Calvinism thus suffers from a totally-depraved definition of Sovereignty, just as the strawman of Romans 9:19.
¨ The strawman, accuses God of robbing him of free will. Paul sarcastically refutes that, in Romans 9:20ff.
¨ The Calvinists, treat that robbing as majestic, and ignore Paul's refutation, which actually began in Romans 1:19-20, "they are without excuse" clause.
¨ To the Calvinists, God is not PERFECT if He allows anyone else to be free. For to the Calvinists, free will is meritorious. Calvinists essentially accept the Arminian false definition of free will as meritorious.
¨ So the Calvinists must REMOVE free will from man, to enable their Macho-Man fantasy of God, to be Sovereign.
¨ Therefore Calvinists also claim God is "constrained" by His "nature" to be Perfect, Just, etc. So God is only God if enslaved to His Nature. If they enslave God to His Nature, thus denuding Him of Sovereignty, then they can justify claiming man is enslaved to his nature post-fall, as well.
¨ Hence Calvinist theology is heretically stagnated in 1610. Arminians had "five points", so Calvinists developed "five points". Both sides ever since, look at each other -- but not at God.
As we saw in the 2nd Contra Calvinism video, thus the Calvinist TULIP, is totally depraved; having denuded God of His Sovereignty by "constraining" Him to His Attributes, man is also thus denuded. So the "T" for man's Total Depravity, reflects the depraved notion of God as Enslaved to His own nature. Thus Calvinism like Arminianism, fails to recognize the true nature of man's depravity, that of being OFF-WHITE, a corruption of attributes other than free will, such that man is dysfunctionally righteous. Yes, fallen man can yet will not to sin, and to do good: but it's never good enough, Romans 3:23. This we saw, in the 5th Contra Calvinism video.
Yet look how easy to fix the "T", to the BIBLE'S definition of total depravity as GENETIC. Adam's sin tainted his biology, Romans 5:12, 1Cor15:22. Since God Alone creates each soul at birth, the soul is perfect at that point. So then depravity is still generated in the same way as Adam's was, by giving into what are for us, genetic urges. Thus your own FREE WILL still depraves you, Romans 5:12, 1Cor15:22, Proverbs 23:6, Jeremiah 17:9, Romans 9:20. God 'gives you over' and 'hardens' in that He won't interfere with your own free will, theme of Romans 1, Hebrews 3, Isaiah 44, Genesis 3, etc. So you remain responsible for your free will's effects. Thus it is not unjust for God to condemn you, theme of Romans 1-9.
As we saw in the 3rd Contra Calvinism video, the TULIP "U" of "Unconditional Election" is likewise totally depraved, for Calvinists would have you believe God must deprive Himself of His Attribute of Truth -- specifically, Foreknowledge -- before picking who will be saved, as if that would make God more 'fair'. Thus God is derided as needing protection from Himself, and man is exalted as having merit if God DID use His Foreknowledge. Same false claim as the Arminians made, though antithetical in flavor.
Yet look how easy, to fix: BIBLE's definition of "Unconditional Election" is that God ELECTS CHRIST, Isaiah 52:13-15, plus Ephesians 1, etc.
¨ So God Elects Anyone Who Believes In Christ, no matter what they are of themselves.
¨ So it doesn't matter who the people are, how good or how bad -- for all that matters, is CHRIST's Merit.
¨ So the Decree being based on Christ, means free will -- beginning with Christ's -- reigns sovereign, with due effects.
¨ Belief is always nonmeritorious, based on the merit of the OBJECT. Free will and hence belief, is never its own object. This is true, even in God, even in Christ. IF God stopped believing in Righteousness, Truth, then He'd sin. Christ never stopped believing, so was made the Substitute Sacrifice for Sin, Isaiah 52:13, 15, 53:10-12. And the object of belief for Him, was in God, His Truth. Which Truth, the Holy Spirit put in Him, John 7:39, John 17, etc.
¨ Now if the object of faith is bad, then bad results from believing in it;
¨ If the object is Good, then Good results from believing in it.
¨ The faith itself, is of no merit either way.
¨ So, salvation can justly be granted to anyone who believes in Christ, because only CHRIST is Good.
