For God so loved the world

“One of my problems with calvinist compatibilists is that they do verbal magic tricks. Rather than being forthright about their views, they cover up what they believe with words like compatibilism, free agency, soft determinism, etc. What they believe is that everything is predetermined by God and so “choices” as normally understood do not occur, cannot occur. I would appreciate it if rather than redefining words away from their standard meaning and usage, they could simply acknowledge that their view eliminates the possibility of “choices” as ordinarily understood.”

Two problems:

i) Henry, in his semantic naiveté, doesn’t know the difference between the meaning of words and the meaning of concepts. He acts as if you could learn all about the theory of evolution or the theory of relativity by just looking up the words “evolution” or “relativity” in Webster’s.

This is a debate over the concept of freedom, the concept of choice, not a debate over the dictionary definition of this or that word.

ii) He also pays us the unintended compliment of alleging that we made up these words. But Peter, Manata, and I employ standard philosophical usage. Henry should spend a little time with the Oxford Handbook of Free Will.

Calvinism didn’t invent these categories. And the terminology is standard philosophical jargon.

“They also do the same with bible verses. John 3:16 says God loves the world enough to send His Son . . . But the calvinist compatibilists come along and the passage needs to be modified a bit. For example bring in a distinction between ‘without exception’ versus ‘without distinction’, and poof the verse loses its meaning since we now **know** that it doesn’t really mean everybody (without exception) but it must mean all types of elect people in the world (without distinction). So rather that being a clear verse on the love of God for mankind, it is really a verse telling us how he loves the elect throughout the world.”

Henry is now advertising his ignorance of Biblical lexicography. “Kosmos” doesn’t have a single meaning in NT usage generally or Johannine usage in particular. Rather, it has wide semantic domain. For example, Peter Cottrell & Max Turner list seven different senses (among others) for kosmos, including “the beings (human and supernatural) in rebellion against God, together with the systems under their control, viewed as opposed to God,” Linguistics & Biblical Interpretation (1989), 176.

Which meaning is appropriate depends on the given context as well as overall theology of the author.

Likewise, Horst Balz defines kosmos in such ways as: “in the Johannine theology one finds again the basic elements of the Pauline understanding of kosmos in the extreme and intensified radicality of the estrangement and ungodliness of the kosmos…the concern is with the nature of the world that has fallen away from God and is ruled by the evil one,” EDNT 2:312.

And as Andrew Lincoln, in his recent commentary on John, explains, “Some argue that the term ‘world’ here simply has neutral connotations—the created human world. But the characteristic use of ‘the world’ (ho kosmos) elsewhere in the narrative is with negative overtones—the world in its alienation from and hostility to its creator’s purposes. It makes better sense in a soteriological context to see the latter notion as in view. God loves that which has become hostile to God. The force is not, then, that the world is so vast that it takes a great deal of love to embrace it, but rather that the world has become so alienated from God that it takes an exceedingly great kind of love to love it at all,” The Gospel According to St. John (Henrickson 2005), 154.

Henry pays lip service to Scripture, but he’s too lazy to consult the standard commentaries, lexicons, or monographs on lexical semantics. In Johannine usage, “kosmos” does not mean “everyone.” Rather, it’s a loaded word with a qualitative rather than quantitative connotation.

But even if you don’t know Greek, or read the standard exegetical and lexical literature, you could figure out for yourself that “kosmos” can’t mean “everyone” in general Johannine usage, by spending a little time with an English concordance. Just try substituting “everyone” for “world” in the following verses and see how much sense it makes:

“The Spirit of truth. The world cannot accept him, because it neither sees him nor knows him. But you know him, for he lives with you and will be in you” (Jn 14:17).

Note the contrast between those who receive the Spirit and those who don’t. But if the “world” means “everyone,” then no one receives the Spirit.

“If you belonged to the world, it would love you as its own. As it is, you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world. That is why the world hates you” (Jn 15:19).

Note the contrast between those whom the “world” loves and those whom it hates. But if the “world” means “everyone,” then no such dichotomy is possible.

