Where do Calvinists make their errors?

Why would you think it was the gentile nation, when in the very next sentence, part of the very same paragraph, Paul writes, "So then BROTHERS....."

If the "you" in verse 14 is "brothers", then the "you" in verse 13 is brothers.

There is good warrant in the context to think verse 13 applies to believers. "Brothers" doesn't have to be read into the passage. "Gentile nation" does. Methinks it is you whose bias is showing.

 

Brothers refers to the group of believers in the church at Thessalonica. A group made up of individuals. Although the church would be primarily Gentile, wouldn't there have been a few Jewish people among the brethern?

How does Paul know the brethern in Thessolonica are elect?

;...knowing, beloved brethern, His choice of you, because our gospel did not come to you in word only, but also in power and in the Holy Spirit and with full conviction.
He knew they were elect because the words of the gospel were joined with the convicting power of the Holy Spirit ensuring that the words would be accepted as the word of God. It was the success of the gospel in these brethern that proves their election from the beginning.

If they were chosen (or elect) as a nation, why wasn't the gospel always successful among the gentiles? If the whole nation is elect, then the whole nation should receive the gospel as the words of God, the gospel should come in power and in the Holy Spirit and in full conviction to everyone in the nation.

But where in either book of Thessalonians does it say any of this?

It doesn't matter if you think it makes sense if you have to read it into the text rather than conclude it from the text. It's the words of the text that ought to tell you what things mean. Where does the text tell of Thessalonians tell you that the elect in these books refers to the gentile nation? Otherwise what you've got is just a bunch of speculation without any textual evidence.

Here's what we can learn FROM THE TEXT of Thessolonians about the elect:

-If someone receives the gospel as more than just a bunch of words, but as true convicting words from God through the work of the Holy Spirit, then that is proof that God has chosen them.

-Election (or God's choosing) is from the beginning.

-Election is for salvation. The elect are chosen to be saved.

-The means by which the elect are saved is sanctification by the Spirit and faith in the truth.

-It is for this salvation through the work of the Spirit and faith that the elect are called through the gospel.

I see nothing here that is evidence that Paul is using the words "elect" or "chosen" to refer to anyone who does not come to faith. Can you show me what you are seeing that I am not? FROM THE TEXT.

 

Can you be more specific. I don't see anything here that supports your views. </font>[/QUOTE]How about the text saying that it is to those who are called, from both the Jews and the Gentiles, that Christ becomes the power and wisdom of God? (v 24)

How about the that the text equates God's calling (the calling that turns the gospel from foolishness to power and wisdom from God) with God's choosing. (26, 27)

How about the text saying that it is by God's doing (or "out of" or "because of" God) that people are in Christ Jesus, and its being in Christ Jesus that makes Christ wisdom and justification and sanctification and redemption? (30)

The text parallels these three things:

</font>

• God's call</font>
• God's choosing</font>
• God's doing</font>

And it is the call, the choice, the work of God that turns the gospel from foolishness to wisdom of Christ. It is the call, the choice, the work of God that makes the gospel successful for those called, those chosen, those who by God's doing are in Christ Jesus (out of both Jews and Gentiles), while it remains foolishness for all the others--both Jews and Gentiles.

 

How can you say that so assuredly? </font>[/QUOTE]Because of the words Paul used in the context in which he used them. "Reader reconstruction" is an inadequate theory of hermeneutics. Paul gets to decide what his words mean and he used words that would communicate that. There is nothing there about "revealing the truth." It is about being saved.

And it is not about being hardened. When someone says 2+2=4 and refuses any other possibility, we do not call that person hardened. I can admit a lot of other possibilities on issues. But all possibilities must deal adequately and accurately with the text from which those possibilities are supported. This one does not.

I think that is what he means, but the context is about individuals being chosen, not some generic choice.

I am well aware of the "mystery" which is why I am not a covenant theologian. I am also well aware that this verse says nothing about a mystery and in fact election is not connected to the mystery here. Paul is speaking to individuals about God's choosing them.

I know ...

I don't disagree but that is not the issue. Those chosen were chosen from the beginning, long before they ever believed anything.

But those presuppositions must be solidly rooted in the text. My interpretation meets that standard.

YOu are right that CvA was not the issue. All the apostles, based on what they wrote, agreed with us on that issue. But the mystery is not at issue in 1 and 2 Thessalonians. That is completely out of keeping with sound interpretation. The Gentiles as a nation were not elect.

I went down this road years ago. I have seen the arguments for your position and I am unconvinced by them. They simply do not deal with the text sufficiently for me.

