I'm going to comment on Craig's response:
Before commenting on the specifics, I'd like to make a general observation. I'm struck by the fact that Craig is often more charitable towards atheists than Calvinists. I'm also struck by the fact that he makes more effort to inform himself on the details of atheism than he does in reference to Calvinism.
I think it’s not hard to explain these passages in light of Scripture’s teaching that God loves sinners. Notice that almost all of them come from poetic passages. They are religious hyperbole expressing God’s hatred of evil and the wicked acts people commit. It would be a hermeneutical mistake to press them literally as statements of Christian doctrine. Drawing hyperbolic, black-and-white dichotomies was a common semitic idiom. For example, “I have loved Jacob, but I have hated Esau” (Malachi 1.2-3; cf. Romans 9.13) is a way of saying that God has chosen Jacob and not Esau. When Jesus says, “Whoever comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, and even life itself, cannot be my disciple” (Luke 14.26), he means that if one prioritizes even one’s most cherished loved ones above Jesus, one’s discipleship is incomplete—a claim which is radical enough without taking it literally! Over against these few hyperbolic passages stands the clear doctrinal teaching of Jesus and the apostles that God loves all persons, even sinners.
i) I think what Craig says in the first two paragraphs is largely correct. However, that stands in ironic contrast to how he immediately switches to passages about divine love. But if he's going to appeal to poetry, hyperbole, and idiomatic expressions concerning divine hatred, would it not be more consist for him to apply the same yardstick to passages about divine love? Don't many of the most vivid depictions of divine love in Scripture have a poetic or anthropomorphic cast to them? Aren't they subject to the same qualifications?
ii) The divine hatred passages aren't the best passages to illustrate the questioner's point. What about divine wrath passages, which are far more prevalent?
God is our model in loving others. We are to love even our enemies.
The problem with resorting to the Sermon on the Mount is that, in contrast to passages of eschatological judgment, this is limited to the church age. So it's a hasty generalization to extrapolate from the Sermon on the Mount to a universal principle.
That is how God loves. Paul later wrote, “God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners Christ died for us. . . . while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of his Son” (Romans 5. 8,10). Our love is to be impartial, just as God showers good upon the evil and righteous alike. Our love is to be universal, not reserved just for a few. Our heavenly Father is perfect, and so He loves perfectly.
i) Inferring universality from impartiality is fallacious. Even assuming God is impartial, that doesn't mean God treats everyone the same way. Judicial impartiality is morally discriminating. It condemns the guilty but acquits the innocent.
Impartiality doesn't' mean treating everyone alike. Rather, it means treating like cases alike and unlike cases unalike. All things being equal, you treat two parties the same way, but all things considered, you may treat two parties differently if, in fact, the two parties are relevantly dissimilar.
ii) There's also his equivocal appeal to "impartiality." "Impartial" in reference to what? To say that God is impartial in reference to justice doesn't entail that God is impartial in reference to mercy.
iii) In addition, there are degrees of love. Doesn't Craig love his own wife more than he loves the wives of his colleagues? I certainly hope so. Doesn't he harbor a special love for his own mother?
iv) Finally, he recycles the the popular falsehood that according to unconditional election, God's love is reserved for "just a few." Why is Craig so conscientious about accurately representing the atheists and Darwinians he debates, but so indifferent to accuracy when it comes to Calvinism?
How wonderful God is! As I reflected on Jesus’ words, it struck me forcefully that Allah’s love as described in the Qur’an rises no higher than the love exhibited by pagans and tax collectors! It is conditional, partial, and has to be earned. But the love of God our heavenly Father is unconditional, impartial, and universal.
Is God's love "unconditional"? Craig believes in hell. Craig believes in damnation. Craig is not a universalist. If God's love is unconditional, why does God make faith and repentance conditions of salvation?
Frankly, Bridger, I’m appalled at the fact that some Christians have an understanding of God’s love which is comparable to that of the Qur’an. They actually think that God does not love all people unconditionally. They have failed to understand something so fundamental and basic to Christian discipleship: God’s wonderful love.
i) To begin with, Craig cherry-picks his prooftexts. But take the OT. In the OT, God often shows his love for Israel in contrast to how he treats her pagan neighbors. Oftentimes, God makes no effort to do for her enemies what he does for the Chosen People. At the very least, God withholds his grace towards her enemies. At most, God judges her enemies while he forgives Israel. The disparity is stark, routine, and deliberate.