Christ. Good. Absolutely Good, as God. Made Absolutely Good in His Humanity, by the Holy Spirit causing Him with His Own Continued Consent, to learn and live on Word, Isaiah 52:13 plus 53:10-11. Good Enough to pay for all the sins of ALL mankind, ibid. But Christ's Humanity was only made so, by God. Not, by using His Own Attributes, Philippians 2:5-10.
So the TULIP "L" of "Limited Atonement" is totally-depraved, as it first of all confuses the separate BIBLE doctrines of Atonement -- which is God-ward, UP -- with BIBLE doctrine of Redemption, which is man-ward, DOWN. Atonement is not Redemption. Bible distinguishes the two rules thus: Atonement is what GOD gets, Hebrew term "kaphar". Redemption aka Ransom, is what man gets from God, Hebrew term "qanah". So Redemption is an APPLICATION of Atonement, not the same as Atonement.
So look how easy to fix: Just change the "L" in TULIP, to "Limited Application" -- limited, to those who believe in Christ.
¨ God got paid for ALL sin.
¨ We only 'collect', as it were, on God's Sovereign Election if we believe in Christ, as that is God's Own Decree.
¨ GOD set the conditions. Christ paid for the conditions.
¨ We either believe or do not, and that based on CHRIST's Merit, not our own.
¨ So then, the Redemption applies to us. Again, due to Christ's Merit, as we have none.
Notice at all points how Sovereignty is stressed.
¨ Sovereign Decree that Christ be the basis, Isaiah 52:13 + Isa53:10.
¨ Sovereign Decree to elect all who believe in Him, Isaiah 52:15 and 53:10-12.
¨ So no compromise, to Sovereignty, if God Sovereignly Exercises His Sovereignty to CONDITION salvation on Christ.
As we saw in the 4th Contra Calvinism video, the TULIP
"I" of "Irresistible Grace", is thus totally-depraved. Having
denuded God of His Sovereignty by constraining Him to His Attributes; having denuded man of his God-given free will
by enslaving him to the sin nature -- as if man post-Adam didn't still deprave
himself -- now God must be made unattractive to man, so Grace must be made tyrannical, too.
For the Calvinist would have you believe that man cannot want God, apart from
God forcing man. Thus God is again
denigrated to needing to force man, in order to save him. Thus man is glorified, as if God needed
man. This of course violates common
sense, as all false doctrine, does.
Thus the Bible definition of man addicting HIMSELF to sin and opposition to God, goes ignored in Calvinism; that's why Calvinists misread Romans 9, as we saw in the Contra Calvinism videos, Parts 8a-c. (Paul's main point in Romans 1, 9-11 is that man enslaves himself to sin, and that man's works are alike products of sin, so he only digs himself deeper in debt by his works, Romans 4:5.)
So look how easy it is to fix the false "Irresistible" Grace, to Bible's "Inalienable Grace". For since God Sovereignly conditions everything on Christ, then Grace is Inalienable. To anyone.
¨ God being paid for everyone,
¨ can justify saving anyone,
¨ can justify CREATING humanity in the first place, theme of Ephesians 1.
¨ Can justify Creating one person at a time, pattern of Genesis 2:7, Sovereignly Creating each such soul AT BIRTH, which is the first moment when a body has independence. Thus God gives that body its first breath, as we saw in 57 Bible "breath" verses, Episode 2b of my Prolife videos. God gives. Sovereignty decrees a human's existence per person, directly, at Birth. God, never evolution. God, never even the womb. God, never Caesar, Exodus 21:22.
So therefore TULIP's "P" for "Perseverence of the Saints" aka "Predestination", is likewise totally-depraved. For since God has been depicted as enslaved by His Other Attributes and thus man as well, God must also be depicted as dragging man back into 'faithful service', as if anything man did even post-salvation, could be meritorious -- same false claim as the Arminians made.
Notice how God is denigrated, but man glorified: man's able to do something meritorious with his dead-in-Adam body, so long as God drags him. Thus predestination is still misdefined in terms of human performance, same error as the Arminians make. As if God needed trained pets. As if human behavior even post-salvation, could of itself be holy or good. As if to get that good human behavior, was even the objective. As if Absolute Righteousness depended on man's behavior.
So look how easy to fix:
¨ BIBLE's definition of
"predestination" is insurance of free will having its free
effects which God Himself, ordained in eternity past. It's not a forcing, but an insuring.
