Steve has already responded to these comments by our midnight atheist Adam Lee. But I’d like to call a foul on the part of Lee that Steve graciously passed over. Lee uses purely fatalistic language in his description of Calvinism, and acts as if he is describing the Calvinistic viewpoint. I knew this would happen when I first saw Lee’s question to Steve, and I can’t let this pass by unnoticed.
If God has predestined someone for damnation, then no matter what they do, no matter what they desire, they are trapped, and doomed to undergo that fate.
“No matter what they do, no matter what they desire,” is simply not the case. This terminology is purely fatalistic, and you mistakenly and unjustifiably equate Calvinism with fatalism. Fatalism says that God accomplishes his purpose apart from the will of man. In other words, the ends occur regardless of the means. God fulfills his plan regardless of the will of man. But this is not Calvinism. Calvinism, however, states that God accomplishes his will through the will of man; God controls both the ends and the means. If Lee is going to play this game in broad daylight, he needs to learn how to correctly define the terms he is using.
Therefore, “No matter what they do, no matter what they desire,” is simply a misrepresentation. God accomplishes his purpose through what they do and through what they desire. I wonder if Lee can show me where the Bible or any Calvinist has ever stated that God will damn a reprobate who, in fact, desired to be saved? Or where God will save someone who desired to be damned? No, the reprobate are damned willingly, and the elect are saved willingly. Yes, the non-elect are “trapped” in some sense, but it is a trap that they willingly set for themselves. It’s like they are in their own burning building, where they themselves set the fire, where they would obstinately refuse any attempt of rescue. They trap themselves because they want to trap themselves.
In contrast, I wonder if Adam Lee is trapped willingly? Or is he simply trapped, regardless of his will? You see, the tables could easily be turned on Lee’s fatalistic lingo. Regardless of Lee’s will, if the universe is an atheistic universe, then it is an atheistic universe. Regardless of Lee’s will, Lee is buried alive. He is in a conscious coma, where he sees everything, hears everything, and is aware of his surroundings, but any effort to move his body or contact the outside world is futile. He wants to, but he can’t. So the only thing he can do is put on a happy face, create his own meaning to his nanosecond, or vapor, of a life, and make the best of being trapped in a virtually dead body. This worldview sounds much more like fatalism than any way Lee can describe a Reformed viewpoint.
This was helpful in seeing the difference between Calvinism and fatalism. On the subject of monergism vs. synergism (which may or may not be related, I don't know, oh I suppose it is in a way anyway) I usually just see the difference as God does it and you either accept that or you don't. If you don't you are still under the tyranny of your vanity. Once you recognize God does it the tyranny of your vanity begins to dissolve.
ReplyDeleteActually when I first read the comment you wrote explaining the difference between Calvinism and fatalism (I mean in one of the comments threads below) I caught one of those visions you sometimes get with theology where you see the strength and beauty of pure biblical doctrine. It evokes joy as well.
ReplyDeleteThe difference between Calvinism and fatalism is surely a difference of utmost importance. In fatalism, we have a God who will accomplish his purpose apart from and regardless of the will of man. God's end occurs regardless of the means of your will and actions. In fatalism, human responsibility is removed.
ReplyDeleteBut in Calvinism, God is the sovereign God who controls both the ends and the means. He saves people after first causing them to want to be saved. He alters their sinful will. And those who are damned are damned because they want to be. God's decree of election and reprobation are fulfilled, but they are fulfilled through the Spirit’s work (regeneration) or lack of work (reprobation) in the will of man.
Fatalism shares a false premise with synergism: human responsibility presupposes human freedom and human ability. The synergist rightly recognizes that the Bible teaches human responsibility. But he then takes this to mean that humans are free (in the Libertarian sense) and able to do good. To the synergist, human responsible is not possible without human freedom and human ability. This, of course, is an unbiblical premise. But the fatalist shares this premise. The fatalist shares the premise that human responsibility presupposes human freedom and human ability. But the fatalist rejects human freedom and human ability. Therefore, based upon this false premise, he must reject human responsibility as well. And if humans are not responsible, their actions are meaningless. God is, therefore, sovereign over the ends, but regardless of the means, rather than being sovereign over both the ends and the means.
