Fifty Million Rob Bell Fans Can’t Be Wrong
In 1959 RCA releasedFifty Million Elvis Fans Can’t Be Wrong—Elvis’ Gold Records Vol. 2.1 Elvis Presley was an exceptionally popular entertainer who was also one of the most controversial public figures of the late 1950s. The title of his second greatest hits album indicates a popular sentiment: It must be right, because millions of people believe it. But this sentiment does not translate to theology. Though many church fathers and theologians throughout the ages may have believed in a particular doctrine, it’s correctness is not established by that fact alone.
Rob Bell is the founding pastor of Mars Hill Bible Church in Grand Rapids, Michigan and is the author of such books as Velvet Elvis, Sex God, Jesus Wants to Save Christians, and Drops Like Stars. Many evangelical Christians are familiar with his Nooma series of videos.2 Bell is influential in Emerging Church circles and is a popular speaker. Though his previous books have sold well, Love Wins is especially popular.
The twin premises of Love Wins are that God is a God of love and that the evangelical Christian view of God is too narrow. “Has God created billions of people over thousands of years only to select a few to go to heaven and everyone else to suffer forever in hell?”3 Bell asks. Love Wins challenges the traditional views concerning heaven, hell, and salvation. For the sake of brevity this review concentrates on Bell’s view of salvation.
Universalism
Simply stated, Rob Bell is a universalist. Baptist theologian Millard Erickson’s description of universalism also describe’s Bell’s views: “From time to time, however, a contrary position has been espoused in the Church, namely, that all will be saved. This position (is) known as universalism.”4 Some years ago Erickson noted this tendency in a list of trends within liberal evangelical circles: “A hope for near-universal salvation. God has not left Himself without a witness in all cultures, sufficient to bring people to salvation if they earnestly seek it.”5
Bell does not concern himself with “earnest seekers.” Instead, he arranges a list of passages from both the Old and New Testaments to describe God’s love for human beings.6 God must save everyone, reasons Bell:
How great is God?
Great enough to achieve what God sets out to do,
or kind of great,
medium great,
great most of the time,
but in this,
the fate of billions of people,
not totally great.
Sort of great.
A little great.7
Bell sees God as a failure if He doesn’t save everyone: “Will all people be saved, or will God not get what He wants? Does this magnificent, mighty, marvelous God fail in the end?”8
One could call this “God is a failure” argument “extreme pathos.” Evangelical theology answers this dilemma, “Will all be saved? The church’s usual position throughout history has been that while some or even many will be saved, some will not.”9 At least two theological arguments stand against the universal salvation espoused in Love Wins. [amazon 006204964X thumbnail]
The nature of the atonement
Bell’s view of the extent of Christ’s atonement is apparently informed by the “Moral-Influence Theory.” This view was originally developed by Peter Abelard (1079-1142), a theologian and professor at the University of Paris.10 Abelard “emphasized the primacy of God’s love and insisted that Christ did not make some sort of sacrificial payment (i.e. ransom) to the Father to satisfy His dignity. Rather, Jesus demonstrated to humanity the full extent of God’s love for them.”11
The Moral Influence Theory was further developed at a much later date by Horace Bushnell (1802-1876) in the US and Hastings Rashdall in the UK.12 Bushnell wrote, “It is not that the suffering appeased God, but that it expresses God—displays, in open history, the unconquerable love of God’s heart.”13 Lewis and Demarest summarize this theory: “At bottom, then, people are saved by the compelling power of God’s self-giving love.”14
Bell views the traditional evangelical view of salvation as “God in the end doesn’t get what God wants”15 because God “wants all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth” (NASB, 1 Tim. 2:4). What will be the outcome of the lives of billions of human beings?
To be clear, again, an untold number of serious disciples of Jesus across hundreds of years have assumed, affirmed, and trusted that no one can resist God’s pursuit forever, because God’s love will eventually melt even the hardest of hearts.16
This is universalism, clearly presented and concisely stated.
The means and extent of salvation
The second theological problem with Love Wins is Bell’s view of the means and extent of salvation. How far does the death of Christ extend to all human beings?
