Question for Calvinists

[JeffreyLloyd]

Are people born who have no chance at heaven?

Please support it with scripture if possible.

Thanks!
Jeff

 

[tigersnare]

Yes.


Jacob I loved, Eseu I hated (in the womb.)
Judas and Pharoah made for the very purpose they carried out.


Sorry for the bad paraphrasing, I don't have my bible handy. These are definatly the most obvious cases to me, but what do I know...

 

[BBAS 64]

Wow! This sounds like the Tim Phelps interview that I downloaded yesterday...

http://www.christianforums.com/t91637

So some people are actually made for the express purpose of being tortured in an eternal fire...by a loving God?

Is that a correct characterization of Calvinism?

Good Day, DOF

The characterization is just yours, based upon your fallible understanding of God's will and his purpose. Hey but do not wain in heart live and learn!

I think that if you read Augustine's view of predesination that may help. Better yet read Thomas Aquinas and his view of the Muslum's the conclusion drawn by him may shock you.

After all is said and done here these two men could be mistaken, as could you or I. One thing for sure God is never wrong and the things we may see as some what unloving or unfair, are only based on a view and understanding we all lack the side of heaven.


I see the cross as the most unfair thing ever to happen in the history of the planet. It is unfair in my mind that Christ HAD TO suffer and die for a crud like me. Thank God he loved me so some times love in and of it's self can be viewed as being unfair.


Peace to u,

BBAS

 

[Todd`]

John 15:16 - You did not choose Me, but I chose you, and appointed you, that you should go and bear fruit.
Deut 7:7 - The Lord did not set His love on you nor choose you because you were more in number than any of the peoples...but because the Lord loved you...
Rom 9:11-13 - For though the twins were not yet born, and had not done anything good or bad, in order that God’s purpose according to His choice might stand, not because of works but because of Him who calls, it was said to her, “The older will serve the younger.” Just as it is written, “Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.”
Rom 9:15 - I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion.
Rom 9:17 - For the Scripture says to Pharoah, “For this very purpose I raised you up, to demonstrate My power in you...
Rom 9:18 - So then He has mercy on whom He desires, and He hardens whom He desires.
Ex 9:12 - And the Lord hardened Pharoah’s heart...
Rom 9:24 - Even us, whom He also called...
Rom 9:25 - As He also says in Hosea (2:23), “I will call those who were not My people ‘My people’, and her who was not My beloved ‘Beloved.’”
Amos 3:2 - You only have I chosen among all the peoples of the earth.
1 Thes 1:4 Knowing brethren, beloved by God, His choice of you.
John 15:3 You are already clean because of the word which I have spoken to you.
1 Pet 2:9 But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for God;s own possession.
2 Pet 1:10 Make certain about His calling and choosing you.

 

[JeffreyLloyd]

Yes.


Jacob I loved, Eseu I hated (in the womb.)
Judas and Pharoah made for the very purpose they carried out.


Sorry for the bad paraphrasing, I don't have my bible handy. These are definatly the most obvious cases to me, but what do I know...

Malachi 1
1 An oracle: The word of the LORD to Israel through Malachi.


Jacob Loved, Esau Hated
2 "I have loved you," says the LORD .
"But you ask, 'How have you loved us?'
"Was not Esau Jacob's brother?" the LORD says. "Yet I have loved Jacob, 3 but Esau I have hated, and I have turned his mountains into a wasteland and left his inheritance to the desert jackals."
4 Edom may say, "Though we have been crushed, we will rebuild the ruins."
But this is what the LORD Almighty says: "They may build, but I will demolish. They will be called the Wicked Land, a people always under the wrath of the LORD . 5 You will see it with your own eyes and say, 'Great is the LORD -even beyond the borders of Israel!'

 

[Dominus Fidelis]

Good Day, DOF

The characterization is just yours, based upon your fallible understanding of God's will and his purpose. Hey but do not wain in heart live and learn!

I think that if you read Augustine's view of predesination that may help. Better yet read Thomas Aquinas and his view of the Muslum's the conclusion drawn by him may shock you.

After all is said and done here these two men could be mistaken, as could you or I. One thing for sure God is never wrong and the things we may see as some what unloving or unfair, are only based on a view and understanding we all lack the side of heaven.


I see the cross as the most unfair thing ever to happen in the history of the planet. It is unfair in my mind that Christ HAD TO suffer and die for a crud like me. Thank God he loved me so some times love in and of it's self can be viewed as being unfair.


Peace to u,

BBAS

Yes, it was unfair that He died for crud like us...but if He died for crud like us, why not the rest of the crud?

