Can God Recall Without Denying Himself?

HP: That is a foundational teaching of any and all that hold to a literal payment theory. Believing that all sins have been literally paid for on the cross for the elect, all that is left for us to do is to accept the fact that such is the case. Salvation for one holding to the literal payment theory is the time that they come to the realization of what has really been the case all along, they just now are fully cognizant of it. They finally realize that Christ has already forgiven all their past present and future sin on the cross two thousand years ago, but today, i.e.the day they ‘receive salvation,’ they come to recognize and believe it is true an applies to them personally.

I believe you would be shocked as to how many Calvinistic and Baptist teachers and preachers accept that to be the case. If by chance there is one on the list that does not believe in the literal payment theory, I would certainly like to hear from them. Would there be one out there that could prove me wrong?

 

Quote:
Originally Posted by Heavenly Pilgrim
What a Calvinist calls belief is nothing more than a necessitated impulse from God

HP: Why is it not true for what you call three point Calvinists? Does a three pointer believe in original sin? If so, they are dead, i.e., completely unable to resond in and of themselves, and MUST be granted a necessitated impulse of regeneration to do anything. Deep down even Arminians would more than likely beleive very close to this. They might term it different, but hold to basically th esame idea. They call it 'prevenient' (sp) grace, do they not?

 

HP: I see that as utterly impossible as unscriptural. His sufferings and death was a substitutionary sacrifice, not a literal payment. Christ, by His vicarious sacrifice, stands between God and the law, and satisfies the demands of the law on behalf of sinful man.

I believe you change the Scriptural penalty for sin to something other than what Scripture states it is, i.e., eternal separation from God.

HP: This verse does not lend itself in the least to any literal payment of the sin debt in the sense that you are trying to make it. This verse implies nothing as to the litral payment of suffering or punishment due. It speaks to the atonement of Christ being sufficient and standing able to satisfy the debt of any and all sinners who will fulfill the conditions God has mandated. If it was a literal payment as you indicate, God would be punishing the wicked in the end for sins that already had been paid for. That is simply not the case. God does not practice double jeopardy. Besides being wrong, it would be a wasteful economy.

 

HP: I can certainly appreciate any and all that would deny irresistible grace, arbitrary selection, double predestination, and a gospel NOT offered to whosoever will. Salute! :thumbs:

What I cannot understand, is how, holding to the Augustinian/Calvinistic doctrine of original sin, they cannot see that although they are right on one hand holding truth which is at antipodes with the Calvinistic system, while at the same time they remain holding firmly in their other hand the very foundational principle from which that they desire to distance themselves receives its very impetus of existence. Again it is none other than the Augustinian/Calvinistic dogma of original sin.

They falsely place the root of sin in the constitution of the flesh as opposed to the will, and make men possess an evil, sinful, and immoral state and that from birth. In doing so they have logically affirmed the notions of arbitrary selection, irresistible grace at least to a degree, double predestination, and a gospel intended only for a select few.

I can hear you now saying, I hold to original sin yet do not believe the things that you are suggesting logic necessitates. Oh, but you have manufactured an unscriptural notion that all have, and must receive, an equal opportunity of hearing the salvation message. That is flatly a manufactured an unscriptural notion, one that not only manufactures ideas out of thin air, but ignores the clear Biblical account of God’s choice of those to whom the salvation message was centered and granted all but exclusively to for at least four thousand years, and that just for starters.

There is one reason and one reason only I can see for the manufacturing of such a notion, and that is to somehow make it appear that God is Just in His condemnation of the ungodly that are said to have been born in sin. God truth, and justice, needs no such help. What God does need is that the truth of the state we are born into consistently upheld, and the truth concerning sin and its heinousness proclaimed even as Scripture and reason clearly testifies to. God does need us to admit and proclaim that we are indeed willing rebels and not simply the victims of our circumstances.

If sin is brought upon us as if it was a natural contagion as Augustine foisted upon the Church, no sinner could possibly be blamed for his or her condition, and would we humans would be a race to be pitied not blamed ad punished. Scripture clearly informs us otherwise.

 

HP: Is there any on the list that consider themselves as a three pointer that would be willing to lay out your views for the list?

