The Bible is God's message to all or only some?

If the "some" pertains to me, then will you please state why Romans 15:4 and 1 Corinthians 10:10-11 are not Scripture and why, in your opinion, I am teaching anything unscriptural, and how you will reconcile what those particular scriptures I gave to your doctrine that God wants all men to be saved.
and if God wants all men to be saved, why then aren't all men saved, and why hasn't God empowered the gospel to save all men ?

 

First, how does the statement "Those who believe in the Doctrines of Grace exclude no one of the elect," so grossly misrepresent Calvinism?

Second, why do you pretend that 99% of the 'non-Calvinists' that you and Dr. Bob engage on a daily basis are any less "mis-representative" or respectful than I have been?

I think you are searching for excuses not to address the difficult questions because you would rather stick to the pat answers of your system, but I could be wrong. You explain it...

 

Because salvation is not a 'one time' event'. This is a HUGE error within the evengelical Church today. Salvation is an ongoing affair throughout the believer's life, NOT a one time event, and the preaching of the Gospel is to keep those believing 'saved'.

...the word of the cross to those indeed perishing is foolishness, and to us -- those being saved -- it is the power of God,
......it did please God through the foolishness of the preaching to save those believing. ! Cor 1:18,21 YLT

Take heed to thyself, and to thy teaching. Continue in these things; for in doing this thou shalt save both thyself and them that hear thee. 1 Tim 4:16

.....work out your own salvation with fear and trembling; for it is God who worketh in you both to will and to work, for his good pleasure. Phil 2:12,13

 

Well, I wasn't speaking of any one individual, in fact, I can honestly say I did not have you personally in mind whatsoever.

Rom 15:14 doesn't teach that the scriptures are only for the saved if that is what you are arguing.

Rom 15:14 And I myself also am persuaded of you, my brethren, that ye also are full of goodness, filled with all knowledge, able also to admonish one another.

Paul is teaching that those filled with knowledge may be able to admonish one another, but this is in no way saying the scriptures are intended for unsaved men as well. I don't see what you see in this verse.

1 Cor 10:10 Neither murmur ye, as some of them also murmured, and were destroyed of the destroyer.
11 Now all these things happened unto them for ensamples: and they are written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the world are come.

I would say the same of these verses, Paul is saying that these scriptures were written for "our" (the saved) admonition, but that does not mean that scripture is only intended for the saved.

John 3:16 is a verse intended for the unsaved. It is telling an unsaved person if they believe on Jesus Christ they will have everlasting life. It is useful for persons who are already saved, to keep them from adding to the gospel, but primarily it is to instruct unsaved persons how to obtain eternal life.

Some scripture is not directed personally to us, for instance when God gave Moses the command to go before Pharaoh (just an example). But these scriptures are still helpful to teach us. We can learn biblical principles from this.

 

How do you say this, based on the fact that not all of mankind have had, have, or will have, access to the Scripture ?

Second, if God wants all men to have the Scripture, why did He single out the Israelites to receive the Law, which are, of course, Scripture, and why did He leave out all other tribes around Israel ?

Leviticus 20:22-24

22 Ye shall therefore keep all my statutes, and all my judgments, and do them: that the land, whither I bring you to dwell therein, spue you not out . 23 And ye shall not walk in the manners of the nation, which I cast out before you: for they committed all these things, and therefore I abhorred them. 24 But I have said unto you, Ye shall inherit their land, and I will give it unto you to possess it, a land that floweth with milk and honey: I am the LORD your God, which have separated you from other people.

Strange God, this one, don't you think ?
Inconsistent, too.

In the Old Testament, He fights the rest of humankind on behalf of a people whom He created out of the loins of one man, and in the New Testament, He says He wants all men saved, when He is the One who created the distinction in the first place.

Wonder if you can explain that ?

 

nope, like I said, goodbye.
enemies are enemies, and you have declared war on the doctrine of grace and its adherents.
I shoulda stuck to the street lessons I've learned in the past.
never shake hands with somebody you've hurt or bent on hurting you.
I tried to be charitable, and you insist on subtility.
I am able to defend what I believe in, but don't have to just because you challenge me.

 

You are misrepresenting what I said. Some would call that a lie! If my memory is correct you have not stooped that low before.

Only GOD can exclude anyone. It is sheer nonsense to think that man can overrule GOD, regardless of what "Freewillism" teaches.

 

What is untrue about the statement? If Calvinism is false, as everyone knows I believe, then doesn't is reason that I would argue that Calvinism excludes people (the "non-elect") that should not be excluded? What is so strange about this comment as compared to all the arguments on this forum that you would say I have never "stooped that low?" Seems to be a bit of an overreaction, don't you think?

And my comment was to reflect on the fact that YOU believe and teach God has excluded all the non-elect, as if that is news to anyone reading this forum...

 

okay.

Now, it's my turn to say sorry.
If what you saw was Romans 15:14, it should have been Romans 15:4.

