Calvinistic vs. Arminian Gospel

by Robert Fraire

A couple of weeks ago at Lakeside Chapel we had a Q & A with the elders. One of the questions that was asked and answered was: "Is there (or should there be) a marked difference in the way a Calvinist evangelizes the lost as opposed to an Arminian?"

First I will give the briefest of descriptions of some important issues that bear on this question. Both groups understand that all men have sinned and are guilty before God. They also believe that Jesus paid the price for sin and that a person's true faith in the payment of Christ is sufficient for salvation.

Where the differences come to bear in the area of evangelism is first and formost a difference in understanding of the spiritual state of man. The Arminian believes that all men have something within themselves that is able to hear, understand, and respond positively to the gospel message. The Calvinist believes that when Ephesians 2 says that men are dead in their sins, it means that men DO NOT posses the ability to understand and respond positively to the gospel.

This doctrinal difference has many practical ramifications. For the Arminian, the goal of Evangelism is to convince a person of the truth of the gospel. To present the gospel in a way that appeals to a man and causes him to exercise his ability to place his faith in Christ. This has lead to the honing of particular methods to persuade people of their need for Jesus Christ. On the other hand, the Calvinist believes that the main purpose of Evangelism is to speak the truth of the gospel as clearly as possible. The Calvinist believes that no man is able to believe the gospel on his own. Instead, the Holy Spirit must do the work of regeneration in the heart of a man in order for that man to believe. And everyone whom the Spirit regenerates WILL believe the gospel message.

A couple of specific areas where we see this difference in belief in action is in the area of altar calls and the grounds of assurance of salvation.

The altar call is a common practice of many/most Arminian churches. I grew up believing that this was "The Way" evangelism was done. After a gospel message was preached, the evangelist would call, and goad, and exhort and persuade as many people as possible to come forward in a service. They would repeat after the evangelist then were told that they had become Christians. At Lakeside we do not do altar calls. The reason is because our understanding that the Spirit will regenerate those whom He has called and they will believe. We are called to plead with men to come but not to attempt to manipulate emotions to gain a "decision".

The second area I will address is the ground of assurance of salvation. Arminian teaching is that when someone prays a prayer of salvation he must write down the date is his Bible, so that whenever he doubted he could look at that date and be sure. I remember a pastor preaching that when he had a rough stretch he would go out to his garden where he had a rock engraved with the date he prayed to receive Christ. At Lakeside we call people to examine their lives to see if the Spirit of God is changing them. Do they love God, love believers and strive to obey Him? These are the tests of 1 John that is the ground for the assurance of salvation.

Finally let me say that another practical ramification of our doctrinal beliefs is in the responsibility of the Christian in evangelism. I read a book from an Arminian author that argued that churches must do everything with professional quality. Why? Because if the unbeliever got a bad impression of Jesus from the church, he may be forever turned off from the gospel. By extension, each believer could be the reason someone spends eternity in hell or heaven. But we believe that since the Spirit regenerates who He wills, our responsibility is to faithfully proclaim the gospel, but understand that salvation is exclusively the work of God.

This is a brief note and much more can be said about this topic. Please let me know if you would like me to continue on this topic.

Limited or Unlimited Atonement? A Restatement

by Bruce Mills

I have recently been involved in examining the teachings of the Church of the Nazarene denomination because of the decision of a family member to join that church.  That denomination is, as are many others, blatantly Arminian in its doctrine, even stating such in its Statement of Faith.  As I thought about the implications of that denomination's position, I decided to re-post the following article which I originally wrote and posted in November 2007.  Perhaps it can clarify some things for anyone who is confused about the debate on this issue.

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I want to write about the most difficult issue I have ever wrestled with in the development of my theology and doctrinal position. For many years I have made no apology for being a Calvinist in my understanding of Scripture. It is clearly the most biblically consistent and logical theological position. However, until a few years ago if you asked me to what degree I was a Calvinist, I would have told you that I was a “Four Point Calvinist.” The point on which I balked is what is known as “Limited Atonement” or “Particular Redemption.” I couldn’t see how John Calvin arrived at such a conclusion when the Scriptures contained statements such as “For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life” (John 3:16).

