An email came into the Credo House today containing this question:
I’m wrestling with Calvin right now and as a parent I have hit a wall…What if my kids aren’t elect? The idea sickens me but it has to be possible. I have a hard time just shrugging that off and saying that it is to God’s glory.
What follows is my response for the sake of processing the topic for yourself:
Thanks for contacting the Credo House. I have 3 precious children and I am personally a Calvinist so please know that I’m not responding to you from a purely intellectual standpoint.
Taking a step back from this particular issue, I think we would all agree with the popular saying that, “God has no grandchildren.” God only has children. No one gets into heaven because they were related to people who were Christians. Even the most ardent Calvinist and the most ardent Arminian would agree that each individual must come to Jesus on their own. So there cannot be any absolute guarantee that all children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren, etc… of all Christians will go to heaven. If this were true then the entire world would probably be a Christian. The Bible is full of statements where every person must consciously believe in Jesus to have eternal life (John 3:16).
If someone tries to defend the “all children of Christians go to heaven” position there aren’t too many verses along these lines. One verse they could point to is the Proverb of training up a child and they won’t depart. This verse, however, needs to be kept in the Genre of Proverbs. Proverbs are statements to make us wise. Proverbs are generally true but shouldn’t be considered an absolute certainty.
For example, if I put 20% of my paycheck in savings and I’m careful to spend less than I make it is wise to think that I should be financially stable. It is a generally true statement. My car could break down, my house could flood in a way that insurance refuses to pay and I could have someone steal my identity and ruin my credit scores. The Proverb is still true. Although I perfectly followed the accurate Proverb, I can still be in financial shambles. So pointing to a proverb as a magical formula is violating the rules for interpreting the Genre. The Bible is made up of many Genres. Poetry is interpreted very differently from narrative (i.e., a woman’s neck being a mighty tower). We have to keep Proverbs inside it’s Genre.
Getting back to the issue at hand, how does a Calvinist cope with kids who might not love Jesus? First, I pray for them until I am blue in the face. Or at least that is my desire. I pray they would come to love Jesus as authentically and passionately as my wife and I do. My wife started praying for the salvation of our kids before they were even a twinkle in her eye.
For instance, when pastor Matt Chandler thought he was dying from a cancerous brain tumor, he realized the greatest thing he could do for his infant daughter is to devote the remaining energy he has to praying for her salvation and her future walk with Jesus.
Secondly, my wife and I are always trying to tell our kids about Jesus and hopefully build in them an authentic love for and desire for Jesus. Although Calvinists believe that no one comes to the Father unless they are drawn, Calvinists never know who those people are. Calvinists don’t have a copy of the book of Life. As Spurgeon said we pray knowing it depends fully on God, but we share as if it depends fully on us.
Ultimately, however, if a child (or parent, co-worker, etc…) rejects Jesus their entire life and dies in that rejection then we don’t commit suicide thinking that we didn’t share good enough so they are damned because of our failures to convince them of Jesus. We trust the loving heart of God that for whatever reason they would have hated a heaven where Jesus is the center of attention. We think we know better than God as it relates to saving people, it’s a lifetime for all of us to learn that He is more loving, more generous, more caring, more fair than we could ever imagine. I believe Paul clearly teaches people are elect for salvation yet he still pleads with all people, every one, to come to Jesus.Even when people, like ardent atheist Christopher Hitchens, seemingly die as God haters I still many times hold out hope that in their last breath God opened their eyes and they came to Jesus. I reserve ultimate despair for later when we will truly know. Then God will console us and help us understand things we can’t know now.
In the meantime, however, I am pleading with all to love and be loved by the only One worth the worship.
211 replies to "What if My Children Are Not Elect?"
Btw, note the biblical word “foreknowledge”! (1 Peter 1: 2), which is connected to the “elect exiles” (verse 1, the people themselves), with too “sanctification of the Spirit”… “for obedience to Jesus Christ and for sprinkling with his blood.” Baptism can only be a “sign” and “seal” of this the great providence and purpose in God In Christ. But not and never the “reality” itself! (See, John 3: 8) None of us are really born-again by baptism, but by Christ! As we can hear St. Paul say: “For Christ sent me not to baptize, (in and of itself): but to preach the gospel.” (1 Cor. 1: 17)
But he did send the twelve to baptize!
