Baptist but not a Calvinist?

HP: Not so fast Brother Bob. Now according to some on this list we are sailing together in a ‘Pelagian’ boat as I recall, not a Calvinistic one. With all the good things FA stated that we seem to find agreement with, shouldn’t we be calling him ‘Our kind of Pelagian?” :laugh:

 

HP: Hey, glad to see your back! Seriously, I know you are busy. I read your posts with keen interest. Sure there are things we disagree with, but there is more agreement than disagreement. I kept the posts to refer to later. Stay in touch as you can. We have much to discuss. Possibly I might try an address just a point or two at a time and see if we can keep our posts very concise and to the point to save time and energy in responding. It is all too easy to write too lengthy of posts and distract readers from the most pertinent points. I am guilty for sure.

Would you mind sharing just a note or two on what and where you are teaching? You do not have to disclose any details, just general things like public or private, many subjects or just one or so. Just give us enough brief details to get the picture of your job.

Thanks again for the interesting posts. Hope to hear back from you soon as you are able.

Pray one for another.

PS. From here forward, we wll quietly and secretly refer to our alliance as the order of the MP's :thumbs:

 

HP: Are you kidding? Once in the boat, always in the boat. Baptism would just make you MP+

Seriously, why would baptism cut you out of anything? All Pelagius was opposed to in the area of baptism to my knowledge was infant baptism for the remission of original sin. He did not see infants as moral beings and as such neither sinful nor holy, as far as I understand him.

 

HP: I will try and see what I can find. Many Spirit filled men have not believed that baptism was an ordinance to be partaken of, but mainly due to the unscriptural thoughts surrounding baptism of their day, believing that it was a condition of salvation, and that the water itself had some salvic power to cleanse from sin.

George Fox of the Quakers was such a man. I might not agree with him in the total disregard of baptism, but if you look at the state and beliefs in the church of his day, it is my contention that indeed he was a man sent from God to set the Church aright in it’s beliefs as to what are the true biblical conditions of salvation. There is an old book entitled “George Fox, the red Hot Quaker“ which I read some time ago that got my attention. God used that man mightily.

 

HP: What right do we have to say “here is the spiritual analogy” concerning a Scriptural passage, when in fact no such connection is made as such in Scripture? Is not that using Scripture to our private doctrinal advantage, as opposed to interpreting it as it is plainly written? I cannot think of one time Christ or any writer used an illustration of raising one from the dead for a picture of salvation. Is such an approach to Scripture wise?

 

HP: This discussion was not intended to place a label of Calvinist, or non-Calvinist on anyone. This discussion was intended to get us to examine the doctrines we hold to, and see if in fact logic does not demand that we accept the very notions we say we detest. For instance, what good does it do to try and say that we detest and do not hold to predestination of the damned, if in fact we believe in the predestination of the elect?

One cannot escape the logical ends of their arguments. If you detest the logical end of your argument, the premise you start from must in fact be faulty. If man is born a sinner, and God has predestined only some to salvation, logic demands that those that are left have been by a direct choice of God to be left out of any hope, and that from eternity past, establishing the doctrine of the predestination of the damned by default. If one sees that the predestination of the damned is in error, you cannot hold to original sin and predestination of the elect, in any sense that would picture God as arbitrarily picking some to salvation and others to their damnation apart from mans will being involved.

It is logical insanity to hold to original sin and predestination of the elect and then state that predestination of the damned is in error.

 

HP: If a governor states that he will never pardon one who has not shown remorse for his crime and has evidenced a repentant heart, and a prisoner shows remorse for his sin and has shown a repentant heart, has the prisoner in any way 'merited' a pardon by his actions? If the prisoner is granted a pardon, having fulfilled the conditions the governor has mandated must be fulfilled in order to receive a pardon, can it be stated that the pardon was granted 'by the will' of the prisoner?

Tom, we need to think through this issue carefully. You are placing a paper duck up to shoot at when you try and equate mans will being the means by which one is regenerated if his will is involved in the process. That is simply not the case. When one eliminates man's will from the salvation process, you cannot end up anywhere short of necessitated fatalism, predestined damnation of the damned, and make a Holy and Just God out to be a arbitrary tyrant and a respecter of persons.

 

HP: Let me ask you a question. If a Governor would refuse to pardon the criminal, and the prisoner was on his way to the death chamber, does the possibility still exist that he might in fact repent although no possibility remained for a pardon? Would it take some 'driving force' to necessitate the repentance, or could the prisoner have a change of heart and simply form an intent to exercise repentance?