Jumpy

Look, Jumpy, Calvinism is a direct offshoot of Roman Catholicism because everything Calvin teaches in his Institutes of the Christian Religion comes directly from one of the most well-known Roman Catholics in history – Augustine. If you want to continue on your path of lies and deceit, that’s your choice (excuse the pun), but don’t expect me to waste my time with you any longer.

One thing, and with that I close my conversation with you. Election and predestination is never unto salvation but always unto blessing and service. That’s why Paul wrote:

As regards the gospel, they are enemies for your sake. But as regards election, they are beloved for the sake of their forefathers. For the gifts [blessings] and the calling of God are irrevocable. (Rom 11:28-29)

Calvinism and its so-called doctrines of grace are totally irrational because Calvinists do not have a free-will. They are bound (chained) to its lies and deceit and the sooner you seek to be freed the better for you. You don’t need to tell me anything about Calvinism. I know it inside out. There is one thing I cannot understand. Why do you want to follow the teaching of a serial killer? And please don’t tell me you are not following Calvin because the doctrines of grace are supposedly found in the Bible. They are NOT. It’s a lie from the pit of hell. If you want to base your salvation on election and predestination, that’s your choice, as I said, but don’t spread your lies on this site. We’ve had enough of Calvinism and its demonic doctrines. England’s King James (who gave us the King James Bible), though he was no Arminian and hardly a “saint,” expressed his repugnance:

This doctrine is so horrible, that I am persuaded, if there were a council of unclean spirits assembled in hell, and their prince the devil were to [ask] their opinion about the most likely means of stirring up the hatred of men against God their Maker; nothing could be invented by them that would be more efficacious for this purpose, or that could put a greater affront upon God’s love for mankind than that infamous decree of the late Synod…

Stop believing a lie. You may have been saved by the real Jesus Christ of the Bible before you fell into the clutches of Calvinism but NOW you are following their false Jesus.

But I am afraid that as the serpent deceived Eve by his cunning, your thoughts will be led astray from a sincere and pure devotion to Christ. For if someone comes and proclaims another Jesus than the one we proclaimed, or if you receive a different spirit from the one you received, or if you accept a different gospel from the one you accepted, you put up with it readily enough. (2 Corinthians 11:3-4).

Jumpy wrote:

In your last reply, you say “God cannot be long suffering to the so-called elect…”, well, if my own personal experience is anything to go by, I should definitely say that He is: My sins stick closer to me than a brother, I know that “In the flesh dwelleth no good thing” Romans 7.18, I also know that “Flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God” 1 Corinthians 15.50.

There are many Christians who were saved before they became engrossed in the doctrines of grace (TULIP). They – like you – know what God’s long-suffering means. However, those who have been staunch Calvinists all along do not and cannot possibly know what God’s long-suffering means, for the simple reason that anyone who believes that man is completely dead (as a corspe) in his sins and transgressions and cannot excercise faith of his own accord because he has no free-will and no understanding of the Gospel, and therefore needs to be regenerated (made alive) sovereignly and monergistically by God, does not need God to be long-suffering to them. Why? Because God decides when He wants to regenrate them. Does that mean He has to be long-suffering toward Himself before He deides to regenrate them? I don’t think so. As I said, God can only be long-suffering toward sinners who procrastinate and a full-blooded Calvinis cannot procrastinate because he is dead (as a corspe) in his sins and tansgressions.

Did you know the Puritans taught that you cannot be assured of your salvation? Is there any proof from history confirming that Calvinists doubted their election? Many Puritans in the late sixteenth and seventeenth centuries doubted their election on their deathbeds because they were taught the infamous lie that saints need to persevere to the end.

If, as Calvinists believe, their salvation is divinely guaranteed and they can never lose it because God’s election is irreversible, why do they need to persevere – to maintain their salvation? It was this paradox, lingering between the assurance of election and the burden of perseverance to make their election sure, that led most Puritans to doubt their election.

They taught that assurance is not so much a gift of the Holy Spirit as it is the result of their own performance in persevering to the end. Hence their exhortation that believers ought to pray fervently, work arduously, and struggle heroically, often for many years, in order at last to obtain assurance. In addition, Puritans taught that God only gives assurance of election (salvation) to a very few of His children.

