within him, or at the very least make the choice to accept Him. Thus salvation depends upon man's choice, as well as God's offer.
It is not even the person himself, but what God foresaw IN that person. That being the person of Jesus Christ.
By this you are saying God foresees man's good choice to believe in Jesus Christ.
Ultimtely, the question remains why does one man invite/accept Christ into his life and the next man refuse Christ.
So for the Arminian, it always returns to his good choice to believe.
The decisions of God are never "arbitrary" to the Calvinist. But they are His alone, most especially regarding salvation.
We are believers because He gave us faith. And that faith pleases Him.
You guys still insist salvation ultimately depends on your good choice to believe.
I appreciate your attention to detail, friend.
I was contemplating your and xzins inverse substitutionary atonement theory. Interesting dynamic. If I'm following the conceptualization correctly it differs from the traditional substitutionary atonement theory in which Christ is said to cover the sinner. In your theory, or at least how i have conceptualized what you have written, Christ instead "fills" the sinner in a way that God sees the person in their own right as filled by Christ because of their reception of Christ. Have I understood this correctly?
NF: Please show me the verse that states this.
1 Jo. 2:2. In black and white.
This statement is in direct contradiction to your professed Calvinism.
It need not be. The maxim "offered to all, applied to the elect through the Holy Spirit" is Calvinist through and through,, see Strong's Systematic Theology, p. 771 ("The Scriptures represent the atonement as having been made for all men, and as sufficient for the salvation of all. Not the atonement therefore is limited, but the application of the atonement through the work of the Holy Spirit."); see also Hodge's Systematic Theology,, Vol. 2, p. 545 ("In view of the effects which the death of Christ produces on the relation of all mankind to God, it has in all ages been customary with Augustinians to say that Christ died "suffcienter proomnibus, efficaciter tantum pro electis" sufficiently for all, efficaciously only for the elect. There is a sense, therefore, in which He died for all, and there is a sense in which He died for the elect alone.")
Not that I care if you consider me a Calvinist. I have my theological positions, derived from several years of intense study. They happen to be Reformed in character. But, at the end of the day, my loyalty is not to Calvinism, or Presbyterianism, or any other -ism. I am a Christian. That is what matters, not this "I am of Calvin" baloney that goes on on this board.
Can God make a person believe, x?
Did He make you believe?
If He did, why doesn't He make the guy next door believe?
And if He didn't make you believe, then ultimately it was your decision to believe.
No. I am saying nothing more than the fact that the Father forsees his Son in us. Upon that condition (however it is satisfied -- whether by force or by invitation) we are thereby elected unto salvation.
I've maintained that this thread really was about the "when regeneration" question.
(1) Regenerated prior to faith via irresistible grace applied prior to regeneration, or (2) regenerated after faith via prevenient grace applied prior to faith.
Your use of the term "by invitation" refutes and thus negates the "no" which begins your sentence.
So that my statement, "By this you are saying God foresees man's good choice to believe in Jesus Christ" is accurate.
And you put God's salvation into a temporal frame, whereas the names of the elect were known to God from before time, and truly before any "invitations" could be accepted or rejected.
Salvation is God's call, not ours.
Why believe in a weaker prevenient grace when God's sovereign grace can and does accomplish everything it intends?
No. By the step of faith we are covered in his blood AND Christ dwells within us.
I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me. (Gal 2:20)
Not so, Dr E.
I've been told by calvinists that they were not forced by God to believe. They have also told me that God did not believe for them, but that they believed for themselves.
Since no one is saved until they believe, I then asked what caused them to believe. They said it was an overwhelming compulsion.
Therefore, their coming to faith is via an overwhelming compulsion. Those who don't come to faith don't get overwhelmed by that compulsion.
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