Calvinism Overview - Steve Gregg

I have been asked to talk about an overview of Calvinism tonight and of course Calvinism is a subject comes up a lot in people's questions and I usually direct them to listen to my lecture series online which is twelve lectures an hour each are covering all the aspects of Calvinism the five points both the case for them and the case against them but we're not gonna be able to do all of that tonight we only because it wasn't until about the Year 400 that Augustine formulated the doctrines that are now associated with Calvinism Augustine was the most influential theologian in history I said Calvin was the most influential theologian of the Reformation Augustine has somewhat a more August not not to make a pun but a more August reputation of being the most influence with other things that aren't as controversial things that like said most of us would probably agree with the majority of what Calvin wrote no matter what subject we're looking at it's just that he has certain specific doctrines associated what we call soteriology that that are different than the early church taught for the first four centuries Augustine originated these doctrines at least as far as we can tell since they're not found in my opinion eight of them so no that's not true that's not where the way we see it now the five points of Calvinism somehow I'm not sure how this acrostic can do because it's an acrostic in the English language that works in English discussions of Calvinism but in you know French which is I mean Calvin was french-speaking the acrostic probably wouldn't work so I don't know who came up with the acrostic tulip but the five points of Calvinism have for a long time been associated with rules popular writings there now of course our CEO has gone on to his reward and there are now other Calvinist leaders who are really making a strong influence on young people one of whom is John Piper of course John MacArthur is another one and and there there are many James White and and others are very well known Council I couldn't even name them all because just take a break these phones can do so much but when they don't it's so frustrating so let me talk to you about the five points of Calvinism as I said if you hold any of them in a truly Calvinistic sense you must hold the others unless you're simply not a consistent thinker because it is a consistent logic and I think it is the consistency of the logic that appeals so much to these young intellectual type Christians who they're looking for something that just really they can lay hold on think it's very logical now my problem with Calvinism is that though it's very logical I believe it starts from a premise that isn't true and and it ends up presenting a God whose character is different then I think the God of the Bible and this is not a small problem I think it can be a big problem for some people the the main issue before we talk about the five points the main issue that that usually is represented as the difference between Calvinism and Arminianism is the issue of the sovereignty of God you may have heard this Calvinists say they take a high view of the sovereignty of God and they say the problem with our minions is they don't take a high view of the sovereignty of God they take a high view of the free will of man now when people say that they're usually Calvinists no there always are Calvinists when they say that and they are using the word sovereignty in a way that is unique to Calvinism and you know what is sovereignty do our minions believe in the sovereignty of God yes when I debated Doug Wilson a Calvinist in Idaho he said well the difference is he said I meaning himself a Calvinist believe in absolute sovereignty of God and I said well I believe in the absolute sovereignty of God too but we have to define what sovereignty is you see sovereignty to the Calvinists well let me just say what it means to me first what's what sovereignty means to me is what it means in the dictionary the word doesn't appear in the Bible by the way so you don't have the word sovereignty in the Bible so you can't use the Bible to define it that way in a dictionary the word sovereign refers to somebody who is the absolute authority like a king a monarch or a sovereign nation like a nation that doesn't have to answer to other nations in other words a nation that's not in the United Nations you know the nation that actually is free to act in its own interests and and is not beholden to any other nations in we don't have monarchies in the Western modern world but we used to a monarch in the old days was simply the guy who he made the rules and he had the right to do it he was the king being a king meant you had sovereign authority to do things and you pretty much were not answerable for your decisions this would be of course in the more ancient monarchy is a monarchy like England which has been sort of more of a democratic type of monarchy for many centuries would that be different but the old idea of a king being the one who he can make the decisions he has the authority to act and to not be challenged by anybody that's that's what sovereign really does mean do Armenians believe that about God of course as an Armenian I believe that God I'm not really in Armenia I'm a non Calvinist but well if you're not a callous they'll call you an Armenian but the truth is I believe and I can't imagine any Christian who does not believe that God has the right to do whatever he wants to do God is gone he made everything he can make it how he wants to make it he can do what he wants to do with it that's not a problem I have no problems the absolute sovereignty of God meaning that God has the absolute right to do with his creation whatever he wants to do but Calvinism adds another aspect to the definition that doesn't really belong to the definition Calvinism uses the word sovereignty to mean what I would call and what some others have call meticulous providence naive I say like I don't even know what that means well think of it meticulous means detailed down to the last detail Providence means God is providentially acting you know if if if you're praying for money to pay your your rent and money comes in you say that's Providence God provided that well Calvinist believed that God providentially does everything everything that happens is the Providence of God every detail everything is ordained by God by his decrees they happen now these are very Calvinist statements see the Bible never even refers to decrees at all but it's one of the main issues in Calvinism you know God has these sovereign decrees and what they mean by that in terms of the controversy is that God decrees who's gonna be saved and who's not now I believe God descries who's gonna be saved who's not if we mean by that he decrees that those who accept Christ or who follow Christ can be saved and those who don't are not notice he may he can make the rules he can even if he wants to individually choose people to be saved or not but does see that's the question Calvinism says God actually decides before anyone was born he knows everyone before they're born you know so he's gonna do he knows who he's gonna save who's not he's and he he decrees that certain people will be elect that has chosen the word elect means chosen to be saved and the others determines reprobate those who are not elect are the reprobate and that everybody from the time they're born and even before they're born is already on one of the two lists God has a list as it were not a written list literally but he has a list of the elect and a list the reprobate and when you're born you're in one of those lists before you know it and therefore you really aren't going to make any choices about that that are gonna make any difference if you're born on God's reprobate list you can't be sane if you're born on God's elect list you can't not be saved it's inevitable that you'll be saved this is because of what they believe about the sovereignty of God now RC sprawl for example in his book chosen by God kind of begins the book by saying that he asked a classroom because he was a professor how