Let's examine what Arminian theology is from an Arminian and not the typical twisted view espoused by Calvinists.
The Five Arminian Articles of Remonstrance
I.That God, by an eternal and unchangeable purpose in Jesus Christ His Son, before the foundations of the world were laid, determined to save, out of the human race which had fallen into sin, in Christ, for Christ's sake and through Christ, those who through the grace of the Holy Spirit shall believe on the same His Son and shall through the same grace persevere in this same faith and obedience of faith even to the end; and on the other hand to leave under sin and wrath the contumacious and unbelieving and to condemn them as aliens from Christ, according to the word of the Gospel in John 3:36, and other passages of Scripture.
II.That, accordingly, Jesus Christ, the Saviour of the world, died for all men and for every man, so that He has obtained for all, by His death on the cross, reconciliation and remission of sins; yet so that no one is partaker of this remission except the believers [John 3:16; 1 John 2:2].
III.That man has not saving grace of himself, nor of the working of his own free-will, inasmuch as in his state of apostasy and sin he can for himself and by himself think nothing that is good � nothing, that is, truly good, such as saving faith is, above all else. But that it is necessary that by God, in Christ and through His Holy Spirit he be born again and renewed in understanding, affections and will and in all his faculties, that he may be able to understand, think, will, and perform what is truly good, according to the Word of God [John 15:5].
IV.That this grace of God is the beginning, the progress and the end of all good; so that even the regenerate man can neither think, will nor effect any good, nor withstand any temptation to evil, without grace precedent (or prevenient), awakening, following and co-operating. So that all good deeds and all movements towards good that can be conceived in through must be ascribed to the grace of God in Christ. But with respect to the mode of operation, grace is not irresistible; for it is written of many that they resisted the Holy Spirit [Acts 7 and elsewhere passim].
V.That those who are grafted into Christ by a true faith, and have thereby been made partakers of His life-giving Spirit, are abundantly endowed with power to strive against Satan, sin, the world and their own flesh, and to win the victory; always, be it understood, with the help of the grace of the Holy Spirit, with Jesus Christ assisting them in all temptations, through His Spirit; stretching out His hand to them and (providing only that they are themselves prepared for the fight, that they entreat His aid and do not fail to help themselves) propping and upbuilding them so that by no guile or violence of Satan can they be led astray or plucked from Christ's hands [John 10:28]. But for the question whether they are not able through sloth or negligence to forsake the beginning of their life in Christ, to embrace again this present world, to depart from the holy doctrine once delivered to them, to lose their good conscience and to neglect grace--this must be the subject of more exact inquiry in the Holy Scriptures, before we can teach it with full confidence of our mind.
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When we examine historical records of the Ante-Nicene Fathers, these are the writers of the first 300 years of the Early Church, some of which were the direct personal disciples of John the Apostle and Paul, we find some interesting things.
1) All of the ideas and concepts and theology of what we call Arminian Theology today can be found in the Early Church. This is what was handed down by the Apostles to their Disciples. This is irrefutable.
2) What we cannot find are any of the ideas, concepts and theology of Calvinism, not a one. None of them! Nothing of what John Calvin taught can be found prior to St. Augustine. Even "Perseverance of the Saints" was a new invention of Calvin. Prior to the 1500s Once Saved Always Saved simply did not exist. It is a man made theology.
Thank you, Dave. I am in the same situation, myself. I'm not really sure what the differences between Calvinism and Arminian Theology are. Should I? I mean, I'm not a Clavinist or an Arminian... I'm a Christian. I am NOT going to follow the belief system of human theology, because we know from scripture that the thinking of man isn't anywhere close to logical in God's eyes. We try to make sense of things ourselves when He is obviously the one with the answers.
It's kinda funny, actually... today, while on break at work, I was read 1 John. In the first chapter, verses 24-28 kind of share my feelings on this matter.
"See that what you have heard from the beginning remains in you. If it does, you also will remain in the Son and in the Father. And this is what He promised us--even eternal life. I am writing these things to you about those who are trying to lead you astray. As for you, the anointing you received from Him remains in you, and you do not need anyone to teach you. But as His anointing teaches you about all things and as that anointing is real, not counter-feit--just as it has taught you, remain in Him. And now, dear children, continue in Him, so that when He appears we may be confident and unashamed before Him at His coming."