There are some OT prophetic passages which indicate that God will someday extend redemption to the Gentiles, and, of course, that anticipates the new covenant. But that's in studied contrast to God's operating policy under the old covenant.
Moreover, even under the new covenant, you have huge swathes of unreached people-groups
ii) In addition, Craig has concocted a scenario in which
He [God] has instead elected to create only persons who would freely reject Him in any world which is feasible for Him to actualise, persons who, accordingly, freely possess the property of transworld damnation. God in His providence has so arranged the world that as the Christian gospel went out from first century Palestine, all who would respond freely to it if they heard it did hear it, and all who do not hear it are persons who would not have accepted it if they had heard it.
http://www.reasonablefaith.org/middle-knowledge-and-christian-exclusivism
Craig finds it necessary to supplement his prooftexting with this conjectural wishful-thinking. But there's no good reason to think his speculation is true.
It is a telling indictment that you think anything Craig says about Romans 9:11-13 is even remotely true. The verses clearly teach election and reprobation, not "common grace." Try reading Isaiah 46:10.
ReplyDeleteIronically, what Craig said about Rom 9:13 is entirely consistent with double predestination.
DeleteIronically, you agree with the Molinists and the Arminians. The fact is election and reprobation are as opposite as black and white. The law of contradiction rules out antinomies in Scripture. God's positive election of some sinners and His negative reprobation of other wicked sinners are both sovereign choices made by God in eternity prior to creation. Equal ultimacy is the biblical view, and it is the view of Calvin himself. Proverbs 16:4 KJV Romans 9:22 KJV
DeleteYou need to learn how to reason rather than blindly reacting. I said nothing to indicate that I agree with Molinists and Arminians. I said I agree with Craig's narrow point that the love/hate antithetical parallelism is a Hebraic idiom for election/rejection. That's fully consonant with unconditional election and reprobation.
DeleteOn the contrary, I simply took you at your word. You said that you agreed with Craig's statement that we should not draw Christian doctrine from the these texts in the Bible. Craig implies that God loves all sinners without exception, which is clearly false.
DeleteI think it’s not hard to explain these passages in light of Scripture’s teaching that God loves sinners.
This is clearly false since many Scriptures prove that God hates the wicked. A few of these proof texts are: Romans 9:13; Malachi 1:3; Psalm 11:5; Psalm 5:5. Ephesians 2:3 NKJV clearly says that the reprobate are under God's wrath and that the elect were at one time under God's wrath. See John 3:18, 36 NKJV. God does love sinners. But which sinners does God love? Clearly the answer is elect sinners. Ephesians 1:3-4, 11 NKJV; Romans 8:33, 35 NKJV
Notice that almost all of them come from poetic passages. They are religious hyperbole expressing God’s hatred of evil and the wicked acts people commit. It would be a hermeneutical mistake to press them literally as statements of Christian doctrine.Drawing hyperbolic, black-and-white dichotomies was a common semitic idiom.
This is nothing more than a presupposition. The grammatical-historical method of exegesis acknowledges that literary devices in the Bible, including poetic passages, have a logical proposition behind them and therefore remain profitable as sources of doctrine. Jesus said, for example, "I am the way, the truth, and the life." No true Christian would interpret this as meaning that salvation is "inclusive" of all. Rather, it means that salvation is exclusively through the person, work, and teaching of Jesus Christ.
Craig claims to be an expert in logic but he is clearly rejecting the law of contradiction in his statement and makes polar opposites into an equivocal doctrine of conditional election.
Charlie
For example, “I have loved Jacob, but I have hated Esau” (Malachi 1.2-3; cf. Romans 9.13) is a way of saying that God has chosen Jacob and not Esau.
DeleteWell, no. Clearly Romans 9:11-12 shows that God's choice of Jacob over Esau is not based on foreseen works but solely on God's free and sovereign election. God will choose whom He will choose and God chose Jacob and rejected Esau before they were ever born. Saying that God chose Jacob and not Esau is a tautology, by the way. God chose Jacob because God chose Jacob and God rejected Esau because God rejected Esau? A = A Another way to put it is A does not equal B. B does not equal A. God chose A and rejected B.