But this is incorrect. I do have textual support for my beliefs. They are supported from the text rightly used. I don't have to jump through hoops and change meanings to make it work, and that is why I believe it. It really doesn't matter than you disagree with me. What matters is that you seem to too easily dismiss what Paul wrote and to whom he wrote it in order to say that it doesn't really mean what it says. I simply cannot reconcile that in my conscience.

Trust me, I have looked at this from all kinds of perspectives and every time I come in here my belief is strengthened because I see the things that are necessary to do to Scripture to deny it. I don't mean that to be offensive. If you, in your conscience, can justify your position, then have at it. I simply cannot go down that road.

 

Skandelon wrote: ' And the following verses which speak of their calling it seems that Paul is emphasizing the type of people who accept the calling. Not wise = humble etc.
Otherwise you would have to believe that God has not willed to save wise or noble people and that's just not true. The point being made is that no who sees himself as being wise and his calling to Christ as being noble will be saved. No one is really wise, noble and all of these things mentioned, they are only self-perceptions of those who have refused to believe the message truth.'

I'm amazed at your exegesis.

The text says nothing about 'self-perceptions' - it says everything about God's perceptions. It says God chose that the great majority of those to be saved would be of the foolish/ignoble sort, so that no flesh should glory in His presence. If man had the ultimate veto on his salvation, then God would have had to put up with whatever ratio of wise/foolish that threw up.

You say that would mean that 'God has not willed to save wise or noble people and that's just not true.' You're half-right: God has not willed to save MANY wise or noble people. If the text had said ANY, then your argument for self-perception would have had some weight. But MANY means that some of those who will enjoy eternity in His presence are of the wise/noble of this world. It cannot mean those who are wise/noble in their own eyes.

These verses are fatal to Arminian understanding of election. It is worth posting in full for us all to read again:

1corinthians 1:26-29, 'For you see your calling, brethren, that not many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called. But God has chosen the foolish things of the world to put to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to put to shame the things which are mighty; and the base things of the world and the things which are despised God has chosen, and the things which are not, to bring to nothing the things that are, that no flesh should glory in His presence.'

In Him

Ian

 

skandelon, I find the following insulting and arrogant:

"I am quite sure that people who have all the facts wouldn't be "dragged kicking and screaming" to Calvinism (as is the testimony of many Calvinists) if they indeed had all the information necessary to adopt a correct soteriology."

This is to say that the many many highly proficient biblical scholars throughout history who happen to be Calvinists are not in possession of "all the facts", yet, somehow you are. I find that to be so fantastic a statement, so arrogant, that not only cannot I not believe it, I can’t believe that you do! Apparenly men like Spurgeon, Murray, Pink, Sproul, Packer, Piper, Lloyd Jones, Robert Dick Wilson, Machen, Warfield, Schaeffer, Horton, Boice, Helm, Ferguson, Jonathan Edwards, John Owen, John Gerstner, Turretin, Dabney, etc etc (before whom, I have no doubt but that your biblical knowledge pales in comparison) are or were, sadly, not in possession of all the facts, they are not in the privilidged position that you are. Would you be so kind as to list and itemize what “the facts” are which are needed to adopt a correct (ie one in agreement with you) soteriology? And please show, since you are certain that Calvinists manifestly do not possess these facts that you are privy to, could you show a statement from the Calvinists you deem ignorant proving that they are not in possession of the coveted facts which you possess?

 

Please show me from the context why us would mean anything more than Paul, Silas, and Timothy, and why you would mean anything other than the believers in Thess. You are reading your interpretation of who us and you are INTO the text. I'm a text person. I need to see it in the text.

I wrote:

You answered:

Not unless you are reading INTO the text. Where is your warrent to change "brethren loved of God" to "Gentiles"? Paul is writing to specific people (a certain group of brethren) and you want to change it to have him addressing Gentiles in general. How can you do that? Where is your textual evidence.

And the text tells you how Paul knew they were elect. Because they believed. Believing is evidence of election.

Aaah...but the Jewish NATION was not chosen for salvation. But there was always remnant from among the Jewish nation that was faithful, and they were faithful because God chose them by his grace to be faithful. (Rom 11)

I wrote:

I asked for evidence from either of the Thessalonian epistles. I don't even buy your Eph 1 explanation--there's no reason to think the us means anything more than the apostle, and the you means anything more than the Ephesian believers. But that's neither here nor there. You can't read what you think the pronouns mean in Ephesians into Thessalonians. Pronouns refer to people in the immediate context. Look in the immediate context for their referents.

