Why do Calvinists....

[UMP]

If God predestined whatsoever comes to pass then God determined that Hitler would kill the jews, and others, for Gods glory. God determined that the child molester would rape and murder an 8 year old child for His glory. If you say that God did not predestine these acts then God, by reason of the Westminster confession, is not God. If God did not preordain these actions then the occured apart from God and, therefore, God is not sovergien. If God did ordain them for His glory then we do not understand what evil is.

Sound familiar? :

Romans 9:
[18] Therefore hath he mercy on whom he will have mercy, and whom he will he hardeneth.
[19] Thou wilt say then unto me, Why doth he yet find fault? For who hath resisted his will?
[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?
[21] Hath not the potter power over the clay, of the same lump to make one vessel unto honour, and another unto dishonour?
[22] What if God, willing to shew his wrath, and to make his power known, endured with much longsuffering the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction:
[23] And that he might make known the riches of his glory on the vessels of mercy, which he had afore prepared unto glory,

 

[Boxmaker]

You've yet to point out in what way God is responsible, and so the assertion is baseless.

You're kidding here right? You're own confession of faith says God is responsible for whatsoever happens. I don't need to point out anything becuase you already confess it!

People are responsible for the motives of their hearts.

Only if those motives are completely independant of God. If those motives are predestined by God,as you assert, then the motive of the child molester is holy because the motovation comes from God.

God's motives are holy -- therefore His responsibility for the existence of evil must be completely pure and justified.

I've thought about that and rejected it time and again. The idea's absurd. Humans are responsible for what they are motivated to do, and their wills are responsible for their motivations and desires as well. This "no choice in the matter" is equally absurd. You have no choice about this thread existing. It exists! Therefore it's relegated to an ordaining, certainly. It's a fact of the past!

Does that make you or I less responsible for it? No. Yet it's completely ordained! It's a fact; it's unchanging reality; it's in the past. You have no choice over it. Yet your responsibility for it remains.

And yet for things in the future, you do have choice over it. Your will controls choices. Yet your will is built a certain way. Your options are open. There are no chains on you. But you are you. You choose consistently with your will. That makes you responsible. The reality that makes you responsible is your choice. And it is not fettered any more than in the free will model.

This last bit sure sounds like you are saying that God is not responsible for whatsoever happens. Is God in control of EVERYTHING or not? Look at it and explain to me why it not.

 

[Boxmaker]

Wayne Grudem respond (he's a lot more interesting to read that anything I might write!):

Against the Calvinistic view of God's providence (which allows that He decrees to permit sin and evil) Arminians would say that God is not responsible for sin and evil because He did not ordain them or cause them in any way. This is indeed one way of absolving God from responsibility and blame for sin, but is it the biblical way?

The problem is whether the Arminian position can really account for many texts that clearly say that God ordains that some people sin or do evil...The death of Christ is a prime example of this, but there are many others in scripture (Joseph's brothers, Pharaoh, the Egyptians, the Canaanites, Eli's sons, David's census, and the Babylonians, to mention a few). The response could be made that these were unusual events, exceptions to God's ordinary way of acting. But it does not solve the problem, for, on the Arminian view, how can God be holy if He ordains even one sinful act?

The Calvinist position seems preferable: God Himself never sins but always brings about His will through secondary causes; that is, through personal moral agents who voluntarily, willingly do what God has ordained. These personal moral agents (both human being and evil angels) are to blame for the evil they do. While the Arminian position objects that, on a human level, people are also responsible for what they cause others to do, we can answer that the Scripture is not willing to apply such reasoning to God. Rather, Scripture repeatedly gives examples where God in a mysterious, hidden way somehow ordains that people do wrong, but continually places the blame for that wrong on the individual human who does wrong and never on God Himself. The Arminian position seems to have failed to show why God cannot work in this way in the world, preserving both His holiness and our individual responsiblity for sin.