Rsearch on this topic reveals a “kindred spirit” to Rob Bell: Nels Ferré of Sweden.17 As a youth Ferré was troubled by his father’s conservative understanding of the Scriptures, especially his eschatology. Ferré eventually immigrated to the US where “he built his own theology on the central thought of divine love.”18 “It is his understanding of God’s love that governs his interpretation of Scriptures and the issue as a whole.”19 Ferré described the means and extent of a universalist salvation in these terms:
The logic of the New Testament at its highest and deepest point is the logic of God’s sovereign love… Those who worship the sovereign Lord dare proclaim nothing less than the total victory of His love. No other position can be consistently Christian. All other positions limit either God’s goodness or His power, in which case both Fundamentalism and modern Liberalism have their own varieties of the finite God.20
Bell’s conclusions are mirror-images to those of Ferré. Concerning the love of God, he writes:
Which is stronger and more powerful, the hardness of the human heart or God’s unrelenting, infinite, expansive love? Thousands through the years have answered that question with the resounding response, “God’s love, of course.”21
…
At the center of the Christian tradition since the first church have been a number who insist that history is not tragic, hell is not forever, and love, in the end, wins and all will be reconciled to God.22
Indeed, theologians throughout the centuries have written about universalism. Origen (ca. 185-254) probably first systematized universalism: “Origen also adopted with some enthusiasm the idea of apokatastasis or universal restoration, according to which every creature, including both humanity and Satan, will be saved.”23 But universalism is not the prevalent theological concept of salvation. Over the centuries a few writers and theologians followed Origen’s lead. Far more theologians have not.
Theological method
At this point we must ask the question, “How does Rob Bell do theology?” In the case of his universalism, Bell assembles a number of verses in an effort to support of the dominance of God’s love over all His other attributes. He then adds a number of “traditions” to the mixture and concludes that everyone must be saved from destruction.
On the one hand Bell does not consider many of the Scripture passages that obstruct his assertions. On the other hand Bell paints the opposing views in stark, evil terms. In response to some church doctrinal statements concerning the condemnation of unbelievers, Bell writes:
So, in the first statement, the “unsaved” won’t be with God. In the second, not only will they not be with God, but they’ll be sent somewhere else to be punished. And in the third, we’re told that not only will these “unsaved” be punished forever, but they will be fully aware of it—in case we were concerned they might down an Ambien or two when God wasn’t looking…24
Bell does not attempt to balance the opposing views against universalism. He makes little effort to compare and synthesize the data of the biblical passages and word studies and the biblical, systematic, and historical theology—and then determine a measured conclusion. This is not to say that Bell did not do any theological research, word studies and analysis. But his presuppositions allow no other conclusion than that Love Wins. In the final analysis, Bell’s theological method is careless and prejudiced.
What may the reader conclude from Love Wins?
Love Wins is as much a book about American popular culture as it is about theology. Bell’s underlying assumptions about salvation are probably based on the prevailing concept of “fairness,” that is, there are no losers and the authorities ensure an equality of outcomes—the authority in this case being God.
It is not unreasonable to conclude that Bell perceives the traditional view of salvation as unfair because some are saved but others aren’t. Though Bell wishes the reader to think he is defending God’s honor, in reality he creates a god who is forced to serve human beings “because He loves them.” In this sense Love Wins is man-centered, or anthropocentric. Here salvation is a right and not the gift of God.
Is Love Wins a polemic against the evangelical view of the gospel? In response to the evangelical view that some are saved but others aren’t, Bell writes:
What kind of faith is that? Or, more important: What kind of God is that?25
This belief raises a number of issues, one of them being the risk each new life faces. If every new baby being born could grow up to not believe the right things and go to hell forever, then prematurely terminating a child anytime from conception to twelve years of age could actually be the loving thing to do, guaranteeing that the child ends up in heaven, and not hell, forever. Why run the risk?26
This statement is part of his “extreme pathos,” a prejudiced opinion against conservative evangelical Christianity. One might hope that Bell is merely overstating his case for emphasis and not revealing his true beliefs. However, though he makes many other harsh statements, Love Wins is not really a polemic.
