Originally posted by swanca99
I know TOL encourages debate, but...DUDES!
I know! I don't like it eiher.
I have been watching the exchange between Rolf and Clete in this thread and the one about Calvinism making Knight furious, and have even made a few replies. I have not bothered to reply again to Clete's replies to me because the Scriptures I would use to support my belief in God's omniscience and sovereignty are the same, most likely, as those that Rolf has used, or at least they would be nothing that Clete hasn't seen before.
While you're probably right, I wouldn't have minded. I've responded many time before and I'm sure I'll respond many more times in the future to the same arguments again and again. Calvinism is almost ubiquitous in the Church today, even people who think they aren't Calvinists have been dramatically influenced by the doctrine, so it's impossible to avoid. I consider TOL practice for when I get the opportunity to confront the error in my "normal life", so bring it on!
I have been reading this forum for 2-3 months and I am coming to a greater understanding of the "Open View." I just tried reading Romans 9-11 with "Open View" glasses on, and I can see how the passage could be interpreted as consistent with that view. I suppose if I read it with "Reformed" glasses on, I would find an interpretation consistent with those offered by their commentators. I would like to think that my interpretation of that passage is based on reading it with clear glasses, but I'm honest enough to admit to you, and myself, that I am probably reading it with "Dispensationalist/4-point Calvinist" glasses on. I think we all tend to read and interpret the Scriptures in light of the system we've accepted, and that we all tend to think our system is the right one. I have seen only a handful of people change systems in my 30+ years as a Christian.
In one respect or another I've "changed systems" a few times myself. I was a hard core Calvinist for a long time but was not always a dispensationalist during that time. For a while I even thought that Herbert Armstrong was right on most of his theology. I had been lured in by him with his escatology which appealed to me as a teenager for some reason. Anyway, the system I hold to now allows me to read the Bible and take the vast majority of it at face value. If I have "glasses" on at all, they don't have much tinting. That is what attracted me so much to the Open View and Acts 9 Dispensationalism. There simply is no need to study every relevant passage, look up the original language, and meditate for hours on the three verses before and the three after in order to be able to read and understand what the Bible is saying in practically every passage. Now don't misunderstand, I don't think there's anything wrong with doing that stuff; in fact, there's a great deal to be learned from that sort of Bible study. But some people act as if you don't have the standing to even have an opinion about what the Bible is saying at all unless you've done such things and that just isn't the case. Generally speaking, if you cannot sit down and read the Bible like you would any other book without your eyes glazing over in confusion, then you've missed the whole point of God having written it in the first place.
If it were possible to wipe the slate clean and base a system upon a book-by-book, chapter-by-chapter, verse-by-verse study of the Scriptures, I wonder what we'd REALLY come up with? Perhaps no system at all...
The key is getting a handle on the overview, the plot of the Bible. Once you've done that, the details basically fall in your lap. Don't do it the other way around. If you attempt to get all the details right and then to draw conclusion about the overview based on them, you'll end up being confused. The proof is that this is precisely the way pretty much the whole church approaches Bible study and the result is thousands of divisions, many of which are utterly unresolvable as long as one party or the other remains focused on their pet detail.
Rolf and Clete, I gather that you both believe in the deity of Christ, the literal resurrection of Christ, and salvation by grace through faith, and have many other important beliefs in common. I consider both of you to be within the boundaries of orthodoxy, consider both of you to be my brothers in Christ, and expect to meet both of you in eternity someday.
Do you consider each other to be brothers in Chirst?
Yes.
This is an interesting question to be asked to (or by for that matter) a Calvinist. By it's very nature, Calvinism makes it utterly impossible to know for certain whether one is saved (a member of the elect) or not. One must simply wait until judgement day to find out.
Do you think that either of you live your life differently than the other because of your differing beliefs?
How could we not? In my view, everything I do say or think has real consequences that I am personally responsible for whether good or bad. In Calvinisms view, I can do nothing that was not already predetermined before even I came on the seen!
