- May 28, 2018
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Mark, you are what I call the kinder Calvinist. There are two kinds of people that result from believing Calvinism. You are the kind one.
What I’ve observed happening after a person is believing Calvinism for a time is as follows. One type we needn’t discuss. The other is the kind version but to maintain their position they have to jettison their mind. That is they must embrace what is essentially nonsense. You say there’s choice but no free will or free choice. These are mutually exclusive. You say Gods not responsible for evil done but yet responsible for the cause. Those are mutually exclusive. You give God the fault for causing sin to be and say He is good. These are mutually exclusive. This is very typical of calvinists. To maintain your eternal security, you are prepared to surrender real understanding and have to close your mind to what words mean.
One day you will stand before Him and have to give a account for why you credited Him with causing sin and evil and taught this to others. You will be unable to dance around the matter by redefining words or repeating mutually exclusive points. I know what your answer will be. And I would that you repent before that day for your sake. You will be saved from Hell, but not from the judgement for the matters whose responsibility you laid on God. He will see it as you accusing Him of evil. Because that is what Calvinism does.
You can't see why Navair2 sounded genuinely puzzled why you would consider him condescending? Remember, that like us all, you will have to give account for every word. Remember, that like us all, you too will be measured by your own standard.
I DON'T:
1. I don't give God the blame for anything, causing that sin be, indeed, for causing the circumstances in which a person CHOOSES to sin according to their own corrupt will, is not blaming him. "Blame" is the word you put to the simple logic of attributing 'cause'. I don't 'give God the fault' for causing sin. I give him the credit for doing what it takes to make a people for himself.
2. I don't embrace nonsense. It is you who denies the logic of cause-and-effect, and grants God-like power of integrity of choice to those at enmity with God. It is you who denies choices are caused, in the plain face of being caused to say so. You CHOSE to say so. Do you deny then, that you have to credit your choice to random chance? Or to what —your own magnificent virtue and intelligence, better and less nonsensical than those who believe as I do?
3. I don't jettison my mind (your words are so kind!). I find the logic of Calvinism delightful and God-honoring. It is YOU who find it necessary to attribute humanity with what only God possesses —absolute spontaneity, sovereignty. Only First Cause is uncaused. It is YOU who denies that the work of grace, the whole of the Gospel, is the work of God alone.
4. I don't believe in mutually exclusive things. It is you, who must deny the fact of God alone being absolutely free and unfettered of all outside causes, in order to call humans free-willed. Those are mutually exclusive. How is choice mutually exclusive from lack of FREE will? For that matter, do you not admit to being a slave to Christ? In him we are free, not in our will. Our will belongs to him. You are not autonomous.
5. I don't accuse God of evil. Your 'logical' extensions of what Calvinism teaches, are NOT what Calvinism teaches. You use a certain logic, no doubt, but it is faulty, making false assumptions.
I bet you would have a problem with "The command does not imply the ability to obey the command." Yet right there in Romans 8, we have described for us, the lost, who are unable to submit to God's law. Yet the law has commanded them all the same. If they will not submit and indeed are unable to submit to God's law, how is their will free?
What will you do on that day, —when God asks you what Romans 8:5-8 is about? or Romans 9:11-23 is about? —when God asks you why you abandoned his word in favor of self-determination?
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