But a few years ago, a close pastor friend informed me that he had become a “Five Point Calvinist.” I began studying the issue to try to prove to him that he had made a mistake. As I began to read and think about the issue, I upgraded my response to say that I was a “Four-and-a-half Point Calvinist.” By that, I didn’t mean that I only half-way believed in Particular Redemption; rather, what I meant was that I believed that the Scriptures taught both Limited and Unlimited Atonement, and so it was sort of a paradox. I thought both viewpoints were true, so I called it “Four-and-a-half Point Calvinism” to indicate my acceptance of both views.

Finally, my son-in-law, a pastor in Kansas, challenged me to study the issue in depth. I remember him telling me, “There simply is no other way logically that it can be anything but Limited Atonement.” I set out to read all I could from both sides of the issue in an attempt to settle, once and for all, what I believed about that issue. After spending about a year in study—sometimes very intense, sometimes superficial—I finally concluded that the correct understanding is that of Limited Atonement or Particular Redemption. So I would like to explain why I believe that this is the correct biblical position.

Now, I understand that it is somewhat dangerous to venture into this territory because it is quite controversial among evangelical Christians. In fact, some friends of mine left our church because we were just “too Calvinistic” for them. But studying this issue is necessitated by the many texts of Scripture that we read which cause us to wonder which is correct. I just finished studying 2 Peter 2:1, in which Peter comments that false teachers who secretly introduce destructive heresies into the church also deny “the Master who bought them.” For years, I understood that passage as many other people do. I took it to mean that Christ actually has purchased redemption in full for all people, even false teachers. It is commonly thought by many (if not most) people that Christ died to pay in full the penalty for everyone’s sins, whether they ever believe or not. The popular notion is that God loves everyone, wants everyone saved, so Christ died for everyone.

This means that His death was only a potential sacrifice or atonement that becomes an actual atonement when a sinner repents and believes the gospel. In this view, the believer’s role in evangelism is to convince sinners to receive what has already been done for them. All can believe and be saved if they will, since no one is excluded in the atonement.

However, if you take that viewpoint to its logical conclusion, it ends with hell being populated with people whose salvation was purchased by Christ on the cross. Thus, the lake of fire is filled with damned people whose sin Christ fully atoned for by bearing the punishment they deserved to receive under God’s wrath.

On the other hand, in the Unlimited Atonement view, heaven will be populated by people who had the same atonement provided for them, but they are there because they received it. In this view, Christ died on the cross for the damned in hell the same as He did for the redeemed in heaven. The only difference between the fate of the redeemed and that of the damned is the sinner’s choice.

This perspective says that the Lord Jesus Christ died to make salvation possible, but not actual. He did not absolutely purchase salvation for anyone. He only removed a barrier for everyone, which merely makes salvation potential. The sinner ultimately determines the nature of the atonement and its application by what he does. As one Bible teacher has stated, according to this perspective, when Jesus cried, “It is finished,” it really should be rendered, “It is stated.”

But the interpretational difficulties and fallacies arising from that view stem from the misunderstanding of two very important biblical teachings: the doctrine of total depravity (perhaps absolute inability would be a better term) and the doctrine of the atonement itself.

Correctly understood, the doctrine of total depravity says that all people are dead in trespasses and sins (Eph. 2:1), separated and alienated from the life of God (Rom. 1:21-22), doing only evil from desperately wicked, deceitful hearts (Jer. 17:9), completely incapable of understanding the things of God (1 Cor. 2:14), blinded by the love of sin and by Satan (2 Cor. 4:4), doing only the will of their father the devil, unable to seek God, and unwilling to repent (Rom. 3:10-23). So, since that is the condition of mankind, answer me this: How is the sinner going to make the right choice to activate the atonement on his behalf?

Clearly, salvation comes wholly and only from God. He must give light, life, understanding, repentance, and faith. Salvation comes to the sinner from God by His will and power. Since that is true, when coupled with the doctrine of sovereign election, the conclusion must be that God determined the extent of the atonement.

So then, for whom did Christ die? He died for all who would believe because they were chosen, called, justified, and granted repentance and faith by the Father. The atonement is limited to those who believe, who are the elect of God. Unless an individual believes in universal salvation, he must believe that Christ’s atonement is limited to some degree—either limited by the sinner who is sovereign, or by God who is sovereign.

Those who hold to an unlimited atonement position are simply mistaken. If one asserts that sinners have the power to limit the application of the atonement, then the atonement by its nature is limited in actual power and effectiveness. With that understanding, it is less than a real atonement and is, in fact, merely potential and restricted by the choice of fallen human beings. But in truth, only God can set the atonement’s limits, and He extends the atonement to all who will believe because they have been chosen in Christ before the foundation of the world.