many of you are believe that God ordains everything that happens and some of the hands went up he said now how many of you are atheists he said none of the hands went up he said well all of you who didn't raise your hand the first time should have raised your hand the second time this is his logic this is Calvinist logic and he explains because if God does not ordain all that happens then he is not God and if he's not God then there's no God so if you don't believe that God ordains everything that happens you don't believe in God now actually there's another step he said if God doesn't ordain all things that happened he's not sovereign and if he's not sovereign he's not God so you know essentially RC spruill said that people like me are atheists because I don't believe that God ordains everything that happens I don't believe that God ordained that Adam and Eve had to sin inevitably Calvinists believe that Calvinists believe that before God made Adam and Eve he already ordained that they would inevitably eat that fruit there's no way it could go any other direction it was foreordained is predestined and so with everything in your life every sin you commit for Dane predestined by God that's sovereignty according to Calvinism now see that's a very different issue than sovereignty according to any dictionary or the normal use of the word the word sovereign refers to somebody who has the right to make decisions about things within his realm and he can make them without worrying about someone else contradicting or forcing him to do something else now Kings who are sovereign in their domains they don't necessarily for ordain everything that their subjects do and that doesn't challenge their sovereignty a king can be a tyrant if he wants to he can do his best to control everything people do make them all wake up when he wants him to wake up eat for breakfast oh he wants to eat for breakfast marry who he wants them to marry have children wants them to dude half you know go to bed when he wants them to have the job a tyrant can try to do that but that's not the only way he can be sovereign the same sovereign can say you know I want to give these people some Liberty here I would like to have these people make some choices of their own I will make the laws and I will enforce the laws people can decide whether they'll keep those laws are not if they break the laws they'll have to suffer the consequences that's their choice now if a king set up his kingdom that way he's still sovereign he's he's still absolutely sovereign because he made the decision out of his pure authoritative right to make such a decision let's take a smaller situation we which we can you know relate to more let's say a father is sovereign over his children in his home he's the children have to obey Him he can make their bedtime be any home he wants it to be he can he can tell them when they can have food and when they can't have food he could I mean when they can watch TV when they can but a father doesn't have to control everything as children do every moment of every day in order to maintain his authority he may want to give them some free time he might want to give them some choices to me that's that's a sovereign choice he can make that God is sovereign does not tell us how much he micromanages everything in the universe that's a separate issue and the Bible of course teaches that God is a king that he's a father that he's Lord and and therefore you know whatever he wills he does the Bible says that many times whatever he wants to do in heaven earth he does it well that's great but the second crisis what you want to do does he want to micromanage everybody's life make everybody have the thoughts that he insists that they have and pre-ordained every thought and action they do or does he want to do something else the impression that the Bible gives very strongly is that when God made man he made man in such a way that man can make choices that disappoint God and God expresses disappointment a great deal in the Bible especially in the prophets but he was very disappointed at the time of the flood with humanity he seemed disappointed with Cain he actually he seemed very disappointed Adam and Eve when they said and in the prophets he's very disappointed Israel and Judah and he's saying why did you do that I never told you to do that and never crossed my mind to tell you to do such things God always acts like people did things that he didn't want them to do so how could he be sovereignly decree in everything well Calvados have an answer to that too we haven't gotten to five points yet but just talk about sovereignty they would say God has his revealed will and he has his secret decreed a will now his revealed will is when he gives things like the tenth Graham says don't commit adultery don't steal don't murdered those he's decreed he's revealing his will in that way but he's got a secret will and that is even though he says don't commit murder he might ordained that you will inevitably commit murder that's that's his secret well it's not a secret once it happens but until it happens is the secret that if you do the bottle says God's not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance but the Bible says not everyone does repent some do perish and so how can that be if God's not willing that a sufficient wealth his revealed will is that people should repent but his secret decree is that many will not repent you notice God's got two wills at different levels the one he tells us about and then there's a summer that's the opposite of this revealed will which is his real secret intentions now if that is true of God and the Bible does not say that it is anywhere if that is true of God then we have to ask how can we know if he's really serious when he tells us that it is his will for us to do something or another maybe it's not maybe he has a secret decree that's the opposite of what he's saying how can we really know what as well is if it's a big secret now what's the point of him revealing one thing if it's not really that his real will now the reason Calvinists say there are these kinds of things is because for example when Joseph was sold into slavery by his brothers it all worked out for the good now the selling of your brother into slavery is a bad thing to do it's a sin his brothers sinned by doing it but when it was all over in Genesis chapter 50 in verse 10 when Joseph is talking to his brothers he says you intended evil against me but God meant it for good now you see they say see the brothers were doing something that God would have revealed as a wrong act he would real do not sell your brother into slavery that's an evil immoral thing but God meant it to happen for good so it was really his secret will that it should happen now we have a similar situation with the crucifixion of Jesus Jesus was crucified as a result of a whole bunch of people's sins Judas Iscariot Caiaphas Pilate a lot of sinners involved in Jesus crucifixion and they were doing things that God says people should not do you shouldn't lie you shouldn't kill innocent people you know this I mean there's a lot of things that God says shouldn't be done that we're done and yet the Bible says that it was according to the the will of God that Jesus died for our sins now they take those two especially maybe a few others in the Old Testament too but those two are favorites because those two are cases where we are specific told that the sins of Joseph's brothers and the sins of those who were orchestrating the crucifixion Christ which we know to be sinful behavior and therefore what God would not want people to do that the results of it was in fact something God meant to happen and so they say you see the the sins were violating God's revealed will but the outcome was God's actual will and what they would say that is therefore God who ordains everything actually put it in the hearts of Joseph's brothers to sell their brother into slavery they he put it in the heart of Judas and Caiaphas and Pilate because God ordains everything even the sins that people do for his will and so that God or you know he decreed that