When Jesus says, “Whoever comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, and even life itself, cannot be my disciple” (Luke 14.26), he means that if one prioritizes even one’s most cherished loved ones above Jesus, one’s discipleship is incomplete—a claim which is radical enough without taking it literally! Over against these few hyperbolic passages stands the clear doctrinal teaching of Jesus and the apostles that God loves all persons, even sinners.
This part of Craig argument is a non sequitur. He changes premises and then draws a conclusion based on a false premise. It does not follow that God's choices are the same as human choices. Nor does it follow that Jesus' use of rabbinic hyperbole to make a point means that God is somehow ignorant of who He will choose and who He will reject. God is not a creature that He is subject to any limitations of knowledge whatsoever. Secondly, God is not bound by time. So if God foreknows something will happen--according to Augustine and the Reformers and Scripture--then it is certain to happen because God has predetermined it that way. All things that come to pass are ordained by God. Ephesians 1:11 NKJV.
The conclusion that Jesus and the Triune God loves all sinners without exception is a foregone conclusion that does not follow from the clear and plain teaching of Scripture. Craig admits as much when he tries to explain and rationalize away the clear antinomies of Scripture as merely poetic devices or rabbinic hyperbole rather than doctrinal propositions. Clearly even Jesus means that we cannot love any creature more than God. That would be idolatry. Exodus 20:3-5 NKJV
Charlie
Charlie J. Ray
Delete"On the contrary, I simply took you at your word. You said that you agreed with Craig's statement that we should not draw Christian doctrine from the these texts in the Bible. Craig implies that God loves all sinners without exception, which is clearly false."
You're illiterate. You lack basic reading skills.
I said nothing of the kind. I was quite specific on my area of agreement. Craig is correct to say the "love/hate" dialectic is an idiomatic synonym for "choose/reject."
Your problem is that you bring a lot of baggage to this discussion. You act as if anything Craig says is equivalent to everything Craig every said. You're too juiced up on Gordon Clark and John Robbins to walk in a straight line. After you've had some time to dry out, come back and pay attention to my actual range of reference.
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
DeleteCharlie,
DeleteSince you refuse to argue in good faith, future comments from you will be deleted.
I'm struck by the fact that Craig is often more charitable towards atheists than Calvinists.
ReplyDeleteJames White made the same observation when commenting on THIS PART of the Craig vs. Hitchens debate. Hitchens asks whether there are any Christian denominations which he regards as false. Craig then says that there are certain tenets of Reformed Theology which he disagrees with. James White rightly pointed out that it's unfortunate that Craig cites Calvinism rather than something like Roman Catholicism (I put it bit milder than the way Dr. White did).
I might add that I agree with Annoyed Pinoy that Arminianism has more in common with atheism than with biblical Christianity. Roger Olson is quite willing to include the heresy of Open Theism within the Arminian camp. Both are heresies, of course, but Open Theism is worse than Arminianism. Both postulate that there is change within God. Augustine's view of God as eternally unchanging means that God does not think thought that pass through His mind in temporal succession. The immutability of God excludes all human temporality or change, including the exclusion of God's experiencing emotional changes. God is absolutely impassible. Malachi 3:6; James 1:17.
ReplyDeleteLike the atheist, the Arminian dares to judge God. And by way of the theology of paradox, Van Til both disagrees and agrees with the atheist and the Arminian. The law of contradiction doesn't apply to Van Til.
And as Calvin put it in Calvin's Calvinism:
"For, pretending a great concern for the honour of God, they bark at us, as imputing to Him a cruelty utterly foreign to His nature. Pighius denies that he has any contest with God. What cause, or whose cause is it, then, that Paul maintains? After he had adopted the above axiom, --that God hardens whom He will, and has mercy on whom He will, he subjoins the supposed taunt of a wicked reasoner, --" Why doth He yet find fault? For who hath resisted His will?" (Rom. 9: 19.) He meets such blasphemy as this, by simply setting against it the power of God. If those clothe God with the garment of a tyrant, who refer the hardening of men even to His eternal counsel; we, most certainly, are not the originators of this doctrine. If they do God an injury who set His will above all other causes, Paul taught this doctrine long before us. Let these enemies of God, then, dispute the matter with the apostle. For I maintain nothing, in the present discussion, but what I declare is taught by him. About these barking dogs, however, I would not be very anxious. I am the rather moved with an anxiety about some, otherwise good men, who, while they fear lest they should ascribe to God anything unworthy of His goodness, really seem to be horror-struck at that which He declares, by the apostle, concerning Himself.