Those who hold to the unlimited view must affirm that Christ actually atoned for no one in particular but potentially for everyone without exception. Whatever He did on the cross was not a full and complete payment for sin, because sinners for whom He died are still damned. Hell is full of people whose sins were paid for by Christ—sin paid for, yet punished forever.

Of course, such thinking is completely unacceptable. God limits the atonement to the elect, for whom it was not a potential atonement, but an actual and real satisfaction for sin. God provided the sacrifice of His Son, which actually paid for the sins for all who would ever believe, who are those chosen by Him for salvation.

It was that issue that finally convinced me of the necessity of a limited atonement. This question kept going through my mind: “To what degree do you believe Christ’s death was propitiatory?” The conclusion that I came to was, if I believe that Christ’s death was satisfactory and sufficient to propitiate God’s holy demand for the punishment of sin, then either all men will be saved because God’s wrath against their sin has been satisfied, or else Christ must have died only for the elect. I could not get around that conclusion with any other satisfactory answer, and thus I came to believe in Particular Redemption.

David Clotfelter has written a wonderful book titled Sinners in the Hands of a Good God. He makes these observations:

From the Calvinist point of view, it is Arminianism that presents logical impossibilities. Arminianism tells us that Jesus died for multitudes that will never be saved, including millions who never so much as heard of Him. It tells us that in the case of those who are lost, the death of Jesus, represented in Scripture as an act whereby He took upon Himself the punishment that should have been ours (Isa. 53:5), was ineffective. Christ has suffered once for their sins, but they will now have to suffer for those same sins in hell.

The Arminian atonement has the initial appearance of being very generous, but the more closely we look at it, the less we are impressed. Does it guarantee the salvation of any person? No. Does it guarantee that those for whom Christ died will have the opportunity to hear of Him and respond to Him? No. Does it in any way remove or even lessen the sufferings of the lost? No. In reality, the Arminian atonement does not atone. It merely clears the way for God to accept those who are able to lift themselves by their own bootstraps. The Calvinist does not believe that any fallen person has such power and so he views the Arminian atonement as unsuited to the salvation of sinners and insulting to Christ.

So how do we deal with the matter of the many passages in Scripture (such as John 3:16) which speak of God’s love for the world? First of all, we must understand that words such as “all” and “world” are not always used in their comprehensive sense. We don’t even use them that way in our speech, so why do we expect such in the Bible? Rather, they often refer to a particular class of people rather than to people universally. Several verses in Scripture use the words “all” and “world” in that sense; specifically, John 1:29, John 12:19, 2 Corinthians 5:19, and Romans 5:18. And every other verse which does use the word “world” in regard to Christ’s atonement has a reasonable explanation for how it does not necessarily carry the universal sense of the term. If you are interested in further reading on this specific issue, I recommend James Montgomery Boice and Philip Graham Ryken’s book, The Doctrines of Grace. They give a wonderful explanation of this issue, relating it to specific verses.

Now, I do not believe, as some Calvinists seem to imply, that God hates sinners. Rather, the Scriptures tell us that God does love all men, but that He has set His affection on some, electing them before the foundation of the world for salvation. But His wrath does abide on those who reject Him. Just as one of my children’s disobedience may have incurred my wrath, at the same time, their rebellious actions did not remove or diminish my love for them. I still had to punish their sin, but I still loved them. So too, while God’s wrath abides on unbelievers and those who reject His Son will be eternally punished in hell for their sin, He demonstrates His love toward mankind through His wonderful gifts of health, food, sunshine and rain, and countless other blessings. A god who hated unrighteous man would not be so benevolent, kind, and gracious as is our loving heavenly Father.

Now some people’s objection to limited atonement comes at the point of the presentation of the Gospel. This was the point of concern of one of the couples who left our church. They objected to the Calvinist positions on election and particular redemption and said, “But how do you present the Gospel to someone if you can’t tell them that ‘Christ died for your sins’?”

