No morality in Calvinism?

[BibleBeliever1611]

To my understanding Calvinism teaches that supposedly God is in control of everything that happens and that people don't really have a free will.

The ramification of this theology is that now there's no morality. If God controls everything that you do and ever will do, then you can never do anything "immoral" because we know that God never does anything immoral. So God would never cause a person to do something immoral. Even if you killed someone, supposedly that was just God who made you do it because God controls everything. So then evil people could just blame God for their evil actions. You could justify murder by saying that God created you the way you are, and actually it was God who made you a murderer.

That's what Calvinism eventually boils down to. I actually used to believe in this before I became a Christian (real Christian anyway).

 

[Amittai]

To back up this question may I "push in" on behalf of my new Calvinist friend who pointed out that what he calls "hypercalvinists" (along with whom I am aware of as "neo-calvinists) (and I've known both those very similar types myself in person) distort what might have been a better version of it. Reputedly "total depravity" was never meant to be any worse than original sin, but I haven't got from U-P with him yet. What worries me about almost all christians is that God doesn't seem to expect Holy Spirit fuelled works from them: I couldn't work out whether this concept caused him surprise or not. Aristotle proposed Nicomachean virtues: are the mystics (through their stranglehold on the media) turning the world's clock back 2,400 years?

 

[Neostarwcc]

The only things Calvinism "adds" from traditional Protestant belief is we believe Christ died for the children of Abraham only but his sacrifice was capable of saving the whole world (we agree 2ith every other Protestant on that.) and that a child of Abraham cannot and wouldn't want to resist God's calling. We believe God calls a person to faith and that regeneration happens before faith. Those are the main differences really.

Every denomination believes in predestination to a point, every Protestant denomination virtually agrees with the calvinistic view of preserverence of the saints. Really, Calvinism isnt really that much different from mainstream evangelical Protestantism and a 10th of the total Protestants in the world are in fact Calvinists. Were are a mainstream denomination and its not like we introduce very many new concepts to the Protestant faith. Or that we weren't a majority denomination for almost 500 years.

Or that we made up anything that isn't stated in the Bible. Everything we state and believe in, is in fact in scripture. The reformation wouldn't have survived if the reformed faith wasn't in fact scriptural.

As for the morality of it, who are we to tell God what is and is not fair or just? We are sinful creatures who only look at sin, God is a perfect and Holy creature with no sin. If it is in fact true that God is Sovereign (and the Bible all over says he is) who are we to question his sovreignty? God has a right to do with his creation whatever he wills and often times, he does better things than we coukd have ever dreamed of.

 

[BibleBeliever1611]

Every denomination believes in predestination to a point, every Protestant denomination virtually agrees with the calvinistic view of preserverence of the saints. Really, Calvinism isnt really that much different from mainstream evangelical Protestantism and a 10th of the total Protestants in the world are in fact Calvinists. Were are a mainstream denomination and its not like we introduce very many new concepts to the Protestant faith. Or that we weren't a majority denomination for almost 500 years.

Well, I don't believe that the Bible teaches any sort of predestination. The only reason why saved people are saved is because they wanted to be saved by their own free will.

If God was the one who chooses who goes to heaven, then everyone would go to heaven because the Bible says that God is not willing that any should perish in 2 Peter 3:9. So the will of God is that no-one would be lost. Calvinists basically believe that God violates his own will by making some people perish anyway. It makes no logical sense.

 

[JM]

You are in the "Ask a Calvinist" section. Please refrain from sharing your unbiblical teaching.

 

[Hazelelponi]

Posted in the wrong forum.

 

[JM]

Well, I don't believe that the Bible teaches any sort of predestination. The only reason why saved people are saved is because they wanted to be saved by their own free will.

If God was the one who chooses who goes to heaven, then everyone would go to heaven because the Bible says that God is not willing that any should perish in 2 Peter 3:9. So the will of God is that no-one would be lost. Calvinists basically believe that God violates his own will by making some people perish anyway. It makes no logical sense.

Accordingly, you must deny God's omniscience which is heretical by any standard.

 

[BibleBeliever1611]

Accordingly, you must deny God's omniscience which is a heretical by any standard.

And you must deny God's omnipotence by claiming that God cannot create a free will.

 

[JM]

And you must deny God's omnipotence by claiming that God cannot create a free will.

(libertarian) Free will is sin and Arminianism is the root of Christian Liberalism.

