Three Questions for Calvinists
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We should actually examine this concept of Total Depravity.
This idea, I am so bound by SIN, it's impossible to look at Creation and think this is God, or a god, did this...
Is that REALLY what the WORD of God claims?
19 because what can be known about God is plain to them—for God has shown it to them.
20 His invisible attributes—His eternal power and His divine nature—have been clearly seen ever since the creation of the world, being understood through the things that have been made. So people are without excuse—
21 for even though they knew God, they did not glorify Him as God
To Summerize the Message of these Scriptures:
what can be known about God is plain to them—for God has shown it to them, So people are without excuse—even though they knew God, they did not glorify Him as God
The REAL IMPORTANT KEY HERE IS:
even though they knew God, they did not glorify Him as God
^
This Tells Me: I am NOT SO DEPRAVED, because God, has made things so OBVIOUS to me, a SINNER, I still KNOW He is God, I just DO NOT CHOOSE to Glorify Him as God!
Once again, You create a Doctrine off Faulty Translations, of Personal Human Interpretations, it will get DESTROYED, by the TRUE WORD of GOD, EVERY TIME!
This idea, I am so bound by SIN, it's impossible to look at Creation and think this is God, or a god, did this...
Is that REALLY what the WORD of God claims?
19 because what can be known about God is plain to them—for God has shown it to them.
20 His invisible attributes—His eternal power and His divine nature—have been clearly seen ever since the creation of the world, being understood through the things that have been made. So people are without excuse—
21 for even though they knew God, they did not glorify Him as God
To Summerize the Message of these Scriptures:
what can be known about God is plain to them—for God has shown it to them, So people are without excuse—even though they knew God, they did not glorify Him as God
The REAL IMPORTANT KEY HERE IS:
even though they knew God, they did not glorify Him as God
^
This Tells Me: I am NOT SO DEPRAVED, because God, has made things so OBVIOUS to me, a SINNER, I still KNOW He is God, I just DO NOT CHOOSE to Glorify Him as God!
Once again, You create a Doctrine off Faulty Translations, of Personal Human Interpretations, it will get DESTROYED, by the TRUE WORD of GOD, EVERY TIME!
To all my Calvinist (reformed) brothers and sisters here. We are, and will always be, the few among the many. The monergistic remnant swarmed by the synergistic hordes. Don’t be drug into the weeds by these folks, simply remind them of the company they keep.
Islam
Mormonism
Jehovah Witnesses
Hinduism
Buddhism
Satanism
Scientology
Classic Penticostal
Roman Catholicism
Oneness Pentecostalism
General Baptist
All liberal Christianity
All gay and lesbian “pastors”
Joel Osteen
Beth More
Kenneth Copeland
Todd White
Td jakes
Etc. Etc. Etc.
All “synergistic”
Islam
Mormonism
Jehovah Witnesses
Hinduism
Buddhism
Satanism
Scientology
Classic Penticostal
Roman Catholicism
Oneness Pentecostalism
General Baptist
All liberal Christianity
All gay and lesbian “pastors”
Joel Osteen
Beth More
Kenneth Copeland
Todd White
Td jakes
Etc. Etc. Etc.
All “synergistic”
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If a Doctrine is made from Esoteric Opinion [Septuagint], which is NOT Biblical, it is indeed Satanic!
Thank God, we can toss the Reformed Doctrines, now.
Is the Septuagint the same as the Tanakh?
The Septuagint does not consist of a single, unified corpus. Rather, it is a collection of ancient translations of the Tanakh, along with other Jewish texts that are now commonly referred to as apocrypha.
What does apocrypha mean?
apocrypha, (from Greek apokryptein, “to hide away”), in biblical literature, works outside an accepted canon of scripture. The history of the term's usage indicates that it referred to a body of esoteric writings that were at first prized, later tolerated, and finally excluded.
Reformed Doctrines are literally based off apocrypha, or better known as, esoteric writings.