I believe J. I. Packer has given the best response to that issue. He points out that the phrase “Christ died for you,” which has become so common in today’s presentations of the Gospel, simply cannot be found in any of the sermons recorded in the Bible. In his book Evangelism and the Sovereignty of God, he writes these words:

The fact is that the New Testament never calls on any man to repent on the ground that Christ died specifically and particularly for him. The basis on which the New Testament invites sinners to put faith in Christ is simply that they need Him, and that He offers Himself to them, and that those who receive Him are promised all the benefits that His death secured for His people. What is universal and all-inclusive in the New Testament is the invitation to faith, and the promise of salvation to all who believe…. The gospel is not “believe that Christ died for everybody’s sins, and therefore for yours,” any more than it is, “believe that Christ died only for certain people’s sins, and so perhaps not for yours.” The gospel is, “believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, who died for sins, and now offers you Himself as your Saviour.” This is the message which we are to take to the world. We have no business to ask them to put faith in any view of the extent of the atonement; our job is to point them to the living Christ and summon them to trust in Him.

Well said. We only need to present the Gospel and then allow God, in His sovereignty, to draw to Himself “as many as [have] been appointed to eternal life” (Acts 13:48). Calvinists have often been accused (and sometimes justifiably) of showing little concern for the lost. But it should never be that way. We have no idea who the elect are, and Christ has left us with the responsibility to share the Gospel and then trust Him to call those to Himself whomever He chooses to call. We must be obedient in doing so.

Also, we must be gracious and kind to our Arminian brothers and sisters in Christ who disagree with us on these matters. Truth divides, but we must not be harsh, unfriendly, or unloving, even though we disagree with them. We should pray for them to study the Word, think seriously about such matters, and hopefully they will gain greater understanding of the truth; just as happened in my own situation.

Those Dangerous Calvinists!

by Bruce Mills

Recently another of the elders at the church I serve called my attention to information posted on Pastor Tom Ascol’s blog, Founders’ Ministries Blog, regarding documents that are circulating among Southern Baptist Churches in western Tennessee.  These documents are intended to teach people in those churches how to determine if any of their church staff are Calvinists and then get rid of any that they may find.  You can view them here.  This information is apparently being spread by individuals who consider the doctrines of grace to be heresy.

The first document is titled "Reformed Red Flags" and it contains a list of 16 "behaviors" to look for when seeking to determine who the Calvinists pastors may be.  Some of these “behaviors” are quite surprising.  Included on the list are:

“Use of the ESV Study Bible” – This is simply another way of promoting the KJV Only position.  Prior to the emergence of the ESV, most of the KJV Only proponents directed their assault on the NIV, but now that the ESV has become widely accepted among reformed evangelicals, they are now redirecting their slander on this fine translation.

“Moving the church to be under Elder Rule” – Perhaps these folks should go back and read Titus 1:5 where Paul clearly instructed Titus to appoint elders in the churches in the cities of Crete.  Apparently God, who inspired Paul to write that instruction, believes that elders are to be the leaders of the church rather than the congregation.

“Focusing on creating the ‘true’ church” – Clearly this is aimed at Grace Life Church of the Shoals in Muscle Shoals, Alabama, a strongly Calvinistic Southern Baptist church which holds an annual “True Church” conference.  Closely related is another statement regarding the use of church discipline.  The unknown author considers the purpose of church discipline to be an attempt to purge the church of anyone who is not part of the “true” church.  While that is never the primary intent of church discipline, the purification of the church is a secondary result.  Apparently those circulating these documents consider that to be a bad thing.

“Look for the men they quote in their sermons; do they mainly quote Calvinists such as John Piper, R. C. Sproul, James White, Jonathan Edwards, and others?” – Wow!  Some of America’s greatest theologians and teaching pastors whose ministries have led countless hundreds and thousands to saving faith in Jesus Christ are persona non grata to these people. 

“Tendency toward a highly logical systematic theology…” – I think it’s clear that they prefer a highly illogical disorganized theology in which anything and everything is up for grabs.

The second page of the document purports to explain the theological differences between what the author describes as “Traditional Southern Baptists” and “Extreme Calvinists.”  For me, the most interesting statement had to do with God’s knowledge.  The writer states: “Traditional Baptists believe in an all knowing God, but they are not determinists, because they do not believe God has planned everything that happens (emphasis mine).  Through His eternal foreknowledge, He knows what is going to happen, but He doesn’t over-ride man’s freewill.” 

This statement clearly shows that the distance from Arminianism to Open Theism is very short!  I’m not sure what they believe the things are that God has not planned, because He stakes claim to both the good and the bad events of our lives and this world (Amos 3:6, 4:6-13; Job 1:12-22; Isaiah 45:7; Lamentations 3:38).  So the writer’s view isn’t significantly different than the Open Theist whose God sits in heaven, captive to the decisions of man, reacting only after man has exercised his sovereign freewill. 