Now though this full assurance is earnestly desired, and highly prized, and the want of it much lamented, and the enjoyment of it much endeavored after by all saints, yet it is only obtained by a few. Assurance is a mercy too good for most men’s hearts, it is a crown too weighty for most men’s heads. Assurance is optimum maximum, the best and greatest mercy; and therefore God will only give it to his best and dearest friends.

Augustus in his solemn feasts, gave trifles to some, but gold to others. Honor and riches, etc., are trifles that God gives to the worst of men; but assurance is that ‘tried gold,’ Rev. 3:18, that God only gives to tried friends. Among those few that have a share or portion in the special love and favor of God, there are but a very few that have an assurance of his love.

It is one mercy for God to love the soul, and another mercy for God to assure the soul of his love. (Thomas Brooks, “Heaven on Earth: A Serious Discourse, Touching a Well-Grounded Assurance,” in The Works of Thomas Brooks, vol. 2 (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth, repr. 1980).

Would you say this is salvation, Jumpy? Are you sure you are going to heaven or do you also doubt your salvation as the Purtians did?

You harper on Nebuchadnezzar. Was Paul also sovereignly and monergistically saved without him having to excercize his free-will and faith to be saved?

BY the way, I am not an Arminian.

Does it trouble you that the Roman Catholic Church believes in the death, burial and resurection of Jesus Christ?

Does it not trouble you that the Roman Catholic Church teach, and adhere to the Arminian theology of man’s free-will?

Jumpy wrote:

2 Peter 3.9 does indeed apply to those whom God will save, or choose. No doubt, many who have been ‘saved’, be it from drowning, a fire, or whatever else, would heartily agree with me that they put absolutely no effort into their temporal salvation?

You completely missed the point I tried to make. Did you not understand me? I said God can only be long-suffering toward sinners who procrastinate. They’ve heard the Gospel many times and may even have responded in some positive way to it, but they postpone or delay the opportunity to be saved. God in his awesome mercy does some delaying Himself. He delays the return of his Son because it is his will that no one should perish. In other words, He is patiently waiting for those who are procrastinating to come to Him for their salvation.

God cannot be long-suffering toward the so-called elect because He Himself sovereignly and unilaterally chooses when he wants to regenerate them. According to Calvinists – they have absolutely no say in their salvation because they are allegedly void of a free-will to make any choices toward their salvation (Deut 30:19) They are as dead as door a nail in their sins and transgressions. Therefore, they are completely inept to put their trust in Jesus Christ in order to be saved; they cannot even hear and understand the Gospel and therefore they cannot respond in faith to the Gospel. Hence God needs to regenerate them unilaterally and monergistically. What sense is there in being long-suffering toward people who cannot understand and respond to the Gospel. A dead person cannot procrastinate, or can he? That’s why I asked you – to whom is God full of long-suffering? It cannot be toward Himself because He is the one who decides when the elect should be saved.

You also misunderstand the passage “Many are called but few are chosen.” Allow me to quote Dave Hunt with whom I agree 100%.

Israel is called God’s elect in both Old and New Testaments (Isaiah 45:4; 65:9,22; Matthew 24:31, etc.). There is no question that God chose Israel, called her, and drew her with “bands of love” (Hosea 11:4) unto Himself. Yet most Israelites went into idolatry, refused to repent, and were surely not among the redeemed. God had to say repeatedly, “my people have forgotten me days without number” (Jeremiah 2:32); “they have burned incense to vanity” (18:15). Many who are drawn to the Lord refuse to believe on Him unto salvation. Christ said, “For many are called, but few are chosen” (Matthew 20:16; 22:14). And even some who are chosen are not willing to fulfill
their calling but betray the One who they claimed was their Lord. Jesus said, “Have not I chosen you twelve, and one of you is a devil? He spake of Judas Iscariot…” (John 6:70–71). Jesus called Judas, drew him, and chose him to be a disciple. Judas followed Jesus with the other disciples, called Jesus “Lord,” and went forthwith the other disciples “to preach the kingdom of God, and to heal the sick” (Luke 9:2). But Judas was like those who will say, “Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name?…cast out devils?…done many wonderful works?” and yet Jesus will say to them, “I never knew you: depart from me” (Matthew 7:22–23). These have not lost their salvation, since they were never saved. “I never knew you: depart from me!” will be Christ’s pronouncement upon those who were drawn to Him but never came all the way to know Him as Savior and Lord.

Indeed, Israel is God’s elect but most of them are going to hell. (Matthew 8:12; Romans 11:28).

