This entry is a continuation of Are We “Free”. If you have not read that entry yet, I would suggest you read it and it’s comments before continuing with this entry.
Again when you get into the issue of “free” will I think “free” is the wrong term to use here. No one is free. If you are free then go join the Cardinals Baseball team, because apparently you are free to do so. It is very easy to think of the word “free” in the wrong way and it is better to not use the word at all. It’s not a matter of being free or not being free, but it is a matter of being able to choose. You can’t choose on all things, but you are allowed to choose some things. For example did you choose who your mother was? That wasn’t your choice, you didn’t have a free choice to go to any parent you wanted to go to, but instead God knew you before you were born, formed you in the womb, and he placed you where you are, it was not your decision to make. You also cannot make the free choice to fly. If you go and jump off the roof of your house you are going to fall to the ground, there is no dispute about this you don’t get a choice. And just like we live under the laws of gravity we also live under the laws of God and there are certain things that we do not get a “free” choice on.
I do think it is clear that people get to make choices and real choices that have real consequences. I can eat and drink when I want, and I can even climb up to the roof of my house and jump off if I choose to do so, there are some freedoms of decisions, but to say we are “free” is a mis-communication.
I am having a very hard time agreeing with the fact that people who are not saved have the choice to do good, because it seems to me that scripture teaches without the Holy Spirit you don’t have the power to do good. Paul says that he wants to do good, but he cannot carry it out in Romans 7:18. He cannot carry it out because of what he says in 7:14, “…I am unspiritual, sold as a slave to sin.”
I definitely do not claim to have all the answers, but as always I seek to be as biblical as I can about all such issues. The Bible most certainly talks about Sovereignty, Predestination, Election, and all of those other issues, so they are real things that God wanted us to be aware of, so I seek to try and understand them to the best of my ability. In order to do that I not only seek the answers in the Bible, but I also seek the opinions and teachings of other pastors, philosophers, and theologians. I would not call myself a Calvinist because I do not completely agree with every single point Calvin makes, but I do agree with most of what he says. I have great respect for Calvin because he was a tremendous theologian and a man truly blessed by God with wisdom and discernment and he was used in a great way during the reformation period that has helped to make our religion what it is today. Many people are instantly against Calvin and do not pay attention to anything that he taught as a theologian just because they disagree with one or two points that he makes, and that is both a shame and a unfortunate assumption. There are many great truths, and a lot of wisdom that comes from Calvin, Luther, and many of the other reformers in that time period.
I do not agree with the teachings of the Roman Catholic Church, but that does not change the fact that our religion was born out of the teachings of that very Church. Over the years we continued to look at the teachings of the Church, found things we did agree with that stood the test of time that we still hold true today, and then found things that we did not agree with that we changed in order to be more obedient to the inerrant scripture of God. So does that mean I should hate the Roman Catholic Church and their teachings and the Reformed Protestant Churches that don’t share the same belief that I do on only some issues not all of them? If I disagree with something my parents teach me, does that cause me to reject all their teachings they ever taught me alltogether? I do not support the wrong views of scripture, but I also do not support recjection of the views that are right.
It is my same issue with the whole Harry Potter series. If you have not read the books or seen the movies then you have no right to cast an opinion on something you know nothing about. Just because people hear that Harry Potter has magic in it they cast it off as witchcraft and sinfulness only by what they hear from others. In the same way people who know nothing about Calvin and why he is a Reformer and the theology he taught and the things that he did hear from other people his teaching on election and they completely reject him as being a heretic. That my friends is not right. The bible says to question everything an hold on to the good. I think we can definitely find a ton of good to hold onto in the teachings of all the puritans, reformers, and all the other people who shaped our religion into what it is today. That doesn’t mean we should believe every single thing, but we should question it all, put it to the test against scripture, and what we find to be truth we hold onto.
Pressed
I like these clarifications…I agree especially with two things you have said–No one is totally free, and non-Christians cannot do good. Very strong points that we need to think about. I agree with some of Calvin and Piper’s teachings, but some just don’t seem right in my heart. In fact, our dinner table discussion here for the last 2 days has been about Calvinism (a continuation from last year). One of my friends is a Calvinist, and the other is seriously looking into it. I am still researching a lot about this topic, but I have to go with what’s in my heart, and what the Bible tells me is true. But I like I said, Calvin does have some great debatable points, however, I just don’t think some things measure up. I have seen way too many personal evidences of Christ in my life to think otherwise.
Jeremiah 17:9-10 “The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure. Who can understand it? I the Lord search the heart and examine the mind, to reward a man according to his conduct, according to what his deeds deserve.”