Notice that the writer says that man has the ability to exercise freewill and that God knows what man will choose, but doesn’t override it.  The problem with such a view is that unregenerate man’s will is not free; it is enslaved to sin (Romans 6:6-20).  So man’s “freewill” really isn’t free.  And since the pursuit of sin is his nature, he will pursue sin.  A pig acts like a pig because it is the nature of a pig to do so.  And the same principle applies to sinful man.  And unless God steps in and overrides man’s will, drawing him to Christ, that man would never choose to believe.

So what’s my conclusion?  Simply this: It’s very, very sad when churches reach the point that their greatest concern is not making sure the Gospel of Jesus Christ is proclaimed, souls are rescued from eternal hell, and God is glorified, but rather that they root out the dangerous Calvinists who might be lurking in their pulpits!  I pray that God will protect other churches and believers who might be tempted to fall into the same dangerous trap as have these men.

Dead Men Walking

by Bruce Mills

“And you were dead in your trespasses and sins" (Ephesians 2:1). In those nine words, there is perhaps no clearer statement in Scripture on the sinfulness of man apart from Christ. In the original Greek text, it literally says “And you, being dead in your trespasses and sins.” In other words, man does not become spiritually dead because he sins; he is spiritually dead because by nature he is sinful. Except for Jesus Christ, that is the condition of every human being since the Fall, including every believer before he is saved. It is the past condition of believers and the present condition of everyone else.

Now contrary to most modern thinking, including such esteemed theologians as Oprah Winfrey and Dr. Phil, man’s basic trouble is not being out of harmony with his heritage or his environment, but being out of harmony with his Creator. His principal problem is not that he cannot make meaningful relationships with other human beings, but that he has no right relationship to God, from whom he is alienated by sin.

His condition has nothing to do with the way he lives; it has to do with the fact that he is dead even while he is alive. He is spiritually dead while being physically alive. Because he is dead to God, he is dead to spiritual life, truth, righteousness, inner peace and happiness, and ultimately to every other good thing.

One of the first indications of physical death is the body’s inability to respond to stimulus, no matter what it might be. The simple fact is that a dead person cannot react. He no longer responds to light, sound, smell, taste, pain, or anything else. He is totally insensitive because there is no life in him.

That is the way of spiritual death as well. A person who is spiritually dead has no life by which he can respond to spiritual things, much less live a spiritual life. No amount of love, care, and words of affection from God can draw a response. A spiritually dead person is alienated from God and therefore alienated from life. He has no capacity to respond. Apart from God, men as spiritual zombies, the walking dead who do not know they are dead. They go through the motions of life, but they do not possess it.

This is the primary reason why I am convinced that Calvinism is correct and Arminianism is wrong. According to what this passage says, men and women are “dead in…trespasses and sins”—they cannot possibly respond on their own to the Gospel apart from the work of God to raise them to spiritual life.

But Arminianism teaches that the fall of man was not total, maintaining that there was enough good left in man for him to will to accept Jesus Christ unto salvation.

Arminians believe that election is based on the foreknowledge of God as to who would believe. Man’s “act of faith” is seen as the “condition” or his being elected to eternal life, since God foresaw him exercising his “free will” in response to Jesus Christ.

The founder of Arminianism, Joseph Arminius, held that redemption was based on the fact that God loves everybody, that Christ died for everyone, and that the Father is not willing that any should perish. The death of Christ provided the grounds for God to save all men, but each must exercise his own “free will” in order to be saved.

He also believed that since God wanted all men to be saved, He sent the Holy Spirit to “woo” all men to Christ, but since man has absolute “free will,” he is able to resist God’s will for his life. He believed that God’s will to save all men can be frustrated by the finite will of man. He also taught that man exercises his own will first, and then is born again.

He even said that a man cannot be saved by God unless it is man’s will to be saved, and a man cannot continue in salvation unless he continues to will to be saved. In other words, he can lose his salvation.

In other words, man’s salvation depends on his own ability and will to stay saved. I find such teachings to be absolutely incompatible with this passage. Before we were saved, we were like every other person who is apart from God—“dead in…trespasses and sins.”

The Greek case indicates the sphere or realm in which something or someone exists. It tells us where we were before our salvation. We were in the sphere of being dead in trespasses and sins. We were not dead because we committed sins, but because we were in sin.

