Hi, Robby:
        You asked Charlie,
|It also gives rise to the question what about a man who wishes to repent,
|but is not elected?  The standard Calvanist answer is that this situation
|will not occur, but in your previous post you said that God foreordaied
|the outcomes of all possibilities of a man's will.  That statement seems
|to allow the existance of this contigency, doesn't it?
        Seems to me that there are those who are predestined to
be saved.  EPHESIANS 1:3-14 would indicate this.
        However, this predestination is based on God's
foreknowledge.  ROMANS 8:28-30 would indicate this.  So it
seems to be, not that God -forces- people to be saved, but that
He knows from the beginning that they will be.
        At this point, Calvin thought like a computer
programmer:  if some are predestined to be saved, all others
are predestined to the opposite.  You're either a "one" or a
"zero", in this scheme of things.
        Certainly anyone's will cannot help.  For our will is
unable to make a 100% good choice or decision.  JEREMIAH 17:9
and ROMANS 7:7-25, show this, and ROMANS 3:9-20 makes it final.
        Nevertheless, Peter declares that "God is not willing
that any should perish" [2 PETER 3:9 (KJV)].
        How He achieves this is, I think explained in this
way.  Those who are not specifically predestined to be saved,
still have an open choice.  The Holy Spirit is always working
to draw people to Christ.  If anyone resists, that person
remains unsaved.  If anyone, by the pure grace of God, does not
resist, that person will be saved.
        God has chosen not to explain this apparent paradox.
 IXTHUS<<
        But in the end, it makes no practical or pastoral
difference, even though it is a very large theological
problem.  As Calvin himself indicated [sorry, it's too long ago
to remember an exact reference], we can not identify who is
elect and who is not, anyway.  Therefore we can only obey the
Great Commission zealously, in order to be sure we do proclaim
the gospel to all who are going to respond.  This, because it
is our proclamation that this person or that one is predestined
to respond to!
        I realize there was a movement among some Baptists in
the U.S. in the last century, to say, "If they're going to be
saved anyway, we can save ourselves all that work".  But this
is contrary to what Calvin taught, and what Christ commanded.
        I presume an Arminian would also be zealous about
carrying out the Great Commission, on the belief that anyone we
don't reach with the gospel is lost, and we are responsible.
        If so, both the Calvinist and the Arminian would be out
there at the same time, accosting everyone who would listen, to
tell them the good news of Jesus!  If God is able to plough a
straight furrow with a black horse and a white horse yoked
together, praise God!
 IXTHUS<<
        If Calvin actually taught that there are only two
classes of people-- predestined to salvation and predestined to
damnation, he was mistaken.  If Arminius taught that man's free
will can be used to achieve salvation, he was even more mistaken.
        The Scriptural answer, I think, lies somewhere between;
though closer to Calvin's side of the continuum.  Nevertheless,
it's a Gordian knot, and the sword of the Great Commission cuts
it right through without even trying to unravel it's twisted
convolutions!
    ||        Praise God!   --Ralph
    ||        Ralph & Gene Ann Wood
    ||        randg.wood@encode.com
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