Yes, Christian Baptism is a wonderful sign & seal of our salvation ‘In Christ’! Part and parcel of Christian discipleship and obedience.
Brother Stumblefoot,
You wrongly assume that God is under any obligation to provide a “safety net” for every human being. You also wrongly assume that God loves every person in the world. No, God loves every kind of person – Jew and Gentile, rich and poor, slave and free, male and female. Further, since Revelation tells us that Jesus was slain from before the foundation of the world, we know that the cross was part of God’s plan even before He spoke Creation into existence.
God is the potter, we are the clay: He has every right to do with us as He pleases. He will indeed have mercy on whom He will have mercy and He will harden whom He will harden.
Further, Jesus’ death on the cross purchased the actual salvation of specific individuals (the elect). It didn’t merely make salvation possible, but dependent on something that sinful man must bring to the table (making man sovereign over God because it makes man the final arbiter of his own salvation and not God). The crucifixion was an act of penal substitution, the innocent for the guilty. Jesus died in the place of the elect (and only in their place). He bore their punishment and, thereby, purchased their salvation.
God is not under any obligation to save anyone and all of us are wholly deserving of eternity in the Lake of Fire. If He chooses to be merciful by saving even one person, that is His right. It is also His right not to save anyone at all.
I think one thing we would all agree on is, whoever is right, however it works, when all is said and done, God will have been right to do what he did! it’s not a question of whether God is right or wrong to do what he does, however he chooses to do it. It’s a question of whether WE are right or wrong about what we THINK God does and how he does it. But in order to grow from this discussion, one must at least *wonder* if the other guy could be right. He’s probably not, but … maybe he’s got a good point?!?
Mike O,
God IS right in everything He does. Whether He saves no one or saves everyone or only saves some, He will have been right to do it. He is the potter; we are the clay: He has the absolute right to do with us as He wills and we have no right to question is choices.
@ mike
Amen brother that is what I’ve been getting to all along God is right period. Those parents do need prayer and some consoling it would be cold and heartless not to. However they also need to come to the truth Luke 14:26 We need to keep God uppermost in our affections that doesn’t mean don’t love your wife and kids but Christ is and deserves to be Preemminet.
Whether (modern) Calvinism is right or wrong is not really the point, either. The point is how Calvinism answers the parent in the original post. There is nothing it can offer to provide peace of mind or hope in the heart for a parent who is afraid her child may not be elect. It just reverts to claims why Calvinism is correct and true. But Calvinism offers no comfort, no hope, no joy.
Charles said,
“Those parents do need prayer and some consoling it would be cold and heartless not to. ”
WHAT consoling?
Again, I’m not looking for reasons Calvinism is indeed true. I’m looking for WHAT comfort Calvinism can offer such a parent.
Again, WHAT consoling?
Irene, you wrote: “The point is that Calvinism has nothing with which to comfort that parent. Only to tell her that her sick feeling is justified…Calvinism offers no comfort, no hope, no joy.”
Would you want the parent to be offered a false hope, a false comfort? If the parent cannot find hope in God, if the parent cannot trust that God will do what is right (what He knows to be right, not what we think is right), if the parent cannot surrender his or her children to God to do with according to His sovereign will, then is the parent putting his or her children ahead of God, thereby committing idolatry?
No, no false hope or delusions requested. Just an honest answer that Calvinism can not provide good news to this parent.
@Irene, the ability to give someone the answer they want is not a requirement of a theology. For example, I wish NOBODY would go to hell … not even child molesters and hitler. But my theology dictates that at least some will (I see NO scriptural basis to make a statement that nobody goes to hell). I don’t like that answer, but I think it’s true based on scripture.
But with that said, I love what you’re doing here … sticking with the point. And I think you’re right … Calvinism can’t provide good news to that parent.