I am not comfortable with using the statements “in my heart.” In saying “it just don’t seem right in my heart” and “I just have to go with what is in my heart” you are placing a lot of trust on understanding the Word in something that is “deceitful above all things.” If I went with ‘what’s in my heart’ all the time I would make some poor choices in life. Just because it is “in your heart” so to speak doesn’t make the Word anymore true or anymore more false, it says what it says.
I am not saying that this is what you are doing, but I feel like a lot of people use that excuse “just gotta go with my heart” as a cop-out to get out of having to think about or believe something that makes them uncomfortable, and just because something makes you uncomfortable or causes a stirring in your heart does not in anyway mean that it is wrong but it does me it is new. For example, when I am sitting there reading and trying to learn something and then I suddenly have a huge revelation and understanding of the scripture it physically affects me. I get this heavy weight on my and I actually have become depressed and sick before just because of this new understanding, not because it was wrong, but because it was so right. If I would have “just went with my heart” at that point in my life I would have tossed that new found belief out the window and basically would have ended up tossing the baby out with the garbage.
Just a bit of wisdom, don’t be so quick to ‘go with the heart’ because ‘the heart is deceitful above all things’, instead seek wisdom and understanding in the truth of the word, even if that truth is almost to uncomfortable and unthinkable to bear.
For years and years now people have fought about these very same issues, it is nothing new to society today. You can never prove Calvin to be wrong, and in fact most of the time scripture proves him right. But on some issues that people just cannot accept as true, they cannot prove it to be false without stretching the scripture to make it say things it doesn’t. I am not in anyway saying that he is completely right about election and predestination, but I cannot prove him to be wrong either. Most people come to that same conclusion and instead of acting intelligent about it their instinct is to bash Calvin, say a bunch of negative smart alec comments about his teaching and think that they have proven him wrong when in fact they have just acted like a bunch of anti-intellectual idiots. (I have read a few web-sites where people with no understanding whatsoever on the subject, just bash it cause it is something to bash, they can’t even come close to proving themselves right.)
The right way to approach it is not to violently throw it out with the garbage but to read it, and seek to understand why Calvin is saying what he says. Don’t blow steam on something you know nothing about, but take his teachings, his commentaries, his sermons and read them, study them, understand where he is coming from and why he thinks the scripture says what it does, and then take the time to think about why you think it is not that way. That is the only way to deal with it intellectually, and that is the only way that is real. It’s not something that you can just learn in two seconds, but it is something that you need to study and learn and come to an understanding on through time and thought. Calvin taught what he did because he truly thought that it is what the scriptures teach, not because he wanted to confuse everyone. So find out why he believed that. Study the language, study his stuff and learn. That is the only respectable way to approach this whole issue.
Earlier I said that I thought non-Christians are capable of doing good. Well didn’t mean that in the biblical sense “good”. But non-Christians are capable of recognizing and even doing virtuos things. But of course, they can not be pleasing to God, because only a relationship with His Son makes us pleasing to him. In the predestination debate, there have been times when I thought I was with a doubt right, and other times when I thought I was proven wrong. But I always come back to my original belief, which is that we are not totally free as has been mentioned in previous posts, but that God has given us considerable choice in our actions, and even if we want to follow him. Could God force salvation on someone, of course he could, but I don’t believe that’s the way he works. How can we love God, if its forced on us? If its forced on us, then aren’t we really just robots? God is a person, like and not like you and me. He wants people to freely choose to love Him, just like you and me. It would be nice if we could just force all people to love you and me, but then would it be love? Love implies a choice
I knew comments would arise when I talked about going with my heart. What I mean is going with the urgings and voice of the Holy Spirit in my soul. I trust the Holy Spirit to lead me in a direction that is always growing…He does this through speaking to my soul, and to the Word. Thank you for clearing that up though. I need to be more careful about what I say.
I don’t think God forces anyone to love him. But the argument isn’t about being forced because the whole idea of being “forced” is being made to do something that you don’t really want to do. I don’t think anyone who has ever come to salvation was being sucked into something they really didn’t want to do. Of course we are not ‘robots’ we established that a long time ago when we established the fact that we can make choices and decisions.
A lot of people use the argument of being a robot to try and emphasize their free will stance but that argument doesn’t seem like it holds up with me. We have established that we have a free choice in some things but not all things, so does that mean I am half robot and half human?
I don’t think the question is about God forcing anyone to do anything, I don’t beleive that. The real question lies within the idea of the drawing of the Holy Spirit. Can a person reject the Holy Spirit when it is drawing them to salvation? That is the heart of the issue. Finding the biblical teaching on that will help aid understanding of this whole issue. Because if people can reject it then the idea of election as Calvin defines it is false becasue that means that the people who are the ‘elect’ can reject salvation and they are not actually ‘elect’. But if a person cannot reject the drawing of the Holy Spirit unto salvation then the idea of election as Calvin defines it can be true, because that means all the people that the Holy Spirit draws to himself will accept Christ. This doesn’t mean they are forced in the sense of they are doing something they don’t really want to do, it simply means they cannot reject God.