The God who is revealed in the Bible is most certainly a God of love, but He is not limited to love. This is the major error of Love Wins. He is also the God of justice, mercy, forgiveness, and grace. He is infinite in His wisdom, eternal in His being, sovereign over the Universe, both transcendent and imminent, and yet He is not limited in any way by our finite understanding of these qualities or attributes. There is much we cannot understand about our great God: “For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways and My thoughts than your thoughts.” (NASB, Isa. 55:9).
Perhaps the combination of Rob Bell’s writings, videos, personal appearances, large church and cultural influence has gained him millions of fans. But his personal popularity does not make him correct—nor does the popular culture he represents make him correct. Love Wins is poorly-done theology and a caricature of evangelical Christianity. How evangelicals wish that universalism was true! But it is not. The Bible is clear that not everyone receives salvation.
And no one’s heart breaks more for the lost than God’s.
Notes
2 Love Wins, dust jacket.
3 Quote from Love Wins dust jacket; “If you don’t have that (a personal relationship with God), you will die apart from God and spend eternity in torment in hell,” p. 10.
4 Millard J. Erickson, Christian Theology, 2nd ed. Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 1998, p. 1025.
5 Millard J. Erickson, The Evangelical Left: Encountering Postconservative Evangelical Theology. Carlisle (UK): Paternoster Press, 1998, p. 21. Though Erickson was describing the Evangelical Left’s openness to salvation through general revelation, Bell argues that salvation is indeed universal (p. 100).
6 Love Wins, pp. 98-103. Though the dust jacket describes Love Wins as “a deeply biblical vision for rediscovering a richer, grander, truer, and more spiritually-satisfying way,” the book consistently does not utilize standard biblical book, chapter and verse citations. Instead, Bell simply refers to chapters (Psalm 22, Philippians 4, etc.). It is frustratingly difficult to find the listed verses without the standard references.
7 Love Wins, pp. 97-98.
8 Love Wins, p. 98, author’s emphasis.
9 Christian Theology, p. 1025.
10 Alister E. McGrath, Historical Theology: An Introduction to the History of Christian Thought. Oxford (UK): Blackwell, 1998, p. 138.
11 Christian Theology, p. 803.
12 Ibid.
13 Quoted in Gordon R. Lewis and Bruce A. Demarest, Integrative Theology. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1990, Vol. 2, pp. 373-374 . It must be stated that neither Abelard nor Bushnell were universalists.
14 Ibid.
15 Love Wins, p. 103.
16 Love Wins, p. 108.
17 See Nels Ferré, “The Third Conversion Never Fails,” in These Found the Way, ed. David Wesley Soper (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1951) and The Christian Understanding of God (New York: Harper, 1951, p. 228).
18 Christian Theology, p. 1028.
19 Christian Theology, pp. 1028-1029.
20 The Christian Understanding of God, pp. 246-247.
21 Love Wins, p. 109.
22 Ibid.
23 Historical Theology, p. 25.
24 Love Wins, p. 96.
25 Love Wins, p. 4.
26 Ibid.
jimfrank Bio
Jim Franklin is a native of Covington, Kentucky and is 2004 graduate of Grace Theological Seminary in Winona Lake, Indiana. He earned his MA in Theological Studies at age 50. He served twenty years in the US Air Force as a supply specialist and medical technician, retiring in 1997 as a Technical Sergeant. Jim was an Adjunct Professor of English with Grace College’s Prison Extension Division from 2008 to 2011. He is currently the pastor of Flora Grace Brethren Church, Flora, Indiana. Jim is married to Alice. They have two adult sons. Jim blogs with his good friend Jeff Bowers at “The World as Best I Remember It” and comments at The American Thinker as “Van Owen.”
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Yes, your several diatribes calling my statements double talk are offensive. This may seem like double talk to you, but I assure you it is not. It only seems that way because you do not understand, much as a JW finds it impossible to understand the doctrine of the Trinity. You are willing to call the Trinity “mystery” but Calvinism is “double talk.” But to the JW the Trinity is double talk, and to a Calvinist, election and its various tennents is mystery.
