Laurence Vance’s article A CRITIQUE OF THE POTTER’S FREEDOM by James White identifies, catalogues and handles White’s rhetoric in favor of Calvinism. While the focus of the article is on rhetoric, Vance does make some…
General
Dort, Synod of
Dort, Synod of (SYNODUS DORDRACENA), a national synod of the United Provinces, held at Dort (Dordrecht; Lat. Dordracum) in 1618-19. I. Origin of the Synod. — The opposition of James Arminius to the Augustinian and…
Interesting Links – 9/6/09
The NIV and TNIV are going away. A new NIV will be out in 2011. Christianity Today has an explanation here. Scot McKnight has a different explanation here. (HT: William Birch). The blog “Truth is…
Interesting Links – 8/30/09
Did God send a tornado as a warning to the Evangelical Lutheran Church?John Piper says yes. Greg Boyd says no. Blogger Ed Thompkins has a post entitled: What is Arminianism and Why am I an…
Essays by Collin Hansen about The Reformed Resurgence
At Justin Taylor’s blog, Andy Naselli recently drew attention to a series of seven short essays on “The Reformed Resurgence” by Colin Hansen, author of Young, Restless, Reformed: A Journalist’s Journey with the New Calvinists…
Interesting Links – 8/16/09
Calvin Leaves a Divided Legacy in South Africa. “Now, as Protestants worldwide mark the 500th anniversary of Calvin’s birth, South Africans are remembering how the followers of the Protestant reformer were counted among the most…
Interesting Links 8-9-09
Peter Lumpkins writes about the misuse of the word “monergism” among Calvinistic Southern Baptists. Ben Henshaw asks: Do you really want to claim John Calvin as your homeboy? Check out the reply thread on this…
The Failure of God?
The following post is comprised of comments submitted to our website by [email protected], slightly revised with the author’s permission. Insofar as such infamous “failed God” arguments clearly assume the doctrine of irresistible grace (grace=force/deterministic salvation)…
Hyper-Calvinism: The Logical Conclusion of Regular Calvinism?
Calvinist Phil Johnson has said, “History teaches us that hyper-Calvinism is as much a threat to true Calvinism as Arminianism is. Virtually every revival of true Calvinism since the Puritan era has been hijacked, crippled, or ultimately killed by hyper-Calvinist influences” (http://www.spurgeon.org/~phil/articles/hypercal.htm).
Might this be because hyper-Calvinism is the logical conclusion to the distinctive doctrines of Calvinism? Perhaps regular Calvinism simply refuses to go where its own doctrine logically leads because where it leads contradicts the Bible so blatantly.
Setting the Record Straight: The Current State of Reformation Arminianism (Part Three of Three Parts)
R. C. Sproul, in his Willing to Believe, notes:
- Repeatedly the Synod of Dort charges the Remonstrants with teaching the doctrines of Pelagianism. Is not this charge overly severe and unfair? Both Arminius and the Remonstrants sought to distance themselves from pure Pelagianism.
Arminianism is often said to be semi-Pelagian, but not, strictly speaking, Pelagian. What the fathers of Dort probably had in mind is the link between semi-Pelagianism and Pelagianism that renders the semi-Pelagian unable to escape the fundamental thesis of Pelagianism.1
But are the “fathers of Dort” right in their estimation? Is there a link between semi-Pelagianism and Arminianism? Though we agree with the Dortians that the “link between semi-Pelagianism and Pelagianism . . . renders the semi-Pelagian unable to escape the fundamental thesis of Pelagianism,” we will witness a rather glaring, broken link between semi-Pelagianism and Arminianism below.
Setting the Record Straight: The Current State of Modern Reformation Arminianism (Part One of Three Parts)
Cornelius Van Til (1895-1987), in his The Defense of the Faith writes, “since the whole debate between the Christian and the non-Christian positions revolves about the question of the relation of the eternal to the…
Interesting Links 7-26-09
British Calvinist Peter Masters criticizes the new American Calvinism. “The new Calvinism is not a resurgence but an entirely novel formula which strips the doctrine of its historic practice, and unites it with the world.” Masters is the current pastor of Charles Spurgeon’s church.
God in the Hands of Angry Calvinists. Describing the angry behavior of some Calvinists, William Birch writes that “How we view God affects how we think and act.”
Exegeting 1 Timothy 2:4: God Our Savior, Who Desires All People To Be Saved
To some Calvinists, the very mention of an Arminian exegesis of 1 Timothy 2:4, in an effort to defend the biblical notion that God desires the salvation of every individual on earth, is insulting, both logically and theologically.
As Alan Kurschner, from the Triablogue blog, stated, “Arminians start with the human-centered assumption that if God does not love all people undifferentiated, then he would be unjust to love some more than others. The Calvinist begins with the Biblical principle that because man is unworthy of grace and deserving only of death, God in his holiness, wisdom, and freedom chooses to love and elect any creature he desires.”
John Wesley Charges that Calvinism Makes God Out to Be Worse than the Devil
To follow up on Roger Olson’s essay recently posted here, perhaps it would be appropriate to post an excerpt from John Wesley’s famous sermon, “Free Grace”, in which he made a very similar charge about Calvinism as Olson, but more passionately and more forcefully. Whereas Olson states that Calvinism’s consistent divine determinism makes it difficult for him to tell the difference between God and the devil in the system, Wesley says that the system makes God worse than the devil and so is blasphemous (and he explains why). Now Wesley accepted Calvinists as brothers in Christ, so he surely did not mean that Calvinists are blasphemers or that they worship a false god or anything of the sort. I take him to mean that the logical implications of Calvinism are blasphemous, which Calvinists themselves might not really see, and which Wesley labored to help them see to bring them to the more bibilical position of Arminianism.
Interesting Links – 07-19-09
The Albert Mohler program interviews Matt Pinson (Arminian) and Mark Dever (Calvinist) on Calvin’s 500 year legacy. They amicably address their theological differences. Were the 18th century (largely Arminian) revival movements based on Enlightenment thought?…
Exploring the Psychology of Embracing Calvinism
In one of our private discussions, one of our members was wondering about the influence background may play in nudging some toward acceptance of Calvinism. He noted that he knows someone whose family background resulted…
The Controversial Jacobus Arminius
What typically denominates an individual as controversial is not necessarily the truth which he or she promotes but the manner in which one argues against an established dogma. The reason why Arminius was so controversial in his time was because the truth which he proclaimed was at variance with an established form of Calvinism in Holland. John Calvin was not controversial due to the “hard truth” which he proclaimed. Nearly everyone within his theological circle (Reformed) agreed with his teachings. What kind of controversy could possibly be caused by someone whose teachings are nearly unanimously agreed upon by a majority of people?
Six Ways That Calvin is Better than Arminius
[Disclaimer: the following is tongue-in-cheek. It is the opinion of the author, and does not necessarily represent the view of SEA, which is generally true of SEA blog posts, but perhaps deserves special mention for this post, which is so bold as to suggest on SEA’s own blog ways that Calvin is actually better than Arminius!]
Today is the big 5-0-0 for Mr. John Calvin. Although he isn’t our favorite theologian, he deserves special recognition in honor of his big day. So we humbly offer six ways that Calvin is better than Arminius.
“Three Lies About Sin” by Robert Hamilton.
I am shocked at how easily, even in my most rational moments, I can sometimes walk willingly into sin. Even when I know a dozen good reasons why I shouldn’t do it, I can be…
Interesting Links 7-5-09
Arminian Today is doing a series on different interpretations of Romans 7. Nick Norelli has a great book review on How to Choose a [Bible] Translation for All It’s Worth. The Road to Rome? Calvinists…