Sometimes it was a problem. But show me from the context of Thessalonians that that is the problem addressed in these epistles.

No, I am saying you are reading into the text because you are making pronouns refer to people not mentioned in the context. That's called reading into the text.

I say you are reading into the text, because you say Paul is addressing a certain problem, but you haven't shown from the text that that is the problem Paul is addressing. You are bringing things from outside these epistles and putting them into it. Why do you think you can do that?

You don't know whether I read into the text or not. I haven't read into the text here, have I? I am taking the pronouns as refering to their immediate antecedents, no more, no less. Isn't that the way its done, usually? Isn't that the rule of interpretation? You just don't like the implications of that, so you are searching elsewhere for other possibilities.

It doesn't matter whether it is much of a stretch. The problem is that you are stretching at all when who those pronouns are refering to is right there next to the pronouns themselves. Why complicate things when the simple answer is right there? Why are you searching at all for any other explanation for what us and you mean?

I wrote:

You answered:

Do you realize how silly that sounds? Every single person who hears the gospel has the opportunity to believe. According to the text, what sets these people apart, what confirms them as "chosen", is that they embraced the gospel.

Please show me that this is the issue being addressed in either epistle to the Thessalonians.


I wrote:

But being granted entrance into the kingdom if they have faith is not SALVATION. It an OPPORTUNITY for salvation. Once again, you must add something to the text--the word "opportunity".

Please, I need to see the text. You have not given me any textual responses. You have repeated your theory over and over again, but you haven't shown me how you get that interpretation from this particular passage or its context. Your interpretation of any passage needs to come out of that passage. Show me from this passage and it's context--I'll be generous and let you call both epistles the "context."

 

Running out of time, cutting to the chase.

That isn't what the verse says to me....that's what the verse says--I even left out any mention of election. Let's just talk "call"! It says, and I quote, "to those who are the called ones...Christ is the power and wisdom of God."

See, there you go again, adding to the text. It doesn't say "who believe and respond to that call."

And my glasses seem to have clear lenses here and the plain text is seen . Your lense seems to have something on them that adds to what you see.

BTW, I see "coming to know Christ as the power and wisdom of God" as the same thing as faith. So as I see it, the text is saying that those who are called come to faith. To the called ones, the gospel results in faith. To all the others, it doesn't--they reject it as either foolishness (the Greeks) or offensive (the Jews).

And you'd be playing fast and loose with the truth. It wasn't a life changing event for those you called--it was a life changing event for those who responded to your call.

Well, yes it does. It implies that every single person that you called had their life changed because you called them.

I find this just goofy. (Sorry, lost my reasonableness.) We don't (at least I don't) say someone is called because the call is completed. Someone is called because they are called because they are called. And in this particular case, the text tells you that this was a call with power. A call that changes what seems insulting and stupid to everyone else into something wonderful.

Where does it say these are the type that are willing to accept it? All it says is that these are the types God is more likely to chose.

No, you have to believe that God has not chosen MANY wise or noble people--not none. That's what the text says. I accept it because it says it. I'm not going to read something into the text because what the words actually say make me uncomfortable.

 

Skandelon, I am not angry. Rather, I am concerned, both about the claims that you make for yourself and those facts that you claim to know about others. Certainly we come here for discussion, and discussion is what we ought to be doing, not making accusations that we have no proof of. Instead, you made a serious accusation, namely that you were “quite sure that people who have all the facts wouldn't be "dragged kicking and screaming" to Calvinism (as is the testimony of many Calvinists) if they indeed had all the information necessary to adopt a correct soteriology." And once again, I ask for you to prove that what you say here in this quote is true. And I also ask you what exactly these facts are that you possess, that Calvinists apparently do not possess.

Of course you can list many Arminian or non-Calvinistic authors, as could I, but that would hardly counter my point. Why? Because I am not the one claiming to possess some fact or other that these other theologians do not have. You are the one claiming special knowledge for yourself. And nor are your credentials an issue here. What is at issue is your claim to know facts that Calvinists do not know, and further, I am looking for some kind of proof to sustain your claim that if only Calvinists knew these facts, they would not become Calvinists. That is what I am concerned with.

So this is what I am asking for, for the purpose of discussion:

1) What are “all the facts” that you have that Calvinists don’t have

And

2) How do you know that no Calvinist possess these facts, whatever they happen to be.

And I accept your apology; it was a very gracious thing for you to do. I too hope that I have not done anything to offend you, and if I have, please forgive me.