Grudem, Systematic Theology, p. 343

It does not make any sense. It says God is not responsible for evil becuase He makes others do it for Him willingly. Its like saying Charls Manson isn't responsible for the murderes because he got his followers to do them for him willingly.

Look, under Calvinism, God is control of everything. Sproul even said it in His book using an anology of one stray molecule being responsibel fro preventing Christ's return to Earth. If you accept that then God MUST control the actions of the people or evil angle willingly doing the evil. If the person doing the evil uses a knife to stab a person of their own choice when God needed their throat cut to better serve His glory, then God's sovergienty has failed. He cannot allow that choice and still be soverein.

Your quote says that is not the case. Your quote says God is not responsible for evil because He makes other want to do it willingly and He lets them choose how to do it. The violates your Westminster Confessions REQUIREMENT that God is responsible for everything. The likely response to this is that the Westminster Confession Chapter 3 that asserts God is responsible for everything is immediatly followed by sentence that states He is not responsible for evil. That may be fine for some but it makes no sense. Everytime I read it I come to the same conclussion about that paragraph: God is responsible for everything except that which He chooses not to be responsible for.

 

[Boxmaker]

Funny how as we delve deeper the correlated errors bubble up. And as the layers are peeled back, we see more clearly the object of Box's efforts to obscure.... he wants a god just a little more powerful, and just a little less limited, than himself. And he will have that god, scripture and reason notwithstanding.

I had hope that RC might break through the veil, but what I find is that it is not a veil of ignorance, but a veil of obstinance. My hope ebbs with each reply.

Oh, Boxmaker, why do you kick against the goads? You see plainly the truth of scripture, but squint your eyes, plug your ears, and hold your breath in hopes that it will just go away. It won't. You'll accept God's sovereignty, undiluted by your mental gymnastics, some day. If not in this life then in the next.

Brad

Brad, I have already accepted God's sovergienty over all. It is your deffinition of that sovergienty that I reject as inconsistant with God's grand design as revealed in scripture. God does not need to control everything that happens to be sovergien. God is sovergien in spite of our best attempts to help or hender His plans. God's will will be done.

Every day I try to say the Lord's Prayer with my family before we leave for the day. (I've not done that lately and I need to bring that back. That is a really nice way to start the day.) Your will be done on eart as it is in heaven. I always remember those words because it puts me in my place. TBN and oters spout this prsoperity gospel garbage where God is portrayed as a big Genie just waiting to grant your every material wish if you will just give enough. Give the right amount and God will give you a new house and great car and so on and so forth.

Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven reminds me to start each day with the mind set of God, what is your will for me today. How may I be your loving servent today to accomplish your will.

 

[bradfordl]

Brad, I have already accepted God's sovergienty over all. It is your deffinition of that sovergienty that I reject as inconsistant with God's grand design as revealed in scripture. God does not need to control everything that happens to be sovergien. God is sovergien in spite of our best attempts to help or hender His plans. God's will will be done.

Every day I try to say the Lord's Prayer with my family before we leave for the day. (I've not done that lately and I need to bring that back. That is a really nice way to start the day.) Your will be done on eart as it is in heaven. I always remember those words because it puts me in my place. TBN and oters spout this prsoperity gospel garbage where God is portrayed as a big Genie just waiting to grant your every material wish if you will just give enough. Give the right amount and God will give you a new house and great car and so on and so forth.

Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven reminds me to start each day with the mind set of God, what is your will for me today. How may I be your loving servent today to accomplish your will.

Box,

I rejoice that you have the discernment to see through the TV WOF charlatans, and that you acknowledge the sovereignty of God on some level. That renews hope that you will not always grope around as in the dark over this whole question. The reality is that sovereignty is total or it is not sovereignty.

But for the sake of the discussion, let's allow your contention that God doesn't have to be in control of everything to be 'sovereign". So does that mean He lets the little things slide by? The ones that don't interfere with His overall plan? But wait! That's not what you say! You say that He leaves the most important thing about His creation, the results of the work of His Son in His Life, Death, and Resurrection up to those He of which He says, "There is none righteous, no, not one".

