Misrepresenting my savior!

God wasn't, the Apsotles were the first baptists!

 

Neither calvinists nor Arminianists , but Apostles of the Lord!

other labels came much later, when those systems got up and running!

 

Jerome,

Ascol said "I would not say Calvinism is the Gospel, without qualification"

Notice Spurgeon qualifies his statement,

"I have my own private opinion that there is no such thing as preaching Christ and Him crucified, unless we preach what nowadays is called Calvinism. It is a nickname to call it Calvinism; Calvinism is the gospel, and nothing else. I do not believe we can preach the gospel, if we do not preach justification by faith, without works; nor unless we preach the sovereignty of God in His dispensation of grace; nor unless we exalt the electing, unchangeable, eternal, immutable, conquering love of Jehovah; nor do I think we can preach the gospel, unless we base it upon the special and particular redemption of His elect and chosen people which Christ wrought out upon the cross..."

The problem is the virulent nature of the word "calvinism", not what it actually teaches. What in the bolded statement above is other than the Gospel?

 

The problem is the virulent nature of some Calvinists:

"It is one thing to believe in the Doctrines of Grace, but quite another thing to accept all the encrustations which have formed upon those doctrines and also a very different matter to agree with the spirit which is apparent in some who profess to propagate the pure Truth of God." —Charles Spurgeon

 

What then? Shall we try to put another meaning into the text than that which it fairly bears? I trow not. You must, most of you, be acquainted with the general method in which our older Calvinistic friends deal with this text. "All men," say they,—"that is, some men": as if the Holy Ghost could not have said "some men" if he had meant some men. "All men," say they; "that is, some of all sorts of men": as if the Lord could not have said "all sorts of men" if he had meant that. The Holy Ghost by the apostle has written "all men," and unquestionably he means all men. I know how to get rid of the force of the "alls" according to that critical method which some time ago was very current, but I do not see how it can be applied here with due regard to truth. I was reading just now the exposition of a very able doctor who explains the text so as to explain it away; he applies grammatical gunpowder to it, and explodes it by way of expounding it. I thought when I read his exposition that it would have been a very capital comment upon the text if it had read, "Who will not have all men to be saved, nor come to a knowledge of the truth." Had such been the inspired language every remark of the learned doctor would have been exactly in keeping, but as it happens to say, "Who will have all men to be saved," his observations are more than a little out of place. My love of consistency with my own doctrinal views is not great enough to allow me knowingly to alter a single text of Scripture. I have great respect for orthodoxy, but my reverence for inspiration is far greater. I would sooner a hundred times over appear to be inconsistent with myself than be inconsistent with the word of God. I never thought it to be any very great crime to seem to be inconsistent with myself; for who am I that I should everlastingly be consistent? But I do think it a great crime to be so inconsistent with the word of God that I should want to lop away a bough or even a twig from so much as a single tree of the forest of Scripture. God forbid that I should cut or shape, even in the least degree, any divine expression. So runs the text, and so we must read it, "God our Savior; who will have all men to be saved, and to come unto the knowledge of the truth."

C.H. Spurgeon.

I want to thank you for posting that Jerome before I have been using it ever since

If we are not preaching the Gospel we are not preaching Spurgeon version of Calvinism.

 

I agree with your premise, but will you also agree the problem is made equally virulent by Arminians?

 

"The fact is, the great dispute between Calvinists and Arminians has arisen very much through not understanding one another, and from one brother saying, "What I hold is the truth "—and the other saying, "What I hold is truth, and nothing else." The men need somebody to knock both their heads together, and fuse their beliefs into one. They need one capacious brain to hold both the truths which their two little heads contain; for God's word is neither all on one side nor altogether on the other: it overlaps all systems, and defies all formularies." —Charles Spurgeon, "North and South"

 

They may have been Baptist in doctrine and practice, but like them, I prefer the label "Christian".

 

That's a very interesting handle you've got there - what does it mean exactly?

 

It would be more accurate to say that Calvin was a Christian, as he got his doctrine from the teachings of Christ. Christ taught the doctrines we now label as Calvinism.

 

(John 14:17) the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it does not see Him or know Him, you know Him because He abides with you and will be in you.

(John 15:18) "If the world hates you, you know that it has hated Me before you.

(John 15:19) "If you were of the world, the world would love its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, because of this the world hates you.

(John 16:20) "Truly, truly, I say to you, that you will weep and lament, but the world will rejoice; you will grieve, but your grief will be turned into joy.

(John 17:6) "I have manifested Your name to the men whom You gave Me out of the world; they were Yours and You gave them to Me, and they have kept Your word.

(John 17:9) "I ask on their behalf; I do not ask on behalf of the world, but of those whom You have given Me; for they are Yours;

(John 17:14) "I have given them Your word; and the world has hated them, because they are not of the world, even as I am not of the world.

 

Well the problem is the doctrines that deny God's sovereignty and right in choosing, as He did. They do not just misrepresent the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ but they make man a god in that they assume that God is ultimately powerless to save anyone. Their idea is of a god who must rely on men to make the final decision and save themselves.

The only way this twisted gospel works is if you ignore virtually all of the Gospel of John and Romans 8 and 9.