 

[St_Worm2]

To my understanding Calvinism teaches that supposedly God is in control of everything that happens and that people don't really have a free will.

Hello BibleBeliever1611, as for God ordaining whatsoever comes to pass, of course He does, or He would not be God. As for people not being able to choose what they desire most at a given moment in time (because God forces them to choose what He wants them to choose instead), that I totally disagree with, and so do all of the other 5 Point/Moderate Calvinists that I know.

The ramification of this theology is that now there's no morality. If God controls everything that you do and ever will do, then you can never do anything "immoral" because we know that God never does anything immoral. So God would never cause a person to do something immoral. Even if you killed someone, supposedly that was just God who made you do it because God controls everything. So then evil people could just blame God for their evil actions. You could justify murder by saying that God created you the way you are, and actually it was God who made you a murderer.

If that's what Calvinism teaches, then much of what you said above would probably be true. Fortunately, that's not what Calvinism teaches (IOW, God does ~NOT~ control everything that we do/say/think such that He makes it impossible for us to ever choose what we truly desire).

That's what Calvinism eventually boils down to.

That may be what your misunderstanding of Calvinism eventually boils down to, but that's not what Calvinism boils down to (if it was, few if any would become Calvinists .. I know I wouldn't have).

God bless you!

--David

 

[Jesse Dornfeld]

Here is my second post on the forum.

Calvinist vs Arminian?

 

[BBAS 64]

To my understanding Calvinism teaches that supposedly God is in control of everything that happens and that people don't really have a free will.

The ramification of this theology is that now there's no morality. If God controls everything that you do and ever will do, then you can never do anything "immoral" because we know that God never does anything immoral. So God would never cause a person to do something immoral. Even if you killed someone, supposedly that was just God who made you do it because God controls everything. So then evil people could just blame God for their evil actions. You could justify murder by saying that God created you the way you are, and actually it was God who made you a murderer.

That's what Calvinism eventually boils down to. I actually used to believe in this before I became a Christian (real Christian anyway).

Good Day,

From what source did you come to what you call "your understanding".

I am interested where your error of what the Historic Doctrines of Grace teaches is coming from in your lacking understanding.

In Him,

Bill

 

[Sovereign Grace]

Accordingly, you must deny God's omniscience which is a heretical by any standard.

Boom! Nailed to the wall!

 

[Sovereign Grace]

Accordingly, you must deny God's omniscience which is a heretical by any standard.

The further ppl stray from the safe harbor of scripture the more likely their boat gets smashed into the rocks.

To deny any form of predestination(most ppl affirm it, but their view is not the biblical view of predestination) is to be in gross error.

 

[JM]

Most evangelicals call Reformed Christians legalists because we take sanctification so seriously and teach the 3rd use of the law. Go figure.

Yours in the Lord,

jm

 

[Don Maurer]

Good Day,

From what source did you come to what you call "your understanding".

I am interested where your error of what the Historic Doctrines of Grace teaches is coming from in your lacking understanding.

In Him,

Bill

Bill, I honestly chuckled when I read your post. The OP demonstrates almost no knowledge of "Calvinism" or reformed theology. Where he got his "understanding" I assume is his own imagination or other Pelagians.

 

[Not Perfect]

Bill, I honestly chuckled when I read your post. The OP demonstrates almost no knowledge of "Calvinism" or reformed theology. Where he got his "understanding" I assume is his own imagination or other Pelagians.

Maybe you should kindly show him what is wrong with his understanding, rather than make fun of him.

 

[Don Maurer]

I have been rebuked by Bill in making fun of BB1611. It is true that I brushed off the comments made by BB1611 because he seems to be just trash talking Reformed theology and not even bothering to properly represent it. So then, I will attempt to explain Calvinism to some small degree.

And you must deny God's omnipotence by claiming that God cannot create a free will.

BB1611, I did scoff at your lack of knowledge of Reformed theology as you continue to terribly misrepresent reformed theology without any shame. Your last quote above is a good example. Anyone with any knowledge of reformed theology would recognize your statement above as totally in error and a false accusation.

Calvinists or reformed people believe in the innocency of Adam and so then, we believe God did create man with a free will. Where we differ is not on the ability of God to create man with a free will, but in something called Original Sin. This has to do with the nature of man after the fall. It is a horrible mistake to assume that the will of man is not affected in any way after the fall.

