Faithful
07-05-2009, 12:04 AM
God's sovereignty is fully exercised despite man's free will, but never in denial of it.
God commands all mankind to love Him. But how could that be required of those He doesn't love and has predestined to eternal torment? Such an idea is both unbiblical and repugnant to the conscience. If all men are required to love God, and if we can only love Him because He first loved us, God must love all men. "We love him, because he loved us" (1 John 4.19).
Wouldn't it be mockery of God to plead with them to repent when He withholds from them the grace to do so?
White derides man's free will as that by which "God is limited in what He can do." God endued man with a free will so that he could love God and his fellows from his heart. Man's will is no threat to God's authority. It brings greater glory to God, who wins the love and praise of those who are free to choose. God's sovereignty is more glorious in ruling over men with free will than over puppets with no choice. If God, as Calvinism teaches, foreordained every thought, word, and deed of mankind without man's ability to have the choice, He is the instigator and perpetrator of evil, His commands and judgment are a pretense, and man is blameless. If God causes all, how can He be righteous and man guilty of the wickedness God caused him to do? For God to effect His will in spite of man's free choice is far more glorifying to Him and His sovereignty than if He would only be able to do so by denying man any freedom to choose.
Can you explain how God can foreordain, decree, and cause sin without being its author? Calvinists cannot escape the logical consequences of their teaching by simply denying it to be so. James White insists that God decreeing sin "does not make Him the author of sin." And as another Calvinist wrote, "Calvinists indeed teach that God foreordains sin, that God decrees sin, that God is the cause of sin, but they also teach that this does not make God the author of sin." Webster's New Universal Unabridged Dictionary defines author as "one who produces, creates, or brings into being; the beginner, creator, or first mover of anything."
Evil intent and jealous hearts God allows but restrains. He foreknows their hearts. He foresaw, allowed and used it for His good, preordained purposes, and allowing man to act on his own initiative but maintained under His control. As Paul says, "counsel of His will" (Eph. 1.11) not as White says, "all things according to His will." There is a difference. Sin is not His will, but He allows it. It makes no sense He would allow what He caused, so White has a slip of the pen when he writes, his god "has a purpose in what he allows." He allows what he decrees? Isn't that a contradiction to decreeing everything? It makes no sense God would allow what He caused. The only reason God allows sin is to let man exercise freedom of choice, without which we could not love God or one another. Otherwise, allow is meaningless and contradictory rhetoric.
God commands all mankind to love Him. But how could that be required of those He doesn't love and has predestined to eternal torment? Such an idea is both unbiblical and repugnant to the conscience. If all men are required to love God, and if we can only love Him because He first loved us, God must love all men. "We love him, because he loved us" (1 John 4.19).
Wouldn't it be mockery of God to plead with them to repent when He withholds from them the grace to do so?
White derides man's free will as that by which "God is limited in what He can do." God endued man with a free will so that he could love God and his fellows from his heart. Man's will is no threat to God's authority. It brings greater glory to God, who wins the love and praise of those who are free to choose. God's sovereignty is more glorious in ruling over men with free will than over puppets with no choice. If God, as Calvinism teaches, foreordained every thought, word, and deed of mankind without man's ability to have the choice, He is the instigator and perpetrator of evil, His commands and judgment are a pretense, and man is blameless. If God causes all, how can He be righteous and man guilty of the wickedness God caused him to do? For God to effect His will in spite of man's free choice is far more glorifying to Him and His sovereignty than if He would only be able to do so by denying man any freedom to choose.
Can you explain how God can foreordain, decree, and cause sin without being its author? Calvinists cannot escape the logical consequences of their teaching by simply denying it to be so. James White insists that God decreeing sin "does not make Him the author of sin." And as another Calvinist wrote, "Calvinists indeed teach that God foreordains sin, that God decrees sin, that God is the cause of sin, but they also teach that this does not make God the author of sin." Webster's New Universal Unabridged Dictionary defines author as "one who produces, creates, or brings into being; the beginner, creator, or first mover of anything."
Evil intent and jealous hearts God allows but restrains. He foreknows their hearts. He foresaw, allowed and used it for His good, preordained purposes, and allowing man to act on his own initiative but maintained under His control. As Paul says, "counsel of His will" (Eph. 1.11) not as White says, "all things according to His will." There is a difference. Sin is not His will, but He allows it. It makes no sense He would allow what He caused, so White has a slip of the pen when he writes, his god "has a purpose in what he allows." He allows what he decrees? Isn't that a contradiction to decreeing everything? It makes no sense God would allow what He caused. The only reason God allows sin is to let man exercise freedom of choice, without which we could not love God or one another. Otherwise, allow is meaningless and contradictory rhetoric.