A Dictionary of Arminian Terms

Some Arminians were kind enough to help the world out by giving them a dictionary of Calvinist terms. In the spirit of brotherly love, we do the same:

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All (1): All always means all. Yup, Jesus died for every single human, including those already dead and in hell, and even including himself.

All (2): (as to sin) If its related to sin, "all" doesn't include babies.

Amazing Grace: Horrible song composed by a Calvinist. Teaches wretched "doctrines of grace."

Argument (1): The mean things Calvinists do, means: a group of propositions wherein the truth of one is asserted on the basis of the evidence furnished by the others.

Argument (2): An unfortunate term for how Arminians lovingly discuss the glorious truth of Scripture, means: if it feels good, it probably is.

Arminius, Jacob: The first church father.

Assurance: Keep trying, hopefully you'll make it, but since you have libertarian free will, you could just flip sides one day. Never can tell.

Barney: Purple dinosaur currently being sued by Arminians over rights to the “I love you, you love me, we’re a happy fam-il-ly” song.

Bible: Cool book with stories that can be used as springboards into inspiring sermons about nothing to do with the text whatsoever. (See exegesis.)

Big Meany: Use this term when losing a debate with a Calvinist.

Brach Davidians: A Christian cult that believes in libertarian free will.

Calvinism: We love everyone, because God is love. Calvinists are devil worshipers, their God is the devil, and Calvinism is a devil worshiping doctrine. We love them.

Calvin, John: Satan incarnated.

Caner, Ergun: You don’t mess with.

Clause, Sanata: Cool story about a nice old man who loves all the children of the world and gives them what they want. Great way to teach Children about God. (See: Jesus loves the little children.)

Christian: Someone with fish bumper sticker on car who repeated a prayer after a pastor with a head-mic on.

Context: Another text that I can put together with the text at hand to render the meaning satisfactory to my philosophical preconceptions. Example: John 6:44 and John 12:32 (no surrounding verses allowed, please).

Dead (1): (as to Christ) Really, complete dead. Unable to see, hear, or respond to stimuli.

Dead (2): (as to Adam's posterity) Somewhat sick. It's hard to see, hear, or respond to the Gospel.

Determinism: False Calvinist teaching that God makes sure that his plan will come about.

Devil Worship: What Calvinism leads to. (Really.)

Drawing: Wooing. Usage example: "Drawing doesn't mean God will surely bring men to himself, he (now, pooch lips out, making a small opening, and, in a low voice say) woooos them."

Dude: Term used in sermon at least 15 times, makes us interesting to non-Christians (See missions.)

Edwards, Jonathan (1): A devil.

Edwards, Jonathan (2): He's some kind of TV celebrity, right?

Effectual call: Unbiblical Calvinist doctrine. Just as Calvinists try to make unwarranted leaps from physical death to spiritual death, they also make unwarranted leaps from earthly careers like "Shepherding," viz., "My sheep hear my voice, I know them, they follow me," to how God brings in his people in the flock, er fold, er, group.

Election: God's "choosing" of people who chose him first. Kind of like me "voting" for the president after November 4th, 2008.

Esau: A nation, that‘s it.

Evil: Something God cannot decree (except in the case of Jesus since God decreed his death at the purposeful hands of humans, and the only way an innocent man could be purposefully put to death is by murder. Hence, God decreed murder. Murder is evil. God decreed evil.).

Exegesis: What?

Exegesis: What?

Exegesis: How dare you X out Jesus. First they Xed out Christmas, now they want to X out Jesus. What's this world coming to.

Fall: An unintended accident. A hiccup in God's plan. (See redemption.)

Fatalist: Something Calvinists are, no matter what they say. (See synergist.)

Faux Pas (1): Going to church without: Sandals, Hawaiian shirt, shorts, and Starbucks coffee in hand; bible optional.

Faux Pas (2): No "Prayer of Jabez" on your bookshelf.

Faux Pas (3): Only a term Arminians use.

Federalism: Something to do with the U.S. government?

Foreknow: God's infallible knowledge of what a creature will do . . . even though he might do otherwise.

Fruit Smoothie: Drink Arminian men drink, more loving than beer.

Geisler, Norman: A "moderate" Calvinist.

Gospel of John: Anything by John Wesley.

Grace: God's being nice.

Heaven: Place we will be unable to do otherwise than love God, but we will freely love him anyway. This is only a problem if you are a Calvinist. Because we said so. It is debatable if we will have wings in heaven. It is probably more loving that we did.

Hebrews, book of: Too bad it made it into the canon, teaches Jesus’ sacrifice was that of a high priest for his people. Teaches that if Jesus is your high priest he intercedes for you. Teaches that Jesus does not intercede for everyone. Teaches that he didn’t die for everyone. Note: Cling to the warning passages to win perseverance of the saints debate, this way Hebrews becomes a wash.

Hell: A place more horrible than anything you could imagine, made by a wuving God, and filled with people God knew, before he created them, would go there. Tell Calvinists their view is evil. (See libertarian free will (4). See supralapsarianism.)