Judas would have to do that now the problem I have with that is the Bible does say that Judas was influenced in his decision but the Bible says the devil put into his heart doesn't say that God put it into his heart there's not a word in the Bible that says that God put anything into Judas is heart but the Bible specifically says the devil entered into him and put in his heart so I'm not prepared to let you know what the devil inspired Judas to do to be attributed to what God inspired him to do but you might say but how could these things have happened if these sins weren't committed how could Joseph have ended up in Egypt to save his people from famine how could Jesus have died for our sins if these people hadn't done these bad things well I don't know but I'm sure there are ways they could happen if if one person didn't send another person might I mean for example Joseph's brothers they hated Joseph they they probably would have loved to have killed him in fact they they first planned to they said let's kill him then we'll see what it becomes of his dreams and then you know Reuben says no look don't kill it let's let's let's just sell him into slavery so he got sold to slavery but how many times earlier in in his life would they have loved to do the same thing but God didn't deliver him into their hands he god only had to let them do what they naturally wanted to do all he had to do is stop protecting joseph from them and they carried out those plans God knew they would but God didn't put it in their hearts God doesn't inspire evil God does not tempt with sin and what about Judas what on you know what do i Caiaphas what are those well these a lot of these people who killed Jesus they tried to kill him a lot of times earlier by the way and it didn't work out for them because it wasn't his hour and God could have made it never be his hour if God didn't want Jesus to die he could have made sure that no one ever laid a glove on him but actually God did want him to die so at a certain point God didn't protect Jesus anymore and he could have I mean Jesus himself said I could call twelve legions of angels they deliver me he didn't because that wasn't the will of God God wanted Jesus to die so God didn't want to intervene to protect him from these people's evil desires those evil desires were present without God's initiating them these were evil people and if Judas hadn't wanted to do it somebody else could some people say poor Judas he is predestined to crucify Jesus it wasn't even his fault the Bible doesn't say anywhere that Judas was predestined to do anything he fulfilled prophecies that said somebody who sat at the table with the Messiah would betray him lots of people sat at Jesus table who could have betrayed him there's a lot of faris Jesus at the table of Pharisees and publicans as there's there's a lot of people from whom somebody could have arisen to do that Judas happened to be a willing guy who is handy and did it wanted to do it Judas wasn't personally predestined to do that how could that be how could God predestined somebody to to be evil and then punish them for being evil and yet that's exactly the Calvinism says happens and if you say well that's not fair you know if they say who are you oh man cancer against God has not the potter power over the clay in other words if you think there's something that's not quite just in God ordaining people before they're born to inevitably do bad things that they have no real choice about that they're more like programmed units that God programmed to do certain things and then he's going to make them punished for it and suffer for it and of course almost all Calvinists believe that means eternal torment that's an interesting kind of a god you've got there I mean how could you be angry at somebody who's doing what you programmed them to do now if somebody has a choice and they do bad things I can see getting angry back but if they don't have a choice and you're the one who wanted them to do that in the first place why punish them for it just doesn't really make much sense I have to say to me and to most people in fact it didn't make sense to the early church fathers before Augustine many of the church fathers addressed this issue because the idea that God ordains everything that happens was present not in the church but in the heresy called Manichean ISM in the centuries of the early church before Augustine mannikin ISM did teach that God ordains everything that happens that everything is fated to occur that nothing happens that wasn't already fated to occur when you do evil and you were intended to do evil when you do good you were made to do good and there are many of the Church Fathers poor frogs me who addressed that as a heresy and said then how could God hold people responsible that was their argument and a very good one it seems to me if God made you to do the wrong thing why would he punish you for it and if he made you inevitably do the right thing why would he reward you for he's doing all the choosing he's doing all this everything you're just a I mean Calvinists don't like to be said that makes him a puppet master but frankly it's hard too hard to avoid that particular parallel I mean any Calvinists who if you tell them if you you think God's a puppet master they would object that strongly but they can't really give a good reason to object to it because they're dot they're doctors that God in fact ordains everything that and you know I won't go further into this but that that idea of sovereignty has to be on the table first if we're gonna understand Calvinism yes those who are not Calvinists believe God is absolutely sovereign but don't believe in meticulous province we don't believe that everything that happens is God making it happen there's plenty of evil in people to get them to sin without God making them do it and you know Joseph brothers the people who engineered the death of Jesus most people were wicked people many of them had tried to find opportunity to the same thing earlier but were permitted to but God finally allowed it to happen now let me talk about the five points of Calvinism as I said these once you've got the first one in place you have to have the other four the first is called total depravity and is the T in the acrostic tulip total depravity the second one is the you in the acrostic which is unconditional election the third is the L which is limited atonement the fourth one is the I in the word tulip and that's irresistible grace and the P is the perseverance of the saints now when I was younger and I didn't really I hadn't really studied Calvinism much but I had heard these things I thought well I can accept total depravity and I didn't even have much problem with unconditional election though I haven't thought it through much limited atonement that sounded not good to me I would have held off on that one irresistible grace meaning that if you're chosen you're gonna irresistible you be drawn to God I would have thought well I can think of some scriptures that seem to contradict that and perseverance of the saints that's generally speaking once saved always saved I did believe that when I was a Baptist and so I probably would have thought three of the points probably told the Prophet II unconditional election and perseverance would would fit with my Baptist thinking at the time limited atonement irresistible grace not so much probably not at all however I didn't understand those three points that I thought I was agreeing with if I had understood them I wouldn't have agreed with any of them so let's start with total depravity let me tell you how the Calvinists understand total depravity total depravity is that ever since the fall man is totally depraved or totally evil in his motivations now they don't mean that he can't be any worse they don't believe in absolute depravity in others they know that although you're a sinner you could be worse you do refrain from some things you probably don't kill people every time you're angry at them you probably don't commit adultery every time you have a temptation do that in others you could do worse than you're