Refute this Arminian that I came across

[buggy]

Can someone refute this Arminian's statement that I came about?

========================================

When it comes to the Calvinism debate, this I have to say. You have to be taught to be a Calvinist! I have yet to encounter somebody who becomes a Calvinist by reading his bible alone. You know why? I wasn't. The same friend of mine asked me this question, "why I shouldn't be a Calvinist?" My reply was this. "Now I beseech you, brethren, mark them which cause divisions and offences contrary to the doctrine which ye have learned; and avoid them - Romans 16:17." I challenged him then with this question: Who do you think satisfies all the clauses here? Have you heard of a church split because a non-Calvinist got into the membership of a Calvinist church?

I can tell of examples of churches that have stopped giving to missions, stopped evangelizing because of Calvinism. Well, one could argue that these are extreme Calvinists. Well, I know one thing. Only error leads to another error.

The heart issue? "For the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any twoedged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart - Hebrews 4:12"

"Historical contacts" to me tantamount intellectualism. I decry this. It seems to me that the word of God and the wisdom therein is not enough unless verified by Science and versified with History. God forbid!

========================================

 

[Iconoclast]

The bible refutes him;

When it comes to the Calvinism debate, this I have to say. You have to be taught to be a Calvinist!

yes, and we are;
45It is written in the prophets, And they shall be all taught of God. Every man therefore that hath heard, and hath learned of the Father, cometh unto me.
Looking in Jn 6 37-44 at the context this teaching is the teaching of Jesus. Those who could not welcome this teaching departed;
65And he said, Therefore said I unto you, that no man can come unto me, except it were given unto him of my Father.

66From that time many of his disciples went back, and walked no more with him.
There are many of us who have believed in the grace of God before we knew all the theological terms,and how some persons have misunderstood the truth. It is a deliberate mis-reading of grace texts and God not allowing someone to see truth that contributes to a large part of this departure from truth;
11He answered and said unto them, Because it is given unto you to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it is not given.
He completely misunderstands Romans 16.
Calvinists seek out ministries where truth is proclaimed and a Sovereign God is proclaimed. Sometimes believers in an arminian church study their bible and inevitably come to these truths known as calvinism. When they speak up, the others cannot take it, mostly because they are unwilling or unable to enter in to a biblical discussion on the topic, get defensive, lash out with a personal attack ,because they cannot defend a biblical position. the "calvinist is then looked upon as causing a split.
Surely there might be times where a calvinist[ new to the teaching] might have more zeal than spiritual maturity and not conduct himself wisely. This can be problematic especially if they have no idea that other assemblies exist who believe as they do.
More often than not the arminian pastor seeks to silence them, saying doctrine divides, let's not study so deeply. and other pathetic human ,fleshly, reasoning.

 

[Marvin Torgeson]

Tell your friend that it takes a revelation by the Spirit of God to understand the truth of God. When the Arminian attends churches and listens to teaching that have no biblical teaching on the sovereignty of God or the work of the Spirit of God to regenerate sinners, or that the Father draws sinners to Christ, its no wonder that when the Calvinist speaks of these things they sound "like they have been taught". The truth is more frightening than some want to admit. Evangelical Arminians so rarely speak of Election or Predestination that when the Reformed believer brings them up the Arminian believer thinks he's listening to some strange new thing. But, its all over the bible and its been sitting in front of his face every time he opened God's word. The fact is, his teachers have been ignoring those doctrines and in some cases twisting them to make them fit free-will assumptions.

But, its not just the avoidance of these doctrines that creates such remarks. Most young believers interpret the bible by the chain of events that lead to their salvation. They in-tern use their testimonies as the hermeneutic for the Soteriology they know. They say "I called, I repented, I believed, I went forward, I cried out, I exercised faith, I said the sinners prayer and so on. They do not see the anonymous working of the Spirit to regenerate them or the Father drawing them or acknowledge the gifting of God to repent and believe. No, they simply see it as formula and contract. "If I do this, God will do this".
All they know is the act of faith and the obtaining of Salvation...appears to be a very humanly accessible event and goal. So, from this thinking is concocted doctrine and testimony, more examples and imperative after imperative where the sinner is to act and the believer is to obey, thereby affirming to them that God's grace is nothing more than the "gracious offer" that greatly depends upon human free-will in order to be fair.

