Non-Calvinists, why is your God so small?

He has indeed done just that. The offer of salvation is to whoever will repent and believe.

So am I and every other calvinist I know.

How would you know that they are not one of the elect? Has God let you in on that?

There will be no crowns for leading the non-elect to Christ because no non-elect person will ever be lead to Christ.

In other words, your objections to calvinism are based on things that are not calvinism. Calvinists are Bible believing, God loving people who desire to see the name of God magnified through the salvation of souls. I would encourage you to not paint them as something else.

 

Just a thought: I have trouble with the words responsible/accountable/culpable/blame being used in respect to God, because they all carry with it the idea of having someone or something to answer to. These words just cannot apply to God, because there is noone or no standard above Him that He can be called to answer to.

God may be the first cause of everything, but He is not accountable for anything. Being accountable would imply an action that can be judged right or wrong. But God IS what is right--whatever He does is right and it is right because it is He who does it.

 

The Bible does not cover how much more or less "glory" God would have received if He had created another type of world (e.g. one without sin), so that is pure speculation, (we should confess not understanding all this before positing such a thing) and the claim that "sin" (and the resulting reprobation/damnation of all passed over for "redemption" and "victory") was necessary for the sole purpose of giving him glory, yields bona-fide supralapsarian double-predestination, which most people here are denying.

As for the whole "equal chance" debate, I never have actually believed in equal chance, due to all those who have never heard, as Calvinists keep leveling at us. This has always been a difficult teaching, regarding those who seemingly have no chance (most non-Calvinists would say if they pray sincerely for the true God to show Himself, He will make sure the Gospel gets to him so he can believe. And, the mitigating factor in the difference in opportunity to hear the Gospel is that people will still be judged according to "to whom much (or little) is given...", which Calvinism doesn't seem to take into account)

Still, don't forget; being in a Christian culture is no guarantee that a person really has "more of a chance". Such a person may also be more likely to rebel against it (especially since he sees the imperfections of it which he sees as "hypocrisy"), or instead, take pride in it as if heritage alone saves him. Actually, the modern "Christianized" world is very much like the Israel Jesus, Paul and the others dealt with in the Bible, doing preceisely these things. Men corrupted God's truth, and people rebelled, and now people have made up their own minds about God and the way to live, and want to hear nothing about the truth of the Bible, as morality plunges ever further and further. (I look around at people, especially kids around the city today, and say "these people have more chance to be saved than others in the world? Just tell them about God and repentance and they'll spit at you, because they've heard it all before, and don't want anyone "telling them what to do"!) So we are truly "hardened" and "blinded" and it can once again be said that the truth is not "given" people. (But this is not from God witholding any chance or ability at all to believe to each individual, but just the general state of the society at large). Those in other cultures hearing it for the first time may be more responsive, because it is new and different; rather than an old established system distorted and watered down by centuries of prominence; which they have long ago already rejected. This is precisely what happened with the Israelites as opposed to the Gentiles, and this was the whole point of Romans 9. God had raised them before others, but now they are hardened, while the others are opened up to.

As for God being free of "blame" because He is not "held to any standard", I guess what people are doing is holding Him up to His own standard He has revealed to us in the Bible. He does actually put it in terms as if He were on trial(Like "taste the Lord, that He is good", "test me in this and see if I will not open up the Heavens...", etc) So to say "whatever God does is right simply because He does it" may make hypothetical sense, but if you take that without His definitions of what He WILL or will NOT do, than you caould have Him "lying" or "sinning", and this made right simply because He does it.

[ November 21, 2002, 03:51 PM: Message edited by: Eric B ]

 

I am sure we will never see that line again.

 

He does actually put it in terms as if He were on trial(Like "taste the Lord, that He is good", "test me in this and see if I will not open up the Heavens...", etc) So to say "whatever God does is right simply because He does it" may make hypothetical sense, but if you take that without His definitions of what He WILL or will NOT do, than you caould have Him "lying" or "sinning", and this made right simply because He does it.