You also misunderstand Romans 8:7 and 1 Corinthians 2:14. In 1 Corinthians 2:14 Paul does not refer to an elementary knowledge of how one should be saved but to the deep things of the Spirit which only a redeemed person can understand. When Peter delivered his sermon on the Day of Pentecost the Holy Spirit did not first regenerate the 3000 and then they understood what was to be done to be saved. Their question “what shall we do?” shows that they perfectly understood what Peter preached.

You also misunderstand Ephesians 2:8. Was the gift of faith forced upon you when you got saved? A gift can only be a gift when you receive it as a gift. You say “when I first believed . . .” Were you saved first and then the gift of faith was given to you or did you first believe and as a consequence to your faith you were saved? How could you believe when you were completely unable to believe? Paul said to the jailer “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou SHALT be saved, and thy house.” (Acts 16:31). He did not say to him, “You must first be saved and then you shall believe. And we don;t even know whether you shall believe because we don’t know whether you are one of the elect. The jailer and his household were saved when they heard and understood the Gospel preached to them. “And they spake unto him the word of the Lord, and to all that were in his house. (Acts 16:32).

Do you believe you are saved because you are one of God’s elect or do you believe you first put your trust in Jesus Christ and then got saved.

“What do you think an unbeliever would say and think when he reads the words “long-suffering to us-ward? Wouldn’t he understand it to refer to him also or will he think “Nah,this verse only applies to the elect and not me. It is not addressing me but only the elect.”

But, however can YOU ( or me for that matter ) put YOUR mind into the head of an unbeliever? Would he ever think like that? How ever could he? Certainly a true seeker (God’s elect) would, and SHOULD apply that Scripture to himself? “Many are called but few are chosen.” Matthew 22.14, certainly the “Call” does indeed go out to the “many”, but God chooses the “few”? Again, “Who maketh thee to differ from another?” 1 Corinthians 4.7.

2 Peter 3.9 does indeed apply to those whom God will save, or choose. No doubt, many who have been ‘saved’, be it from drowning, a fire, or whatever else, would heartily agree with me that they put absolutely no effort into their temporal salvation?

As regards Nebuchadnezzar; the question is, WHO caused him to lift “up mine eyes unto heaven…”? Daniel 4.34. We must, as ever read the context. Does not God’s Word tell us that Nebuchadnezzar had to fulfil “seven times” (seven years)? Daniel 4.23. Nebuchadnezzar could NOT lift “up mine eyes unto heaven…” UNTIL God’s appointed time. Remember Proverbs 21.1?
As an old divine once said; “If God never chose me, I would never have chosen Him.” How can the “carnal mind” Romans 8.7 and the “natural man” 1 Corinthians 2.14, believe? Faith “is the gift of God” Ephesians 2.8.
Certainly when I first believed, I thought it was my free-will acceptance of Jesus Christ as Saviour, but after much personal study I believe along with the Puritans that the “Calvinistic doctrine of election and predestination” (as you call it) is clearly taught in Scripture, though obviously you do not.

John

I can only shake my head at you. You crept onto this blog under disguise. I told you in the beginning we often have people come on here all friendly and then as as time goes by I notice there is a stance towards Calvinism, and then ATTACK, they jump out of their holes and have a good go at us. I started to trust you, but alas you have proven to me that you are one of those with an underlying support for Calvinism.

>> You obviously have never lived in a country that has a dominant Catholic population.

No I live in a country that is predominantly full of witchcraft from the Catholic church, Anglican church, right down to the last Apostolic faith church in my town.

I will never stop someone from attending church, if they speak the truth and nothing but the truth. But the FUNDAMENTAL ground of the Presbyterian church is based on the Westminister Confession of Faith which states that God chose mankind to go to heaven or hell before the foundation of the world. So when the preacher speaks about salvation, he is in fact preaching about Election.

>> A discerning Christian goes into a fellowship with his eyes and ears open.

Really? You so far have not discerned the foundation of the ORDER of the Presbyterian church. You may as well go and sit in a Catholic church and fellowship.

Jumpy,

Do only the elect read the Bible? What do you think an unbeliever would say and think when he read the words “long-suffering to us-ward? Wouldn’t he understand it to refer to him also or will he think “Nah, this verse only applies to the elect and not to me. It is not addressing me but only the elect.” Perish the thought! Unless, of course, only the elect read the Bible as I said.