Now, whether it *should* or not is a different question. But I think you’re right … it can’t. The child may go to hell and there’s not a darn thing you, as a loving parent, can do about it because it’s been pre-ordained.
That doesn’t make it untrue (although I think it is untrue), it just makes it unable to provide a happy answer.
@ Irene
It can provide hope that God will do what is Right by His standard and the parent can put their hope in God’s sovereign plan saving. Because a rebellious heart cannot be reasoned with. It seems you are looking for false comfort Irene Read Luke 14:26 don’t nitpick here God must be first and our trust is to let go and believe God will do right by His standard not what we think he should. I am not trying to be confrontational Irene but it seems like your looking for us to find a magic scripture that says God will save people we want because we think its right. He saves not us we can’t choose him without His enabling. Even arminianists believe God must enable people to choose Him. It becomes pelginaism when people say they choose apart from God making man sovereign over salvation. God is neither arminianist or calvinist but the Scripture is clear He shows mercy to who He will, and we must put His decisions and righteousness before what we want.
Irene, the “good news” is that God is sovereign, that He will accomplish all His purpose, and that everything He does is right. If a parent can’t take comfort in that, find hope in that, then I have to wonder if that parent isn’t putting his or her children ahead of God, thereby committing idolatry. We must surrender our children to Him (they’re His anyway) to do with as He sees fit, and find comfort in the fact that He will wipe the tears from our eyes when we go home to be with Him.
What other hope and comfort do you want? Even the semi-pelagian (which most “Arminians” today are) can’t provide any guarantee that any parent’s children will be saved. Those who believe in the heresy of baptism being salvific or believing that children are saved because someone dipped them into the water as babies (paedobaptism) are offering a false hope because baptism saves no one and is only for those who have first put their trust in Christ (credobaptism).
@Mike
Exactly.
Whether Calvinism is true is not the issue here.
What I want is not on trial here.
The question is whether Calvinism can offer consolation to a worried parent.
It can’t.
Providing hope and joy is not a requirement for a religion to be true. I’m not claiming it to be so.
I AM claiming that Calvinism is a religion that lacks comfort and joy and cannot provide real hope to a worried parent, or to any person who loves another person.
So the answer to the parent would be, I suppose, you have an inordinate love for your child. Get over it and learn to love her less.
Irene you are putting your love for child above love for Christ. You are claiming so much right to self that is the disposition of the sin nature. I am not even talking about calvinism I am telling you that God is sovereign you need to realize He will make the Right Choice Pray and be content with His Mercys. You want a ear tickling answer that everything is allright if your child says a sinners prayer they are ok. But God saves on His timetable we cant know if someone is elect it is something you have to come to terms with election is all over the bible. 1 Peter 1:2 Peter is writing to “the elect” your out on a witchhunt against calvinism when the problem seems to be you want God to give answers now. It would be wrong and irresponsible to say he someday God is just gonna save your kid or condemn them. Instead we tell them keep praying keep preaching the Gospel to them and hope God does a work of repentance in their heart. However God is God Read Luke 14:26 again if you haven’t The Lord Jesus’ reply to men is yes you have too much love for your child it it surpassing your love for me you are commiting idolatry in that.
So the answer to the parent would be, I suppose, you have an inordinate love for your child. Get over it and learn to love her less.
That is a backwards statement it should be set your hope in Christ and Love Him more He will not fail no one who has trusted him is disappointed.
As a Lutheran, my first action as a parent when my daughter was born was to baptize her, trusting God’s promise would apply to her just as it applied to me. From that day on, I have spoken the word of God over her, and, as she grows, I will teach that word to her, teaching her how to receive the forgiveness that God has freely offered for Christ’s sake.
While doing that, I will also pray for her, that God would give her an ear to hear what the Spirit is saying to the Church, and that He would draw her to Himself, for that is the only way that she will come.
When my son was born, I was not a Lutheran. I was a Pentecostal in the Church of God in Christ. While I did not practice infant baptism, I did dedicate my son to the Lord, and I taught him, as soon as I felt that he understood me, the Gospel. I raised him in the nurture and admonition of the Lord, and I prayed to God concerning his soul.