Blessings

 

It doesn't kill me to concede anything. But look at your statement:

for those I called....it was a lifechanging event.
I took out the parenthetical statement so you can see what your sentence actually says. It says that for those you called, it was a lifechanging event. If you called 20, then those 20 had their life changed. It's in the grammar. If only ten had their life changed, and you want to be truthful then you say,

...for some of those who called, it was a lifechanging event

or you could say:

....for those who responded to the call, it was a lifechanging event.

But if you word it the way you worded it, then you are indeed implying that your call was a lifechanging for all whom you called.

Maybe. But the grammar of your sentence makes it clear that all who were called had their life changed. Just as the grammar of the passage discussing makes it clear that for all whom God has called (in the way the word is used here), Christ is the power and wisdom of God.

That is a different usage of the word than in this passage. But if I were, "for those who are called to the ministry, the ministry is a joyful one", then that implies that whatever way I am using the word "call" every single one of those who are called in that way will find the ministry to be joyful.

Once again, its in the grammar--not in the definitions of words. In fact, the particular definitions of the words is determined partly by the grammar of the context.

No, God chooses according to his purposes. Notice Paul is talking about HUMAN standards here--not MANY people who were born to the ruling class, not many worldly scholars, not many influential people were chosen.

Notice that this is "so that no flesh can boast before God." (verse 29) Humility is the result of God's choosing, not the cause.

Except I don't think this is exactly what Paul is writing about. There were indeed people who are born into the nobility, the upper crust, the ruling class. There were men who were scholars, philosophers, etc. Those are the ones in particular that Paul is refering to.

 

OK, fair enough Skandelon.

My comment would be to say that 6 people is hardly much of a sample of the population, nor is it really sufficient to know whether or not your 3 points, if known by all persons considering these doctrines, would be certainly persuaded to a different theological ideology, namely Arminianism, which is what you claim, and is the point I am in disagreement with you on. You just cannot know such a thing for sure.

I would not say that either you or anyone else was not a “true” Calvinist, simply because one adopts another theological view. My view of salvation would be to say that one was not a true Christian if one abandons the faith, but I do not equate switching from Calvinism to Arminianism with switching from Christianity to Atheism or the like.

As far as your historical discussion is concerned, I would comment that Arminians were not considered some kind of intellectually elite group, when compared to Calvinists of the same (or even later) time period. Arminius was no more of a scholar than Calvin, in fact, though he was indeed brilliant, I think he is less of an exegete when compared to Calvin, IMHO, and, I think, even in Arminus’ opinion as well. So too with the rest of the adherents to Arminianism, that they are the “real thinkers” of the day cannot be proven. It is just this kind of broad statement, the same sort you make about being sure that if only people knew what you know, or rather, what your opinion is concerning 3 hermeneutical points, that they would never “convert” to Calvinism, that I am having difficulty with. That would be, in reality, impossible for you to prove. All this sort of statement can prove is to tell us that in your opinion, Arminians were intellectually superior to Calvinistic thinkers. And your opinion can go no further than that, an opinion. It certainly would not warrant the statement you seemed to dogmatically assert concerning the respective intellectual abilities of the 2 groups; I am referring to specifically where you say “They (Arminians) were seen as the real thinkers and scholars of the day who challenged the orthadox (sic) views”. What evidence can you offer to prove such a thing?

So too, to get back to my original objection, you are in no position to dogmatically assert that if only people knew your 3 points of contention with Calvinism, that they would certainly and invariably not adopt Calvinism. You can't know such a thing for sure.

I think the general error you make can also be typified in the following statement you make:

This is ridiculous. Imagine the contrary. "If only Arminians objectively evaluate their position, they will see their errors." Would you, as an Arminian, be persuaded of the truthfulness of such a statement!?!? Of course not. In other words, it is an insult to Calvinists for you to say what you said. You are inferring that you know, with certainity(!), that Calvinists have not been objective in their deciding that Calvinism is more faithful to the overall scriptural testimony regarding soteriological concepts, or whatever other theological point. Further, what is it that you even mean by using the term "objective"? Does this mean to be really saying: "if they only they saw things as I do, then I would deem them objective"? That is the trouble with making such broad statements, it only reflects the attitudes and opinions of the writer/speaker, and nothing more about objective reality. Unfortuantely such statements always attempt to be saying much much more then they do say or, worse, what they can say. For, again, how could you know such a thing? The motives of men's hearts are hidden, many times even to themself, let alone being able to judge the motives of another's heart, which is exactly what you claim to be able to know. This knowledge is reserved for God alone.

Blessings