Then you will have to study some more of typologies in the Bible. Of the various pictures and illustrations that God uses, and then take a second look at national Israel viz-a-viz spiritual Israel, and then maybe you will see what I am seeing.

Jn 3:16 is a scripture telling God's children the manner and intensity with which God loved the world [so loved the world] (which contains them) in that He gave His only begotten Son to save them from His wrath, for them to see that whosoever is already believing in Him has (hath) everlasting life. This love is confirmed by Christ when He compares His disciples, God's own, to salt, a preservative.

There were already believers before He came. The Magi are an example, the shepherds, Joseph, Mary, Elizabeth, the old man at the temple, those who later became the Apostles. One said to another: We have found the Messiah. These all had eternal life in them.

I was once a missionary baptist, and had started a church in a totally devout Roman Catholic neighborhood in an environment and atmosphere which one can say there can never be converts, and where seminary training in the "how to's" of getting people saved could have helped but I chose to discard that training and simply rely on the Spirit to find His people and bring them together.
In one year we organized with 80 souls as founding members, and I would say about 90-95% of them were converts.
Jesus Christ was a missionary from His Father, and the Father did not send Him here to start from scratch.
He had prepared a people for Him.

And the world will not adopt these principles because it is a dead world.
Only the living will adopt the Living Word.

 

over and over again the bible is addressed to believers.

 

If the Bible is only for believers, why do we give so many away to the unsaved?

The Gideons need to rethink their ministry I guess.

 

I wouldn't think of doing what many people are doing in the hotels and lodgings knowing that in the drawer or on top of the table is a Bible.

And I guess that concept of getting people "saved" (in the eternal sense) is a carry over from Catholicism when the break came between the Roman Catholic church and the Reformers.

 

Nevermind. I read the question wrong. Sorry.

 

Let me start over.

I heard a woman speak a few years ago that gave her testimony of salvation. She was leading a very sinful life of drugs and s*x and became pregnant. She decided to have an abortion and was staying at a motel. The night before the procedure, she finally realized the shape she was in and broke down in tears. She picked up the bible the Gideons had left there and began to read it. It was then that she was saved and did not have the abortion. Her daughter was with with her as she gave her testimony.

Maybe you think the bible had nothing to do with her submitting to God, but the bible itself claims to have the power of a two edged sword and I believe it made the difference in that woman's life.


Hebrews 4:12 For the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any twoedged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.

 

Jesus: "I am not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance." (Matt. 9:13)

 

You are absolutely correct Jerome. The preaching of the Gospel should call sinners to repentance, saved and lost; but it should also feed the sheep.

To quote A.W. Pink:

"The gospel is not to be offered, it is to be proclaimed".

 

Amy, I have no objection to what you just gave as an example.
But again what we forget is, as kyredneck, without the Spirit working in us to and to will of His good pleasure, the Bible will be just another book.
In my case, I would have placed it right below or on top of Mao's red book, or Engel's dialectical materialism. I burned those books.

My baby sister and her husband was into the "swinger" lifestyle back in the early 70's, wife swap and all that filth. No need to say how such kind of s*x can be so depressing in the long run, and she wanted out, her husband didn't, and their life spiralled down, and one day she just wanted totally out of the human race and she bathed and cleaned the house, changed the bedsheets, and lay down to slash her wrists when she felt something under the pillow.
It was a Bible that a cousin gave her.
She read, and read, and read, and like me, texts and phrases and verses and chapters leapt out at her, and conviction gripped her heart.
But it wouldn't have happened without the Spirit.
Too bad she had to learn more of her Savior in the Full Gospel church.

I firmly believe that the Holy Spirit does not use means to regenerate His children, and that the day she was quickened was not the day she read the Bible. it was way before that.

Some on here who oppose the Doctrine of Grace accuse us of teaching that one momen a sinner is merrily sinning when zap ! he just suddenly realizes his condition and repents.

We do not teach that.
We believe that in due time the Holy Spirit quickens His children according to His timing, His way, and His will.

 

I have gone astray like a lost sheep; Seek thy servant;.... Ps 119:176

My people have been lost sheep: their shepherds have caused them to go astray;.... Jer 50:6

19 And as for my sheep, they eat that which ye have trodden with your feet, and they drink that which ye have fouled with your feet.
22 therefore will I save my flock, and they shall no more be a prey; and I will judge between sheep and sheep. Ezek 34

But he answered and said, I was not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel. Mt 15:24

...Go not into any way of the Gentiles, and enter not into any city of the Samaritans: but go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. Mt:10:5,6

Take note in all these Jerome, they're sheep, not goats. Lost implies something out of place, not something bound for destruction.

 

OUTSTANDING ARTICULATION.

It is all 100% His call on how He deals with each individual one of His children. We are NOT to do as Peter and ask, 'Lord, and what shall this man do?', to which the Lord answered, 'If I will that he tarry till I come, what is that to thee? Follow thou me'.

 

And I totally agree. Without the Spirit none of us would be saved. I think our disagreement comes from how each of us views God's means of salvation.

But I'm glad you're nice to me.