Wow, thats a lot of crud!

God Bless

 

[Bulldog]

Wow! This sounds like the Tim Phelps interview that I downloaded yesterday...

http://www.christianforums.com/t91637

So some people are actually made for the express purpose of being tortured in an eternal fire...by a loving God?

Is that a correct characterization of Calvinism?

There are a couple of things to understand about this:

1) People who are eternal tortued after death are just getting what they deserve. In, fact its what we all deserve because of our sin. God doesn't owe us anything. But God, in His grace and love, decided to choose some for salvation before the world began, not beccuase they were better than the others, but because of His love.

2)Even though we are created by God, we are not all sons of God. The Bible tells us that the God of this earth is Satan. Again, God doesn't owe us anything but had enough love and grace to choose some to be adopted sons through Jesus Christ.

 

[Dominus Fidelis]

There are a couple of things to understand about this:

1) People who are eternal tortued after death are just getting what they deserve. In, fact its what we all deserve because of our sin. God doesn't owe us anything. But God, in His grace and love, decided to choose some for salvation before the world began, not beccuase they were better than the others, but because of His love.

2)Even though we are created by God, we are not all sons of God. The Bible tells us that the God of this earth is Satan. Again, God doesn't owe us anything but had enough love and grace to choose some to be adopted sons through Jesus Christ.

So we deserve to go to Hell because of our sin...ok, I could buy that...but that isn't what the original question is asking.

What the Hell-bound do, ie sin, has no bearing on their lack of salvation, if they were only created to go to Hell, according to Calvinism, correct?

Understand my logic?

 

[BBAS 64]

Yes, it was unfair that He died for crud like us...but if He died for crud like us, why not the rest of the crud?

Wow, thats a lot of crud!

God Bless

Not all CRUD is created for the same purpose:

Rom 9:18 Therefore hath he mercy on whom he will have mercy, and whom he will he hardeneth.

Rom 9:19 Thou wilt say then unto me, Why doth he yet find fault? For who hath resisted his will?

Rom 9:20 Nay but, O man, who art thou that repliest against God? Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it, Why hast thou made me thus?

Rom 9:21 Hath not the potter power over the clay, of the same lump to make one vessel unto honour, and another unto dishonour?

Rom 9:22What if God, willing to shew his wrath, and to make his power known, endured with much longsuffering the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction:

Rom 9:23 And that he might make known the riches of his glory on the vessels of mercy, which he had afore prepared unto glory,

DOF I hope you would not stand up a serve as the person in 9:20 and help Paul to make his point, against you Would you?

Peace to u,

Still just CRUD

BBAS

 

[Dominus Fidelis]

I am well aware of Romans, thanks. I'm personally trying to understand the logic of Calvinism's assertions, but Jeff did ask for Scripture, so hopefully this will be good for him to see.

 

[nyj]

DoF, please refrain from posting in this thread.

 

[II Paradox II]

Are people born who have no chance at heaven?

Kind of a loaded question, but I'll take a stab at it anyways...

1) Ultimately, no man is saved unless God decrees it and gives that man grace to make it to heaven.

2) You could make a distinction between sufficient and efficacious grace as Aquinas does to lessen the difficulty of election ante praevisa merita, but I'm not sure it's anything more than a play of words without substantial reality.

3) The question is also canted by where your starting point is. As you probably well know, many of those who believe in election ante praevisa merita often correlate this with a presupposition that the mass of humanity is *already* condemned by it's foreseen sin, yet out of this squalid mass some are chosen by the mercy of God for salvation while others are passed over. As such, the wonder of election is that the mercy of God is exercised at the expense of His justified wrath. Without this presupposition election becomes much more difficult to explain without resorting to mystery.

ken

 

[tigersnare]

.

What the Hell-bound do, ie sin, has no bearing on their lack of salvation

I think you have missed the whole point of election(unless you are just asking for the sake of asking), it has nothing to do with what we do or don't do. No matter what I do, I can never even deserve a shot at salvation, it is ultimatly up to God and his providence whom he chooses to give grace to.

Back to the Potter and the Clay, how can the clay tell the potter who or what it wants to be?

 

[tigersnare]

So some people are actually made for the express purpose of being tortured in an eternal fire...by a loving God?

Is "loving" the only character of God we see in the bible? How about the God who is just, jealous, and wrathful? No I don't have the first clue about understanding God but from the scriptures I definatly see evidence of the characteristics of the short list I have described.


With the view of that, taken from the quote, what do you think about the early books in the O.T. when God commands the Isrealites to kill every living thing, included women, children, babies, and pregnant women....kinda shakes things up alittle I would imagine...