doing so they don't believe an absolute depravity which couldn't be worse but they believe in total depravity they say everything you do when you're unregenerate before you're born again everything you do is shot through with sinful motivation partly because you're not doing anything for the glory of God if you're not a believer if you're not born again you may do religious things and even good deeds for you're not doing it for the glory of God so even that's motivated unworthily and therefore everything that an unbeliever does is depraved they're totally depraved they can do nothing that's good or pleasing to God in their unconverted or in their Unruh generated state now usually Calvinists once they get on this they wax quite eloquent about how evil all people are who are not regenerated and if you want to get a good example you could probably read Jonathan Edwards sermon sinners in the hands of an angry god and he says if God hates you God despises you you're more loathsome to him than the most loathsome spider is to us you know I mean he's he loves to you know pile it on and and you know when you get the Calvin is talking about this they'll say you know those who don't aren't regenerate they they hate God they absolutely hate God they would hate to go to heaven then be much happier in hell even if they're in torment because they hate God that much and because they hate God they cannot repent they have no inclination their totally to pray there's no inclination to turn to God there's no inclination to trust God there's no inclination to love God there are totally depraved and what that means of course is that nobody in that condition can do anything that would get them saved make it ever so easy just say oh all you have to do is believe and you'll be saved they can't do that they are too evilly inclined to even want to believe or want to get rid of God now this is often massaged with the illustration that Paul gives of people the Ephesian Christians before they were saved as being dead in trespasses and sins Paul uses the same expression in Colossians to the Colossians and the Ephesians our both described as haven't been dead in trespasses and sins and so they just say look every unbeliever is dead in trespasses and sins even children from birth you're dead in trespasses and sins now that's certainly extending Paul's teaching far beyond Paul's teaching here because Paul didn't say anything about babies he's talking to these adult converts these pagans who'd become Christians not so long ago mostly converted by him personally he said before they were converted they were dead in trespasses and sins he didn't say they were born that way his children he said they they were pagans and in their pagan condition this is the expression he uses dead you can find it in Ephesians chapter 2 for example where he says at the beginning of chapter 2 of Ephesians and you he made alive who were dead in trespasses and sins in which you once walked according to the course of this world according to the Prince of the power of the air the spirit who works in the sons of civilians among them also we all once had our conduct absolves conducted ourselves in the lusts of our flesh fulfilling the desires of the flesh of the mind and we're by nature children of Wrath just as the others but God who is rich in mercy because of his great love with which he loved us even when we were dead in trespasses made us alive together with Christ now he's our other conversion I was dead and now I'm alive now they the Calvinists love to really press this matter of this metaphor of death and it is a metaphor because none of you before you became Christians we're dead none of you have that you have yet been dead literally you will die but none of you have yet gone there unless you've resurrected to say someone was dead might have any number of metaphorical meanings but he's not talking it literal they were not corpses now what the Calvinist says well they were spiritually dead and that in fact almost everybody reading the Ephesians Tuesday he talked about being spiritually dead well maybe he is he doesn't say that there's no no expression spiritually dead in the Bible but that's what they know that these people were not physically dead so Paul must be me and they were spiritually dead well he might mean that but there's some other possibilities too people are sometimes said to be dead for example when they are on the brink of death for example in Abimelech took Abraham's wife Sarah into his harem God welcome to nice as you're a dead man well he the man wasn't literally he's not saying you're spiritually dead he's saying you're in danger imminent danger of death I'm gonna kill you if you don't stop doing what you're doing it's what you sane if you're stuck on a train track in your car and you can't get the doors open a trains coming and it's only a few feet away some of the cars are saying we're dead and they're not literally dead at that moment but they will be soon it's very often the case that someone is said to be dead when in fact death is seemingly inevitable and imminent a very common way of speaking but there's also that way which Jews commonly spoke of somebody being dead to them like a Jewish son who would go off and you know do something shameful the family we say you're dead to us the prodigal son's father used this expression of his son when his son came home he said my son was dead but now he's alive he was lost but now he's found he means he was dead to me he wasn't dead he was alive doing stuff you know he's a living man but to me he was dead to me he was lost now he's alive alive means he's restored to relationship with his father to say that a person is dead because of their sins can certainly mean dead to God meaning the relationship is broken it's a deadly situation certainly for the person who's alienated from God but the dead there does not mean you literally are dead and can't do anything you see sometimes non Calvinists will say that it's like I was drowning in the sea and God threw me a life preserver and I grabbed the life reserve and that was Jesus and I got saved Calvin say no that's that that's not a correct illustration you were dead at the bottom of the sea your lungs were filled with water you had no breath your heart was not beating God had to scuba dive down there and pull you out and resuscitate you you were dead not you weren't able to reach out and grab a life sort of dead people can't do that see they're pushing this metaphor of death really strongly but you see the problem with that is what they're saying is someone who's spiritually dead in trespasses and sins can't make a decision until they God they can't believe they can't repent they're totally to pray they're beyond hope unless God unilaterally does something for them now how they would get that out of this metaphor I do not know I mean for example they know that unregenerate people who are dead and sins make lots of decisions every day they decide what they're gonna have for breakfast they decide who they're gonna marry they decide what they're gonna do for a living and where they're gonna go to work or not they decide how they're gonna spend their money they decide you know what they're gonna be faithful to their wife lots of decisions a lot of our moral decisions and ever knows that people who are supposedly spiritually dead make decisions of all kinds every day but the county says oh but there's only one kind they can't make they can't make a decision to turn to God where are you getting that exception it's not in the passage certainly there's nothing in the passage to suggest that there's you know Paul's usually that we're dead just suggests there's just one thing they can't do they can do a whole lot of other things we can't do that one thing well the prodigal son was dead and he made a decision he was as far in a far country alien from his father lost and dead according to Jesus who made up the words in that parable and the son said you know I'm gonna go back to my father and say father I've sinned against heaven in your side I'm no longer worthy to be called your son make me one