In the end, we just have to trust that God does not lie, that He truly desires all to be saved, and that the Gospel truly IS the power of God unto salvation for everyone who believes. I will live in such a way that my children are not made to stumble, and I pray that the Word of God would have free course among them.
@ Delwyn
wellspoken brother.
#14 robert said “We raise our children in the Covenant of Grace and Glory, and hope for their covenantal salvation in God In Christ! This is the essence of infant baptism btw”.
Am I reading this correctly?
Covenental salvation in God= infant baptism?
This IS THE ESSENCE!
Is that a biblical HOPE (as in a “full expectancy and anticipation of a promise sure to come to fruition”)?
Then the assurance you give to the anxious inquirer in the post is that ALL baptized children RAISED in the covenant of Grace and Glory WILL be saved (ergo children are one of the elect vis a vis the infant baptism).
#47 the old adam agrees with you and says “God has chosen to elect…in Baptism. BAPTIZE YOUR KIDS and teach them what Christ has done for them in their Baptisms. And when faith comes (by hearing), then BAPTISM IS COMPLETE.”
So forget crusades, missiology, evangelism etc…. let us set up infant baptizing stations and get all infants elect by baptizing them into the covenant… and if their parents refuse to raise them under this covenant, we take the kids and raise them ourselves… This is a moral necessity for their (children) election and eternal destiny are assured through the baptism and covenant.
I just read that someone posted that “the good new is that God is sovereign.” Really? That was the Gospel that Paul preached, and that Luther confronted papal power over? WOW; here I am thinking that the Gospel is that God freely forgives our sins for Christ’s sake, and that we may confidently trust this promise, to the saving of our soul. “Christ died for our sins, according to the Scriptures,” is the message that I recall Paul proclaimed, and I believed, and do believe. Think about it saints….
The horrible decree raises its ugly head for all to see its disease filled putrefaction.
Supralapsarian (or infra) results in God reprobating whom he will including infants, children of heathen and even children of the elect.
Infant baptism is so essential to Reformed theology, Catholicism, Presbyterians, Episcopalians, Methodists and Calvinism in general. It is shocking that such a crucial doctrine of baptizing babies to remove original sin, enter them into a covenant, provide remission of sin and (to some) regenerate this child is TOTALLY ABSENT IN THE BIBLE!!!
Why is there no example of ANYONE baptizing infants in scripture? Why is there NO text of scripture that even remotely teaches that baptism removes original sin or places into a covenant? Why is there no doctrine taught by Jesus or the apostles that teaches children of elect parents should baptized their children to place them in a covenant of grace, make them elect or assure their home in heaven?
I just figured Calvinists didn’t have children. Kidding aside, I think type of issues really boil down to how much one holds tight to their theology.
I don’t think a extreme Calvinist would have children to the belief that it would simply be like playing the lottery.
No different than a person truly believes that if you deny God you are no longer able to change that position because that would be crucifying Christ twice.
Or if your theology interferes with your desires, then you create another doctrine as a trump card, such as infant baptism.
@Jeff: You sir, are not arguing correctly but only with straw-men! And of course arguing against Calvinism here is not the post subject fully! Not to mention Augustine and historical Augustinianism! And note, not all Anglicans believe in infant baptism as to the removal of Original Sin. For most of us Evangelical Anglicans baptism is a “sign & seal”, but not any baptismal regeneration. I can see you have not fully read my posts here! Again, please don’t misrepresent people and Reformed Theology!
I would suggest that you read Calvin here, coolly & calmly, as to the Covenant of Grace & God’s Glory! Note my # 14 and Calvin’s Inst. IV.16.5.
Thanks to listen! 🙂
*Acts 2: 39
Sorry Irene, I am not going to engage in your ad hoc.
A joke: What did the Calvinist say when he fell down the stairs? Whew! I’m glad *that’s* over! 🙂
Back to Irene’s excellent point, Calvinism has nothing to offer the parent wondering if their child is elect. The worried parent isn’t looking for a theology lesson, they are looking for COMFORT (right or wrong). And Calvinism has none to offer in this case. I’m sorry, but it doesn’t. If the child is not elect, the child is damned.
