Ironfire said:
Everyone is not saved. God does not save everyone.
Clearly, there is something more important to God than everyone being saved. I would think everyone can agree on this (hear me out).
So what is it?
1. It is more important to God that He display/exercise His wrath and justice.
2. It is more important to God that man is able to love Him, assuming it is impossible to love without having a free-will.
Anyone other reasons why God doesn't save everyone?
The reason I ask is because I'm having trouble reconciling this question with Calvanism.
I posted on the topic a few days ago. I'll repost it here in case someone wants to comment on it in this thread.
...
I don't think there is one universal view taken by Calvinists on the soteriological problem evil.
The most coherent I think is the one put forward by A.W Pink:
"To declare that the Creator's original plan has been frustrated by sin is to dethrone God."
I find that statement to be an astonishing conclusion.
Paul Helm gives this as the reason for God ordaining evil events:
"The state of pardon and renewal is one of far greater worth or blessedness then an original faultless position."
The question begs to be asked here, why didn't God start with a perfect creation without any desire to rebel which would live with him forever in heaven? God has plans to bring this situation about in the future, but why has he decided to go through all this sin and pain first?
Calvinism struggles to find a satisfactory answer. God could still save the whole world through regeneration and imputed faith right now, but he doesn't. The answer given for why he has decided it is better not to is simpy that this way glorifies him more. A human anlogy would be a parent putting a child through trials and suffering just so the restoration and rise would be more dramatic. God could have bypassed death and evil but decided not to for his glory.
The conclusion I see being drawn is that in Calvinism the glory God seeks is simply unrestricted power. It manisfests itself in a display of mercy to a limited number and a display of fiery justice to the masses. This is what Romans 9 is taken as in reformed commentaries.
I would argue as a non Calvinist that God is not glorified in lording his power over his creation but by through his own sacrifice. We have to redrawn our concept of God around Jesus for anything really to make sense.
The book of Job offers great insights on the nature of God and his plans and lays some groundwork for my disagreement with reformed theology:
At the start of Job Satan lays down the gauntlent in 1:9-10 - he says in effect "people only love you because you show them special favour". Just as satan tempted Jesus to worship him for power and material gain, he suggests that someone like Job only worships God for the same reasons.
God does not ignore the accusation but remarkably stakes his reputation on Job (2v.3) and allows satan to instigate Job's suffering. Satan is the cause of the suffering - God merely allows it but in no way causes it, directly or indirectly.
If God is not the cause, is allowing it to happen much better? From Job's point of view, suffering cause by God would feel no different then suffering caused by satan. It's a hard question, but I think I can see a reason for it:
Satan's accusation is that God's kingdom is based (like his own) on force and expediency. This is how I see Calvinisms kingdom being played out. God imputes obedience into people and forces all of creation to do his will. There are no free agents, God authors both sides, good and evil.
God shows through Job that his kingdom is not based on expediency, but on the obedience of love. The whole message of Job is that someone could love God without any hope of a reward because God Is Who He Is. God's boast in his servant Job would lose all meaning if God was secretly forcing Job to it.
This answers the problem of evil in a way Calvinism cannot.
Suffering is a result of God's choice to allow his creation the freedom of choice to love him or not. When his creation chooses not to love him, sin and pain results. God could have decided to create nothing, but like child birth he has decided that the end result - a stable creation based on a love freely given from his people - is worth the pain involved to bring it about.
None of this God-given responsibility dethrones God; God's ultimate plan of a new heaven and a new Earth are unthwartable, but human beings as individuals can and do thwart God's plan that they should be a part of it.
This all has to be based in scripture of course, moral appeal is not going to convince anyone:
Compare:
For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior, who will have all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.
1Timothy 2:3-4
with:
I will instruct you and teach you in the way which you should go; I will counsel you, My eye shall be on you. Be not like the horse, or like the mule, who have no understanding, whose mouth must be held in with bit and bridle, so that they do not come near you.
Psalm 32:8-9
God surely hates sin but he never steps in and stops David from sinning. If God forced David to repent his allegiance would not be freely given - he would be like a mule led by the bit. So God's desire that none should perish is consistent with the idea that people do perish because God has a single will to save
persons. Being made into a mule is just another form of perishing.
It is not some dual willed mystery - there is no paradox between the perishing of people and God's desire to save them. If God were to force people to repent and love him, they would no longer be persons but mules. He would have failed to achieve anything of his purpose. His desire to save and the perishing of individuals are both expressions of God's ultimate goal to form relationships based on love which will last forever.
There are a couple other verses which show that God has plans for his creation which are not fulfilled:
(Jesus is speaking) What then did you go out to see? A prophet? Yes, I tell you, and more than a prophet. This is he of whom it is written, "'Behold, I send my messenger before your face, who will prepare your way before you.' I tell you, among those born of women none is greater than John. Yet the one who is least in the kingdom of God is greater than he." (When all the people heard this, and the tax collectors too, they declared God just, having been baptized with the baptism of John, but the Pharisees and the lawyers rejected the purpose of God for themselves, not having been baptized by him.)
Luk 7:26-30
Also 2 Peter 2:v1
But false prophets also arose among the people, just as there will be false teachers among you, who will secretly bring in destructive heresies, even denying the Master who bought them, bringing upon themselves swift destruction.
2Pe 2:1