“‘Have you not heard? Long ago I did it; From ancient times I planned it. Now I have brought it to pass, that you should turn fortified cities into ruinous heaps. Have you not heard? Long ago I did it; from ancient times I planned it. Now I have brought it to pass, that you should turn fortified cities into ruinous heaps. Therefore their inhabitants were short of strength, they were dismayed and put to shame; they were as the vegetation of the field and as the green herb, as grass on the housetops is scorched before it is grown up. But I know your sitting down, and your going out and your coming in, and your raging against Me. Because of your raging against Me, and because your arrogance has come up to My ears, therefore I will put My hook in your nose, and My bridle in your lips, and I will turn you back by the way which you came.’”
God knew about the evil intentions of King Sennacherib of Assyria (v.27), and “planned” to use it to His own advantage. To bring judgment upon Israel, all God needed to do was to lift His hand of protection. God did not need to push the Assyrians out the door. They already desired to plunder Israel.
What do Calvinists believe?
God’s determined-will is that King Sennacherib of Assyria would do exactly as God had stated, and which proves that divine determinism and human freedom are not incompatible, which serves as the basis for “Compatibilism” or “Compatibilistic free-will.”
Our reply:
God did not cause King Sennacherib’s evil intentions but rather used it to His own advantage, for the purpose of judging disobedient Israel. The king’s slaughter of many people was an evil sin, but that is due to the king’s own independent will, which God planned to put to use.
As for God having put a “hook” in the king’s “nose” and driving him back home, that was a matter of situational force, as the defeated king had no other feasible choice but to return back home. As an analogy, someone might say, “I had to obey the Court Order.” That is not meant to imply that they are a puppet for a third party or that they are being programmed in their choices, but rather that the circumstances dictated that their only feasible choice was to take a certain course of action.
What do Calvinists believe?
James White: “How could it have been God’s eternal purpose to judge this generation of Israel that was judged by the Assyrians? How could He do that? Because He’s dependent upon the evil intentions of the Assyrians which do not arise from a divine decree? Now I would argue that means He could not have known them anyways, but that’s another issue.”683
Our reply:
In Calvinism, God decrees whatsoever comes to pass, including the motives and intentions of every created being throughout all time. So, according to Calvinism, (a) God had to determine their intentions or else if He didn’t exhaustively and precisely determine their intentions, then (b) He couldn’t infallibly know what their intentions would be, and if He couldn’t infallibly know what their intentions would be, then (c) He couldn’t have had an eternal plan, and if He didn’t have an eternal plan, then (d) He couldn’t have had an eternal purpose, and if He didn’t have an eternal purpose, then (e) it follows that everything that happens must be random and pointless. Of course, (a) through (e) completely unravels if one accepts the belief that God is capable of knowing something without causing it. Additionally, 1 John 2:16 indicates that evil intentions come from the world, without saying that it somehow comes from God in order to execute His plans. Calvinists seem to have a really low view of God’s omniscience and omnipotence, if they really think that God must play both sides of the chess board in order to win.
What do Calvinists believe?
James White: “Which means He cannot discipline or judge others unless given the opportunity by the rebellion of autonomous, libertarianly free creatures.”684
Our reply:
Why would God even want to judge these creatures unless they freely sinned? The answer from Calvinism is that God [allegedly] needs to do this in order to have a script whereby He can display His various divine attributes, which is somehow a really important thing, despite an otherwise apparent vain and petty aspiration. Calvinism is beneath God’s dignity.
In Calvinism, God wants to create a people and then decree their evil intentions so that He can punish them. The Calvinist complaint is that free-will might otherwise get in the way and deny God the opportunity to have an eternal plan to do this. The bottom line in Calvinism is exhaustive divine determinism, without which, God could neither know people’s future intentions nor have any sure plan concerning them. That is the systematic that Calvinists drag into their Bible interpretations.
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683 Does Isaiah 10 prove Determinism?, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=upzG62s2018, 1:05:31–1:05:49.
684 Ibid., 1:32:34–1:32:43.
[This post has been excerpted with permission from Richard Coords, Calvinism Answered Verse by Verse and Subject by Subject, © 2024.]