¨ So
"predestination" has nothing to do with human performance, but
everything to do with freedom.
¨ For the ELECTION was, FIRST to create
CHRIST, Isa52:13.
¨ Then, to create mankind, Isa52:14.
¨ And THEN, Isaiah 52:15+53:10, to save
anyone who believes in CHRIST, based on CHRIST's Merit.
¨ Finish.
You believe,
you're forever saved. You
don't have to be "kept" saved, it's OVER, you got God's Righteousness
and Life that first nanosecond you believed in Christ, Titus 3:5 due to 2
Cor5:21 and John 3:16. Finished.
¨ So now, Eph2:10, your life is new, born-again,
and GOD's Works are to be worked in you, ibid plus Philippians 2:12-13,
James 1-2 in
Greek. Not your behavior, but HIS. (James removes or inserts the article to track the
difference between God's works and your own, so James can't be properly translated
to reflect that.)
So it's not a matter of the one who wills, nor a matter of the one who pants on a race course, but God's MERCY to predestine EVERYONE, Romans 9:16. This we saw in the Part 8c video concluding Romans 9 between the rhetorical 'bookends' of Romans 9:15 and 9:24.
¨ God's MERCY was to have Christ pay for everyone;
¨ God's MERCY was to call everyone to Christ, beginning with that first moment God Sovereignly Elects to make your own soul, at your birth. That is the first election. For there are two elections in the Decree, not just one.
¨ Now, whether you believe Christ paid for your sins, is your choice -- because now you are ALIVE to make it --
¨ and God in eternity past, ALSO Sovereignly Elected that Your Choice Be Made Efficacious,
¨ at which point the Holy Spirit gives you God's Righteousness and His Eternal Life,
¨ which births you spiritually, John 3 and Titus 3:5.
¨ There is nothing to add to it.
¨ There is nothing to "keep".
¨ So the only thing you can 'lose' thereafter, is potential spiritual maturation, Ephesians 4:11-16. You cannot lose the salvation 'floor', 1Cor3.
For it is, about Sovereignty. True Sovereignty is not affected by another's free will. Since all of creation's continued existence depends on GOD'S Choices, if God Chooses That Creation Be Free -- Ephesians 1, especially Eph 1:15-23. So our freedom derives from His Choice. Thus the unrestricted free will of man co-exists with God's Own Sovereignty, By Divine Decree.
Free will of itself, is not meritorious. The merit depends on the object to which Free Will is applied. So God has free will and I do, too; but when I apply my free will to the 'object' in my thinking, any results depend on the merit in those objects. And as we saw in the 5th Contra Calvinism video, the problem of total depravity is that it's really dysfunctional righteousness, off-white; so never enough. So my application of my free will will likewise be dysfunctional.
Thus I can't save myself. However, I can still say yes to God, believe in Christ; because, God INSURES my free will -- predestination is insurance, Ephesians 1 -- to be able to do that. And it's God's Choice and Merit, not my own, to RESPOND to my choice by Sovereignly choosing to save me. Christ's payment is sufficient, but God isn't obligated to use it on my behalf. He chooses, just as He chose to make me at my first birth, to make me have a 2nd birth which lasts forever.
God Sovereignly chose in eternity past to CREATE a condition for salvation: Faith in His Son, Isaiah 52:13-15, Ephesians 1, John 3:16. Then, He Sovereignly Chooses to Honor the Condition He Himself Created. So at no point is His Sovereignty at all 'influenced' by human choices. For He chooses to EXERCISE Sovereignty by HIS Conditions, John 3:16.
All this, the Calvinists miss. All this, keeps Calvinism back in 1610 arguing against a bunch of idiots who also couldn't read the Bible. Falsehood stunts spiritual maturation, because the one believing falsehood is thus carnal, depraving himself still further, and won't be taught by the Holy Spirit. Therefore, Calvinists misread the Bible's "draw" verses, as we saw in the 6th Contra Calvinism video. Therefore, Calvinists will reverse Bible's order of salvation and will flunk first-year Greek and Hebrew though insisting on Sola Scriptura, as we saw in the 1st and 7th Contra Calvinism videos. All because, Calvinism fails to apply proper Biblical hermeneutics to Romans 9, in order to denude God of His Sovereignty by constraining His Attributes, as we saw in Contra Calvinism videos 8a, through 8c.
