“So, it is always strange that non-Calvinists get so riled up that we have our beliefs that do not affect you at all.”
Who is riled up?
If you aren’t trying to promote Calvinism, don’t. If you are, then I have a right to point out an opposing view. I’m not trying to convince you and I doubt you’ll convince me. But others reading here might want to see BOTH sides.
I think scripture is pretty clear. I’ve never met anyone who came to Calvinist beliefs simply by reading the Bible. But...I don’t think anyone loses their salvation over it, either. One thing is certain - no where in scripture do we find, “Score 85% or higher on a theology exam and you shall be saved...”!
Quite honestly, I never met anyone who came to Christ by a Calvinist witnessing o them either.
The Calvinists I knew and worked with were very stand offish and aloof and did NOT share their faith. The disdain and contempt with which they treated others was very obvious and quite a turn off to the unsaved.
I only realized they were Calvinists after I got saved and realized what Calvinism was and connected it with the church they attended.
I find the way they portray God to be too much like the image of God I had from Catholicism, harsh, severe, capricious, and reluctant to save.
>>I’ve never met anyone who came to Calvinist beliefs simply by reading the Bible.
You have now. I didn’t know they were Calvinist beliefs. I was a Methodist and things I read did not make sense with what I was taught. I asked questions and was told that there are things that seem to contradict because the bible does not give the full story and we will learn that in heaven.
I studied more and more and pestered more people. One day, I was studying Calvinism to teach the “annual” anti-Calvinism class and I began to see things that made sense. I asked my pastor and he told me that I need to steer clear of TULIP because they believe that everyone is a robot you don’t want to be robot, do you?
I dropped it and hit the “I believe” button and assumed that it is impossible to understand salvation because it is designed to be confusing. From time to time, I’d ask someone authoritative in the UMC and would get the same sort of answers, so i was happy with it.
Years later, I decided to leave the UMC for other reasons. I needed a new church and started shopping and a friend pointed me to one nearby and he said he loved it. I checked and it was Presbyterian, so I thanked him and so no way I’m becoming a Calvinist. He didn’t really know much so he just said OK.
It started bugging me because I only knew what people who hate Calvinism told me that it is. So, I started looking for someone Calvinist to explain it. I have a friend who is Presbyterian (PCUSA—the Progressive Presbys) and asked him. He described Calvinism as “basically the same as Methodist, you’ll love it.” I knew that was BS considering how much the Methodists try to steer people away.
I did some reading on my own and then found RC Sproul’s “What is Reformed Theology” and read it. Suddenly, everything made sense to me. I understood the full gospel for the first time.
Then, I remembered something that my most liberal Methodist pastor once told me. It was that churches that believe heavily in personal salvation tend to be light in social justice and vice versa.
They had been lying to me to push their social justice, “Jesus was a Socialist” agenda! They need you to be in fear for your soul constantly to be able to keep asking you, “ARE YOU DOING ENOUGH?”
I realized, “Holy crap! That’s the basis for the Pelagian Heresy!” and they have just used it to push Christians toward Progressive Humanist SJW causes. These Arminian pastors don’t believe anything but to keep em scared, keep em giving, keep em working.
In Calvinism, you were saved at the foundation of the Earth and the work was done in 33 AD. The answer to the question, “Are you doing enough?” is “No, but Jesus did.” From that realization comes Christian Liberty (Westminster Confession of Faith, Chapter 20), which you WANT to use to do works—not because you fear the future but because you know that you are secure and you just want to show God your love for what he did...for you...personally. Churches that believe in personal salvation do not worry so much about social justice causes.
Sorry, you just have. I was a Calvinist before I knew what it meant, because I could not reckon how an all-knowing God could not know who would choose Him. And the elect and predestined passages did not jibe with the Arminian position. When I read the Westminster Shorter Catechism, it made sense.
The way I see it, God has predestined all things. But we are not God, and act out of our limited knowledge. And these actions are fully our responsibility, but are according to God’s plans. What happened to Jacob or Judas is no different than what happens to us.