Why I Am Not A Calvinist

By NORMAN L. GEISLER

(These are notes I made listening to Dr. Geisler. I have augmented them slightly.)

There were two lines in heaven, one marked PREDESTINED and the other FREE WILL.

A man got in the one marked PREDESTINATION and was why are you here. He said I got here because I chose to be here. They told him he belonged in the other line.

When he got to the head of the FREE WILL line they asked why he was there and he said they told me I was predestined to be there.

The acrostic regarding the five points of Calvinism are called T-U-L-I-P. The modern day doctrine was started in the Netherlands where tulips grow freely. The points are:

TOTAL DEPRAVITY
UNCONDITIONAL ELECTION
LIMITED ATONEMENT
IRRESISTIBLE GRACE
PERSEVERANCE OF THE SAINTS

I. TOTAL DEPRAVITY
Calvinists believe man is so totally depraved he no longer has the capacity to comprehend God’s grace. As a result man can’t believe and be saved. Therefore, they believe God has to regenerate them, that is save them and give them a new nature, with which they can believe. Regeneration means to give a dead person life. For them regeneration precedes faith.

How is “dead” to be understood? It either means separation or annihilation. Calvinists interpret it to mean annihilation. Correctly understood it means separation. Adam and Eve are examples. Genesis 3:3 God said that in the day they would eat of the tree in the midst of the garden they would “surely die.” They did not die physically, but they were separated from God, dead to the truth. The image of God was still in them. It was effaced, but not erased.

Unsaved people, that is those who have not been regenerated can know the truth. Romans 1: 19 says they can see and understand the things of God. I Corinthians 1: 14 notes they can perceive the truth of God and still not believe the truth.

Ephesians 2: 1 is their basis for this belief. “You He has made alive who were dead in trespasses.” The death spoken of was spiritual not physical. Ephesians 2: 8 says, “For by grace are you saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is a gift of God.” In this text faith comes before salvation. Romans 5:1 confirms this. “Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with Go through our Lord Jesus Christ.”

II. UNCONDITIONAL ELECTION
Calvinists believe election is unconditional on God’s part. There is no condition for Him giving it. There is no condition for receiving it. It is given by grace. They believe you don’t have to believe to receive. God gives salvation regardless of what a person believes. After receiving His regeneration then the person believes. Extreme Calvinists believe God chooses who will believe. In reality God chooses them because He foreknows who will believe. I Peter 1: 2 “…elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father….” Romans 8: 29 “For whom He foreknew, He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son….” To foreknow does not mean to make to happen.

Suppose a person is sitting on a mountain side from which he can see running along another mountain a roadway. From his vantage point he can see just around a curve in the road a bridge out. He can see a car speeding down the road. He knows that traveling at that speed the car will go off the bridge. He foreknows it, but he does not make it happen. The fact God foreknows something does not mean He makes it happen.

Texts often referred to are: Ephesians 1: 3,5 “Blessed be the Lord God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ…. having predestined us to adoption as sons by Jesus Christ.”

“Predestination” means predetermined destiny. The Greek word translated predestination is “proorizo.” It was a surveyors term which meant to mark out a boundary. For example years ago surveyors marked out a boundary and decided all within that territory would be called Georgia and/or Georgians. Spiritually before the dawn of creation God marked off a boundary and predetermined all within that boundary would be saved. The boundary is defined in Ephesians 1 as being “in Him” (vs. 4, 7,10) and “in Christ” (vs. 10). “As many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become the sons of God” (John 1:12).

We believe and they we receive. Salvation does not come out of our will, but it comes through our will. To God be the glory. If a person gives another $1,000 the giver gets the credit. We receive salvation, but it is given us. We, the receiver, the beggar, God is the giver deserving all the glory.

III. LIMITED ATONEMENT
Calvinists believe Christ did not die for all men, He died only for the elect. That is in conflict with many Scriptures.

“God so loved the world….” John 3:16 “Christ died for the ungodly” Romans 5:6 That includes everyone for “all have sinned and come short of the glory of God.” Romans 3:23 “…One died for all…” II Cor. 5:14 Calvinists interpret “all” and the “world” to mean all the elect of the world only. All, all means is “all,” the whole world, everybody. “…God our Savior, who desires all men to be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth.” I Timothy 2: 3,4 It does not say “some.” Hebrews 2: 9 “…that He, by the grace of God, might taste death for “everyone.” “The Lord is not slack concerning His promises, as some men count slackness, but is longsuffering toward us, not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance.” II Peter 3:9

John 1:29 “Behold! The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.! “He is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the whole world.” I John 2:2 Calvinists interpret this to mean the Christian world. I John 2: 16 defines the world as something more that the Christian world: “For all that is in the world — the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life — is not of the Father, but is of the world.” I John 4:8 “God is love.” is nature being love, He must love all people. He is pictured a being all loving. Therefore, God does not love just the elect.