Accepting that God is GODwill upset many things about what you have believed in the past. A lot of what is taught in Churches you have been to will no longer make sense. People you love you will realize are in error, and you will be confused as to what to do about it. You will probably change Churches. Many of us here have been through that. You will survive it. But one thing you will realize, and finally concede to above all these other things, is that He says:

Isa 42:8 I am the LORD: that is my name: and my glory will I not give to another, neither my praise to graven images.

And He means it.

SDG,

Brad

 

[GrinningDwarf]

It does not make any sense. It says God is not responsible for evil becuase He makes others do it for Him willingly. Its like saying Charls Manson isn't responsible for the murderes because he got his followers to do them for him willingly.

Look, under Calvinism, God is control of everything. Sproul even said it in His book using an anology of one stray molecule being responsibel fro preventing Christ's return to Earth. If you accept that then God MUST control the actions of the people or evil angle willingly doing the evil. If the person doing the evil uses a knife to stab a person of their own choice when God needed their throat cut to better serve His glory, then God's sovergienty has failed. He cannot allow that choice and still be soverein.

Your quote says that is not the case. Your quote says God is not responsible for evil because He makes other want to do it willingly and He lets them choose how to do it. The violates your Westminster Confessions REQUIREMENT that God is responsible for everything. The likely response to this is that the Westminster Confession Chapter 3 that asserts God is responsible for everything is immediatly followed by sentence that states He is not responsible for evil. That may be fine for some but it makes no sense. Everytime I read it I come to the same conclussion about that paragraph: God is responsible for everything except that which He chooses not to be responsible for.

You're still not getting it.

There are two things here...

1. God has ordained everything (not the same thing as responsible...you keep wanting to equate the two);

2. But does is so that God is not the author is sin, nor is violence offered to the will of the creatures.

Sound like a contradiction? I suppose it is...to Enlightenment thinking, which we all in the 20th century Western world are captive to. This is the stumbling block to our comprehending what the Bible so clearly says.

There are two givens in Scripture:

1. God has ordained (remember...ordained does not necessarily mean responsible for) certain bad things (the death of Christ is a prime example of this, but there are many others in scripture..such as Joseph's brothers, Pharaoh, the Egyptians, the Canaanites, Eli's sons, David's census, and the Babylonians, to mention a few);

2. God still holds those who carry these things out as morally responsible.

Any attempt to get around explaining these things away simply does violence to the clear teachings of Scripture...we need to use Enlightenment reasoning to get around what is so clearly stated.

Grudem puts a stake through the heart of Enlightenment reasoning, including your Charles Manson analogy, when he says

While the Arminian position objects that, on a human level, people are also responsible for what they cause others to do, we can answer that the Scripture is not willing to apply such reasoning to God. Rather, Scripture repeatedly gives examples where God in a mysterious, hidden way somehow ordains that people do wrong, but continually places the blame for that wrong on the individual human who does wrong and never on God Himself. The Arminian position seems to have failed to show why God cannot work in this way in the world, preserving both His holiness and our individual responsiblity for sin.

and this does not contradict Sproul.

Contemplate that for a while.

 

[heymikey80]

You're kidding here right? You're own confession of faith says God is responsible for whatsoever happens. I don't need to point out anything becuase you already confess it!

Go ahead. Find the quote "God is responsible".

Responsibility isn't ordination.

Only if those motives are completely independant of God. If those motives are predestined by God,as you assert, then the motive of the child molester is holy because the motovation comes from God.

Then you're a dead man. Because the Spirit gives birth to spirit, and you're then not responsible for your salvation. Your evil, you're still responsible for (for no one who was independent of God atoned for it), and so in your view you're dead by God's judgment.

This last bit sure sounds like you are saying that God is not responsible for whatsoever happens. Is God in control of EVERYTHING or not? Look at it and explain to me why it not.