These verses speak about "remaining in what we've heard from the beginning." It is like Ole Cattle put it in his shorter response (pg 1), some people ground their faith in Theology and then compare the Bible to the Theology. It shouldn't be this way. We should Ground our faith in the Bible, and then, as we mature, compare other doctrine to IT. I realize this is sometimes hard to do... especially when you are SURE of what you believe, or when you WANT to believe something is true/false. When you want to know something... refer back to scripture... not your denomination's beliefs... not a certain Theology... CHRIST IS OUR THEOLOGY... WE ARE CALLED TO BE A UNIFIED BODY OF BELIEVERS!... STOP ALLOWING SATAN TO BRANCH CHRISTIANS OFF!...
I'm not going to type out these verses... go and read it. 1 Peter 5:1-9. Basically, it's saying:
Elders... be examples, eager to serve...
Young men... be submissive to those who are older... (when they are examples, that is)
"God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble"
Humble yourselves.
Resist the devil... he is prowling around looking for someone to devour... stand firm in the faith.
Our job is to spread the Good News and the great Joy of Jesus. Not to criticize the human logic behind our... Theologies. Please... be an example.
dear dave and jf, you are both right .. and you struck a cord with me.. i should of let my short post stand on its own.. but instead, in defence of my beliefs i posted calvins history.. when i should of just let it go.. my apologies to everyone.. instead of just speaking my beliefs, which i believe everyone has that right. i bashed a dead man instead... looking back that dont feel so good.
My mind's made up. Don't confuse me with the facts. Come again? Don't get caught with this wrong-headed attitude!
People believe what they want to believe, much of the time. I don't mean to say that they believe things without any reason, but they believe, oftentimes, without good reason.
Most people will give some reason why they believe something. But an indicator of the fairness of their point of view is how they respond to even-handed, fair criticism of their view and to evidence for an opposing view. Lots of people have reasons for what they believe, but when those reasons are refuted--when they're taken away or weakened by other evidence--do they still stand on their point of view, or are they willing to adjust their view based on the evidence that comes in?
Sometimes the evidence people are initially faced with seems compelling. We were talking this morning about the Mars rock. As far as I've been able to tell, I think the Mars rock is much ado about nothing. NASA wants to send a probe to Mars and they don't have the money for it. All of a sudden this rock makes it into the news. They see a couple of forms one-hundredth the width of a human hair through an electron microscope. Scattered around it are some chemicals that are sometimes, but not necessarily, associated with life. As one person pointed out, if this had been found on earth, no one would have ever drawn the conclusion that this was life.
Indeed, these shapes you read about in the paper weren't even mentioned in the peer review piece sent to Scientific America -- the one reviewed by the scientists, so it must be more careful and rigorous. The reason they weren't mentioned is that these shapes were not good indicators of life. It sounds good in the press to the rank and file, but apparently no scientist in the field would take those shapes seriously. They were interested in the chemistry.
The point is, the evidence for ancient life on Mars wasn't conclusive in any way, shape or form. Yet those who want to believe in life on other planets or in evolution-- and even if there was life on Mars, it wouldn't prove evolution, as I pointed out-- they seize on this scanty evidence.
So, people will say, "Life on Mars! It's already been proven." Well, it hasn't.
Another example of this is, "Everybody knows that homosexuality is genetic; it's constitutional. Science has proven it." But science hasn't proven it. There is some indication that there may be some physiological factors contributing to a person's homosexuality, but no one has demonstrated any necessary genetic link.
Here's an example to give you an idea how careful you've got to be in drawing some conclusions. I was challenged on this issue by someone who pointed out there were enlarged hypothalamus in one study of homosexual cadavers. I asked, "How do we know that the enlarged hypothalamus in the homosexuals was the cause of homosexuality and not the effect ? These men were dead. Their lives were over. What evidence justifies our presumption that an enlarged hypothalamus was their in the beginning, causing the homosexual behavior? Why not rather presume that it was the homosexual behavior that caused the enlarging of the hypothalamus later in life?
To be honest, I don't know one way or another, because I'm not an expert in this field. I'm just raising the issue to show you how you can't simply jump to that conclusion. Those who are careful about the scientific evidence haven't come to that conclusion. The ones who have are those who are not in the field, who are not careful, yet who have something at stake in making the case for constitutional homosexuality.