What is Esoteric Writings?
a personal interpretation!
Thank God, we can toss the Reformed Doctrines, now.
Is the Septuagint the same as the Tanakh?
The Septuagint does not consist of a single, unified corpus. Rather, it is a collection of ancient translations of the Tanakh, along with other Jewish texts that are now commonly referred to as apocrypha.
What does apocrypha mean?
apocrypha, (from Greek apokryptein, “to hide away”), in biblical literature, works outside an accepted canon of scripture. The history of the term's usage indicates that it referred to a body of esoteric writings that were at first prized, later tolerated, and finally excluded.
Reformed Doctrines are literally based off apocrypha, or better known as, esoteric writings.
What is Esoteric Writings?
a personal interpretation!
What you call "synergystic", I call Scriptural; speaking on that point:
In Calvinism, there is the "doctrine" of predestination (as I'm sure you know already), i.e. that the Lord God chose from the beginning whom would be saved and who would not. According to it: basically, if a person is saved, there's nothing they can do to lose their salvation according to this line of thinking: God chose them and that is that. Alternately, if they were not chosen to be saved, there is nothing that they can do to change this and must thus accept their fate in hell (and thus subsequently, the Lake of Fire).
Scripture says the following:
"“Then the King will say to those on His right, ‘Come, you who are blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. For I was hungry, and you gave Me something to eat; I was thirsty, and you gave Me something to drink; I was a stranger, and you invited Me in; naked, and you clothed Me; I was sick, and you visited Me; I was in prison, and you came to Me.’ Then the righteous will answer Him, ‘Lord, when did we see You hungry, and feed You, or thirsty, and give You something to drink? And when did we see You a stranger, and invite You in, or naked, and clothe You? When did we see You sick, or in prison, and come to You?’ The King will answer and say to them, ‘Truly I say to you, to the extent that you did it to one of these brothers of Mine, even the least of them, you did it to Me.’
“Then He will also say to those on His left, ‘Depart from Me, accursed ones, into the eternal fire which has been prepared for the devil and his angels; for I was hungry, and you gave Me nothing to eat; I was thirsty, and you gave Me nothing to drink; I was a stranger, and you did not invite Me in; naked, and you did not clothe Me; sick, and in prison, and you did not visit Me.’ Then they themselves also will answer, ‘Lord, when did we see You hungry, or thirsty, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, and did not take care of You?’ “Then He will answer them, ‘Truly I say to you, to the extent that you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to Me.’ “These will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.”
(Matthew 25:34-46, NASB
1995, emphasis mine)
So, two things here:
1) The passage "Come, you who are blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world."; many take this to mean " God chose you from the beginning so He's been working on this for you from the beginning". But this assumes God chose them from the beginning, and we find no indication of that here, nor in the Greek texts. Instead, what is confirmed is that the reward has been prepared for those "blessed of my Father (God the Father)'; it shows that the "kingdom" is the eternal kingdom which is the end result of all the ages, and whose preparation was begun with the creation of the heavens and the Earth.
2) The passage "Depart from Me, accursed ones, into the eternal fire which has been prepared for the devil and his angels;", to put it frankly: if the Lord God chose from the beginning who would be saved or damned, then why did Jesus not mention unsaved humans as those for which this fire had been prepared?
Or in other words: Man was never intended to go to the Lake of Fire. And one cannot claim "man was just meant to go to Hades":
"Then I saw a great white throne and Him who sat upon it, from whose presence earth and heaven fled away, and no place was found for them. And I saw the dead, the great and the small, standing before the throne, and books were opened; and another book was opened, which is the book of life; and the dead were judged from the things which were written in the books, according to their deeds. And the sea gave up the dead which were in it, and death and Hades gave up the dead which were in them; and they were judged, every one of them according to their deeds. Then death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. This is the second death, the lake of fire. And if anyone’s name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire. " (Revelation 20:11;15, NASB 1995, emphasis mine)
The Greek word used here, Hades literally means "the abode of the dead", not "the grave" (indicated by the Greek word used for Death, Thanatos . Since "death and Hades were thrown into the Lake of Fire", this means that neither could be considered a permanent situation for the unsaved, as it was always God's plan to remove death from the world permanently.