When you attack that doctrine, you are (in their minds) attacking the validity of their salvation, attacking the work of God that supposedly has effected their salvation. So on goes the confusion and the resistance.

Remember that your friend might not have ever heard grace explained to him where God truly gives grace to sinners in the very mindset and activity of sin and rebellion. God didnt ask permission of sinners to make Christ "alone" the only way to the Father, He didnt ask any sinners permission to institute moral laws that would effect such a condemnation upon them they ache in their hearts for the sins which corrupt them. So, God is not a passive God hoping some sinner is going to give him a chance; no, God is the only real seeker of men that will drop that crucificied Savior right in front of a hell-bound man, then tell that man "this is what your sins did to my Son". All this talk of reformed believers being "taught from men" things that the bible doesnt openly proclaim is such utter garbage; no believer once he has seen that his salvation is not simply the execution of a mans will, it is the execution of God's will and God's grace to show him favor and forgiveness and mercies in spite of his hellish hard-hearted demands to be left alone on the path to destruction.
Jesus didnt ask permission of any sinner to drink the cup of wrath for him. Jesus didnt ask permission of any sinner to carry a cross and hang upon it
until he was dead. Yes it was part of the prophecy and plan of God that this take place, yes God has his agenda and that all the more proves that God is not now asking spiritually dead men for their permission to work upon them so that they might be partakers of the grace of God. That is grace, its not a trespass its a physician helping a dying man, a Samaritan bind up wounds, its a healer forgiving sins while he lay on his bed.

Dont look at your friend from the standpoint of scorn or reject him because he might still walk in the counsel of the ungodly. Preach grace, preach it with passion, he'll know that what you have is not some academia but a living truth and a glorious God. Introduce him to a much bigger God than he has imagined. Introduce him to the grace of God that will convict him, the grace of God that destroys vain pride, the grace of God that explodes the myth that God is waiting for some sinner to give him permission to do something for him.

 

[Steve Curtis]

I was raised as an Arminian; I taught and preached as an Arminian; I defended Arminianism (and dispensationalism, for that matter) for many years. Then I was reading my Bible one day as was my custom, and, by the providence of God, my eyes were open to things that I had never "seen" in Scripture before. Suddenly, the doctrines of God's sovereignty began to jump off every page! I could no longer hold my prior positions honestly. After trying (in vain) to convince the pastor of my church of the truths I had discovered, I sought out a Reformed fellowship.
So, mine is a testimony of one who became a Calvinist ONLY by virtue of the word and the will of God. Every teaching under which I sat previously was not only Arminian but anti-Calvinistic. There were no Reformed teachers (or even friends) whispering in my ear. All of grace, all of God!

 

[Skyler]

Can someone refute this Arminian's statement that I came about?

Yes, I'm sure someone can.

When it comes to the Calvinism debate, this I have to say. You have to be taught to be a Calvinist! I have yet to encounter somebody who becomes a Calvinist by reading his bible alone. You know why? I wasn't. The same friend of mine asked me this question, "why I shouldn't be a Calvinist?" My reply was this. "Now I beseech you, brethren, mark them which cause divisions and offences contrary to the doctrine which ye have learned; and avoid them - Romans 16:17." I challenged him then with this question: Who do you think satisfies all the clauses here? Have you heard of a church split because a non-Calvinist got into the membership of a Calvinist church?

I know several people (on this board) who became a Calvinist just from reading the Bible. The reason most people nowadays have to be taught is because Calvinism runs so counter to the humanism that is taken for granted, even by Christians.

Secondly, I have heard of a plethora of examples of non-Calvinists causing church splits. The Mennonite church comes to mind.

I can tell of examples of churches that have stopped giving to missions, stopped evangelizing because of Calvinism. Well, one could argue that these are extreme Calvinists. Well, I know one thing. Only error leads to another error.