Yes, God is in control of everything. God created human wills and they appear in a particular way to form history. They also do what they will, and so they're responsible.

Recognize derivative causes, and too recognize that causing and ordaining even are not responsible causes. Responsible causes must be accompanied by intent. Otherwise you'll be forever chasing your tail here. God causes everything. People cause things, too -- but they're caused (and indeed influenced in other ways). Impersonal forces cause things too -- but they're also caused. They're all different kinds of causes.

 

[Boxmaker]

Yes, God is in control of everything. God created human wills and they appear in a particular way to form history. They also do what they will, and so they're responsible.

Recognize derivative causes, and too recognize that causing and ordaining even are not responsible causes. Responsible causes must be accompanied by intent. Otherwise you'll be forever chasing your tail here. God causes everything. People cause things, too -- but they're caused (and indeed influenced in other ways). Impersonal forces cause things too -- but they're also caused. They're all different kinds of causes.

I agree with you here. God does not cause whatsoever happens to happen. There are other causes.

 

[Boxmaker]

Chapter 4 – The Fall.

Sproul talks about the fall as a myth and how society is corrupt because it is made up of sinners. It was one of his more interesting chapters and A lot of what he said was well said.

I see the fall differently. It is a real event and we live with the consequences of it every day. On the day Adam fell two thing happened. First, the knowledge of good and evil entered into men. Once that knowledge was there, there was no possible way for it to be unlearned. Once learned, it is impossible not to pass it on to their children and the knowledge of good and evil is forever with us.

The second thing that happened is that a huge God shaped hole was torn out of men soul. We were separated from God. We each spend our lives searching for something t fill that hole. Some turn to drugs, some to money. Sex, alcohol food, family – all these things are indulged to extremes in an effort to fill that God shaped hole in our hearts.

God uses the law to teach us that these things are inadequate. God created us in His image to be with God. That is still His desire. When that God shaped hole was torn out of us He left us with the ability to recognize that emptiness. He works on our hearts to change them so that we will accept Him. It is not a choice that is forced on us nor is it coerced.

 

[heymikey80]

I agree with you here. God does not cause whatsoever happens to happen. There are other causes.

Yes, they're derivative causes or secondary causes. In the case of persons, these are causes with a limited intent, which because of their limited nature are definitely not the same as God's intent.

Different intents -- different judgments.

 

[Boxmaker]

Yes, they're derivative causes or secondary causes. In the case of persons, these are causes with a limited intent, which because of their limited nature are definitely not the same as God's intent.

Different intents -- different judgments.

And that takes care of the chapter 3 of the Westminster. We are agreed that God does not cause whatsoever happens.

 

[GrinningDwarf]

Chapter 4 – The Fall.

Sproul talks about the fall as a myth and how society is corrupt because it is made up of sinners. It was one of his more interesting chapters and A lot of what he said was well said.

I see the fall differently. It is a real event and we live with the consequences of it every day.

I had to scratch my beard and think a minute when I read this. Are you saying that Sproul says he believes the fall is a myth?!

God uses the law to teach us that these things are inadequate. God created us in His image to be with God. That is still His desire. When that God shaped hole was torn out of us He left us with the ability to recognize that emptiness. He works on our hearts to change them so that we will accept Him. It is not a choice that is forced on us nor is it coerced.

This is still the point under debate, isn't it?

 

[GrinningDwarf]

And that takes care of the chapter 3 of the Westminster. We are agreed that God does not cause whatsoever happens.

He never said anything of the kind.

You still aren't getting the difference between ordained and responsible, or between first and second causes. Try again.

 

[Boxmaker]

I had to scratch my beard and think a minute when I read this. Are you saying that Sproul says he believes the fall is a myth?!

No, he sees the fall as federal. Adam was aperfect representative of the whole hunman race so his fall justly conviced us of sin as well. I don't fully agree because the Bible:

The soul who sins is the one who will die. The son will not share the guilt of the father, nor will the father share the guilt of the son. The righteousness of the righteous man will be credited to him, and the wickedness of the wicked will be charged against him.