Now, we are holding fast, all the while, a godly purpose of vindicating the justice of God from all calumny. And the modesty of these timid ones would be worthy of all praise, if it were not the offspring of moroseness, inflated with a certain secret pride. For such men speak according to their own natural sense and understanding. But why do they fear to concede to the power of God, that which is beyond the power of their own mind to comprehend, lest His justice should be endangered? Why, I say, is this? It is because they presume to subject the tribunal of God to their own judgment. Now, Paul shows us, that it is an act of intolerable pride in any man to assume to himself the judgment of his brother: because there is one Judge, by whom we all stand or fall; and to whom every knee must bow. What madness is it then, for a man to raise his crest against this only Judge Himself, and to presume to measure His infinite power by natural sense!"
Calvin, John (2011-11-24). Calvin's Calvinism: A Treatise on the Eternal Predestination of God. Translated by Henry Cole. (Kindle Locations 373-391). . Kindle Edition.
Notice that Calvin accuses the semi-pelagians and papists of trying to rationalize away the sovereignty of God, not the advocates of propositional truth in Scripture.
Speculating that God elects on the basis of foreknowledge is rationalism.
Charlie
Thanks for that Charlie,
ReplyDelete"And the modesty of these timid ones would be worthy of all praise, if it were not the offspring of moroseness, inflated with a certain secret pride".
Ouch! Calvin's got balls. I like that.
So why does Calvin look so morose and Craig doesn't?
The word "morose" is nothing more than propaganda since it says nothing about the actual logic of Calvin's propositional statements, nor does it say anything about what the Scriptures teach or propose on the doctrine of predestination and the doctrine of foreordination. Only an Arminian would think that Craig's irrationalism says anything meaningful. Martin Luther devastated the semi-pelagian view way before Arminianism came on the scene:
ReplyDelete"THIS, therefore, is also essentially necessary and wholesome for Christians to know: That God foreknows nothing by contingency, but that He foresees, purposes, and does all things according to His immutable, eternal, and infallible will. By this thunderbolt, "Free-will" is thrown prostrate, and utterly dashed to pieces. Those, therefore, who would assert "Free-will," must either deny this thunderbolt, or pretend not to see it, or push it from them."
Martin Luther, The Bondage of the Will, Section 9, The Sovereignty of God
Steve,
ReplyDelete"Is God's love "unconditional"? Craig believes in hell. Craig believes in damnation. Craig is not a universalist. If God's love is unconditional, why does God make faith and repentance conditions of salvation? "
I am very surprised you question that God's love (whoever He loves) is unconditional, especially in contrast to Islam where God's love must be earned. Who could think they earned the cross?
God be with you,
Dan
There are different ways of conditioning salvation. To say salvation is not conditioned on "earning God's love" hardly entails that someone like Craig doesn't make salvation contingent on other conditions, like faith and repentance.
DeleteMoreover, unlike Calvinists, who espouse unconditional election, Craig is a Molinist, so his version of election takes the counterfactuals of creaturely freedom into account.
In Calvinism, election is unconditional, but salvation is conditional. However, God ensures the fulfillment of the conditions (e.g. faith, sanctification, perseverance) in the life of the elect, through his invincible grace.
Calvinism/Molinism aside, Christians can agree that God's love is unconditional and this is a huge contrast to Islam. In Islam, you have to be "good enough" for Allah or your spouse or whatever love you want to get. But God's love was the driving reason behind the cross.
DeleteGranted, salvation is one of the major ways God shows His love. And yes, on Molinism, both salvation and election are conditional, so major expressions of God's love are conditional. And this seems to mirror scriptures expressions like Hosea 9:15. So in that love is a synecdoche for God's expressions of love, sure, it's conditional in that sense. But strictly speaking, God's love isn't based on our worth or being "good enough".
God be with you,
Dan
Your view is equivocation, frankly. You imply that God loves both the elect and the reprobate unconditionally. That view is Arminianism. The Bible plainly teaches that only election is unconditional. Therefore, God's love is unconditional only toward the elect. The reprobate were predetermined to be objects of God's wrath from before the foundation of world, and, in fact, from all eternity. Romans 9:11-13; 1 Peter 2:8; Isaiah 46:10; Daniel 4:35; Proverbs 16:4; Romans 9:18-22. God loved Jacob and hated Esau before they were born or did good or evil. Further, God's love is not conditioned on foreseen good works just as reprobation is not based on foreseen evil works.