Hmm. That must be why every major revival/evangelistic effort in the past few centuries has been lead by Calvinists. The Great Awakening, the Welsh Revivals, the Great Missionary Movement, etc. Even the Wesleyan revivals were half Calvinist. Not to mention the Reformation itself! I wonder why Arminianism doesn't have that great of a track record?

The heart issue? "For the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any twoedged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart - Hebrews 4:12"

Which is why Calvinism is so painful to begin with.

"Historical contacts" to me tantamount intellectualism. I decry this. It seems to me that the word of God and the wisdom therein is not enough unless verified by Science and versified with History. God forbid!

Historical what? Maybe you mean "historical context"?

If so, I don't think you get the idea of historical context. The question isn't about "checking the Bible against history", it's about reading the Bible the way the people it was written to would have. Otherwise, you add a lot of your own presuppositions to the Word of God--talk about intellectualism!

 

[buggy]

My thanks to all. These remarks actually came from a missionary that was from my previous fundy church.

 

[Puritan Sailor]

I'd simply tell him that he should hold his tongue until he does his homework because he is making foolish and uninformed judgments about brothers in Christ. It's not good to judge others using his own limited experience and very limited and misunderstood knowledge of church history.

 

[SolaScriptura]

I'd agree that one needs to be taught to be a Calvinist - because of our sinful hearts it comes quite naturally to think highly of ourselves, to want to think that we can do something to merit favor with God, that we can better ourselves in His sight, etc. The doctrines of grace are for that reason odious to the sensibilities of natural man, and since when we are justified and adopted as coheirs with Christ, we aren't automatically made mature, we must be taught to put aside the old man and put on the new man, whose mind is renewed in Christ.

So sure, we must be taught to be a Calvinist. Praise God that He doesn't leave us to what comes natural for us!

 

[MarieP]

Can someone refute this Arminian's statement that I came about?

========================================

When it comes to the Calvinism debate, this I have to say. You have to be taught to be a Calvinist! I have yet to encounter somebody who becomes a Calvinist by reading his bible alone. You know why? I wasn't. The same friend of mine asked me this question, "why I shouldn't be a Calvinist?" My reply was this. "Now I beseech you, brethren, mark them which cause divisions and offences contrary to the doctrine which ye have learned; and avoid them - Romans 16:17." I challenged him then with this question: Who do you think satisfies all the clauses here? Have you heard of a church split because a non-Calvinist got into the membership of a Calvinist church?

I can tell of examples of churches that have stopped giving to missions, stopped evangelizing because of Calvinism. Well, one could argue that these are extreme Calvinists. Well, I know one thing. Only error leads to another error.

The heart issue? "For the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any twoedged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart - Hebrews 4:12"

"Historical contacts" to me tantamount intellectualism. I decry this. It seems to me that the word of God and the wisdom therein is not enough unless verified by Science and versified with History. God forbid!

========================================

You have to be taught to be a Christian too... Granted, one can be a Christian without being a Calvinist. But is he going to toss out a certain view of baptism or the end-times or the inerrancy of Scripture or the Trinity because you have to be taught it? The Arminian's assumption is that you have to have things added to Scripture to come to Calvinistic convictions. His assumption is also that he himself is always correct when he comes to the Bible.

 

[Don Kistler]

Roger Nicole once said that we are all born semi-Pelagian. So it would therefore be necessary that we be taught to be Calvinists. We have to unlearn the bad theology that is inherent in each of us. And the best teacher is the Apostle Paul.

 

[Steve Curtis]

I would think it too charitable to say that we are all born semi-Pelagian. Isn't it closer to the mark to say that we are enter the world as full-blown Pelagians?

 

[Skyler]

I would think it too charitable to say that we are all born semi-Pelagian. Isn't it closer to the mark to say that we are enter the world as full-blown Pelagians?

I thought babies were atheists???

 

[Steve Curtis]

I would think it too charitable to say that we are all born semi-Pelagian. Isn't it closer to the mark to say that we are enter the world as full-blown Pelagians?