Ron Hanko rightly notes:
The [fatalist], then, makes the same mistake as the Arminians and free-willists, only he draws a different conclusion. Both think that to command or demand repentance and faith of dead sinners must imply that such sinners are not dead and have in themselves the ability to repent and believe. The free-willist says, then: "To command must imply ability, therefore, men have the ability." The [fatalist] says: "To command must imply ability, therefore we will not command any but the elect."
Do you think it's important to add along with what you've written that God's will acting in us becomes our will when we've been regenerated and have the Holy Spirit in us (which is God in us)? Because I can see where if that isn't added a person may not see how God's will acting in us is any different from being some kind of robot. It has to be seen that self-will yes is bondage rather than freedom, but God's will acting in us is our natural will because we are made in the image of God (and begin to recover that with regeneration) and so is not any kind of bondage or robotic foreign will acting on us by coercion or as not a part of us.
ReplyDeletePacker writes somewhere that a regenerate Christian takes part in the life of the Trinity. With the Holy Spirit in us, connecting us to Christ and the Father, I can see this, and God's will - rather than self-will which is a delusion and represents bondage to the Kingdom of Satan - then becomes our true will and makes us true individuals. As anti-intuitive as that sounds, but the truth calls for new thinking and getting away from "carnal" thinking. It calls for inner reorientation from self-will to God's will.
Whenever a synergist (or an atheist like Lee) misrepresents the Reformed position as stating that God "forces" mean to believe, or that the elect are saved apart from their will, it could never be any less true.
ReplyDeleteFirst of all, the notion that God would "force" someone to believe entails that there is resistance upon their part. But can man resist the actions of God in any sense? The Reformed view states that God is absolutely sovereign, that salvation is a work of monergism. Therefore, not even the will can be set against the work of God. There is no resistance on the part of man.
But monergism is not just monergism. It is monergistic regeneration. A heart that was once unwilling is know made willing. This refutes the strawman that man is saved regardless of his will. Rather, he is saved through his will. He is made willing.
John Calvin stated:
"The will is not destroyed but rather repaired by grace."
Similarly, Spurgeon said:
"A man is not saved against his will, but he is made willing by the operation of the Holy Ghost. A mighty grace which he does not wish to resist enters into the man, disarms him, makes a new creature of him, and he is saved. (Sermons, Vol. 10, p.309)"
We hardly see the "trap" or the "no matter what he desires" scenario that Adam Lee posed.
Do you think it's important to add along with what you've written that God's will acting in us becomes our will when we've been regenerated and have the Holy Spirit in us (which is God in us)? Because I can see where if that isn't added a person may not see how God's will acting in us is any different from being some kind of robot. It has to be seen that self-will yes is bondage rather than freedom, but God's will acting in us is our natural will because we are made in the image of God (and begin to recover that with regeneration) and so is not any kind of bondage or robotic foreign will acting on us by coercion or as not a part of us.
ReplyDeletePacker writes somewhere that a regenerate Christian takes part in the life of the Trinity. With the Holy Spirit in us, connecting us to Christ and the Father, I can see this, and God's will - rather than self-will which is a delusion and represents bondage to the Kingdom of Satan - then becomes our true will and makes us true individuals. As anti-intuitive as that sounds, but the truth calls for new thinking and getting away from "carnal" thinking. It calls for inner reorientation from self-will to God's will.
At times the metaphor I've heard with respect to salvation taking part as part of the life of the Trinity is akin to a Divine Conversation. The 3 Persons of the Trinity are having a Conversation about what to do about the sins of men. The Father decides that they will terminate their wrath for sin for some in hell and others in themselves. The Son volunteers to do this. Then the Spirit goes and gathers the ones for whom Christ died and brings them in so that they can participate in the eternal conversation.
