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Well then stop talking to me.The first part of Wikipedia is correct, that it is unconditional on our part in God's election.
The second part is assuming that foreknowledge is some sort of foreseeing certain events into the distant future. I addressed our view on "foreknowledge," and you refused it. You're not worth talking to, you have your fingers stuffed in your ears.
The problem is that you think that we Calvinists hold to a view of God as Muslims do Allah, fatalism!Yet another example of Calvinist manner of proving ones point. You provide no evidence of what I said being "nonsense". You simply state it as a fact as if that settles the matter.
Apparently you didn't really think that through. Do you agree that under Calvinism when a person is born they are already elect to eternal life or eternal damnation and that nothing can change their elect status? Yes, I understand that Calvinists propose that God, having already elected someone to eternal life will gift them with faith at some point. But that doesn't change their salvation status. For is a person is elect to eternal life, and nothing can change their elect status, then they are already saved prior to coming to faith in Christ.
That doesn't follow. I've taken the Calvinist premise and shown where it logically leads. They have provided no evidence that I have misrepresented the premise. Because I know Calvinism. While they are disturbed as to where I show where that premise logically leads, they have provided no evidence that the logic, the reasoning, itself is wrong.
All they've done so far is make vain propositions that I have presented a straw man argument, or simply propose that I am wrong, but have provided no evidence, neither of misrepresenting the premise nor any evidence that my conclusion doesn't logically follow.
And that fact, so far, speaks for itself, as to how Calvinists defend Calvinism.
Why? What does that question have to do with the OP? Do you agree with the OP? If not provide evidence to disprove it.
You do not understand what really happened to all of us due to the fall!You still have failed to show how I have misrepresented the premise of Calvinism nor show where my logic as how it leads to my conclusion is wrong.
He seems to be getting his information on what believe not from our theology books or sources, but from what someone else stated was what we were holding with!No, you have taken what you believe to be a Calvinist premise and followed that to its logical conclusion. You have taken a strawman understanding of what Calvinism teaches and then have knocked that down. If all of the Calvinists in this conversation are saying, "No, you've got our position wrong," that should be evidence enough that what you have said Calvinists believe is not, in fact, what they believe. Stating a position that no one actually holds and then knocking it down, at the end of the day, has not accomplished anything at all.
It's okay to take issue with Calvinism, but so far what you have taken issue with is not an accurate reflection of Calvinism. It would be no different than if someone said that they take issue with Christianity because Christianity is polytheistic in that it worships three deities. We wouldn't affirm that, and someone telling us that we do does not make it so.
I believe more than once it has already been said that your statement that Calvinists believe that "salvation is not by faith in Christ" is not an accurate reflection of Calvinism. Calvinists absolutely affirm that salvation is by faith in Christ. You might take that to be an inconsistency with other things that Calvinists believe, and that's fine, but let's not confuse your interpretation of Calvinist theology with what Calvinism actually teaches. Give me a statement that accurately reflects Calvinism and ask me to defend that, but I'm not going to try to defend a statement that doesn't reflect what I believe at the outset.
I did.You still have failed to show how I have misrepresented the premise of Calvinism nor show where my logic as how it leads to my conclusion is wrong.
I am a Christian that holds to a Calvinist view on salvation, are you an Arminian?Well let's do a simply wikipedia on "Calvinism"
This choice by God to save some is held to be unconditional and not based on any characteristic or action on the part of the person chosen. This view is opposed to the Arminian view that God's choice of whom to save is conditional or based on his foreknowledge of who would respond positively to God.
So you're an "Arminian"?
That’s not it exactly. I’ve been in debates with him before through the years. It’s been covered. But no matter how many times it’s explained, the straw man “arguments” still rear their ugly heads.Again, the basic problem is that the person does not really understand what we teach and hold with in our theology!
Can you name one?Calvinists often love to boast about their assurance of salvation.
John Calvin's Institutes of Religion is the defining document of Calvinism. If you have never read it right through (as I have), you would have absolutely no idea of what Calvinism actually is. What you are believing is an extremist view, and not what Calvin taught at all.The Hypocrisy of Calvinists
Under Calvinism salvation is not by faith in Christ, but rather by a pre-birth election whereby God arbitrarily decides ones eternal fate, and that not based upon God's foreknowledge of some future faith. Thus people are born ether saved and eternally secure or unsaved and eternally damned, there being nothing they can do to change that fate in either instance.
Yet when asked the question, as the Philippian jailer asked, "What must I do to be saved?", the typical Calvinist will answer as the apostle, "Believe in the Lord Jesus and you will be saved?" ("Believe" being in the imperative in the text and not subjunctive as if saying "if you were to believe", and thus, being imperative, indicating to the man that there is something he could do to be saved, and furthermore that he was not saved until doing so).
But if Calvinists actually believed in Calvinism they would respond something like, "There is nothing you can do to be saved, for your fate was determined prior to you being born and there is nothing you can do to change that fate." That's an example of the hypocrisy of Calvinists.
This is a mystery. No one has ever been able to successfully work out how a person can take hold of the promises of God, receive Christ and be saved, and then know that they were elected of God from the foundation of the world. God has not explained that to us fully in the Bible. What He has done is to present His promises, given us the invitation, and then for those who accept the invitation and receive Christ, He then informs them that they were elected.It IS the case (according to Calvinists) that salvation is by Faith in Christ and that coming to Faith results from a decision on the part of God made before the persons birth.
Read and learn:Calvinism proposes that election is not based upon God's foreknowledge of ones faith or lack thereof. So when you say "alternative" you're not dealing with the issue at hand, namely what Calvinism proposes. Since I don't know what kind of soteriology you're constructing I don't know how to answer in the framework of such a construction, nor would I find any relevance in doing so as I doesn't speak to the issue at hand - namely Calvinist soteriology.
I don't see as Rom 8 and Eph 2 have to be reconciled. In what way do you see a contradiction between the two passages?Okay then, try this one: I believe all of the scriptures(the 66 books of the Bible). Do you?
If so, how do you reconcile Romans 8:28-30 with justification by grace through faith (Ephesians 2:8)? Cannot one be elected and justified by faith in Christ at the same time?
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