Many years ago, I believed very much as you do. I did not understand Calvinist teaching on salvation, and was prejudiced against it from my upbringing. I could muster many arguments against it, as you are doing. But I was mercifully kept from denouncing and defaming it as some do, and as you seem to want to do. I think the Holy Spirit enabled me to realize, even then, that there was mystery here that I did not understand, and it is unwise to denounce what one does not understand. Perhaps, in time, it may prove to be true after all. Gradually, as I continued to study Scripture, the spiritual fog began to recede, and these truths became clear and eventually compelling. I understand where you are coming from because I have been there.
I would strongly caution you against defaming what you do not understand. It is one thing to confess that you do not understand. It is quite another to slander and defame. It should be obvious that millions of Christians over many centuries and in many parts of the world have believed these doctrines. You may disagree, but if you are wise, you will be more cautious.
Given your strong prejudices, I question that further discussion would be profitable. Perhaps when you are more open to inquiry we may resume. Until then, I trust you will know God’s blessing upon your life.
Sincerely,
Greg Barkman
G. N. Barkman
My response re: doubletalk was not meant to insult your person, as I’ve tried repeatedly to point out. It is unfortunate that you have taken it personally. I was hoping to find at least one instance where a logical explanation can be made, which clearly shows that the assertions made do not cancel out each other and qualifications, if any, put forth do not change the meanings of words or phrases.
To warn someone not to defame Calvinism with implicit warnings of dire consequences is tantamount, in my opinion, to idolizng a theological system on the part of the one giving warning. I actually expected so much more from this SI forum.
I appreciate the patience you have had with me and I respect your position. Let us hope that sometime I will appear to you more open for discussion and you would be willing to show me specifically in what way certain of your propositions offered are not doubletalk.
I did not say that I thought you insulted me personally. I said that I found your label of Calvinist theology as double talk offensive. I cautioned you against blaspheming (speaking against) what you clearly do not understand. I return to the example of the doctrine of the Trinity. To the JW (as well as others), it appears contradictory, self-cancelling, or double talk. To the orthodox Christian, it is mystery, a precious, glorious, and necessary truth. In other words, for those who cannot and will not understand it, it is double talk. To those who have come to understand it (I would say have been enabled by the Spirit of God to understand it), it is mysterious but vital and precious truth.
You say that you are disappointed because I do not show you why my explanation of Calvinist soteriology, which you consider double talk, is not self contradictory. Much like the JW who keeps challenging the Christian to explain why the doctrine of the Trinity is not double talk. No matter what the Christian says, it will continue to sound like contradictions to the JW. After a while, there is really no more to be said. The JW will continue to consider the Trinity a foolish, self-contradictory doctrine unless and until the Holy Spirit opens his mind to understand.
I am aware that this sounds audacious to an Arminian. Remember, I used to be where you are, and I bristled as you do by such assertions from Calvinists. Calvinist doctrine used to seem contradictory to me too, until I began to understand it. What more can I say? If what I have already said can only been seen by you as double talk, I have nothing more to add. There is no value in going around and around endlessly, and I do not believe Christ will be honored by my laying out more explanations of truth for you to defame by your responses. Enough for now. I pray God’s richest blessing upon you.
Cordially,
Greg Barkman
G. N. Barkman
1. I already noted that explaining the trinity to a JW not asking him to accept doubletalk but rather a mystery. To me, a myster and logical a self-contradictions are two different things.
2. The theology of Calvinism is not “audacious” but mere self-contradictory, as far as I see it. I could never reconcile myself to it’s propositions. Just in case, I should let you know I’m not bristling (thanks for the concern), I just find Calvinist theology, with respect to the subject of salvation, as incompatible with Biblical revelation.
3. I would think that showing, at least in one place, where and how there is no self-contradaction, at least, on one particular point would help me better understand the Calvinist position. Failing that, I must maintain my position that what is presented by Calvinist in defense of their theology is doubletalk (not “doubletalk” as a deliberate deception but as a logical self-contradiction).
Well, in any case, I’m glad to know there was no personal offense on your part taken by my comments.
We are probably getting a bit silly, now, debating perceptions rather than doctrine. However, I did not call Calvinism audacious. I said that you probably will consider my statement that you, like the JW, will not understand Calvinist theology until the Lord opens your mind “audacious.” You can continue to state that the Trinity is not contradictory, but a mystery, but that will not convince a JW. To him, it appears to be a contradiction, just like to you, many assertions of Calvinism appear to be contradictory. I have debated the Trinity with JW’s enough times to know that at some point it is useless to continue. He will continue to see a hopeless contradiction where I see a beautiful mystery. Ditto for our discussion regarding Calvinist theology.