The standard is what He is. His character is what perfect righteousness is. All the commands are right because they are a reflection of His character. And we don't have to hold Him to any standard, because His character is unchanging, so there is no possibility He won't do what is true to His always righteous character.

The problem I have with those words is that , for one thing, by definition they assume the possibility of wrongdoing. In addition, if I make the statement that God is reponsible/culpable/accountable for something, then it makes it seem as if I am presuming to stand in judgment of God, something that would at least be be very cheeky of me; for while I may have a measure of understanding of what is righteous, my understanding is certainly far from perfect.

Well, I can't find the second quote, but "Taste and see that the Lord is good" does not say "Taste and see IF the Lord is good." It is not an invitation to put God on trial, but rather an invitation to trust him and enjoy the experience of His goodness. But the assumption in the text is of His goodness....

The statement that "whatever God does is right simply because He does it " is true because what He does is alway in agreement with His character. By definition He cannot lie or sin, because He is truth, and He is righteousnesss. The statement that He cannot lie is rooted in His immutable character. If He says it, it will be truth. If He does it, it will be righteous.

 

So He has also shown that it is not in His character to damn people by way of making them helpless, and then holding them "responsible" for what they couldn't help. The whole countercharge of "creating people with less chance" is far different than deliberately creating people with absolutely no chance simply to supposedly get some sort of "glory" from torturing them.
This is why people say it is not according to His character, so "It's right just because He does it" doesn't hold any more than the idea of Him lying being right if He does it.

 

And who says God does this?

[ November 23, 2002, 11:55 PM: Message edited by: russell55 ]

 

Oh brother!
Isn't this what Calvinists are saying is "right" because God does it?

 

Man's inability is because of man's sin. There was nothing wrong with the way God created Adam. The sin of Adam brought about man's inability, not God.

Ken

 

True. But the problem we're having here is that the Calvinists also describe it in terms of God deliberately "hardening" or "passing over" people, and their damnation for "His glory", with various scriptures quoted to this effect. When it's pointed out that this makes God
"responsible" or is "double predestination", then it is insisted that no, man really did it all to himself.

 

Eric B,

I guess you'll have it take up that issue with the double predestination types.

Ken

 

As far as the Biblical record is concerned, the only time we can be sure man hardens his own heart is when the Bible says so. And the only time we can be sure God hardens man's heart is when the Bible says so. It says both. So I don't see how anyone could argue that it's all man or all God.

[ November 24, 2002, 03:49 PM: Message edited by: npetreley ]

 

So how would you interpret Exodus, where Pharaoah is said to harden his own heart just as many times as it says that God hardened his heart? Is this a contradiction? Were they in cahoots? (I love that word - cahoots... I haven't used it in a while!)

 

Well, I believe hardening and passing over by God are exactly the same thing: it is not intervening, but leaving them as they are--intransigently opposed to God. And mankind's intransigent opposition to God comes from the fall and from the resulting rebelliousness of each individual heart, not from any action taken by God, so only mankind is to blame for it.

So to go back to your original statement:

God did not make man the way he is. That is a result of the fall. And he is not helpless, either. He is just so hostile to God that he never will submit to Him. Obstinate, stubborn, but not helpless. Inability to respond positively to God comes only from this firmly entrenched willful opposition to God. So anyone who is finally damned is not damned because God makes them helpless, but because he refuses to submit to God.

God doesn't create people with no chance. Anyone who hears the gospel has the opportunity to respond to it. Those who don't respond don't respond because of their hostility to God, not because they don't have a chance or an opportunity. They just won't take the opportunity when they are presented with it.

 

There is as much chance as a non-elect choosing God as there is me rolling a 7 on one die. In the Calvinist scheme, there is no chance, since the odds are 0:100 that the person will be "enabled" by the Spirit.