DeleteDan,
DeleteYou insist that God's love is unconditional, only to do an about-face and say God's love is conditional.
Your denial that God's loved is based on our worth or being good enough is attacking something that was no part of my post to begin with.
Steve,
DeleteI pointed out the section of your post I object to, and the senses in which God's love is conditional vs. unconditional.
God be with you,
Dan
Charlie,
DeleteGlad we can agree that God's love is unconditional, even if we don't agree as to who God loves. Many Calvinists think of God as loving to all, based on Ps 145:9, Matthew 5:45 and similar passages.
I disagree the bible plainly teaches that election is unconditional. For example, God chose "the younger" to reverse the natural birthright and demonstrated that salvation isn't based on nationality. But "younger" is a condition. Likewise, in 1 Corinthians 1:27, God chooses the "foolish", "weak" and "poor". Again, these are conditions.
God be with you,
Dan
Dan, no we don't agree since you are redefining terms in an equivocal fashion. I also disagree that "many Calvinists think of God as loving to all." That's plainly what the neo-Calvinists and the neo-Kuyperians teach, including the late Van Til. However, that view is not and never was the classical Calvinist view and it certainly isn't supported in Scripture or in any of the Reformed confessions.
DeleteCharlie
Godismyjudge
Delete"I pointed out the section of your post I object to, and the senses in which God's love is conditional vs. unconditional."
Which reduces your original objection to doubletalk.
In fact, common grace is specifically denied in the Canons of Dort, 3rd and 4th Heads of Doctrine, Rejection of Errors 5.
ReplyDeleteV. Who teach: That the corrupt and natural man can so well use the common grace (by which they understand the light of nature), or the gifts still left him after the fall, that he can gradually gain by their good use a greater, namely, the evangelical or saving grace and salvation itself. And that in this way God on his part shows himself ready to reveal Christ unto all men, since he applies to all sufficiently and efficiently the means necessary to conversion. For the experience of all ages and the Scriptures do both testify that this is untrue. "He showeth his Word unto Jacob, his statues and his ordinances unto Israel. He hath not dealt so with any nation: and as for his ordinances they have not known them," Psalm 147:19, 20 KJV. "Who in the generations gone by suffered all the nations to walk in their own way," Acts 14:16 KJV. And: "And they (Paul and his companions) having been forbidden of the Holy Spirit to speak the word in Asia, and when they were come over against Mysia, they assayed to go into Bithynia, and the Spirit suffered them not," Acts 16:6, 7 NKJV.
Charlie
The idea that natural revelation is the same thing as "common grace" is the Arminian doctrine, not the Reformed doctrine. The error of common grace elevates general revelation or natural revelation over special revelation in the written or inscripturated Word of God.
ReplyDeleteAlso, the neo--Calvinist doctrine of the "free offer of the Gospel" has God desiring what He has decreed not to do, namely to save the reprobate. There are no contradictions in God's mind. Simply because the Bible commands all men to repent and believe in the general call of the Gospel does not imply that all men have the ability to believe. As Augustine said, God willingly permits that which is against His will. So God must have predetermined reprobation. 1 Peter 2:8 KJV; Acts 2:23 KJV; Acts 4:27-28 KJV; Romans 9:13 KJV; Romans 9:18 KJV. The error of the free offer is in confusing the general call of the Gospel with the effectual call. God does not desire to save anyone except the elect. Matthew 22:12-14 KJV; John 6:37-45, 65 KJV. In fact, only the elect are regenerated and that regeneration precedes faith, and such regeneration is completely up to the will of the Holy Spirit who regenerates whom He wills to regenerate. John 3:3-8 NKJV.
As for God's choosing whom He will choose, your proof texts that allegedly prove that God is subject to the conditions of His creation is clearly a non sequitur. It does not follow that because God chooses the younger over the elder son in the case of Jacob and Esau, David over his older brothers, Joseph over his older brothers, etc., that this therefore means that God's choices are conditioned on circumstances. That would make God subject to time and His creation rather than sovereign over creation. God is eternal and immutable, not subject to change or to any creature or created thing, including time.