Scripture here demonstrates that Hell was never originally intended for Mankind. Man ended up bound for there when he sinned in the Garden of Eden, disobeying the Lord's only rule and making it impossible for the Lord to fellowship with man. This is why Jesus Christ had to die for us in our place.
On a final note: love cannot exist where there is no ability to choose either to love or not to love. When God created man, He also created within them the ability to make decisions and choose freely according to how they wished and felt (free will). This was necessary because love can never be coerced, OR IT IS NOT LOVE. This can be easily demonstrated by telling someone "you must tell me that you love me!" The words will have no meaning, because there is nothing there to back them. Love is caring for someone's greatest good, and when people truly love one another, they want the best for them even if it means that "best" may not be with that particular person. But if they truly love you back, they also care for your greatest good as well. God gave Adam and Eve the ability to choose to love Him or not, and the ability whether to obey Him or not.
Since "God is love" (in this case, the definition of it, as His attributes and innate nature define all things in this universe), rather than choosing to make "preprogrammed meat robots", He gave them the ability to chose for their greatest good.
Unfortunately, they chose POORLY.
With all of that said: Calvinism cannot be correct. In order for it to be true, God would have to violate a basic part of His nature, use people for a means to an end, disregard the human dignity and His Own Image that He created them in, and utterly break several passages of Scripture just for Calvinism to be true.
And he's not about to do that.
So, "synergistic"? Since all throughout Scripture we are given action commands to "watch", "listen", "repent", "pray", "follow", "walk", "do" and such...you bet the BIBLE that salvation is "synergistic"!
After all, the opposite of that is...
REBELLION
-Sojo414
In Calvinism, there is the "doctrine" of predestination (as I'm sure you know already), i.e. that the Lord God chose from the beginning whom would be saved and who would not. According to it: basically, if a person is saved, there's nothing they can do to lose their salvation according to this line of thinking: God chose them and that is that. Alternately, if they were not chosen to be saved, there is nothing that they can do to change this and must thus accept their fate in hell (and thus subsequently, the Lake of Fire).
Scripture says the following:
"“Then the King will say to those on His right, ‘Come, you who are blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. For I was hungry, and you gave Me something to eat; I was thirsty, and you gave Me something to drink; I was a stranger, and you invited Me in; naked, and you clothed Me; I was sick, and you visited Me; I was in prison, and you came to Me.’ Then the righteous will answer Him, ‘Lord, when did we see You hungry, and feed You, or thirsty, and give You something to drink? And when did we see You a stranger, and invite You in, or naked, and clothe You? When did we see You sick, or in prison, and come to You?’ The King will answer and say to them, ‘Truly I say to you, to the extent that you did it to one of these brothers of Mine, even the least of them, you did it to Me.’
“Then He will also say to those on His left, ‘Depart from Me, accursed ones, into the eternal fire which has been prepared for the devil and his angels; for I was hungry, and you gave Me nothing to eat; I was thirsty, and you gave Me nothing to drink; I was a stranger, and you did not invite Me in; naked, and you did not clothe Me; sick, and in prison, and you did not visit Me.’ Then they themselves also will answer, ‘Lord, when did we see You hungry, or thirsty, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, and did not take care of You?’ “Then He will answer them, ‘Truly I say to you, to the extent that you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to Me.’ “These will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.”