When someone is genuinely interested to know what I believe, I am happy to try to explain. When it appears that someone merely wants to argue, it is time to walk away, like the Apostle Paul from synagogues when the Jews stopped listening, studying, learning, and started blaspheming. He then know it was time to withdraw. At what point does one become guilty of casting pearls? It is clear that you have studied Calvinism fairly thorougly, as your citations from the WCF indicate. It is also clear that you do not understand very well what you have studied, as your responses about “double talk” indicate. It seems to me that you are more interested in arguing than studying. If I am mistaken, please forgive me.
Sincerely,
Greg Barkman
G. N. Barkman
[Barkman] I did not call Calvinism audaciousI stand corrected. Thanks.
[Barkman] You can continue to state that the Trinity is not contradictory, but a mystery, but that will not convince a JW. To him, it appears to be a contradiction, just like to you, many assertions of Calvinism appear to be contradictory.The contradiction and the fact that such qualifications changes the meaning of words or phrases is not merely apparent but real. For example, you say:
Did God, therefore, “choose” some for Hell? Only in the sense that He chose not to rescue them. The “choosing” of the elect is not an exact parallel to passing over the non-elect. God determined to leave some to their own sinful choices, and to rescue some out of their self chosen misery by providing them with a Savior, and giving them new desires.1. The idea that God did not God did not really choose men for damnation except “only in the sense” is an attempt, as I see it, to make “choose” mean something other than what it means and deflect the attention from the “other side of the coin” regarding the act of God’s choosing.
First if all, the act of God not rescuing is only the means to an end for the non-elect, that is, God does not rescue in order to fulfill His predetermined plan to damn “some men”. Therefore, God’s intention is to damn “some men”. he accomplishes that intention by not rescuing those whom He has chosen from all eternity for damnation.
Second, as such, the reality is, if God chose not to rescue them, then it is because He chose to damn them; and, add to that the Calvinistic notion that God foreordains men to damnation from all eternity and, add to that the notion that God is in exhaustive control of all the actions - great and small - of men, it becomes an inescapable fact that Calvinism teaches God has chosen to damn “some men”. Men are not ultimately damned because that was their choice but because God chose to damn them (deserts have nothing to do with that choice). Cp WCF 3:3,7 - “God was pleased…to ordain them to dishonor and wrath” (The phrase “for their sin,” which comes rights after, results in a self-contradiction when placed next to the phrase, “to ordain them to dishonor and wrath…to everlasting death.”
2. The quoted proposition seems an attempt to imply that God is passive and has nothing to do with a man’s damnation (except to give him what he deserves). This in my opinion, does not hold and is wholly not Biblical (see verses in NT where God “casts” men into hell). If God foreordains, predestines, controls everything from the lesser to the greater, even the actions of men and angels, to say that God “allows” is (and I say this, again, respectfully as one stepping on eggs) doubletalk. It is a self-contradiction to say that God “allows” what he has predestined from all eternity to occur and is simultaneously actively engaged to cause the event.
3. Well, in any case, since you have opted out of a continued discussion, I also will end it here with you.
Unfortunately, I thought discussions on this forum were going to be objective leaving out any conversation implying negatively the character and motives of the opposition or implying insults and negative judgments upon them. Again, I am by no means a scholar so my explanations may be crude but I hope one is able to catch my meaning. Aany understanding I may obtain, on forums such as this one, helps to sharpen or redefine, enhance or correct my views of what God has sought to reveal in the Bible.
Unfortunately, Barkman’s manner of response only helps reaffirms (in my mind) that Calvinism is inadequate to properly reflect Biblical truth. If anyone can show me specifically how and why a proposition put forth on a previous post by Barkman is not a self-contradiction or how/why a qualification on a statement he made does not change the meaning or definition of a phrase or word, it would be appreciated.
Otherwise, I remain open to an objective discussion of the issues and appreciate the opportunity to somewhat sharpen iron with Barkman, even if it was to a disapponting end.