Imagine a farmer has a large pond around which there is a fence with such signs as: “No Trespassing,” “Stay out,” “Danger, Keep Out.” One day he drives by on his tractor and saw three boys in the pond in danger of drowning. Three responses are possible. H e might say, “I warned them. They are getting what they deserve.” Is this a loving person? He could have lassoed one and call out, “You in the blue shirt, I am throwing you a rope I going to save you.” The other two he willingly leaves to drown. Is this a loving person? He could throw all three a rope. One accept and the other two decide they can do it themselves. Each of the two determine on their own free will if he will grasp it and be saved.

IV. IRRESISTIBLE GRACE
Calvinists believe God is all powerful and can save anybody, even against their will. However, He chooses to use His power to save only those He chooses to save. If the choice is God’s and He is all loving He must love everyone. In Matthew 23: 37 Jesus is depicted as saying of Jerusalem “I wanted to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing.” Love will not force them to love Him against their will. Forced love isn’t love. God works persuasively, but not forcefully. Either a person says, “Thy, will be done O God” or God says, “Thy will be done.” He will not force anyone against their will.

The grace of God can be resisted. Acts 7: 51 describes persons who resist God’s grace as “stiff-necked” saying, “You always resist the Holy Spirit.” Romans 9 poses several questions. It notes God loved Jacob and hated Esau. God did not hate Esau in the sense of cursing him or deliberately being hostile to him personally without cause. Esau was a blessed man (Gen. 39: 9 & 36: 1 – 42).

In his letter to the church in Rome (9: 13) Paul quoted a passage from Malachi (1: 2, 3).

In these texts the word “hate” is used hyperbolically, that is in an exaggerated sense, as it is in other Bible passages. It is used in a relative sense such as when Jesus said we are to “hate” our father and mother. In using it in a relative sense, He was saying compared to the love for God our love for our parents is as though it were hate. This does not discourage love for parents, but it encourages stronger love for God.

“Hate” as used in the case of Jacob and Esau is not used in a positive sense, but in a relative sense to simply express a strong preference for the conduct of Jacob. It was a result of moral resentment. God has a strong distaste and disgust for sin. Therefore, He disapproved of the sin of Esau. If God had acted otherwise He would have been acting contrary to His very own holy nature.

Based on Romans 9: 10-13 some have concluded God loved Esau and hated Jacob before their births. Not so. It is logical that God should have responded negatively to Jacob as a result on his sins. God did not, and does not, arbitrarily, capriciously, temperamentally, or impulsively make any judgment contrary to traits of His character, some of which are: love, grace, knowledge, and mercy.

God’s perspective is different from ours. He knows things we can never know. In His foreknowledge He knew what the mind set of the two would be. He did not make them chose as they did, but He knew what they would choose. God’s “hate” toward Esau did not cause Esau’s conduct, Esau’s conduct caused God’s aversion to him because of his own willful mind and heart set of“hate” God preceded God’s”hate” for Him and was the consequence of Esau’s free willed hate not the cause of his “hate.” Esau hated God and the kind of hate he had is a sin. God has a form of hate that is righteous indignation which causes Him to “hate” sin. Esau having hated God it was inevitable that God must hate him because of the unrepentant sin in his life or be untrue to His holy and just nature.

God, in His foreknowledge, knew before their births Jacob would love Him and Esau “hate” Him. He did not dictate that Jacob would love Him and Esau hate Him, but He knew each would respond as they did. The fact He foreknew does not mean He made them act as they did. The term “hated” is a relative term meaning, “loved less.” It is the term used to in Genesis 29: 30, 31 to describe Jacob as loving Rachel, but he loved Leah less. Why did God love Jacob more and Esau less? Because He foreknew Esau’s evil deeds. The same sun that melts wax hardens clay. He loved them both.

V. PERSEVERANCE OF THE SAINTS
For the Calvinist the only way a person knows they are saved is to die. If you are one of the elect you will hold out. “I know whom I have believed and that He is able to keep that which I have committed….” II Tim. 1:2

GOD IS LOVE, GOD LOVES ALL, CHRIST DIED FOR ALL

Nelson Price