If not, can anyone give me an idea as to where these three pointers might be found? Is there a denomination or group that claims to hold to just these thee points and no more?

 

Again, we have those evidently called 'three point Calvinists' that do not believe in irresistible grace. This again to me is simply amazing, in that every Calvinist or Baptist I have met or read, has stated or implied they believe in the literal payment theory. Prove me wrong. Is there one solitary Baptist or Calvinist that does not hold to the literal payment theory?

How can one state that they believe that Christ made a literal payment for their sins two thousand years ago and deny irresistible grace? Are they going to tell me that some of the sins Christ paid for the elect are somehow not going to be atoned for or that the atonement was less than able to accomplish its intended ends due to man saying, “I don’t want the forgiveness you paid for me on the cross” two thousand years after it was sign sealled and delivered that their sins were no more???

Either the literal payment theory is clearly in error, or they are completely inconsistent in trying to inject free will into a system that cannot allow such to exist. Which is it? Me thinks there is a fly in the soup of this ‘three point’ business.

 

HP: Stated in typical Calvinistic jargon, intended to confuse the listener as to what he really believes.

Let me as you Martin, how can one come who has been denied the abilities to come and who is not one of the elect? Your “All may come” is as hollow as a ham hanging from the ceiling having been ate by rats. Why hide your true sentiments behind such deceptive statements?

HP That is once again Calvinistic confusion as to what you really believe. What do you mean being left in or being judged for ‘your sins?’ How can being born a sinner be any more ‘your sins’ or fault? Those sins were someone else’s that you claim are transplanted to the other by physical generation. Why don’t you say you are being judged for Adams sin. That is precisely what you believe, is it not? Would you believe that man should be judged for the color of ones hair or skin? It makes as much sense as to be judged a sinner due to Adam’s sin. It is not only wrong but it is in direct contradiction to the Word of God. Eze 18:20 “The soul that sinneth, it shall die. The son shall not bear the iniquity of the father, neither shall the father bear the iniquity of the son: the righteousness of the righteous shall be upon him, and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon him.”

HP: Away with the pretense. God has withheld the needed abilities to respond according to you. The non-elect never had a chance in the world to be something they were not predestined to be, again according to what you really believe. Who do you think cannot see through the facade of language you use to conceal your true sentiments?

 

HP: The same difference that exists between any simple temptation and the actual transgression. Here is James explaining it. Jas 1:13 ¶ Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God: for God cannot be tempted with evil, neither tempteth he any man:
14 But every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust, and enticed.
15 Then when lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin: and sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death.
16 Do not err, my beloved brethren.

PS: I never have stated that Christ was born without any natural propensities to sin. Where did you get that?

 

HP: The Calvinist, and many others, including the Arminians, believe that we are born morally depraved, sinful from birth, born in sin. Although the Arminians try to soften this by stating that the guilt of Adams sin is not actually what God charges against us, they still feel that we could not have any possibility of being anything other than a sinner. In this they eliminate free will, although they try hard to uphold free will.

I do not believe the will can be born ‘morally depraved,’ for if it was, all morality would be a mere chimera, for morality involves choice. No choice, no morality. It is absurd to me to predicate morality, which of necessity involves choice and the formation of intents, to a state of birth that of necessity lies antecedent to any and all choices or formed intents. I believe that sin is the willful transgression of a known commandment of God, and is not nor can it be a state we are born into to. Sin is heinous, sin is rebellion, sin is blameworthy. It is absurd to blame one for being born into a state that they had no choice in. Sin and actual blame must occur subsequent to a choice of selfishness not before.

Man certainly is born with tendencies to sin or proclivities to sin, but these are mere influences to sin NOT sin itself. I would disagree with anyone that predicates sin or morality to any sentient being prior to the possibility of the formation of a selfish intent, and that subsequent to an age of accountability. No formed intent? No sin. No formed intent? No morality can be predicated. Proclivities may exist. Tendencies may exist, influences both to righteousness as well as evil may exist prior to sin or righteousness, but no morality can be predicated of the individual until the age of accountability and the knowledge that something in and of itself, apart from rewards or punishments, is intrinsically good or evil and a choice in either direction is made by the will in the formation of an intent.