Romans 9:18 KJV flatly rejects your idea of conditional election in any case whatsoever, including your misused proof texts. God is completely free to elect or reprobate whom He wants to elect or reprobate. I might also point out that the expected choices in the Old Testament were that the elder son would receive the blessings, not the younger. So God's choosing the younger sons in the cases I cited proves that God is not bound to human expectations or conditions--including yours. God will do as He pleases. Psalm 115:3 KJV; Psalm 135:6 KJV; Daniel 4:35 KJV.
Also, 1 Corinthians 1:27 KJV clearly is a purpose statement, not a conditional statement or proposition. God chooses the weak for the purpose of shaming the wise and the mighty. Even a plow boy or a garage mechanic who reads and understands the Bible by comparing Scripture with Scripture knows more than the so-called "experts" who elevate human scholarship above the perspicuous and plain teaching of Scripture.
May God grant you grace to believe the Bible,
Charlie
all who would respond freely to it if they heard it did hear it, and all who do not hear it are persons who would not have accepted it if they had heard it.
ReplyDeleteThis is circular logic. God rejected those who did not hear because He knew that they would reject Him if they did hear? How would Craig know what these people would or would not do? He isn't God! So speculating that God rejects them based on foreknowledge assumes the conclusion in the premise. I can tell you plainly that those who do not hear are predetermined to unbelief because God determined that they would not be saved: 1 Peter 2:8 NKJV; Proverbs 16:4 NKJV; Romans 9:22 NKJV. Also, the Holy Spirit clearly stopped Paul from preaching in Asia because God did not want to save those in Asia: Acts 16:6 NKJV
Charlie,
ReplyDeleteHow am I equivocating, when I say God’s love in unconditional in contrast to conditional love as taught by Islam?
Common grace or the free offer are not denied by Dort. What you cite only denies men can use common grace to obtain additional grace and salvation.
Your denial of the free offer conflicts with passages like John 3:16 and your denial that God prefers salvation to damnation conflicts with passages like Ezekiel 33:11.
You cited Romans 9:11-13 as evidence of unconditional election, and when I showed you the conditions within that text, you appealed to your presuppositions on God’s relationship with time and His immutability to justify maintaining your position. Unconditional election is simply not taught in the text you said it was in.
Romans 9:18 speaks of mercy, not election.
On 1 Corinthians 1:27, I agree the statement is a purpose statement. And God’s purpose includes choosing the weak, foolish and poor, which are conditions.
Please don’t say or imply I don’t believe the bible.
God be with you,
Dan
Dan, Scripture is logical. The text does not say that God is conditioned by the creature or by the creation. Even Van Til was not stupid enough to confuse the creature with the Creator. Bare assertions that God is subject to His creation do not make it so. You are simply presupposing that view. As I cited plenty of other verses that contradict your premise, I can only conclude that you reject both logical propositions and the principle that Scripture interprets Scripture.
DeleteThe Canons of Dort do indeed reject the doctrine of common grace since Rejection 4 clearly says that the "gifts" you claim still exist were lost in the fall. Secondly, the pronoun "they" clearly indicates that the confusion of natural revelation with common grace and common grace itself are errors of the Arminians and therefore rejected.
"The true doctrine having been explained, the Synod rejects the errors of those:
I. Who teach: That it cannot properly be said, that original sin in itself suffices to condemn the whole human race, or to deserve temporal and eternal punishment. For these contradict the Apostle, who declares: "Therefore as through one man sin entered into the world, and death through sin, and so death passed unto all men, for that all sinned," Romans 5:12. And: "The judgment came of one unto condemnation," Romans 5:16. And: "The wages of sin is death," Romans 6:23.
II. Who teach: That the spiritual gifts, or the good qualities and virtues, such as: goodness, holiness, righteousness, could not belong to the will of man when he was first created, and that these, therefore, could not have been separated therefrom in the fall. For such is contrary to the description of the image of God, which the Apostle gives in Ephesians 4:24, where he declares that it consists in righteousness and holiness, which undoubtedly belong to the will.
III. Who teach: That in spiritual death the spiritual gifts are not separate from the will of man, since the will in itself has never been corrupted, but only hindered through the darkness of the understanding and the irregularity of the affections; and that, these hindrances having been removed, the will can then bring into operation its native powers, that is, that the will of itself is able to will and to choose, or not to will and not to choose, all manner of good which may be presented to it. This is an innovation and an error, and tends to elevate the powers of the free will, contrary to the declaration of the Prophet: "The heart is deceitful above all things, and it is exceedingly corrupt," Jeremiah 17:9; and of the Apostle: "Among whom (sons of disobedience) we also all once lived in the lusts of the flesh, doing the desires of the flesh and of the mind," Ephesians 2:3.