of your servants and he did that's a decision to return to his father and Jesus put that decision into the mouth and the mind in the heart of a person that Jesus was making up for the purpose of illustration of salvation he put that into the heart of somebody who was in the parable itself he was said to be dead when he made that decision so anyone who says well we were dead and trust us in sins but and that means we couldn't make a decision for Christ couldn't believe well they're reading into the passage something that's not slightly even imply they're just making stuff up some Calvinists made it up Augustine and and people just kind of apparently without thinking assumed that he must be right but look at Colossians to the other place where Paul talks about people being dead and since this is interesting because you'll see that Paul does not assume that when we're dead since we couldn't believe you'll see in Colossians 2 verse 12 that we were buried with him in Baptism in which you also were raised with him through faith in the working of God who raised him from the dead and you being dead in your trespasses this is verse 13 you being dead in your trespasses and uncircumcision of your flesh he has made alive together with him having forgiven you all your trespasses now the sentence structure is he has made you alive having that is having previously justified you haven't forgiven you well everywhere Paul talked about justification how does someone get justified in the Bible anyone know any doctrines in the New Testament or justification what what was Luther's doctrine of justification how is one justified by faith okay a person is justified by faith that means they have to have faith in order to be justified now Paul says you were dead God raised you having justified you previously well if he just made you prove you must have had faith previously you're justified by faith and Paul makes the order this you have faith you are justified and thus God brought you to life from dead that means that when you were dead you believed and we're justified there's no way to take the grammar of that sentence properly without making justification which means also faith that caused the justification prior to being made alive now the Calvinists of course is I can't I can't refute everything they say here right now we don't have time but their position being what it is about total depravity I would never have accepted even when I thought I'd accepted it when I used to think I believed in total depravity what I meant is everybody's a sinner I believed in universal sinfulness I still believe that I believe that everybody is a sinner and I just thought when you hear total depravity just means you're admitting that it runs the Senate and sure okay why not of course but that's not what it means then it means that everything that a person does before they are regenerated is sin and sinfully motivated and they cannot because they're dead and their sinfulness they cannot turn to God now it's an interesting question what about Cornelius Cornelius didn't hear the gospel until Peter came to him but before that Cornelius is praying and giving gifts and an angel came to him said God has heard your prayers God is pleased with what you're doing send messengers to get this guy named Peter he'll tell you some words and how you can be saved well that's interesting the man was not saved he was not regenerated but he was praying he was seeking God and in a way that an angel no less told him was pleasing to God so where are we getting this idea that an unregenerate man cannot turn to God and cannot seek God he can he did the Bible does not support the Calvinists idea in any verse of scripture but it refutes it in a great number of verses description but now that you've got T tulip t total depravity that it's necessary to have the you unconditional election now remember election means children God chooses who he's going to say and the emphasis here is on unconditional why because the sinner cannot meet any conditions he's dead if the sinner is dead and trust us then there's no conditions ever so simple as God might set them that he can do a dead man can do nothing so even if God just says let's just believe on the Lord Jesus Christ are we saved all the unregenerate man can't do that he's dead so what that means that God has to decide who he's going to save before and without them doing anything everybody's in the same boat everybody's dead but God elects this one and this one here and this one here and this one here and this one here but not these other ones he chooses from the mass of you may which once he will save and then he regenerates them he brings them to life from the dead and having done so he gives them the gifts of faith and the gift of repentance in other words if you have faith and have repented it's because you made a decision you couldn't God made that decision that you would and maybe your spouse would not or maybe your kids would not or maybe your parents or not or your best friend would not some do some don't it's God's decision its unilateral since people are all dead in trespasses and sins until they're regenerated God has to regenerate them unconditionally and he has to choose which ones he will he makes that choice unconditionally now Arminius taught something something different Arminius taught that God chooses who he'll say but he does so by force seeing their faith that is he believed a person could have faith and God foresees the faith of some and therefore he chooses that he will save them because he foresees their faith Calvinists will have nothing of that because that's not unconditional then God can't foresee something you doing something you can't do as a dead person you can't have faith in the future unless God gives you the faith so it's not it's not enough for the Calvinists to say God foresaw who would believe and chose to save them in advance because he knew they would do it that's that's arminianism not Calvinism Calvinism is God just makes it happen to those that he wants to make it happen now this is very important in that in the matter of God's sovereignty God can save anyone he wants to does he save everybody according to Calvinism no he does not what but he can save anyone he wants to Kenny yes then does that mean he doesn't want to save certain people absolutely it means that Calvinism believes that God glorifies himself in choosing and saving the elect and also in condemning and torturing or tormenting the reprobate on the one hand he magnifies his Grace on the other hand magnifies his justice so in order to glorify himself magnified his Grace's justice he made a whole human race from which he decided to elect unconditionally to save totally undeserving sinners who had who were no different than the ones he didn't say and he just elected unconditionally to save those ones give give them faith give them repentance and he chose unconditional equally unconditionally to damn these ones because he could have saved them all if you wanted to Calvinism does not believe that God wants everyone saved it's clear he only loves the elect now some counties know he loves all people but he doesn't love everyone redemptive ly he only he loves all people but he only loves the elect redemptive ly well what kind of strange love is that that this person is dead on the way to an eternal torment in hell and God can save them it says I don't think I will he let him go that's love and and Calvin say well God didn't decide that they would go to hell there everyone's on the way to hell God just saved some and he just lets the others go their way he just kind of passed this fine doesn't save them well that's still the same he could have saved them he could save anyone he wants to that makes God out to be like the the priest and the Levite that saw the man who has fallen wrong thieves on the road to Jericho and instead of helping him he says no I don't think I'll do it this time here's somebody who needs help here's somebody who needs to be loved and the Samaritan does it but the the priests believe I don't and well what was so wrong with their behavior they