Btw, if Calvinism has nothing to offer, then surely Arminianism offers nothing but false ideas. I’ll take a Sovereign God myself! Note, this is already a theologically loaded question!
*I know Irene, I bit down on your ad hoc some. But, I will say no more, promise! 😉
the question I would want answered from the Armenian side is this: What is it that you are praying for? According to your beliefs God can not and indeed will not do anything to sway the will in an irresistible way. The only way for God to act in response to prayers for salvation would be in a way that violates human free will as you define it.
Indeed great points from Porter! Ya can’t have it both ways! Thank God the biblical doctrine of God is totally sovereign! The Arminian God is hampered!
You wrote earlier:
Taking a step back from this particular issue, I think we would all agree with the popular saying that, “God has no grandchildren.” God only has children. No one gets into heaven because they were related to people who were Christians. Even the most ardent Calvinist and the most ardent Arminian would agree that each individual must come to Jesus on their own.
Actually that’s not true. Afrikaner Calvinists used to have a collective, rather than individual, view of election, by which they (the Afrikaners) were “elect” as an entire nation, set apart from the “non-elect” black Africans, etc. This policy, of course, was used to justify apartheid. It was a form of “salvation by grace through race”, you could say. That belief is still held today by many in the “Christian Identity” movement.
Of course that’s disgusting racist bile and no one in their right mind would believe that today.
Despite this, however, I do have mixed feelings. Individualism of ANY kind, whether in theology or elsewhere, has always made me uneasy (I guess I’m too much of an Easterner, or a Sobornost fan, at heart). Was the early church individualistic? Their culture certainly was not, and neither was Old Testament-era Judaism. The idea that everyone must “decide” on their own whether they want to be part of Israel or not would have been ridiculous to the Hebrews, wouldn’t it? So I’m not sure how to reconcile that reality with the individualistic view of salvation so many Christians (especially Protestants) hold. Did Jesus die billions of times, once for each individual? Or, did he die and resurrect once, for his Church?
Delwyn Xavier Campbell, you might want to go back and read that post in its context. The “good news” being referred to there isn’t the “good news” we call “the gospel,” but good news for the parent who wonders whether his or her child is elect.
Irene seems to want Calvinism to offer some false hope to parents that their children will be saved. At the very least, she seems to want Calvinism to be able to tell parents that there’s a way they can thwart God’s sovereign will and somehow force Him to save their children. In her demand is a presumption that parents are somehow entitled to be comforted in this present life regarding the eternal state of their children.
So, yes, the “good news” (not referring to the gospel here) for the parents who wonder whether their children are elect is that God is sovereign, that He will do what He pleases with His creation, that He will wipe the tears from our eyes when we go home to be with Him, and that we will fully understand and accept the wisdom of His sovereign choice to elect or not elect particular individuals. God is not some impotent being that has to depend on man exercising so-called “free will” in order to save them; He is not thwarted by man’s sovereign “free will” – He doesn’t need your permission or mine or anyone else’s to save anyone.
Jeff Ayers,
I am a Calvinist; but, like John MacArthur, I don’t believe in baby-dipping (infant baptism).
God doesn’t reprobate anyone. We’re all, from the moment of conception, reprobate – and it is because of Adam’s sin (the guilt of which is imputed, charged to, the whole of humanity according to Romans 5:12-21) that this is so. God has elected to save only some of these reprobates and made His choice before He even spoke Creation into existence – His choice being based not on mere foreknowledge, but on the counsel of His own will. Likewise, Christ was slain before the foundation of the world, meaning that the crucifixion was part of God’s eternal plan even before He said “Let there be light.”
God is the potter, we are the clay: God has the sovereign right to do whatever He chooses to do with each and every one of us – and none of us have the right to question God’s choices!
Mike O wrote: “Back to Irene’s excellent point, Calvinism has nothing to offer the parent wondering if their child is elect. The worried parent isn’t looking for a theology lesson, they are looking for COMFORT (right or wrong). And Calvinism has none to offer in this case. I’m sorry, but it doesn’t. If the child is not elect, the child is damned.”