I actually don't care if it turns out that homosexuality is genetic. It's irrelevant to the moral question. Just because homosexuality may come naturally for some doesn't mean it's moral to practice it. Indeed, one could say that the difference between just doing what comes naturally and principled self-restraint is called civilization.
Do we want to argue that whatever we "naturally" feel like doing at any moment ought to be morally allowed? That's the same as living like animals, because animals always obey their base physical impulses. Human beings are different. They have moral rules that constrain their behavior.
The point I'm making here is that, even if homosexuality did turn out to be hard-wired into the physiology, it still wouldn't begin to answer the question of whether it is moral to act on the desire. That's a different issue entirely.
My point is that people seize upon scanty evidence to justify something because they want it justified, not because they've examined the issue carefully. They'll say animals practice homosexuality. How do they know that? Because they see male dogs mounting other male dogs, or licking them in their genital areas. See? It's obvious: homosexuality is natural.
But it's not so obvious. Think about this for a second. If you ever had a male dog, you know that they don't just mount other male dogs. They also mount sofas, and trees, and will mount the leg of your guests if you're not careful. This is not homosexual behavior. This is auto-eroticism.
The only way one could show this behavior was homosexual is if one could demonstrate that the dog was desiring the male gender of the animal he was mounting. One can't conclude from the observed activity alone that any animal has homosexual desires. This is just another example of a hasty judgment.
Christians are also capable of hasty, unbalanced judgments. They often hold points of view that are not well justified or even are consonant with the full counsel of the Scriptures.
I get frustrated when people proof-text their pet point of view, but are unwilling to look at any other texts against their view. They just want to keep citing their pet verses, even when those verses are equivocal.
I've faced this in my teaching on Decision Making and the Will of God. For those who disagree with my particular approach, please take the time to look at my biblical assessment and critique the verses. Frankly, after I've given the talk I've had people come up to me and say, "That's pretty thorough. I think you're wrong, but I can't find any arguments against your biblical analysis."
Why would someone say such a thing? That's pretty good evidence I'm right, not wrong. I could be mistaken, but the way to correct me is to show how my treatment and assessment is not legitimate, given the texts I cite.
Here's what bothers me. We've talked a lot here about the issue of salvation, and whether God is the ultimate author of it or man is. This is the Calvinism vs. Arminianism debate. I've noticed a tendency of people who argue against my view-- that God chooses man for salvation-- and they simply keep going to their texts that talk about man choosing God.
Those verses do have to be taken into consideration in any overall assessment. Sometimes, though, it's like they're saying, "Where are manofgod and the rest of these Reformed guys getting this stuff? They're just making it all up, because here are my proof texts that are so clear."
Friends, what I'm trying to do is to make sense out of the whole Bible. It's my job to construct a way of viewing any particular doctrine which does the best justice to the most verses and references. I can't just camp on my pet verses and say, "There it is, plain as day. What's wrong with you?"
What bothers me is that many won't take the time to construct a theological point of view that attempts to integrate all the verses pertaining to an issue. I want to ask them, "If your point of view is correct, then make sense out of this verse, and this verse and this verse... and I'll give you hundreds for my side. I could be wrong about my view, but you're going to have to work a lot harder at making sense of verses for my view in light of your theology."
I work hard at integration. This includes trying very hard to make sense of verses that seem to be contrary to my point of view. Anyone who does not do that simply is not interested in the truth. Anyone who sits on his verse and doesn't try to carefully deal with contrary verses-- doesn't try to offer an explanation of them that fits in with his overall view of the issue-- is not taking truth seriously.
I'm not saying that if you disagree with me then you're not taking truth seriously. I'm also not saying that you've got to be able to explain every single verse, because I can't do that either. Every point of view has its problems.
What I'm saying is this. If you're even-handed and fair-minded, you have to say: "I've looked at all the verses, and here's my understanding of it. This verse seems to state my view rather clearly, and here's a verse that seems to contradict my view, but there may be something else going on in this second passage. Here's what I think it is, and here's why I think it's stated in this particular way, so it gives the appearance of a contradiction, but it isn't really a contradiction. Here is a way to solve the apparent contradiction."
That's called scholarship, ladies and gentlemen. That's called even-handed Bible study. That's called clear thinking. And if all you're willing to do is sit on your own verses, you have no guarantee you aren't going to be completely wrong in your view. You can only have confidence if you're careful to integrate into your particular point of view, as much as you possibly can, even those verses which seem contrary to it.