Let’s put the shoe on the other foot. Why don’t you explain your Arminian position, and let others critique it? You approach here has been a bit like Obama’s. He, and his political party, refused to put a budget on the table, preferring to wait for the Republicans to put out theirs, and then attacking it to death. The Republicans put several proposals on the table, only to have them torn apart by the Democrats. But where was the Democrat’s plan? It’s an easy game to play, and once I began to realize what you were doing, I decided to stop playing. It became apparent that whatever else I added would only provide more grist for your strongly prejudicial, anti-Calvinist mill.
But I am willing to continue if you want to put your beliefs out for examination. It’s one thing to say that you reject Calvinism, and are unconvinced because you believe Calvinism to be un-Biblical. It’s quite another to state your doctrine, and let others examine it through the lens of Scripture.
So, Mr. nbanuchi, what do you believe about election? That would be a good place to resume our discussion.
Cordially,
Greg Barkman
G. N. Barkman
In an attempt to understand your position I am going to present what I believe you believe Calvinism affirms, based on your comments in this thread. If this is not what you understand Calvinism to affirm, then please show where I am incorrect.
Let me use an analogy to explain what I perceive your understanding of Calvinism is:
God, before the foundation of the world, lined mankind up. At this point mankind was neither for nor against God, they were in an effectively innocent neutral state. God then walked down the line and everyone He passed was eager to be chosen for heaven, but God only said to some of those “you come to heaven,” and said to the others “you go to hell.” His choice of both the come-to-heaven group and the go-to-hell group was identical. This choice directly caused the go-to-hell group to become reprobate as God’s choice deprived them of any opportunity to be other than reprobate.
Here is the same analogy from the Calvinist perspective:
God, before the foundation of the world, lined mankind up. At this point mankind was against God, they were in a state of rebellion, and God would have been perfectly just to have cast the entirety of mankind into hell. But because he is both a God of justice and mercy, He determined to save many from their rebellion. As God walked down the line, every single person He passed spit at Him, cursed Him, and declared that they would rather go to hell for eternity, than to spend a moment in His presence. And yet He said to some “you come to heaven,” and passed by the others. The come-to-heaven group received something they did not want (mercy) while the others received exactly what they wanted (justice).
From the http://www.reformed.org/documents/canons_of_dordt.html Canons of Dort
1st Main Point of Doctrine
[Article 1: God’s Right to Condemn All People]
Since all people have sinned in Adam and have come under the sentence of the curse and eternal death, God would have done no one an injustice if it had been his will to leave the entire human race in sin and under the curse, and to condemn them on account of their sin. As the apostle says: The whole world is liable to the condemnation of God (Rom. 3:19), All have sinned and are deprived of the glory of God (Rom. 3:23), and The wages of sin is death (Rom. 6:23).
[Article 5: The Sources of Unbelief and of Faith]
The cause or blame for this unbelief, as well as for all other sins, is not at all in God, but in man. Faith in Jesus Christ, however, and salvation through him is a free gift of God. As Scripture says, It is by grace you have been saved, through faith, and this not from yourselves; it is a gift of God (Eph. 2:8). Likewise: It has been freely given to you to believe in Christ (Phil. 1:29).
[Article 6: God’s Eternal Decision][Quote=Article 7: Election]
The fact that some receive from God the gift of faith within time, and that others do not, stems from his eternal decision. For all his works are known to God from eternity (Acts 15:18; Eph. 1:11). In accordance with this decision he graciously softens the hearts, however hard, of his chosen ones and inclines them to believe, but by his just judgment he leaves in their wickedness and hardness of heart those who have not been chosen. And in this especially is disclosed to us his act—unfathomable, and as merciful as it is just—of distinguishing between people equally lost. This is the well-known decision of election and reprobation revealed in God’s Word. This decision the wicked, impure, and unstable distort to their own ruin, but it provides holy and godly souls with comfort beyond words.