Hermeneutics: Whose menu ticks?

Hodge, Charles: A devil.

Hypostatic Union: God can do this but it can’t make it that he decrees all things yet man is responsible.

Inerrancy: The only time God determined and controlled free actions of men in order to produce exactly the propositions he wanted to convey to humans. That the dictation theory is false and the concursive theory is true remains a mystery.

Instigate: The fights Calvinists try to start with Arminians. (See teach.)

Intelligence: Something I had extra of such that I would believe and not my neighbor, who had the same grace and the same wooing. (See also: spiritual insight, moral superiority, and third eye).

International Churches of Christ: Christian cult that believes in libertarian free will.

Irresistible Grace: Calvinist wishful thinking that God actually could make sure that those he wanted to save would be saved.

Jacob: A nation, that’s it.

Jehovah’s Witnesses: A Christian cult that believes in libertarian free will.

Jesus: My homeboy.

Jesus Loves the Little Children: Theological version of "Santa Clause is coming to town." Usually sung with great gusto, forgetting the covenantal context in which Jesus said the words that inspired Herbert Woolston to write this song. (See Clause, Santa.)

John 3:16: Great verse to be read in isolation from others, especially John 10:22-30. Possibly God's biggest mistake was including all that stuff around John 3:16 (like Genesis 1:1 - John 3:15 and John 3:17 – Revelation). Man at football game had it right.

Kitty cat: More loving pet than a dog.

Knowledge: Don’t think, feeeeeel.

Knox, John: A devil.

Libertarian Free Will (1): Our choices and actions just randomly "pop" into existence. Rewind the tape and, given all the exact same reasons, causal history, etc., a different choice could have been made. What explains that? Must be luck that we went one way rather than another.

Libertarian Free Will (2): That great gift, so great it justifies the rape, torture, and mutilation of millions of children throughout our world's history.

Libertarian Free Will (3): An a priori philosophical speculation, not found in Scripture, but imposed on Scripture as a valid hermeneutical tool.

Libertarian Free Will (4): Magic word that gets God off the hook for making people he knew would go to hell. Usually faster to say: abracadabra, though.

Love (1): Something that you set free, if it returns it is yours forever, if not, it was never meant to be.

Love (2): Swinging. Since God doesn't show special love or make distinctions, neither should we with our spouses. Showing a different kind of love to your spouse than the general love shown to neighbor is unbiblical.

Love (3): Wuv.

Love (4): That warm feeling in your tummy accompanied by the feeling of butterflies darting about in your tummy (technically, "the flutters").

Luther, Martin: A devil.

Machen, John Gresham: A devil.

Missions (1): Abroad: Whipping thousands of people of in third-world countries into an emotional frenzy in order to get them to say, "I believe." They become "saved," for now. The rest is up to them.

Missions (2): At home: Packing out massive stadiums, whipping people up into an emotional frenzy, having them come down to the stage, say they believe, write their name down, and report the thousands of converts you have made while suppressing the fact that almost all of them have done this rodeo the past 3 times you came to town.

Missions (3): Spin zone: Hid the fact the "the majority of missionaries in Africa, Asia, and Latin America have been Calvinists" (Evangelical Dictionary of World Missions, Baker, 2,000, p. 156) from fellow Arminians; tell them that Calvinists think it is "a waste of time."

Moonies: A Christian cult that believes in libertarian free will.

Moral Responsibility: All men must have been able to actually do otherwise in order to be held morally accountable for their actions, except Judas, Peter, the men who killed Jesus, and God too since he cannot not be loving.

Moral Superiority: Something I had extra of such that I would believe and not my neighbor, who had the same grace and the same wooing. (See also: intelligence, spiritual insight, and third eye).

Mormonism: A Christian cult that believes in libertarian free will.

Mystery (1): A contradiction, if used by Calvinists.

Mystery (2): Pious, humble, contrite way to answer the Calvinist, brilliantly employed by Wesley: "Whatever that Scripture proves, it never proved this; whatever its true meaning be. This cannot be its true meaning. Do you ask, "What is its true meaning then?" If I say, " I know not," you have gained nothing; for there are many scriptures the true sense whereof neither you nor I shall know till death is swallowed up in victory. But this I know, better it were to say it had no sense, than to say it had such a sense as this."

Mystery (3): Libertarian Free Will

Mystery (4): God's foreknowledge of the libertarian free choices an agent makes (see, foreknowledge).

Mystery (5): See Inerrancy.

Nation: (See Jacob, Esau, stuff like that.)

Nee ner nee ner, you don’t have a weener: Probably our best argument.

Offer (1): (as to unfair) To present something for acceptance or rejection.

Offer (2): (as to fair) To present something for acceptance or rejection while making sure every single person can meet any conditions of the offer. Example: The grocery store made an unfair offer to "buy 1 pizza get one free" since they didn't provide the appropriate transportation for old man Whithers, crippled from the war, to get to the store. Food-4-Not-Much should have sent the company car to his house.