Above and again in other posts Romans 9 has come up a couple of times and so it seems apropriate to repost my own understanding of the chapter. Note, while reading the following, how the simple surface meaning of the text is preserved and how it strongly argues against Calvinistic predestination...
From post 1593 in the "ARGH!!! Calvinism makes me furious!!!" thread...
ROMANS 9 IS JERIMIAH 18
The ninth chapter of Romans is speaking about the cutting off of Israel. It is painfully clear that Paul is making a case that God cut off Israel and turned instead to the gentiles and that God is justified in having done so.
It helps to see it if one looks at the introduction and summations of the chapter. In the first few verses it is clear that Paul is speaking of Israel and that he is upset by their condition of unbelief...
- Romans 9:1 I tell the truth in Christ, I am not lying, my conscience also bearing me witness in the Holy Spirit, 2 that I have great sorrow and continual grief in my heart. 3 For I could wish that I myself were accursed from Christ for my brethren, my countrymen according to the flesh, 4 who are Israelites, to whom pertain the adoption, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the service of God, and the promises; 5 of whom are the fathers and from whom, according to the flesh, Christ came, who is over all, the eternally blessed God. Amen.
And then in the last few verses Paul sums up the point of what he's just been saying...
- Romans 9:30 What shall we say then? That Gentiles, who did not pursue righteousness, have attained to righteousness, even the righteousness of faith; 31 but Israel, pursuing the law of righteousness, has not attained to the law of righteousness. 32 Why? Because they did not seek it by faith, but as it were, by the works of the law. For they stumbled at that stumbling stone. 33 As it is written:
"Behold, I lay in Zion a stumbling stone and rock of offense,
And whoever believes on Him will not be put to shame."
Now that by itself is enough to make it clear what Paul is talking about but what really nails it down is his reference in the body of the chapter to the potter and the clay story. This story is a reference to a passage in Jeremiah let's take a look at it so that we can be on the same page that Paul was on when he made reference to it. Perhaps that will shed additional light on the point he was making.
- Jeremiah 18:1 The word which came to Jeremiah from the LORD, saying: 2 "Arise and go down to the potter's house, and there I will cause you to hear My words." 3 Then I went down to the potter's house, and there he was, making something at the wheel. 4 And the vessel that he made of clay was marred in the hand of the potter; so he made it again into another vessel, as it seemed good to the potter to make.
5 Then the word of the LORD came to me, saying: 6 "O house of Israel, can I not do with you as this potter?" says the LORD. "Look, as the clay is in the potter's hand, so are you in My hand, O house of Israel! 7 The instant I speak concerning a nation and concerning a kingdom, to pluck up, to pull down, and to destroy it, 8 if that nation against whom I have spoken turns from its evil, I will relent of the disaster that I thought to bring upon it. 9 And the instant I speak concerning a nation and concerning a kingdom, to build and to plant it, 10 if it does evil in My sight so that it does not obey My voice, then I will relent concerning the good with which I said I would benefit it.
Hmm! :think:
Imagine that! Jeremiah was making the very point that Paul is making! No wonder Paul referenced this passage, it applies directly to the subject he was dealing with! It
IS the subject he was dealing with! Romans 9 and Jeremiah 18 are making the exact same point, they both use the same analogy for the same reasons. For all intent and purposes Romans 9 and Jeremiah 18 are the exact same chapter! The only difference is that Romans 9 applies the principle described in Jeremiah 18 directly to the nation of Israel.
Romans 9 is not about predestination at all. Paul didn't start talking about Israel and then suddenly change the subject to predestination and then just as suddenly change the subject back again to Israel. The whole thing is on one issue and one issue only. That being God's absolute right to change His mind concerning His blessing of a nation that He promised if that nation does evil in His sight. It's no more complicated than that.
Resting in Him,
Clete