A person does not become a liar when he tells a lie; he tells a lie because he already is a liar. He does not become a thief when he steals; he steals because he already is a thief. And so also with murder, adultery, covetousness, and every other sin.

Committing sinful acts does not make us sinners; we commit sinful acts because we are sinners. Jesus confirmed this when He said, “The things that proceed out of the mouth come from the heart, and those defile the man. For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, slanders” (Matt. 15:18-19).

Now, someone might ask, "Do you mean that because all men are equally dead in sin that they are all equally corrupt and wicked?" No; twenty corpses on a battlefield might be in many different stages of decay, but they are uniformly dead. The manifestation of death occurs in many different forms and degrees, but death itself has no degrees. Sin manifests itself in many different forms and degrees, but the state of sin itself has no degrees. Not all men are as evil as they could be, but all fail to measure up to God’s perfect standard.

As a state of being, a sphere of existence, sin has more to do with what is not done than with what is done. God’s standard is for men to be perfect just as He Himself is perfect (Matt. 5:48). God has never given any standard for man but perfect holiness.

It is because of that perfect standard of holiness that men apart from God cannot be anything but sinful. Because he is separated from God, he cannot do anything but fall short of God’s standard. No matter how much good he does or attempts to do, the standard of never doing or never having done evil at all is unattainable.

Because I live on the Gulf of Mexico, let me give you an illustration I have used many times. Let’s suppose that all of us decided we would go down to the beach, and we all lined up and took turns trying to jump across the Gulf of Mexico. Some of us might jump only a couple of feet, but others might jump 8 or 10 feet out before we landed in the water. Even if we brought in a professional broad jumper, he might be able to jump 25 or 26 feet. But no one would be able to jump to the other side of the Gulf. Our degrees of success would vary only in relation to one another, but in relation to achieving the goal, we would all be equal failures.

That is the same way it is with attempting to achieve God’s holiness. Every unbeliever is an equal failure. That’s why the morally good, helpful, kind, considerate, self-giving, generous person needs salvation as much as the serial killer on death row.

The person who is a good parent, a loving spouse, an honest worker, and a civic humanitarian needs Jesus Christ to save him or her from the eternal condemnation of hell just as much as the drug-addicted prostitute or the heartless terrorist. They do not lead equally sinful lives, but they are equally in the state of sin, equally separated from God, and equally estranged from spiritual life.

Jesus once said, “If you do good to those who do good to you, what credit is that to you? For even sinners do the same” (Luke 6:33). On another occasion He said, “If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask Him?” (Luke 11:13). What He was saying is that a person apart from God can do humanly good things.

But as the Lord points out in both of those statements, the person is still a sinner, still evil by nature, and still operating on a motive less than that of glorifying God. A sinner’s doing good is good, but it cannot change his nature or his basic sphere of existence, and it cannot reconcile him to God.

There is one more passage which states this principle, which I personally think is the most frightening passage of Scripture in the Bible. It’s found in Matt. 7:22-23. Jesus is concluding the Sermon on the Mount, and he tells the listening crowd what it will be like at the Great White Throne Judgment, and He says, “Many will say to Me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name, and in Your name cast out demons, and in Your name perform many miracles?’ And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness.’”

In other words, there will be many people who will stand before the Lord and try to justify themselves on the basis of their wonderful works of power, and their wonderful teaching done in His name, and He will send them to hell because they never had a personal relationship to Him.

Being good and kind to other people pleases God. You might even say it is a step in the right direction. The only problem is that 100,000 such steps cannot bring a person any closer to God because it is a sinner’s condition of sinfulness and not his particular sins that separate him from God, his particular acts of goodness cannot reconcile him to God.

So, man is in an impossible situation. He is spiritually dead and entirely unable to extricate himself from that situation. How then, is he supposed to have a relationship with God? How will he ever be able to avoid God's wrath and just condemnation to an eternal hell? We'll examine the answer in our next post.

Human Free Will - Fact or Fiction?

by Robert Fraire

Free Will is one of those phrases that most Christians take to be a central truth of their Christian faith. For most of us the idea of "free will" was preached from the pulpit, proclaimed in Sunday School and assumed whenever Christians gathered. But I'm here to say that no one really believes that men have free will. And the Bible teaches in fact that man's will is not free.