“I have given them your word and the world has hated them, for they are not of the world any more than I am of the world” (Jn 17:14).

Same disjunction as we saw under Jn 15:19.

“The world and its desires pass away, but the man who does the will of God lives forever” (1 Jn 2:17).

Note the contrast between the fleeting world and eternal life. But if the “world” means “everyone,” then the existence of the believer is just as transient as the existence of the unbeliever.

“For everyone born of God overcomes the world. This is the victory that has overcome the world, even our faith.” (1 Jn 5:4).

Notice the antithesis between the regenerate who overcome the world, and the state of the unregenerate. But if the “world” means “everyone,” then no one overcomes the world.

“We know that we are children of God, and that the whole world is under the control of the evil one” (1 Jn 5:19).

Observe the contrast between the children of God and all those who lie under Satan’s dominion. But if the “world” means “everyone,” then everyone is a Satanist.

“On the other hand most christians believe that God loves people enough to send Jesus to the world to make salvation possible to all people and that people’s eternal destinies are not set before they are born, but depend how they respond as individuals to the work of God in revealing Himself to them.”

i) Is loving sinners just enough to make salvation merely *possible* for everyone while leaving everyone vulnerable to eternal damnation the most loving thing that God could do?

Which is more loving—to throw a drowning man a life preserver and say to him: “now you have a chance to save yourself–take it or leave it!” Or jumping in and actually pulling him to safety?

An Arminian lifeguard never rescues a drowning man since that would violate his freewill. Instead, the Arminian lifeguard throws him a life preserver, then goes on a lunch break.

ii) In what sense does Henry think that everyone has a shot at salvation? Everyone hasn’t heard the gospel. So Henry must take the position that you don’t have to believe in Jesus to be saved. Yet, in opposing universalism, he says that you do have to believe in Jesus to be saved. Or does Henry subscribe to postmortem evangelism?

“In theological determinism, the damned are damned ‘and there was nothing THEY could do about it, if they weren’t CHOSEN.’ In the other view of non-calvinists, God makes it possible for all to be saved so all have the opportunity to be saved and those not saved are those who freely rejected God’s gracious working in their lives.”

An in classical Arminianism, to which Henry evidently subscribes, God foreknew who would freely spurn his grace and spend eternity in hell, and yet God went ahead and created the damned in full knowledge of their infernal fate. How is that the most loving thing that God could do for them?

“One of the reasons that Calvinists have attempted to go to atheist philosophers to find arguments for their view is that they don’t have a strong philosophical argument to overcome people’s innumerable experiences of free will and choices.”

Several problems:

i) As I recall, Henry doesn’t hesitate to cite Searle and Kant in his favor. So he appeals to secular philosophers when they agree with him. And what about Stewart Goetz, whom he also cites? Is Goetz a Christian philosopher or a secular philosopher?

Henry also makes favorable appeal to Moreland, Plantinga, Craig, Flint, Freddoso, and the Thomists. But while they are Christian philosophers, they are also Christian philosophers who make extensive use of secular philosophers to defend their Christian faith.

Such is Henry’s forked-tongued rhetoric on secular philosophy.

ii) Everyone has a philosophy. The only question is whether you have a thoughtful, consistent philosophy, or a half-baked philosophy.

iii) Henry is appealing to “experience.” And he’s appealing to universal human experience (as he construes it).

So unbelievers have the same experience. Secular philosophers have the same experience. Secular philosophers who are soft determinists, hard determinists, compatibilists, and semicompatibilists have the same experience.

It is therefore duplicitous of Henry to appeal to human experience and then disqualify the analysis of human experience by secular philosophers.

iv) An appeal to experience to prove something is a philosophical appeal. It is therefore subject to rational scrutiny.

“And Jesus says that the drawing involves Him being lifted up on the cross and this drawing involves all men (“And I, if I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all men to Myself” Jn. 12:32).”

Henry also doesn’t know the difference between sense and reference. He acts as if a universal quantifier (“all”) specifies the referent. But it doesn’t. Its denotation must be supplied by context. In context, Jn 12:32 has reference to the multiethnic scope of the gospel—which sweeps in Gentiles as well as Jews (cf. 12:20).

