Genesis 1:28
“God blessed them; and God said to them, ‘Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth, and subdue it; and rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and over every living thing that moves on the earth.’”
God’s sovereign prerogative was to delegate dominion of the earth over to Adam, who would then “subdue” and “rule over” it. Psalm 115:16 states: “The heavens are the heavens of the LORD, but the earth He has given to the sons of men.” However, since Calvinism teaches that God decreed whatsoever comes to pass, including every thought, word and deed, how would God be delegating anything over to mankind?
What do Calvinists believe?
Westminster Confession of Faith: “God from all eternity did by the most wise and holy counsel of his own will, freely and unchangeably ordain whatsoever comes to pass; yet so as thereby neither is God the author of sin; nor is violence offered to the will of the creatures, nor is the liberty or contingency of second causes taken away, but rather established. Although God knows whatsoever may or can come to pass, upon all supposed conditions; yet hath he not decreed any thing because he foresaw it as future, as that which would come to pass, upon such conditions.”649
Our reply:
The implication of absolute determinism is that that which is delegated by the right hand is taken away by the left.
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649 The Westminster Confession of Faith (1646), Chapter III., verses I. and II. on “Of God’s Eternal Decree,” emphasis mine. http://www.reformed.org/documents/index.html?mainframe=http://www.reformed.org/documents/westminster_conf_of_faith.html.
[This post has been excerpted with permission from Richard Coords, Calvinism Answered Verse by Verse and Subject by Subject, © 2024.]