Open Theism: A heretical movement that some Calvinists try to say we are logically committed to. Here’s what we say: “As a classical Arminian, I find much more common ground between my theology and Sanders’s than between mine and Helm’s or Ware’s. And I agree with nineteenth century Arminian theologian John Miley who said that dynamic omniscience (John’s term for open theism’s view of God’s foreknowledge) would not undermine any vital Arminian doctrine. In fact, I would go so far as to say that I cannot see how it undermines any Christian doctrine” (Roger Olsen, response to John Sanders’s Divine Providence and the Openness of God, in Perspectives on the Doctrine of God (4 Views), Broadman & Holman, 2008, p248).

Osteen, Joel: Preach it, brother!

Owen, John: A devil.

Paul (aka Saul of Tarsus): Like anyone who studied under Gamaliel can be trusted.

Pelagius: Misunderstood opponent of that evil Augustine.

People’s Temple: Christian cult started by Jim Jones, held to libertarian free will.

Pharaoh: "It says he hardened his heart first!"

Philosophy: The queen of the sciences.

Piper, John: A devil.

Preaching the Gospel: Something that is done with a power point presentation, sound effects, cool, contemporary music, and all delivered by a dapper salesman. Remember, loads of tears and emotion to entice the hearer, since God can't guarantee that those he wants saved will be saved.

Prevenient Grace: Substance similar to Pixie dust that is sprinkled through the air, if you believe hard enough, then you can fly.

Pride: Something Calvinists think they don't have, and we are humble enough and discerning enough to point out to them that they have it coming out their ears . . . this is best said in the middle of a debate with them, 'cause it's so relevant to the actual argument.

Quiche: Food Arminian men eat, more loving than steak.

Redemption: Whew! God's quick thinking to get as many men back on track as possible. Brilliant chess move. (See fall.)

Regeneration: Coming to spiritual life after you came to spiritual life.

Reprobate: Those who God knew would never choose him and instead spend eternity in hell, but he created them anyway. Tell people that this is better than the Calvinist position.

Robot (1): How we lovingly represent our Calvinist brother's position. It's always them who are mean and nasty, not us.

Robot (2): Forbidden dance. (See sanctification.)

Salvation: Something God starts but can't finish.

Sanctification: Don’t drink, smoke, chew, or go out with girls who do.

Sovereignty: God's control over laws of nature.

Spiritual Insight: Something I had extra of such that I would believe and not my neighbor, who had the same grace and the same wooing. (See also: intelligence, moral superiority, and third eye).

Stryper: Best band ever. If Calvinists would only listen to “Free” on the album “To Hell with the Devil,” then they’d see:

Free to turn away - say goodbye

Free to walk away - and deny

The gift waiting for you

Whispers a still small voice

It's your choice - you're..

Chorus

Free - Free to do what you want to

Choose your own destiny

Free to do what you want to

Free to open up - and believe

Free to simply ask - and receive

There's no better time than now

You've got the right to choose

You can't lose - you're...

Repeat Chorus

Supralapsarian: Pure evil (unless fellow Arminian and libertarian free willist, Alvin Plantinga, espouses it).

Synergist: Something we are not, no matter what Calvinists say (see Fatalist).

Teach: What we try to do to help out Calvinist, until they instigate a fight with us. (See instigate.)

TBN: Broadcasting the truth around the world, 24 hours a day.

Theodicy: If your little girl gets murdered, say: But God gave us libertarian freedom, that makes it all better.

Theology: Word of unsure origin. Examples: Rick Warren: "Purpose Driven Life." T.D. Jakes: "Woman, Though Art Loosed!". Joel Osteen: "Your Best Life Now."

The Way International: Christian cult that believes in libertarian free will.

Third Eye: Something I had extra of such that I would believe and not my neighbor, who had the same grace and the same wooing. (See also: intelligence, spiritual insight, and moral superiority).

Turretin, Francis: A devil.

Unitarian Universalists: A Christain cult that believes in libertarian free will.

Universalism: Why didn’t we think of that? Wait, some of us did.

Ursinus, Zacharias: A devil.

Venom: What Calvinists spew.

Vermigli, Pietro Martire: A devil.

Virgin Birth: God can do this, but he can’t make it that he decrees all things yet man is responsible.

Warfield, Benjamin Breckenridge: A devil.

Warning Passages (1): Proves the ability to lose salvation. If a warning deterred everyone it was given to, it wouldn’t be a good warning. It must have a failure rate of at least 10% to be a true warning.

Warning Passages (2): Calvinists say they can be meaningful since hypothetical statements have truth values, and telling the truth is meaningful. This we deny. We still have yet to figure out what truth grounds the counterfactual actions of men appealed to in our theory of free will. This is a mystery, but that is okay (see mystery 2).

White, James: Greek speaking devil.

Wine: Grape juice.

Witsius, Herman: A devil.

World: Every single person whoever, except when the same author says not to love the world or the things in it, or when he says the whole world is under the control of the evil one, or when it says that the gospel had been preached throughout the whole world, or when it says . . .

X-rated: The Institutes, Triablogue, etc.

Zwingli, Huldrych: A devil.