I will say that I lean towards the idea that people can reject the Holy Spirit’s calling on them. I can’t fully stand up under that and prove it to be the truth, but from what I know at this point in life that is my belief. But it causes a problem because now I can’t easily explain what the Bible means by ‘election’. It makes the explaination of predestination and election a bit more difficult. But I am still learning and seeking to understand myself. It has taken almost three years now to come to the conclusion I am at now, but it still is not completely closed.
People certainly don’t like the idea of being a puppet or that people are elected to salvation. Sometimes I feel that those feelings start coming from a humanist point of veiw which I am totally opposed to. Taking what we think God would do and saying I can’t believe that He would do that is dangerous. That brings God under our own understanding and then that makes your understanding god.
Whether not someone can reject the Holy Spirit is the big question.
Here are a few of my observances:
The rich young ruler, he came to Christ, but could not give up his riches, and Christ new this would be essential to his salvation. So did he experience conviction from the Holy Spirit and reject it, or did he only want Christ because he thought it could enhance his material life? Anyway you take it, he came seeking, but rejected Christ.
Why do some people become “saved” in America only to turn their backs on God later. They must have been convicted in order to “go forward”, as we Christians say. Did they feel the calling of the Holy Spirit but did not commit?
When I mentioned this to a assistant pastor in South Africa, he asked me if he thought that people could experience “partial grace.”
I might have an answer for Stuarts above posting about why people become saved only to reject God later on. While I can’t say this is true in all cases, I suspect it’s a lot more common than we might think. It’s called emotion.
I think and have observed that people get stirred up in some emotional moment that compels them to enter into a “salvation experience”. One way that this occurs (unfortunately) is through praise and worship and on mission trips. Don’t get me wrong. These things are definately of God when they’re done right. But I’ve seen it done wrong a lot too. I’ve seen where praise choruses get people all stirred up and teary eyed and emotional. In the turrent of that emotional moment, they make a decision, be it on their own or by the (godless and narcissitic) promting of another. When the emotion fades, so does the commitment that came with the decision. I’ve also seen praise chorses confused with love songs. Yikes! You can see what a horrible mess this can be, so i won’t get into it right now. Let’s just say that directing something to man that was meant for God will only reap destruction because you’ve made another individual your god.
Another way that people make “false commitments” is through an emotion called fear. Knocking on some strangers door and asking them if they’re going to hell scares people. Nobody wants to burn. So out of fear, they make a commitment to a God that they know nothing about (and then we pat ourselves on the back b/c we rang up another soul for God…isn’t He lucky to have us?….yeah, right). There’s no foundation of knowledge on which to base their decision. Only an emotional fear that they’ll burn burn burn…..in a ring of fire….in a ring of fire (sorry, I just like that song…anyway).
So, basically what i’m saying is that “backsliders” or “false salvations” mostly come as a result of being an emotion junkie and using your heart and not your head. When you’re feeling that emotion, you’re there and God is cool and you’re on fire. But when the emotion fades, so does the decision that was made on that emotion.
Or maybe some people are just freaks.
I couldn’t agree with you more Le Renard about the whole idea of emotion. There is some false idea out there that emotion changes people, and we just need to build everything we do up to an emotional point to get people to make decisions, but the only problem is their decisions are fake.
Now to Stuart I would say that there is a big difference between ‘conviction’ and ‘feelings’. People don’t have to feel real conviction to go forward. If I am afraid of going to hell, or I feel like I need to fit in or any other kind of feeling that can cause me to go forward will do, but it doesn’t have to be conviction. This is how you get people who claim to be saved but really do not know what being saved really means. And the Church has done a poor job of explaining to people what salvation really is.
Now to your comment about the Rich Young Ruler. We don’t know for sure if he was being drawn by the Holy Spirit or if he was just going on his own accord to Jesus, and this makes a big difference when it comes to understanding his rejection. And really we can’t say for sure either way.
I recognize that my posting on this subject will likely never be read. After all, I did not read the posting others have left concerning the topic. I just wanted to say that you might be better understood if you made distinctions between free will and free choice (as you did) and independance and freedom. Freedom of choice is what we posess. There are a number of things withing a number of God set “boundaries” from which we can choose. However, we are not independent or autonomous so as to have complete will. We cannot leave Missouri and be in Alaska in ten seconds no matter how hard we try. We are dependant, like it or not, on other things.
As far as the “can a non-believer do good?” No, without faith, it is impossible to please God (Hebrews 11).
Jim Shultz
Thank you very much for you post Jim. I did not explain myself very well, and frankly I wasn’t thinking about our dependance and how that affects our ability to do things. Very good point.