What comfort would you have us provide? The truth is what it is and it is not always comforting. The FACT of the matter is that, from the moment of conception, we’re all deserving of eternity in the Lake of Fire and we all bear the guilt of Adam’s sin. God is sovereign and He has chosen (elected) from before He even spoke Creation into existence those He will save and it is His absolute right as God – like the potter’s right over the clay – to save no one or save everyone or save only some.
Parents are to surrender their children to the sovereignty of God and are to love Him more than they love their children – to do anything less is idolatry. Parents were allowed to procreate and, thereby, bring children into existence, but the children are God’s to do with as He pleases. Some people, like Irene, seem to think that God is somehow obligated to give her children or the children of Christians some sort of special treatment, that He is somehow obligated to save those children or, at the very least, give the parents comfort in this present life regarding those children. Well, it just doesn’t work that way. Our comfort must be in God doing what is right (what He knows to be right, not what we think is right, like the way these parents are secretly thinking their children somehow “deserve” to be elect). We must rest in His sovereign will and take comfort that He will accomplish all His purpose.
@Chancellor, we agree. If there is no comfort to offer, I’m not suggesting you offer false comfort, I’m suggesting you admit it. If election is the only “right answer” (I happen to believe some are elect and some can choose) God knows and whether I like it or not, that’s the answer. And I would not expect lies just to make me feel better.
Just admit it – I think that is all Irene is saying. She seems to have left us on this one, but I see such accusations against her here – she wants this or that, or she expects this or that. But I will defend her and say I don’t think that’s the case (only Irene knows). I think she just wanted you to admit Calvinism provides no comfort to that parent.
@Fr Robert, I didn’t mean to say Calvinism has nothing to offer – like Chancellor said earlier to Xavier – “you may want to go back and read that post in it’s context.” I said Calvinsim has no COMFORT to offer in that situation.
I am taking the Arminian side on election in this conversation, but most people who know me would generally call me a calvinist, although not a 5-point Calvinist. I agree election happens. I just don’t see that the Bible supports “only” election on this question.
@Porter, you asked,
“the question I would want answered from the Armenian side is this: What is it that you are praying for? According to your beliefs God can not and indeed will not do anything to sway the will in an irresistible way. The only way for God to act in response to prayers for salvation would be in a way that violates human free will as you define it.”
I don’t know that I can answer from a purely Arminian angle because, just like I am not a 5-point Calvinist, I an not a 5-point arminian (or however many points they have – see? I don’t even know how many points they have 🙂 )
Anyway, to your question. That’s not true. You paint God as a kid watching bugs in a jar, just to see what will happen, with no interaction at all. That’s not how I think it is at all … God LOVES us and WOOS us and does try to “get us to love him back.” He sent his son to die on the cross for us – how is that not wanting to sway an individual.
But you used the word “irresistable,” and maybe there’s the rub. I believe God’s wooing *is* resistable. Look around you – Billions resist it, or are at least unaware of it. I believe everyone has the chance to either a) be elect (god’s choice) or b) choose (man’s response to God’s wooing).
I may be wrong about this, but I don’t think there is a single person on the face of the planet who does not have eternity with Christ as a potential outcome.
Calvinists do, and on that point I differ.
@Mike: Surely whatever you believe? It is not even four point Calvinism! But that’s fine, you also might want to read some of the debate between Augustine and Pelagius, to get a better historical context. Indeed both Calvin and Luther were closer to Augustine on this long and much debated subject! Were not the first Christian generation to struggle with such profound mysteries. 🙂
All I know is my wife thinks I am “pretty much a Calvinist,” but she is very liberal in her theology. And my closest Christian brothers are Calvinists and we tend to agree on most things (strict election not being one of them).
So in the very least, I have a Calvinistic bent to my theology, but the way I see it, the people on both sides of most arguments are intelligent, God-honoring Christians who, somehow, have come to drastically different conclusions using the same source material and following the same Jesus, all while “using the good sense God gave them (as my mother used to say) :). That dynamic is interesting to me, and I am willing to consider differing opinions. And sometimes, IMO, Calvinism, as a “packaged theology” theology, has it wrong.