My sins convict me all by themselvs.

On the other hand, God has been known to cures upto seven generations.

Ultimatly, we are convicted by our own sins, not Adams.

This is still the point under debate, isn't it?

Not to me. Christ fullfilled the law and we are no longer condemned by it. Even Paul said clearly that nothing is forbidden to him but not all things are god for him. Pretty broad statement. But the law is a teacher. It teaches us our desperate need for a savior. Once we accept that savior we are redeemed to eternal life with our savior in Heaven.

 

[Boxmaker]

He never said anything of the kind.

You still aren't getting the difference between ordained and responsible, or between first and second causes. Try again.

That is because, functionally, there is no difference.

If God by the most wise and holy counsel of His own will, freely, and unchangeably ordain whatsoever comes to pass, whatever name you give it (ordained, responsible, predestined, predetermined, etc) it is functinally the same. If there is a difference then God did not {insert declaritive of choice here} whatsoever comes to pass.

You cannot have it both ways. Either God by the most wise and holy counsel of His own will, freely, and unchangeably ordain whatsoever comes to pass or He didn't. Which is it? If God did, then the second cause MUST BE the same as the first cause. If He didn't, then the second cause is outside ofGod's direct control meaning God is no longer sovergien. Which is it?!

 

[heymikey80]

And that takes care of the chapter 3 of the Westminster. We are agreed that God does not cause whatsoever happens.

You missed the point. We're not agreed; God is the first cause for whatsoever happens. Created entities are secondary causes. So both are causes.

God has an intent in causing events that is not shared with secondary causes. So there's a definite distinction in responsibility.

And that takes care of Westminster Ch. 3. God does indeed cause whatsoever happens, and He has a purity of intent which vindicates Him in His causation.

Philosophically there's a problem with the "functionality" argument, too. Have you ever noticed that you can't get from "does/is" to "should" through any amount of logical syllogism? They're functionally independent. And so to say causation is functionally no different from ordination -- that says nothing about respective moral judgments (a "should") about them. So indeed it can be both ways -- because we're talking about "should", not "does/is", and so functional equivalence does not imply judicial equivalence.

 

[GodsElect]

Box, Do you think God is going to be MAD at the calvinist to say that "God is FULLY and sovereignly in control of His creation? Do you think I will be sent to hell for this?

 

[GodsElect]

what does this verse mean to you Box?

Isaiah 45:7 I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the LORD do all these things.

It is a SOVEREIGN God in operation, not a lonely old man letting things happen as they may!

 

[GodsElect]

God created and is in control of EVERYTHING! Even how fast your fingernails grow, how fast your hair grows, even when you get it cut!

God made good and evil, made man, made satan!

However, just because He created satan, satan tempts man of evil, that's what he was made for. But MAN (ADAM) that was created with UTTER(TOTAL) FREE WILL commited the ACT OF SIN, thus, MAN is the AUTHOR of it, PERIOD! Not GOD! And MAN IS RESPONSIBLE FOR IT! NOT GOD!

 

[Boxmaker]

what does this verse mean to you Box?

Isaiah 45:7 I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the LORD do all these things.

It is a SOVEREIGN God in operation, not a lonely old man letting things happen as they may!

A more interesting question is what does it mean to you?

Compare Isaiah 45:7 to Chapter 3 of the Westminster
. God from all eternity, did, by the most wise and holy counsel of His own will, freely, and unchangeably ordain whatsoever comes to pass;http://www.reformed.org/documents/wcf_with_proofs/III_fn.html#fn0 yet so, as thereby neither is God the author of sin, nor is violence offered to the will of the creatures; nor is the liberty or contingency of second causes taken away, but rather established.

The Bible says God created evil and the Westminster says God is not the author of sin. This is a huge contridiction. The Bible says God created evil. Sin is the manifestation of evil.