Election [or choosing] is God’s unchangeable purpose by which he did the following:
Before the foundation of the world, by sheer grace, according to the free good pleasure of his will, he chose in Christ to salvation a definite number of particular people out of the entire human race, which had fallen by its own fault from its original innocence into sin and ruin. Those chosen were neither better nor more deserving than the others, but lay with them in the common misery. He did this in Christ, whom he also appointed from eternity to be the mediator, the head of all those chosen, and the foundation of their salvation. And so he decided to give the chosen ones to Christ to be saved, and to call and draw them effectively into Christ’s fellowship through his Word and Spirit. In other words, he decided to grant them true faith in Christ, to justify them, to sanctify them, and finally, after powerfully preserving them in the fellowship of his Son, to glorify them.
God did all this in order to demonstrate his mercy, to the praise of the riches of his glorious grace.
As Scripture says, God chose us in Christ, before the foundation of the world, so that we should be holy and blameless before him with love; he predestined us whom he adopted as his children through Jesus Christ, in himself, according to the good pleasure of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace, by which he freely made us pleasing to himself in his beloved (Eph. 1:4-6). And elsewhere, Those whom he predestined, he also called; and those whom he called, he also justified; and those whom he justified, he also glorified (Rom. 8:30).
[Article 15: Reprobation]
Moreover, Holy Scripture most especially highlights this eternal and undeserved grace of our election and brings it out more clearly for us, in that it further bears witness that not all people have been chosen but that some have not been chosen or have been passed by in God’s eternal election— those, that is, concerning whom God, on the basis of his entirely free, most just, irreproachable, and unchangeable good pleasure, made the following decision: to leave them in the common misery into which, by their own fault, they have plunged themselves; not to grant them saving faith and the grace of conversion; but finally to condemn and eternally punish them (having been left in their own ways and under his just judgment), not only for their unbelief but also for all their other sins, in order to display his justice. And this is the decision of reprobation, which does not at all make God the author of sin (a blasphemous thought!) but rather its fearful, irreproachable, just judge and avenger.
[Article 18: The Proper Attitude Toward Election and Reprobation]
To those who complain about this grace of an undeserved election and about the severity of a just reprobation, we reply with the words of the apostle, Who are you, O man, to talk back to God? (Rom. 9:20), and with the words of our Savior, Have I no right to do what I want with my own? (Matt. 20:15). We, however, with reverent adoration of these secret things, cry out with the apostle: Oh, the depths of the riches both of the wisdom and the knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments, and his ways beyond tracing out! For who has known the mind of the Lord? Or who has been his counselor? Or who has first given to God, that God should repay him? For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be the glory forever! Amen (Rom. 11:33-36).
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http://www.ccel.org/ccel/boettner/predest.iv.iii.v.html Reprobation
As Mozley has said, the whole race after the fall was “one mass of perdition,” and “it pleased God of His sovereign mercy to rescue some and to leave others where they were; to raise some to glory, giving them such grace as necessarily qualified them for it, and abandon the rest, from whom He withheld such grace, to eternal punishments.”
Luther also as certainly as Calvin attributes the eternal perdition of the wicked, as well as the eternal salvation of the righteous, to the plan of God. “This mightily offends our rational nature,” he says, “that God should, of His own mere unbiased will, leave some men to themselves, harden them and condemn them; but He gives abundant demonstration, and does continually, that this is really the case; namely, that the sole cause why some are saved, and others perish, proceeds from His willing the salvation of the former, and the perdition of the latter, according to that of St. Paul, ‘He hath mercy on whom He will have mercy, and whom He will He hardeneth.”’
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Thank you for taking time to explain this position so clearly.
Cordially,
Greg Barkman
G. N. Barkman
[JohnBrian] In an attempt to understand your position I am going to present what I believe you believe Calvinism affirms, based on your comments in this thread. If this is not what you understand Calvinism to affirm, then please show where I am incorrect. Let me use an analogy to explain what I perceive your understanding of Calvinism is…As per your request…
1. For your first analogy, what you “perceive” as my understanding is, as you know, the Calvinistic understanding. It is misleading to attribute an analogy that clearly reflects Calvinism as your perception of my understanding of Calvinism.
2. Both your analogies represent two different Calvinistic views respecting salvation, in particular, the “divine decrees”. As you presented them, you give the impression that the first analogy is not Calvinism (but my “understanding” of Calvinism), while the second is Calvinism, as if the first is erroneous while the second is correct. However, since both analogies are Calvinistic views, what you implied was misleading.