“People can and do resist the work of the Spirit. Stephen in the midst of an evangelistic message in which the Spirit was certainly working explicitly states that people do (which means they can) resist the Holy Spirit: “You men who are stiff necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears are always resisting the Holy Spirit; you are doing just as your fathers did" (Acts 7:51, just as their fathers did, means that this resisting of the Holy Spirit was not a one time occurrence or exception, but occurred repeatedly, it occurred in the Old Testament, in the New Testament [e.g. the Pharisees committing the unpardonable sin in response to the Ministry of Jesus] and it occurs today as well).”

Henry is ignorant of the doctrine he’s opposing. In Calvinism, “irresistible” grace denotes regeneration. Regeneration is irresistible.

Acts 7:51 isn’t talking about the work of the Spirit in regeneration. Rather, it’s talking about the work of the Spirit in prophetic preaching. These are further examples of how Henry quotes Scripture instead of exegeting Scripture. He simply indulges in acontextual prooftexting.

“Though if the Spirit works on a person, that does not **necessitate** salvation as people do in fact resist the Spirit. If you want lots of evidence of resistance of the Spirit, just examine the Old Testament and see how many times God’s people resisted the Lord.”

No, they didn’t resist the Lord. Rather, they resisted the word of the Lord. And they resisted the preaching of the prophets because they were *hardened* by God (Isa 6).

“Third, the possibility which you leave out is someone being drawn by God and yet resisting the Holy Spirit, responding in unbelief.”

So unbelievers respond in unbelief. If that is Henry’s tautology of grace, then no one would ever be saved.

“The cross of Christ is a provision for all but only applied to those who believe. Just because the provision is sufficient for all does not automatically lead to universalism with everyone being saved.”

But, for Henry, the cross is insufficient to save anyone. So, for him, the cross is, at most, a necessary, but insufficient, condition of salvation. Same thing with Henry’s diluted pneumatology.

“So the Spirit must draw a person and that person must respond with faith or they will not be saved.”

So an unbeliever must respond in faith. But the Spirit cannot make an unbeliever a believer. Faith is not a gift of God. How, then, does an unbeliever ever become a believer?

“Merely stating your assumption. No where in the text of John 6 or anywhere else for that matter does it state that only the elect are drawn. Also where in the text of John 6 does it say “he must chose who to draw” with the meaning that He only draws the elect? It says No one comes unless drawn, it says that if they respond in faith to this drawing they will be believers and will be raised up (throughout John 6 the point is made repeatedly that if you do not **partake** of Christ you cannot be saved; and in the context it is not talking about cannibalism but about having faith in Christ; if you have faith in Jesus you will be saved and raised, if you do not partake of His flesh/have faith in Jesus you cannot be saved). Calvinists tend to prooftext from isolated verses in John 6 without also emphasizing the other verses about the importance of faith to salvation which are actually more frequent in John 6 than the Calvinist “prooftexts”.”

I already pointed Henry to Carson’s commentary on John, which exegetes these Reformed prooftexts in context, just as I referred him to Schreiner’s online article on the priority of regeneration, just as I referred him to Warfield’s online article on predestination, just as I referred him to Beale’s online article on the hardening of Pharaoh’s heart—not to mention Baugh’s online article on Rom 9. Not to mention Schreiner’s commentary on Romans. Has Henry bothered to interact with a single one of these exegetical arguments for Calvinism? No.

“When those biblical instructions are ignored or put aside so that people can merely be argumentative, condescending, verbally combative, then the philosophizing that ought to be taking place is impeded and obstructed and can become quite evil.”

Henry is a false teacher. The Bible has very harsh things to say about false teachers. And keep in mind that, in the NT, the false teachers were professing Christians. But that doesn’t prevent the Bible from denouncing them in no uncertain terms.

I would be prepared to cut Henry some slack if he were an honest man. But he prevaricates. He raises objections. When we answer him on his own grounds, he then chooses to ignore the counterarguments, change the subject, or repeat himself ad nauseum.

So Henry isn’t even true to his own objections.