just passed by and didn't decide to do anything for him isn't that what God has done according to Calvinism he sees a whole race of people lost and he doesn't do anything for most of them for some of them he will but not most of them that's a strange picture of God certainly isn't the picture Jesus painted or anywhere else in the Bible frankly it's Augustine's picture it's Augustine it took him it took 400 years for this doctrine to come into the church you know I asked I was debating a Doug Wilson up in Idaho on Calvinism one of the Deacons in his church came over he says does it bother you Steve that your view is not held by any of the great modern or great historic Protestant commentators well he's wrong about that some commentators do take the are many of you Arminius did and certainly Adam Clark some others do but and certainly Wesley did but I let him have it I mean I let him I gave him I let him have that point okay so does it bother me that none of the great commentators of Protestantism take my view I said well let me ask you this does it bother you that none of the Christians in the world took your view until 400 AD yeah 400 AD that's 400 years of not knowing something as important as what they think Calvinism is important and and what they say is their answer they admit this is true I mean any any knowledgeable Calvinist knows this truth that Augustine invented Calvinism but they would say actually think Paul taught it but it wasn't discovered until Augustine four hundred years later well the problem here is they say in the first three centuries of Christianity they were they were fighting out christological heresies you know the nicey and these these early councils they ever talk about Christological controversies they didn't have time to figure out some of these things and once they got that settled they were they figured out the election thing I think so it takes 400 years to come up with a if this is a major doctrine of Scripture how did these church fathers who all read the scripture in the original language because that was their native tongue Greek they couldn't see any of these doctrines for 400 years I have I have only lived less than 100 years and I have worked out my eschatology I've worked out my soteriology I've worked out my you know my Christology I mean frankly in in less than hundred years I myself have been able to work from the scripture out what I believe about these things and and why would the church take 400 years to do that and and if for the first 400 years they didn't know these things does it could these things possibly be very important if they're true why would God let the church be ignorant of these things why would they be so obscure if they're important well and the truth is the Bible doesn't teach these things and it took a Manichean that's what augustine was before he was a Christian he was a manichaean neoplatonist philosopher became a Christian he mixed his neoplatonism with Christianity and came up with some doctrines that no one had ever accepted before in the church which I believe are mistakes but Calvinists don't think their mistakes so this unconditional election the tea is total depravity you is for unconditional election election of who's gonna be saved has got to be done unconditionally on God's part the L is limited atonement now sometimes they like to call this particular Redemption instead the atonement is what Jesus accomplished for sinners on the cross the Calvinists believe that Jesus only died for the elect he didn't die for all people now this is not too shocking although I would have had trouble with it when I was younger if someone had presented to me that starkly but here's how they see it God doesn't love and doesn't want to save anyone except the elect if he wanted to eat save them all he only saves the elect so why would he have Jesus died for anyone other than the elect they sometimes even bring out where Jesus is praying in John chapter 17 verses father I do not pray for the world I pray for these that you have given me and they say if Jesus wouldn't even pray for the non elect why would he die for the non elect now of course they're really going crazy on that one they're not executing at all Jesus is referring to that particular prayer for the unity and the sanctity of his people and their protection is I'm not praying this for the world I'm praying this for my people yeah but on other occasions he did pray for non-elect he like when he was on the cross and Father forgive them they don't know what they do they didn't all get free they didn't all come to Christ he prayed for them though certainly not everyone at the foot of the cross was elect the ones who crucified him the Sanhedrin and so forth he prayed for them yeah Jesus prayed for the non elect and he loves the non elect he's not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance according to 2nd Peter chapter 3 verse 8 or 9 and yet they say well he only loves and only wants to save the elect so he only died for the elect now there's here's here's the difference in their idea of what Jesus did when he died when Jesus died he God already knew who's gonna be saved the elect and only one of them safe so Jesus actually procured their salvation in a sense when he died they they were saved now if he died for all men we have to say he only died potentially for their salvation we would have to say that he only made salvation available to all but he didn't procure it and make it happen for anyone in particular right so the non Calvinist view which I hold is that Jesus death did make salvation universally available but did not guarantee the salvation of any particular individuals everyone gets to make a choice about that Calvinism says that's a weak atonement it that's a limited atonement it's limited its power they say our atonement is unlimited in its power it reaches those for whom Jesus died and it it brings them in they makes them say it but this is just it I mean this is a different view of what the atonement accomplishes it's very clear many times in Scripture that Jesus tasted death for all men and that you know he he's the propitiation for our sins not for ours only but for the sins of the whole world John said in first John chapter 2 I mean there's lots of passages about you know God desires all men to be saved he's not willing that he should be paid that should he should perish you know he died for all he's a ransom for all the Bible says and first Peter first Timothy chapter 2 there's lots of references to all but what the Calvinist says well when it says all or all men it means all the elect men now if their doctrine is true then it must mean that because if Jesus only died for the like that all these verses that don't say that must mean that and one wonders if in fact they mean that why don't any of them say that why is there so many references to all men and none of them mean all men they mean all the elect men that's that's a rather strange wait to give us a Bible to say things that we're not supposed to believe that we're not supposed to believe the way they're said we're supposed to read into them things that are late coming doctrines that arrived with Augustine insist upon them being them so that's a limited atonement then there's an irresistible grace irresistible grace is the idea that if you are one of the elect God's grace will draw you irresistible you will not fail to come to Christ you will repent well of course because God just unilaterally gives you life unilaterally gives you repentance gives you faith what choice do you have a matter if you're elected you will inevitably be drawn to Christ and so that also leads to the fifth one perseverance of the saints perseverance of the saints means if you're one of the elect you will persevere in faith you won't just express faith at some point in your life and then walk away if you want to be elect you'll express faith and you'll live that faith persevering to death in fact this is a very strong assertion they say that if you seem to be saved and to serve God for let's say 30 40 years of your life maybe maybe your whole life from childhood until