3. In any case, since I quoted the WCF (of which, I assume, you are familiar) and made a clear, although very short, presentation of the Calvinist view (e.g. post #40), it seems to me that you had sufficient information to attempt to understand my position (although, clearly, not the doctrinal position I espouse). Therefore, your query was unnecessary and only deflects from the main issue.
4. Finally, since I am not arguing decrees per se, your comments #53 and #54 are irrelevant. My contention in the “Bell” thread, along with a few textual considerations, is centered around propositions made to explain Calvinism that I see as amounting to doubletalk; see my posts #40-#43. Therefore, “I was hoping to find at least one instance where a logical explanation can be made, which clearly shows that the assertions made do not cancel out each other and qualifications, if any, put forth do not change the meanings of words or phrases” (cf. post #47).
These statements are no more double talk than the statement, “God is one; God is three” is double talk. If that is double talk, the Bible teaches “double talk.” One man’s double talk is another man’s mystery.
Do the Calvinist statements seem like double talk to you? Apparently. Are they? No, because this is actually what the Bible teaches. Could we prove to you that it is not double talk? Probably not, any more than I can prove to a Jehovah’s Witness that the statements about the Trinity are not double talk. What is Bible truth to me is double talk to him.
Please forgive me if I have presumed to answer in place of John. He is fully able to answer for himself, and I look forward to his answer. However, since your reference to “double talk” figured prominently in our previous discussions, I thought perhaps it would be all right for me to try again.
Sincerely,
Greg Barkman
G. N. Barkman
1. It was already shown why the JW challenge to the trinity does not apply.
2. You neglected to show how certain propositions put forth are not doubletalk.
3. As such, I fail to understand what you mean when you say, “it would be all right for me to try again.” “Try” what “again”?
The point is this: there are many truths in Scripture that appear, at first glance, to be double talk, the Trinity being an obvious example. The fact that a JW calls the doctrine of the Trinity “double talk”, does not prove that it is. It simply demonstrates the JW’s inability (or unwillingness) to accept the apparent contradictions of Scripture, which unwillingness renders it impossible that he will be able to grasp the teaching of Scripture on this subject. As long as he calls it “double talk”, he’s stuck in a dead-end of his own creation. Once he acknowledges that the Bible does, in fact, teach that God is both one and three, he comes to new understanding. What was previously double talk is now a mysterious truth reveled by God. It is impossible to prove, to a JW’s satisfaction, that the Trinity is not double talk. He must get beyond his “hang-up,” and wrestle with competing statements of Scripture until he arrives at an understanding of the Trinity.
The same is true of many Biblical statements regarding the sovereignty of God and the responsibility of man. As long as thoughtfully derived doctrinal statements are labeled “double talk,” no further progress in understanding these apparent contradictions will be made. Once it is acknowledged that such apparent contradictions are indeed taught in Scripture, a new level of understanding opens to be able to reconcile into harmonious truth that which previously seemed hopeless contradictory.
Until you can see the parallels between Calvinistic harmonizations of Scripture, and the doctrine of the Trinity, further progress will prove difficult.
Sincerely,
Greg Barkman
G. N. Barkman
1. You’ll need to go back and point out why your insistence re: JW’s is irrelevant. As I stated, explaining the trinity does not amount to a self-contradiction (unless it has been explained in thw wrong way). I already touched on that so, while I can see you still insist a JW would view it as doubletalk, it may be because in your experience with JW’s, you may have explained the Biblical idea of the divine trinity incorrectly. As such, from my perspective, your comments here are irrelevant and we ought to just disagree and go forward.
2. The statements made do not “appear” as doubletalk; they really are doubletalk (unless you seek to define “doubletalk”) as I previously pointed out. And, just to make clear, this problem lies not with the Scriptures, but with the Calvinistic interpretation of the Scriptures.
3. I respectfully submit that you have yet to show how previous statements made are not self-contradictory, therefore, resulting in nonsense…doubletalk.
Since you are repeating yourself (and I have already provided answers, repeatedly) and not offering any specific rebuttal to the charges of doubletalk, any further responses you make that go no further than you have so far commented, I must respectfully decline to answer.
Discussion