The Reformed scheme itself is explicitly trinitarian. The Father elects; the Son redeems a people; the Spirit applies the benefits of redemption.
Arminianism puts election outside the grace of God the Father by making it contingent on a libertarian decision by man. The Spirit's work comes by way of prevenient, not effecual grace. So the grace of the Son is in view, by way of the cross. This view is either explicitly binitarian or functionally Unitarian. Amyraldians insert dissention into the Godhead by having the Father and the Son work at cross purposes with respect to intercession, even though, conceptually, the atonement, which is general on this scheme is never intended for all men, since the particularizing decree (election) is placed after the atonement but actually executed prior to creation itself.
The metaphor for monergism in Scripture explicitly answers to birth. The faith that comes to us is not like a commodity that we don't have that we are given. It is the result of the restoration of the ability we naturally possess as beings created in God's image who use faith all the time in a misdirected fashion to act in a manner congruent with a new moral ability which we did not have. As a new birth a re-creation, the implication is that we should be able to do this, but we can't because of sin. This disjunction is what results in our inabilityt do spiritual good and the necessity of monergistic regeneration.
The birth metaphor is most appropritate here in that faith is to monergistic regeneration as breathing and crying is a baby's natural birth. There are no still births in God's delivery room. Just as the first thing a baby does when born is cry and take its first breath, so the new believer believes and repents of his sins. As the baby continues breathing as long as it is alive, so the believer keeps breathing. This is by the grace of God; this new nature is underwritten by monergistic regeneration and a perfect atonement, ergo the life it brings will not die out; the breathing may grow shallow at times, but it willl not cease.
Hello. First of all, I am new here. This is my first post. I wound up here after exploring a number of other sites, blogs and message boards and reading a number of articles and books--all as part of a search for some deeper meaning to my life than just the "daily grind" it had become. That search continues, but for the time being, it has "paused the longest" over the Calvinism I see discussed here. In part, I think this is because, out of all the other worldviews I have examined, Calvinism is the only one so far that does not degenerate into utter nonsense when probed to its core, e.g., the atheists' "existence is just existence." At the same time, I am currently struggling with the concept of total divine sovreignty (which is why I am posting here in particular). Even if I could reconcile logically how our will belongs to and is controlled by God (how, then, is it even ours, at all?), my real struggle is how can I possibly explain such a concept to my wife or any other person I care about--people I know never have nor ever will truly examine their own worldview in this way no matter what I say or do.
ReplyDeleteEven as I write I see that my true struggle may be in the realization that the worldly bonds keeping me from accepting Christianity right now may very well include the fear of leaving behind (at least spiritually) my loved ones. That is serious business. Are any of you not spiritually aligned with your loved ones, for example, your wife or husband? How do you deal with this? Do you just tell yourself it is God's will and that your life on Earth is insignificant to the life you will have with God eternally?
By the way, I am not formally trained in apologetics, philospohy, metaphysics or the Bible. I have a lot to learn and read, including the Bible itself (again). In fact, I would say that the one comfort I have from what I would otherwise call my state of despair is that I can at least continue to read and learn. But periodically as I search, and especially now in light of what I read here, I feel like I am just biding my time, waiting for God to act in me or not. Waiting for salvation or damnation, whatever be God's will for me.
Anyone willing to engage in an e-mail exchange with me about these things? If so, please write to adin75@comcast.net. Thank you.
Ok, I think I've grasped the predestination doctrine: those who believe were predestined to do so by God, and those who disbeleive were also predestined to do so. There is no free will: there is only God's plan, unfolding majestically.
ReplyDeleteSo why do the reprobate exist at all? Why create people who are doomed to eternal torment? Is this not a bit unfair?