(Matthew 25:34-46, NASB
1995, emphasis mine)
So, two things here:
1) The passage "Come, you who are blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world."; many take this to mean " God chose you from the beginning so He's been working on this for you from the beginning". But this assumes God chose them from the beginning, and we find no indication of that here, nor in the Greek texts. Instead, what is confirmed is that the reward has been prepared for those "blessed of my Father (God the Father)'; it shows that the "kingdom" is the eternal kingdom which is the end result of all the ages, and whose preparation was begun with the creation of the heavens and the Earth.
2) The passage "Depart from Me, accursed ones, into the eternal fire which has been prepared for the devil and his angels;", to put it frankly: if the Lord God chose from the beginning who would be saved or damned, then why did Jesus not mention unsaved humans as those for which this fire had been prepared?
Or in other words: Man was never intended to go to the Lake of Fire. And one cannot claim "man was just meant to go to Hades":
"Then I saw a great white throne and Him who sat upon it, from whose presence earth and heaven fled away, and no place was found for them. And I saw the dead, the great and the small, standing before the throne, and books were opened; and another book was opened, which is the book of life; and the dead were judged from the things which were written in the books, according to their deeds. And the sea gave up the dead which were in it, and death and Hades gave up the dead which were in them; and they were judged, every one of them according to their deeds. Then death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. This is the second death, the lake of fire. And if anyone’s name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire. " (Revelation 20:11;15, NASB 1995, emphasis mine)
The Greek word used here, Hades literally means "the abode of the dead", not "the grave" (indicated by the Greek word used for Death, Thanatos . Since "death and Hades were thrown into the Lake of Fire", this means that neither could be considered a permanent situation for the unsaved, as it was always God's plan to remove death from the world permanently.
Scripture here demonstrates that Hell was never originally intended for Mankind. Man ended up bound for there when he sinned in the Garden of Eden, disobeying the Lord's only rule and making it impossible for the Lord to fellowship with man. This is why Jesus Christ had to die for us in our place.
On a final note: love cannot exist where there is no ability to choose either to love or not to love. When God created man, He also created within them the ability to make decisions and choose freely according to how they wished and felt (free will). This was necessary because love can never be coerced, OR IT IS NOT LOVE. This can be easily demonstrated by telling someone "you must tell me that you love me!" The words will have no meaning, because there is nothing there to back them. Love is caring for someone's greatest good, and when people truly love one another, they want the best for them even if it means that "best" may not be with that particular person. But if they truly love you back, they also care for your greatest good as well. God gave Adam and Eve the ability to choose to love Him or not, and the ability whether to obey Him or not.
Since "God is love" (in this case, the definition of it, as His attributes and innate nature define all things in this universe), rather than choosing to make "preprogrammed meat robots", He gave them the ability to chose for their greatest good.
Unfortunately, they chose POORLY.
With all of that said: Calvinism cannot be correct. In order for it to be true, God would have to violate a basic part of His nature, use people for a means to an end, disregard the human dignity and His Own Image that He created them in, and utterly break several passages of Scripture just for Calvinism to be true.
And he's not about to do that.
So, "synergistic"? Since all throughout Scripture we are given action commands to "watch", "listen", "repent", "pray", "follow", "walk", "do" and such...you bet the BIBLE that salvation is "synergistic"!
After all, the opposite of that is...
REBELLION
-Sojo414
The Holy Spirit or "Comforter" "reproves" the World of Sin, Righteousness and judgement. (Acts 16:7-8) In other words, when He deals with our heart, He convicts us of our sin, presents us with God's righteousness(God's perfection and Jesus' work on the cross), and our impending damnation in Hell. Trusting in the Lord Jesus Christ for salvation is a totally selfish "act" because the believer's #1 priority, at the time, is escaping the judgement of Hell. It IS something that you "do" as it involves your God-given freewill, but it is NOT a "work" because it doesn't involve any physical "deed": It all takes place in the heart. How do I know? Because I believed on Him (on May 11, 1986). Could I have rejected Him? Yes. Felix did....