Thus we come full circle. Calvinism is a mix of falsehood because it imposes its tyrannical 'philosophy' upon God, defining Him as necessarily enslaved to His Attributes, and then twists Scripture which contradicts that notion, to conform to its debating goals with its imagined enemies from four centuries prior, the Arminians. Thus Calvinist theology has stagnated four centuries. And has not -- till yet! -- grown up.
Because
Calvinism has not grown up, it has progressively retrogressed, and is in fact
becoming yet more like the Catholics it detests, as centuries pass. For Calvinism increasingly uses the same
arguments and relies on the same false doctrines, as the Catholics do, to wit:
1. Like the Catholics, the Calvinists believe that life begins at conception. So the Calvinists miss the TRUE SOVEREIGNTY of God in SELECTING EACH HUMAN BEING AT BIRTH.
2. Like the Catholics, the Calvinists continue to misread Genesis as initial six-day creation, rather than six-day RESTORATION after some period of time, so the Calvinists alike rely on Bishop Ussher's timeline for creation, and Aquinas' Treatise of the Six Days.
3. Like the Catholics, therefore, the Calvinists are preterists, completely ignoring God's Massive Accounting System for Time, which begins in Genesis 5.
4. So like the Catholics, the Calvinists erroneously believe they REPLACE Israel, not noticing the dual Kingships of Christ in the Book of Hebrews, and hence the necessity for a RAPTURE which triggers off a seven-year real Tribulation.
5. So like the Catholics, the Calvinists erroneously treat Revelation as largely past or allegorical of trends between now and the second Advent.
6. For like the Catholics, the Calvinists treat the bilious Church Fathers as if they were Bible experts, using their distorted ideas of God and salvation, to buttress Calvinist doctrines. Never mind, the Church Fathers and their progeny were so confused and unable to read Bible, they had to convene councils to figure out what books were Bible, whether God was Triune, and whether Christ was both God and man.
7. So like the Catholics, the Calvinists resort to philosophical arguments and man's reason -- rather than the Bible -- to win debates. Debates, not souls.
8. Therefore like the Catholics, the Calvinists ever more often arrogate to themselves the "one true faith" mantle, starting with what is and is not, Bible. Hence like the Catholics, Calvinists constantly invoke "tradition" and what their men of the past write -- as "the" way to read Scripture.
9. Thus like the Catholics, the Calvinists stand pat on their past interpretations, as if there were nothing new to add, no corrections to make. They only improve the way they argue and defend that past.
10. So it's not surprising that, like the Catholics, Calvinists ever more treat John Calvin -- whose writings contradict TULIP in many ways -- as a kind of pope. Like the Catholics did with Peter, long after John Calvin died, he is the invented new head; with each passing generation, the luminaries of Calvinism are added to the list.
11. Hence like the Catholics, the Calvinists develop their own brand of ecumenism; and dissent is not welcome.
12. So like the Catholics, Calvinists no longer really adhere to Sola Scriptura, though that moniker was their Reformation guidon -- since now it's really the Bible according to THEIR IDEA of what Calvin wrote.
13. So like the Catholics, the Calvinists have begun to abandon "Faith Alone in Christ Alone", in favor of Lordship salvation -- the twist that if you don't make Christ Lord, you never really got saved in the first place. No different from the Catholic claim that you must "cooperate", "contribute" to your salvation.
14. So like the Catholics, the Calvinists add additional conditions to qualify one as saved: you must adhere to the Westminster Confession, hence believe God is Triune, Christ is God-man, invite Christ into your heart or life, evidence works.. you must you must you must... the list grows, daily.
15. So like the Catholics, the Calvinists are beginning to abandon Predestination, even by their TULIP "P" definition -- for if you sin some big sin which the CALVIES think 'too big', then your previous faith in Christ, didn't really count.
16. So like the Catholics, the Calvinists are on a crusade. They have a political agenda, like the Catholics. They seek Caesar's help, like the Catholics. They condemn who THEY feel is the 'heretic', like the Catholics did. And anyone who's not Calvinist, well.. maybe that person isn't saved!
So Calvinism needs to clean its own house, get back to the Bible, revisit its overweening protasis of a Tyrannical God Who Forces Everyone. Overdue, for four hundred years. Don't bet on them waking up and cleaning up, anytime soon.