This is very important. It doesn't matter whether you happen to agree with me or not. That's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about care in study, whether it's Bible, or science, or Mars rocks, or homosexuality, or whatever. It's a willingness to engage all the facts, and try to integrate them as even-handedly as possible into a theory or view or hypothesis so you have the least amount of conflict with all of the facts concerned.
Those people who use the scientific method in the best sense are people who try to fit all of the facts in and not just grab onto those facts they like. They don't play, "Hear no evil, speak no evil, see no evil" with facts they don't like.
This is bad scholarship with scientists, but it's reprehensible for a Christian when you consider what's at stake, the source of the information (the Bible), and that it's the most important truth we could ever be thinking about. We'd better be giving that kind of issue our best shot!
I ask for an interpertation of a verse,and I get a rant about how calvin was a bad man,I thought this was a biblical discussion thread?
Calvinism was not invented by Calvin,The verses are in the bible,why cant anyone discuss them?
are we to pretend they dont exist?
I am willing to discuss this topic point by point,verse by verse with anyone,but dont just throw verses at me without looking at the verses I point out.
And Mr Cattle....You seem like a nice guy and all,but you have chastized me several times on here in the past,so now its my turn....you are not right about everything sir,just because you say something ,that doesnt make it true,Your not that much older than me,and Ive been through a whole lot in my life too!youve accused me of pride,well I can see that in you too!Just because others agree with you on something,doesnt make it accurate.There are many,many people that agree with me,are we to be pushed aside?I asked you to give me your interpertation of a verse.You never did that.Instead you told me john Calvin was evil.I say,and so does the bible by the way,that we are all evil,so whats your point.you did apologize,and I respect that,so I ask again,What do you think these verses mean?
I am new to this discussion.I have never studied either side view.I was taught to read the bible and work out my own plan of salvation.I know nothing about Arminian or calvin.
Question- Are we to follow god os a man?
Just asking.
I would like to know more about both sides.I will not be a wise guy or mouthy,promise.
dear man , truth is sometimes uncomfortable for us to hear.
now to answer your question.. what do i make of the verses you gave that speak of predestination ..
we do know that GOD does draw us to JESUS..
as found here.
john 6:44 No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him; and I will raise him up at the last day.
see i believe in predestination only that it is conditional.
i understand that this pre-decision on God's part is to save the ones who repent and believe. the predetermination of the destiny of individuals is based on God's foreknowledge of the way in which they will either freely reject Christ or freely accept him.
i also believe that these verses here say exactly what they mean and that JESUS died for all men.. therefore refuting the verses you gave.. and supporting my beliefs that predestination is conditional..
2 corinthains 5:14 For the love of Christ compels us, because we judge thus: that if One died for all, then all died;
2 corinthians 5:15 and He died for all, that those who live should live no longer for themselves, but for Him who died for them and rose again.
titus 2:11 For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men,
1 john 2:2 And He Himself is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the whole world.
you say that saving grace is not irresistible, as in classical Calvinism. these verses here to me show It can be rejected. because we know that not all men are saved.. yet the LORD desires all men to be saved..
1 timothy 2:3-4 3 For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior, 4 who desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth
2 peter 3:9 The Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some count slackness, but is longsuffering toward us, not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance.
matthew 18:14 Even so it is not the will of your Father who is in heaven that one of these little ones should perish.
and then we can go back to the old testament and find that they also were asked to choose life or death. it was up to them..
deuteronomy 30:19 I call heaven and earth as witnesses today against you, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing; therefore choose life, that both you and your descendants may live;
if we look at romans 5:1 we can see that we are not justified before we are saved but yet it is after we are saved that we are justified because of our LORD and SAVIOR JESUS CHRIST. after we drawn to HIM and choose to have that faith in HIM.
romans 5:1 Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ,
I'll have to agree with Jesusfreak, I'm not an Armenian/Calvinist...I hope I'm a christian that seeks after God. If God/the bible convinces me of an error in my beliefs then I will change. Guaranteed. If there are a lot of verses that contradict a belief then I won't believe it. Weigh scripture with scripture. That's the "scientific method" of a christian. The bible is infallible, let the bible interpret the bible. If you don't believe the bible is infallible then go ahead and let man's changing views/interpretations meddle with your beliefs.