IV. Who teach: That the unregenerate man is not really nor utterly dead in sin, nor destitute of all powers unto spiritual good, but that he can yet hunger and thirst after righteousness and life, and offer the sacrifice of a contrite and broken spirit, which is pleasing to God. For these are contrary to the express testimony of Scripture. "Ye were dead through trespasses and sins," Ephesians 2:1,5; and: "Every imagination of the thought of his heart are only evil continually," Genesis 6:5; 8:21.
Moreover, to hunger and thirst after deliverance from misery, and after life, and to offer unto God the sacrifice of a broken spirit, is peculiar to the regenerate and those that are called blessed. Psalm 51:10, 19; Matthew 5:6." Rejection of Errors
My denial of the "free offer of the Gospel" is not a denial that the Gospel is to be preached to all men without exception. My denial is with the doctrine of the FOG as it is defined by the proponents of the three points of common grace. Furthermore, John 3:16 NKJV does not say that all men without exception are loved by God. It says that God loves the "world". That is further particularized by John 3:18 NKJV, which says that those who refuse to believe are "condemned," and by John 3:36 NKJV, further particularizing the meaning of John 3:16-21. I might add that Revelation 5:9 NKJV shows clearly that election is of all classes of humankind including nations, tribes, gender, social status, young, old, etc.
DeleteAs for Ezekiel 33:11 NKJV, it is clearly written to the Old Testament church, the nation of Israel. Therefore, it cannot be applied universally to all men everywhere without exception. Those who are members of the church are not necessarily elect either, since Paul says that not all Israel is true Israel. Romans 9:6-7 NKJV.
You cited Romans 9:11-13 as evidence of unconditional election, and when I showed you the conditions within that text, you appealed to your presuppositions on God’s relationship with time and His immutability to justify maintaining your position. Unconditional election is simply not taught in the text you said it was in.
ReplyDeleteRomans 9:18 speaks of mercy, not election.
You claim that God is subject to conditions. Where does the text say any such thing? On the contrary, the Bible over and over states plainly that is not subject to man or to creation. God does as He pleases. Psalm 115:5; Psalm 135:6; Daniel 4:35. You, however, agree with the Arminians and the papists that God is somehow indebted to man. Hint: God judges man. Man does not judge God. Read the quote from Calvin again.
As for Romans 9:18, the verse speaks of election and reprobation. God "hardens" the reprobate. Your argument is answered by Paul in Romans 9:19-21. And clearly, Isaiah 45:7 KJV; Proverbs 16:4 NKJV shows that God creates the reprobate for the specific purpse of their destruction. Romans 9:17, 22 NKJV.
My presupposition is that Scripture speaks for itself. You are reading into the text what is not there, namely that God is subject to conditions. Election is unconditional because God is not subject to any law. He does what He pleases and nothing God does is wrong. Scripture alone is the Word of God. Jeremiah 23:29 NKJV. Any plow boy or housewife can read the text and understand what it plainly says. 2 Timothy 3:15 NKJV; 2 Peter 1:19-21 NKJV; Hebrews 4:12 NKJV; Isaiah 8:20 NKJV
and consider that the longsuffering of our Lord is salvation-- as also our beloved brother Paul, according to the wisdom given to him, has written to you, 16 as also in all his epistles, speaking in them of these things, in which are some things hard to understand, which untaught and unstable people twist to their own destruction, as they do also the rest of the Scriptures. 17 You therefore, beloved, since you know this beforehand, beware lest you also fall from your own steadfastness, being led away with the error of the wicked; 18 but grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To Him be the glory both now and forever. Amen. (2 Peter 3:15-18 NKJ)
ReplyDeleteI completely disagree with the statement by Craig that Arminians and Calvinists are brothers. Arminianism was condemned as a semi-pelagian heresy at the Synod of Dort. Arminians are not saved. Furthermore, Arminianism is not just a matter of adiaphora. Arminianism is a papist leaning heresy that leads back to the papists' errors. I can say that because I graduated from two Arminian schools of theology.
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