To really be a “Calvinist” one has to believe in the complete Sovereignty of God, and this is much more than a definition itself, but “the doctrine of God”… “Behold then the goodness-kindness and severity of God!” (Rom. 11: 22)…”For from Him and through Him and to Him are all things. To Him be the glory forever. Amen.” (Rom. 11: 36)
Btw, though we are Brit’s, my wife likes the Tea-Party! She might be even more conservative than I am? 😉
Btw too, what our wife’s may think, is thankfully secondary! Of course I say this about theology, for the “home” is theirs, just as we are theirs! So we walk softly, or should before them! 😉
Jesus said, And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ The second is this: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.” Mark 12:30-31 ESV
And in Mark 9:43:48, Jesus speaks of the horrors of hell and the serious way we should approach staying out of that horrible place. He said, “If your hand causes you to stumble, cut it off; it is better for you to enter life crippled, than, having your two hands, to go into hell, into the unquenchable fire, where THEIR WORM DOES NOT DIE, AND THE FIRE IS NOT QUENCHED.] “If your foot causes you to stumble, cut it off; it is better for you to enter life lame, than, having your two feet, to be cast into hell, where THEIR WORM DOES NOT DIE, AND THE FIRE IS NOT QUENCHED.] “If your eye causes you to stumble, throw it out; it is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye, than, having two eyes, to be cast into hell, where THEIR WORM DOES NOT DIE, AND THE FIRE IS NOT QUENCHED. NASB
Taking all of that into consideration, it is really hard for me to see how as parents or as neighbors/friends it is even possible for us to “love someone as ourselves” (surely we love ourselves enough to not want to go to that terrible place) and still be able to say it is right and good for God to make that decision–having passed over them with them having no opportunity for salvation. It leaves us with a huge dichotomy in our thinking–we surely do not want them to go there and endure that horror but it is quite right and good of God to make the decision before the creation of the earth that that is their destiny and there is no possibility of anything else taking place.
Somehow, I don’t think I have expressed my thinking here very well.
Surely the doctrine of eternal-separation from God, is quite God’s mystery! And since it is HIS, we can only bow our knee here! (Matt. 25: 46) And St. Paul surely taught it, though even he does not define it fully, (2 Thess. 1:7-9). And btw, chapter 2 of 2 Thess. is quite sobering, even frightful, noting especially verses 11 & 12. And again surely verses 13-14 is quite so-called Calvinistic!
Of course the great question that is always before us, is that, do we believe…actually fully believe God’s Word and Revelation? And believe does not mean that we fully understand it intellectually, i.e. God’s Word & Revelation, but that we acknowledge that GOD alone is God, and we say, Amen! This is quite a lost attitude today however in modernity & postmodernity…again quite!
Fr Robert,
I don’t think “mystery” is a word that is nearly adequate for this.
To tell us on one hand of a place that is so horrible that we are to basically go to any extreme necessary to avoid it, and then in the next breath to tell us that we or our neighbors/friends/children whom we are to love as ourselves may very well be created with the unalterable destiny of going to that very place and then telling us that is right and good and we are to be comforted by that fact…..that is mind bending dichotomy.
To be comforted by something with an unalterably horrible outcome is an interesting concept to say the least.
@cherylu: As I have said quite over and over, St. Paul uses this biblical word Mystery or literally “Musterion, Gk.” quite often! And perhaps the most comprehensive manner is in 1 Cor. 4: 1, “Let a man (person) regard us in this manner, as servants of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God.” Though I am surely no apostle, I am a “presbyter” of God by His grace and choice, in this time of His Church and the historical dispensation of His “musterion”. So it is here I seek to state His grace & glory, in the very words of the NT Revelation! To God be the Glory! We are never going sound the depths of God’s great “mysteries”, but we can and must proclaim HIM therein! This is a least my desire! And btw, GOD is always quite HIS own dichotomy, for HE alone is God! Tertullian noted and preached the great Antitheses in God!