To give you a simple, off the top of my head, definition of the term "Original Sin," it refers to when Adam sinned and fell, and death came upon the human race, that the human race entered into depravity and rebellion against God by nature. The term is taken from a Church Father by the name of Augustine. Of course Augustine is not the same as scripture, but just like the term trinity is not in the bible, but it was also a term coined by the Church Fathers, so also the term "Original Sin" came from the debates between Augustine and Pelagius. Passages in the NT that teach the fall of Adam and the human race into sin and death would be passages like Romans 5:12ff. Other references would be passages like Ephesians 2:3 which refers to the nature of man and the death of man.

To the extent of my knowledge, there are one of several positions that deny "Original Sin."
First, there is the Pelagian position, which was condemned at the 2nd council of Orange as herecy. This free will position denies that the fall actually had any effects upon the ability of man to do good and any time. This is the ultimate free will position espoused by a British monk named Pelagius. In history, there were later semi-pelagians. One such group was later called Arminians. Finally Charles Westley articulated that Original sin is true, but that God restored all humanity to free will in an act of universal grace. This is called universal prevenient grace. I could go over the scriptures when were used to establish universal prevenient grace, but they are used out of context anyway.

BB1611, if you want to bring the conversation up a few notches by doing more than just trash talking Reformed theology with groundless accusations, that would be great. Maybe you could talk about your view of what happened when Adam fell? How did this affect the human race? Reformed people believe the human race can make whatever choice we want. The problem is what we want. Because of Original Sin and depravity, what we want is to rebel against God.

By the way, if you want, we can talk about your use of 2nd Peter 3:9. To assume that the term "all" or "any" (pantas) is referring to the whole world is a contextual error. Its antecedent is the word "you" (humas) (notice same number and gender). The term "you" (humas) is referring to Christians (Peters audience).

 

[Humble_Disciple]

To my understanding Calvinism teaches that supposedly God is in control of everything that happens and that people don't really have a free will.

Some people have an aversion to predestination because they think it means God determines every little thing that ever happens. As Martin Luther explains, we have some measure of free will in all the choices we make, except for the decision to believe the Gospel and come to Christ:

Luther argued that the human will is bound, that there is no free will—at least not in things above, that is, in things pertaining to salvation. While people recoil at this, because we want to be free, because we want to play some role in our salvation, there is real freedom in recognizing our bondage and in receiving our salvation entirely as gift, by promise, as dead men and women brought to life like Lazarus in the tomb. We can’t mess it up. It doesn’t depend on us. We don’t live under a yoke or burden any longer—anxious, busy, fearful, desperate to even out the scales of justice. No, we’re set free to live as those loved, redeemed, and given a world back as gift, to be enjoyed and used for our neighbor.

Luther does grant we have freedom in things below. We can choose a Ford or Chevy, a Big Mac or a Whopper, Apple or Microsoft, apples or oranges. When it comes to our salvation, though, our freedom comes from Christ’s free will, from the fact that He freely chose to become Man, to suffer, die, and rise for us to live and move and have our being in Him, by grace, with joy and peace, even in suffering. Trying to work our way back into our salvation, therefore, is to undermine and under-appreciate Christ’s work. Serving so that He will love us is to insult His love, which already is ours, was ours even when we were His enemies. To seek freedom in slavery, slavery to sin, our natural human condition, where we freely choose how to sin, perhaps, but nevertheless can only sin, even with our best works, or to seek it in naturally human religion, which knows only the ways of the law and fallen reason, is to fail to understand and embrace the true freedom Christ was bound, beaten, nailed to a tree, and died to give us.
Luther’s Bondage of the Will: An Uncompromising Gospel | 1517

If we are saved by grace alone, then faith is entirely a gift received by Christ, rather than the result of our own effort to believe. Even if we wanted to believe in the Gospel without the Holy Spirit’s help, we wouldn’t be able to do so, due to our fallen state.

On the other hand, those who are not among God’s elect are deserving of hell, because it was their free-willed choice to sin. Rather than complaining that God has chosen to save some and not others, we should be thankful that God has chosen to save anyone at all.

 

[lesliedellow]

“Well, I don't believe that the Bible teaches any sort of predestination.”

Even coming from an Arminian, that statement is unbelievable. Have you ever read the thing?

“Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God, to the saints which are at Ephesus, and to the faithful in Christ Jesus: Grace be to you, and peace, from God our Father, and from the Lord Jesus Christ. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ: According as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before him in love: Having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself, according to the good pleasure of his will,” (Ephesians 1.1-5)