you're old and then you fall away just before you die and you renounce God you never were saved because if you were you'd stay saved you'd persevere if you if you do not hold fast until death then you are not one of the elect now it's interesting because sometimes Calvinists say you know without Calvinism we'd have no assurance of salvation I'd say with Calvinism we have no experience of salvation with Calvinism I can't know if I'm saved until I breathed my last breath and I didn't Holloway I guess I'm saved because according to them I can have every evidence of being a Christian I can be myself persuaded that I'm a Christian and everyone else can be for certification and this for decades this even for my whole life perhaps but if I fall away and renounce Christ at the end under torture letters say well then I never really was saved but if I wasn't really saved but how can anyone know if they're saved at all I know people who served God for twenty and thirty years and then fell away and their service of Christ was as convincing his mind they seemed to love God they were passionate for God they led others to Christ they experienced deliverance from drug addictions and other things in their life miraculously the work of God in their life was as persuasive as frankly the work of God in the lives of many people who I have no doubt that they're Christians in fact I have no doubt that those people were Christians either but they fell away but if Calvinism was true they weren't Christians even during those times when everything pointed that direction and if they let themselves go logically on this they have to say therefore all the things that make me seem like a Christian might be equally deceptive I may not really be one I've know very few Calvinists who are humble enough to admit this they say no I know I'm saved but those people who found the way they said they knew they say yeah but they really didn't but they said they didn't yeah well they didn't obviously because they weren't saying they were fakes well how do you know how do you know that well because their doctrine requires it but I heard of a friend who's a reformed pastor in Grangeville Idaho a good friend of mine one of my closest friends in Greenville he's a pastor of a Reformed Church we used to get together for breakfast almost every day to debate Calvinism and and he's one of the few that I've known among Calvinists who said he's not really sure if he's saved and that he can't really know until the day of his death he can hope for it he has evidence of it I have no doubt three stages were very godly man but but he knew that his doctrine did not allow him reasonably and logically to know for sure if he was saved until he persevered to the end now there's an another version of that which is more what I learned is a Baptist which wasn't really perseverance of the saints wasn't really the Calvinist doctrine but there's once saved always saved doctrine that you sometimes hear where you know someone live their life for the devil and died drunken and in a violent accident or something like that but sometimes it ah but they accepted Christ when they're five years old so they're in heaven now you know they accepted Christ when they're five never lived today for Christ live for the devil their whole life and died for you know serving the devil but they're saved because they got saved once saved always saved you got saved when you're five you're always saved well there are people who believe that Calvinists don't Calvinists who say that person never was saved and he proved it by his life he did not persevere in faith and obedience to Christ Calvinists and Armenians agree about one thing if you die apostate you're lost if you die an unbeliever you're lost the Calvinists would say you never were a believer and armenian might say well you might have been but you aren't anymore let's see Calvinists and armies have that in common the person who dies without faith is lost whereas the Baptist that I grew up among would say well if they had faith when they were a kid they gave their life to Christ when they're 16 years old never really stuck but but you know God's grace covers well certainly that that is not taught in Scripture but we now know what the five points of Calvinism are and if you have true total depravity then condition election must be unconditional because no conditions could be met and if God has unconditionally chosen who he's going to saved and no others can be saved then Jesus would only die for those to save them and they would be irresistibly drawn to God because God is going to unilaterally put it in them to come to him and they will persevere to the end because again they are electing God put it in to come he'll put it in him to stay so this is what the Calvinism doctrine teaches now I'm gonna end this here but I want to I don't just ask some practical questions what practical ramifications are there of this doctrine well I've already mentioned one of them if you really take Calvinism points seriously you cannot have you cannot have assurance of salvation until you die or at least until you're about to die because even if everything about your life pointed to you being a true Christian if you happen to fall away on the at the last moment before you die you never it's not just that you lose it you never were in it none of those evidences that your version were valid though everyone thought they were and you thought they were and you know that's that seems to me a sad thing because the Bible says for example Jesus said whosoever hears my words and believes on him that sent me has eternal life and shall not come into condemnation that has passed from death in life that's already happened I can know that I'm supposed to be able to know that John said in first John 5:45 13 you know these things I've written unto you that believe on the name of the Son of God that you may know that you have eternal life how because I believe well I always believe well I don't know for sure but I have eternal life now while I am believing I'm connected to Christ by my faith and that life is in him and in him I have eternal life John says that also in 1st John 5 I think it's verse 10 or 11 he says this is the message that God has given to us eternal life and this life is in his son he that has the son has life he that does not have the son of God does not have life so the life is in Jesus eternal life is in Jesus if I am in him I have it if I am not in him I don't and Jesus indicated there's a danger of not remaining in him once you're there he says I'm the vine you're the branches every branch that remains in me will bear fruit but if any man does not remain in me he is cast forth as a branch with it and they gather them and burn them how do you remain in Christ your men in Christ by having a relationship with Christ a relationship where he's your Lord where your trust is in him and your obedience has toward him are you perfect in obedience know nobody's perfect in obedience the Apostles weren't if they weren't I don't think we are but our decision that governs our life is to be obedient to him we fall short we stumble at times but we're determined to follow Jesus as long as your determination is to follow Jesus you're still abiding in him and no matter how many times you've failed and fallen and tripped and fallen it doesn't matter how many times it is some people say well if you can lose your salvation how many times can you sin before you lose it how many sins does it take to lose your salvation it doesn't take any number of sins it takes one which is apostasy it takes the sin of giving up on Jesus if you give up on Jesus it's like a marriage how many sins can you commit against your wife before you're not married to her anymore well if she's infinitely forgiving and wants to stay in the marriage and you want to stay in the marriage you're still married no matter how much you fall short but it only takes one sin to end a marriage that's the divorce just say I'm not in this anymore I'm done and there are people come that point with God I'm done with you God you I'm really disappointed with you