I am a Lutheran surrounded by Calvinists and Arminians. Alone in a crowd…. In the end, I can only say that if my children are saved, “to God alone be the glory,” and if they are not, “to God be the glory.” For either way, whether they live or die, they are His. That may not comfort, at least, not in the short run, but if I did all that I can do, I have done all that I can do. The rest, as always, is in God’s hands. HE has ordained salvation such that “faith comes by hearing, and hearing from the Word of God.” There is no other way to salvation but through the Gospel, and if it is rejected, there is nothing else we can offer. I am confident that God will not let His word fall to the ground empty, but that it will accomplish the purpose for which it was sent. Therefore, I made disciples of my children, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things, whatever Jesus commanded. That is ALL that I can do. If, somehow, they end up enemies of God, it will not be because I failed to preach the Word, being ready in season and out of season, but because they rejected God’s will in Christ concerning us, our salvation through faith in His name. Unlike others, Lutherans do not attempt to explain this, we simply accept it as biblically true.
@Delwyn: In reality, we all Calvinist, Lutheran, etc. are surrounded by God’s great grace, glory & mystery! And this should always quite humble us! God alone is God! As Luther knew so well!
Btw, I wonder how many Lutherans have read Luther’s great piece, Bondage of the Will? Simply a must read really for all today’s Christians certainly!
@Mike,
I was occupied for a while yesterday; thanks for stating my case!
Just as an aside, I have never heard anyone with your theory before, about some people predestined and some people accepting of their own will. It sounds like it couldn’t possibly be true, but I admit I don’t have a reason right now for it to be an impossibility.
I like what I heard Peter Kreeft say once (paraphrasing): Fate and freedom seem so separate and distinct, but really they are like two rivers flowing down a mountain from the same source. By the time they get down to us, they are two separate things, but really they are one thing, because they have the same source. It’s just that we can’t see the top of the mountain. We’re down at the bottom.
Maybe that fits well with what you have observed.
Anyway, for any sick at heart parent out there, there are better answers out there, that still uphold the sovereignty of God! God need not, and does not, create people for condemnation in order to demonstrate his sovereignty, and there are millennia worth of very intelligent, very holy people who would back that up.
God loves our children more than we do. God desires their salvation even more than we do. But God wants more than “people in heaven” for his glory. God wants to be loved freely by us, and gives us the power, spiritually, to make that possible. THAT is AWESOME news, for everyone!
To any and all Calvinists in this thread, what would you tell a Christian parent that was grieving the death of a child that to all appearances died not knowing and loving the Lord and was therefore evidently not a part of the elect?
It would be hard enough to lose a child that you had every confidence was in the Lord’s presence. How much harder to lose one that you believe will be suffering unbelievable eternal torment.
So do you tell them not to grieve that fact? If it is right and good that they be suffering that torment and it could of never been otherwise, can we really grieve the fact that they are?
(And yes, I did read what Tim Kimberley said on the subject.)
Fate is simply more pagan than biblical revelation!
Greek & Roman Mythology, the three goddesses who preside over the birth and life of humans. Each person’s destiny was thought of as a thread spun, measured, and cut by the three Fates, Clotho, Lachesis, and Atropos.
And Irene, you are surely rejecting the position of Augustine and too Aquinas on the great doctrine of Predestination & Election! But sadly this has been quite the position of the so-called modern (really now postmodern) RCC, note the CCC is quite far from either Augustine or Aquinas here. But, this was not really the position taken when I was a young Irish lad! My Irish priest was a most certain Augustinian (educated from the order), and held close to both men. But this was in the 50’s.
And btw, note God’s use of Pharaoh in Rom. 9: 17-18! Certainly flies in the face of what you state! Always scripture and revelation, and NOT what we think or how we feel! Indeed your whole ad hoc has been based upon “feelings”, and that of a mother and parent. I wonder what Aaron felt when God killed his two son’s (Nadad and Abihu) for presenting “strange fire” on the altar?
@cherylu: Certainly Arminian doctrine does not give any real hope here, either! Just poor and even false doctrine, rather!