And as he reasoned of righteousness, temperance, and judgment to come, Felix trembled, and answered, Go thy way for this time; when I have a convenient season, I will call for thee. -Acts 24:25
None of that is "works" so it is not "synergism" and none of it is "monergism" or "fatalism" because it involves the free will.
And as he reasoned of righteousness, temperance, and judgment to come, Felix trembled, and answered, Go thy way for this time; when I have a convenient season, I will call for thee. -Acts 24:25
None of that is "works" so it is not "synergism" and none of it is "monergism" or "fatalism" because it involves the free will.
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Because Calvinists all believe the same thing? LOL. Your attitude would suggest they do, when in reality, they don't.
Just more of your contradictory attitude, which is in need of a major adjustment.
Are you a puppet, or do you co-operate with God's will and His plan for your life?
Your rants and diatribes against "synergism" suggest you believe yourself to be a puppet.
Just more of your contradictory attitude, which is in need of a major adjustment.
Are you a puppet, or do you co-operate with God's will and His plan for your life?
Your rants and diatribes against "synergism" suggest you believe yourself to be a puppet.
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Another example of God giving men free will. And notice that he WANTS them to "choose life". So if they do NOT "choose life" then wouldn't that be "thwarting His will" ?(according to calvinists encountered)
15 See, I have set before thee this day life and good, and death and evil;
16 In that I command thee this day to love the Lord thy God, to walk in his ways, and to keep his commandments and his statutes and his judgments, that thou mayest live and multiply: and the Lord thy God shall bless thee in the land whither thou goest to possess it.
17 But if thine heart turn away, so that thou wilt not hear, but shalt be drawn away, and worship other gods, and serve them;
18 I denounce unto you this day, that ye shall surely perish, and that ye shall not prolong your days upon the land, whither thou passest over Jordan to go to possess it.
19 I call heaven and earth to record this day against you, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing: therefore choose life, that both thou and thy seed may live:
20 That thou mayest love the Lord thy God, and that thou mayest obey his voice, and that thou mayest cleave unto him: for he is thy life, and the length of thy days: that thou mayest dwell in the land which the Lord sware unto thy fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give them.
15 See, I have set before thee this day life and good, and death and evil;
16 In that I command thee this day to love the Lord thy God, to walk in his ways, and to keep his commandments and his statutes and his judgments, that thou mayest live and multiply: and the Lord thy God shall bless thee in the land whither thou goest to possess it.
17 But if thine heart turn away, so that thou wilt not hear, but shalt be drawn away, and worship other gods, and serve them;
18 I denounce unto you this day, that ye shall surely perish, and that ye shall not prolong your days upon the land, whither thou passest over Jordan to go to possess it.
19 I call heaven and earth to record this day against you, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing: therefore choose life, that both thou and thy seed may live:
20 That thou mayest love the Lord thy God, and that thou mayest obey his voice, and that thou mayest cleave unto him: for he is thy life, and the length of thy days: that thou mayest dwell in the land which the Lord sware unto thy fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give them.
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And as he reasoned of righteousness, temperance, and judgment to come, Felix trembled, and answered, Go thy way for this time; when I have a convenient season, I will call for thee. -Acts 24:25
Again, the Holy Spirit or "Comforter" let Felix know that Jesus Christ and His work on calvary was the only way, that Felix was a lowdown wicked sinner, and that Felix was bound for Hell. Then "Felix trembled" in terror my friend. That was God the Holy Spirit speaking to his heart and he put it off for a "more convenient season". God WANTS everyone to be saved, He wants people to "choose life" but when they put it off like Felix did, they get death.
Again, the Holy Spirit or "Comforter" let Felix know that Jesus Christ and His work on calvary was the only way, that Felix was a lowdown wicked sinner, and that Felix was bound for Hell. Then "Felix trembled" in terror my friend. That was God the Holy Spirit speaking to his heart and he put it off for a "more convenient season". God WANTS everyone to be saved, He wants people to "choose life" but when they put it off like Felix did, they get death.
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