you didn't you know you didn't do what I thought you're gonna do you know you let my child die you let my wife die whether I'm done with God well you're done then how many sins does it take to lose your salvation just the one and yet you can commit hundreds or thousands of sins out of weakness in the course of your lifetime and not lose your salvation because you're still clinging to Christ you're still depending on his mercy you become a Christian by an act of your will and this is not something that Calvinism believes Calvinism does not believe that you become a crease right after the will you become a Christian by an act of God's will he takes you when you're dead makes you alive and then makes you want him now I this is a very controversial point I want to make that it's and very offensive to Calvinists I hope not to anybody else but what if a young man wants to persuade a young woman just sleep with him and she says no and she consistently says no because she hates him but then he slips her a roofie a date-rape drug suddenly her will has changed she's compliant she goes along with it he gets what she wants they've got it you know they have a relationship now well how did that happen he didn't win her he changed her against her will because before before he changed her will she didn't want him and according to Calvinism before God makes you want him you hate him that means that the elect are people who hated him before he regenerated them but his unilateral act of regenerative forced them against their will to love him now who says no it's not against the role he changes their will yes so did the guy who gave the girl a roofie changed her will to she would not have made that decision if she was asked according to Calvinism an unregenerate person if asked do you want to follow Jesus Christ would say no so God just has to force it on them and of course as I said it's offensive to calculus but find a problem with that analogy I mean a logical problem with it I don't see one a couple of the ramifications Calvinism does not allow you to tell anybody that God loves them because you don't know if they're elect or not a very well-known Calvinist writer named Jay Adams wrote a book called competent to counsel back around 1970 and in it he sort of encountering somebody don't ever tell them that God loves them or that Jesus diese don't ever tell them that God that Jesus died for them because you don't know if he did you don't know if they're the elect or not you can't give anyone that assurance don't tell anyone that Jesus died for them don't tell him that God loved him I I made this point on a recording years ago and James Flight dealt with it on his program once and he and he he played me saying you know if Calvin's was true that you can't tell anyone that God loves me he said that's right you can't we don't know who God loves and who he doesn't love we can't tell me when God loves him well that certainly changes the message doesn't it what can you tell them geez don't know you don't know if you die for them jesus loves him well you don't know if he does what do you know you can just tell them you know Jesus died for the sins of the world and if they're alike they'll receive it I guess that's I mean God will make them receive it but there's all kinds of information the Bible tells us about God's love for the world and so forth that we can't affirm if Calvinism is true and if I don't know that God loves anyone in particular I only know he loves some people some nebulous group called the elect I don't know who's in it who's out if I don't know that he does anyone in particular I don't know if he loves me in particular there's no way to know I have to wait and see if I die faithful or not but I still live my life now if I'm consistent Calvinists are not they you know they love the consistency of their system but they're not consistent in their reasoning if Calvinism is true you can't know until you die that you will persevere because some people don't some people who appear very much be Christian in every respect do not persevere and that means they weren't saved according to Calvinism and therefore maybe I'm one of them unless I'm just too arrogant to allow that I could be one of them only arrogance could make me think that because you know other people are why am i immune to self-deception so these are these are concerns I have with the ramifications of Calvinism and of course the character of God I think is impugned in Calvinism because it makes him out to be a God who though he could save everybody he really would rather not he'd rather let the vast majority of people that he created who never asked to be born go to hell and be tormented there forever they didn't ask to be born God in his sovereign decrees just decided he could glorify himself by making a bunch of people who would be evil and then showing how just he is by tormenting them is that really a demonstration of justice some people think so I'm not among them but fortunately I I mean I would have to think that I would have to think that if Calvinist was true fortunately it is news the bible does not teach Calvinism I know every verse they use and I discuss every verse they use in my series on captain it's called God's sovereignty and man's salvation twelve lectures I give every proof text for Calvinism I point out what the Calvinists say about it I quote them and then I go over it and I say here's what it says in context it's not saying what they're saying and it isn't Calvinists are not very good exegesis and this is an interesting thing too because when I first heard of James fly it was an article he wrote about Calvinism he said Calvinism is if nothing else it's an exegetical position I think that is not what I find when I read the writers I don't find them exegete in the scripture actually Jesus means you have to take it in context you have to bring out the meaning that's that's intended by the author not the one that you're reading into it you don't have you can't add qualifiers and words that the author never thought to put in there apparently it's not Calvinism is an isogenic old position which is why it took 400 years for anyone to add to the scriptures those ideas that aren't there but which were in manikin ISM which were in Greek philosophy and which am a former mana key and Greek philosopher Christian Augustine introduced there's reasons why actually you know it one point I'm gonna give you great Augustine could not read Greek he said so he did not read Greek he was a Latin father he read a Latin Bible translated from Greek to Latin called the Vulgate translated by Jerome the church fathers before him who rejected the ideas that he offered they were the greek fathers who actually read and spoke from their mothers you know breasts they learned Greek it was the same language the new test was written it they read the New Testament in Greek and never came up with any of these ideas now a lot of comments say well if you know as you analyze the Greek you'll get this these ideas out then how come the people who spoke Greek as their native language didn't get those ideas out and it took someone who didn't read Greek and only read Latin to get those ideas come on this is not an intellectual honest position I'm not saying the people are not honest I think they haven't thought it through it takes a long time to think through all these things I'm sure but that is the brief synopsis of Calvinism from my point of view and if someone is interested in looking into every scripture Calvinists use I have those I treat those in my series God's sovereignty of man's salvation it takes a little more time to listen to though so I'm going to stop there we're going to take a break and then really have questions and answers all right

Channel: SteveGreggVideos

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Keywords: Calvinism, five points, tulip, John Calvin, Augustine, Steve Gregg, the narrow path, salvation, soteriology, gospel oh, Jesus, Christ, God, Christians, Christian, Christianity, Church, arminianism

Id: hMon_HqnZds

Length: 71min 59sec (4319 seconds)

Published: Sun Apr 14 2019