I thought babies were atheists???

sensus divinitatus, or as Hodge says, we are all born with a “sense of dependence and responsibility
to a being higher than ourselves” (ST, vol. 1, p. 195). However, the natural response to that sense is Pelagian.

 

[Marvin Torgeson]

Little bobby was born a sinner. For the next few years he's going to be simply natural. Whatever come out of this little boy is going to be natural. Pelagian or Semi is way beyond what this little boy has operating in him. Children that young dont concieve of merit yet and Pelagian/semi P concern themselves with Merit and will. What you get is simply "all natural" humanity that is alienated from God. But I wouldnt say God is absent from the "all natural" child because of believing parents. Blessing and grace
may rest upon that Child.

 

[Steve Curtis]

Yes, little Bobby is born a sinner. And he is also aware - very early on - that his behavior can elicit a desired response. A cry sends Mommy running, a smile earns a hug. At root, those are actions that anticipate Pelagianism: I can effect an outcome based upon my behavior. Granted, little Bobby does not cognitively grasp this, but, as you say, he is acting naturally. And, naturally, we all think that we can determine the outcome. This develops – naturally – into Pelagianism (in whatever religious form we may craft it).

 

[Semper Fidelis]

I challenged him then with this question: Who do you think satisfies all the clauses here? Have you heard of a church split because a non-Calvinist got into the membership of a Calvinist church?

Yes, it's called the PCUSA.

The sad thing is that your friend doesn't realize that all the heavy lifting for the defense against inerrancy and modernism came from Reformed thinkers (Warfield, Machen, etc). Fundamentalism, stripped of its Reformed underpinnings, gave us Fuller Seminary in its current incarnation as well as today's Purpose Driven Life.

 

[Manuel]

I was raised as an Arminian; I taught and preached as an Arminian; I defended Arminianism (and dispensationalism, for that matter) for many years. Then I was reading my Bible one day as was my custom, and, by the providence of God, my eyes were open to things that I had never "seen" in Scripture before. Suddenly, the doctrines of God's sovereignty began to jump off every page! I could no longer hold my prior positions honestly. After trying (in vain) to convince the pastor of my church of the truths I had discovered, I sought out a Reformed fellowship.
So, mine is a testimony of one who became a Calvinist ONLY by virtue of the word and the will of God. Every teaching under which I sat previously was not only Arminian but anti-Calvinistic. There were no Reformed teachers (or even friends) whispering in my ear. All of grace, all of God!

Same thing happened to me, so I am another example.

---------- Post added at 04:57 AM ---------- Previous post was at 04:47 AM ----------

I can tell of examples of churches that have stopped giving to missions, stopped evangelizing because of Calvinism. Well, one could argue that these are extreme Calvinists. Well, I know one thing. Only error leads to another error.

For each one of these examples there are at least ten other of churches that have distorted the gospel beyond recognition because of arminianism, because they think that salvation is a human decision in the sovereign, all-powerful will of man they have gone to "seeker-sensitive" movement and no longer use the word "repent" and "sin" and "justification", and now sins are "bad habits that make you unhappy" and so on. Because of arminianism they have even stopped preaching the gospel and now they tell moving, sentimental stories and invite people to repeat a prayer to accept Jesus and tell them that they are saved without even the most basic knowledge of the Gospel.

It is a shame what arminianism has done to the Gospel.

 

[TaylorOtwell]

I've never understood this argument. To me, it seems to speak against his own position.

When we come out from this perverse generation and are saved by God from the wrath of God, we usually do have to have our previous understanding of God corrected.

 

[hojun1978]

Tell your friend that it takes a revelation by the Spirit of God to understand the truth of God. When the Arminian attends churches and listens to teaching that have no biblical teaching on the sovereignty of God or the work of the Spirit of God to regenerate sinners, or that the Father draws sinners to Christ, its no wonder that when the Calvinist speaks of these things they sound "like they have been taught". The truth is more frightening than some want to admit. Evangelical Arminians so rarely speak of Election or Predestination that when the Reformed believer brings them up the Arminian believer thinks he's listening to some strange new thing. But, its all over the bible and its been sitting in front of his face every time he opened God's word. The fact is, his teachers have been ignoring those doctrines and in some cases twisting them to make them fit free-will assumptions.

But, its not just the avoidance of these doctrines that creates such remarks. Most young believers interpret the bible by the chain of events that lead to their salvation. They in-tern use their testimonies as the hermeneutic for the Soteriology they know. They say "I called, I repented, I believed, I went forward, I cried out, I exercised faith, I said the sinners prayer and so on. They do not see the anonymous working of the Spirit to regenerate them or the Father drawing them or acknowledge the gifting of God to repent and believe. No, they simply see it as formula and contract. "If I do this, God will do this".
All they know is the act of faith and the obtaining of Salvation...appears to be a very humanly accessible event and goal. So, from this thinking is concocted doctrine and testimony, more examples and imperative after imperative where the sinner is to act and the believer is to obey, thereby affirming to them that God's grace is nothing more than the "gracious offer" that greatly depends upon human free-will in order to be fair.

When you attack that doctrine, you are (in their minds) attacking the validity of their salvation, attacking the work of God that supposedly has effected their salvation. So on goes the confusion and the resistance.

Remember that your friend might not have ever heard grace explained to him where God truly gives grace to sinners in the very mindset and activity of sin and rebellion. God didnt ask permission of sinners to make Christ "alone" the only way to the Father, He didnt ask any sinners permission to institute moral laws that would effect such a condemnation upon them they ache in their hearts for the sins which corrupt them. So, God is not a passive God hoping some sinner is going to give him a chance; no, God is the only real seeker of men that will drop that crucificied Savior right in front of a hell-bound man, then tell that man "this is what your sins did to my Son". All this talk of reformed believers being "taught from men" things that the bible doesnt openly proclaim is such utter garbage; no believer once he has seen that his salvation is not simply the execution of a mans will, it is the execution of God's will and God's grace to show him favor and forgiveness and mercies in spite of his hellish hard-hearted demands to be left alone on the path to destruction.
Jesus didnt ask permission of any sinner to drink the cup of wrath for him. Jesus didnt ask permission of any sinner to carry a cross and hang upon it
until he was dead. Yes it was part of the prophecy and plan of God that this take place, yes God has his agenda and that all the more proves that God is not now asking spiritually dead men for their permission to work upon them so that they might be partakers of the grace of God. That is grace, its not a trespass its a physician helping a dying man, a Samaritan bind up wounds, its a healer forgiving sins while he lay on his bed.

Dont look at your friend from the standpoint of scorn or reject him because he might still walk in the counsel of the ungodly. Preach grace, preach it with passion, he'll know that what you have is not some academia but a living truth and a glorious God. Introduce him to a much bigger God than he has imagined. Introduce him to the grace of God that will convict him, the grace of God that destroys vain pride, the grace of God that explodes the myth that God is waiting for some sinner to give him permission to do something for him.

Thanks for this wonderful sharing.
Although the healthy "understanding" of doctrine itself does not save us,
it is indeed a solid witness that these confessions could not be from a non-regenerated people.
Praise our Lord Jesus!

 

[Willem van Oranje]

I would respond in two main points.

1. Doctrines associated with Calvinist soteriology, such as predestination and irresistible grace, must be taught because although we experience the effects of these things, we can't sense them ourselves. When we first believe in Christ we don't necessarily realize that God had foreordained this, or that it is a result of the Spirit's work. Predestination is a secret decree not revealed until it becomes effective. Also, see in John 3, "the Spirit bloweth where he listeth, and no man knoweth whence he cometh, or whither he goeth..."

2. Other doctrines of Calvinism, such as total depravity, God's justice to punish sinners with eternal damnation, and salvation by faith alone without works are most certainly understood in some seed form by every Christian convert. Before I became Reformed, when I began to read Jonathan Edwards' Narrative of Surprising Conversions, I remember thinking that his description of the experience of conversion was the first I had read or heard which painted an accurate description of my own experience in conversion several years before.

 

[jogri17]

Of course you have to be taught. We're born stupid, sinful and intellectually lazy. Arminianism just fits in that context.