So if you are still reading this post, let us examine the words Free Will. In order for a will to be free their must necessarily be No limitations on it. If the Will is Free, it must be able to accomplish whatever it sets out to do. But we all understand that to be false just from our own experience. To start with an extreme example: If a man wills to fly can he accomplish it? No, not unless he is in an airplane. So then can a man marry any woman he wills to marry? At 5' 6" and 42 years old can I dunk a basketball if I will to do so? (No I can't)

Ok, so we would all agree that man's will is limited in many ways. One of those ways is that our bodies can only accomplish things that are phyically possible. Are there other ways that the human will is limited? Yes, man's will is limited by his desires. A man will make choices that he thinks are best. He may choose to forgo pleasure for a time in order to reap greater benefits later. But men won't do what doesn't make sense for them to do. Unless of course they are insane.

So what is it in man that forms his desire? Here is where I will turn to scripture. The Bible tells us that man was created from the dust of the ground. Therefore part of man is his Flesh. The Bible then tells us that God breathed into the man and he became a living being. Or as the King James says, a living soul(Gen 2:7). So here we see that man has an eternal part to his being, his soul, or his spirit. So man has a spirit and a flesh. Those inform his will as to what is the right thing to do. So when a man is faced with a decision he does not make a choice in a vaccum. Whatever his spirit and his flesh tell him he then chooses.

So now what does the Bible tell us is the state of man's flesh and his spirit? In Genesis 3 we see the sin of Adam and Eve and that their punishment was death. That death was not only their eventual physical death, but also their spirit died as well. And by die, I mean that it ceased to be able to do what God commanded it to do. Romans 5:12 tells us that through Adam sin entered the world, and through his sin, all his descendants faced the same consequence that he did. We inherited a spirit that was dead in terms of being able to obey God. Our spirit was tuned to sin, and our flesh was tuned to sin. Jesus termed this truth in this fashion: in John 8:34, "everyone who sins is a slave to sin." And Paul echos this truth concerning our flesh. In Romans 7:14 Paul says "...but I am flesh, sold into bondage to sin. So if the spirit is a slave to sin, and the flesh is in bondage to sin then what will be the choice that man makes on his own? He will always choose to reject God's gospel. He is a slave to sin, nothing in him desires God. He is an enemy of God and the gospel message and his messangers are the stench of death to him (2 Cor 2:14-16)

In Romans 3: 10 - 18

as it is written,
"THERE IS NONE RIGHTEOUS, NOT EVEN ONE;
THERE IS NONE WHO UNDERSTANDS,
THERE IS NONE WHO SEEKS FOR GOD;
ALL HAVE TURNED ASIDE, TOGETHER THEY HAVE BECOME USELESS;
THERE IS NONE WHO DOES GOOD,
THERE IS NOT EVEN ONE.
THEIR THROAT IS AN OPEN GRAVE,
WITH THEIR TONGUES THEY KEEP DECEIVING,
THE POISON OF ASPS IS UNDER THEIR LIPS;
WHOSE MOUTH IS FULL OF CURSING AND BITTERNESS;
THEIR FEET ARE SWIFT TO SHED BLOOD,
DESTRUCTION AND MISERY ARE IN THEIR PATHS,
AND THE PATH OF PEACE THEY HAVE NOT KNOWN.
THERE IS NO FEAR OF GOD BEFORE THEIR EYES."

So does a man who hears the gospel choose to accept it or reject it? Yes he does. And everytime he exercises his will, he chooses to reject! His will is NOT free, it is a slave to sin because his spirit and his flesh that inform his will are slaves to sin. Without the supernaturual work of regeneration by God himself all men would be lost, always rejecting God's invitation of the gospel.

So then where do people get the idea of "free will"? One place is a verse like John 3:16 In that verse, scripture says: "that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life."
The logic that follows is that since God gives a choice (whoever believes) then man must have the ability to believe. But this verse does not state that everyone is able to make the positive choice for faith in Jesus. It only states that whoever does believe will be saved. If I said, whoever runs a mile in less than 4 minutes will make the Olympic team. That, in no way states that you have the ability to run a sub 4 minute mile.

So then who does make the positive choice for faith in the Gospel? Earlier in John 3 Jesus says that it is those that are Born Again who will see the kingdom of heaven. So what occurs in the act of being born again? The Holy Spirit removes the man's dead spirit, and puts in a spirit that is free from sin. Thatman with a new spirit hears the gospel and then is able to exercise his will and always chooses to believe in Jesus Christ.

What a great God He is. In His mercy and through His grace, His Spirit brings new life to men, who then call out in faith and are redeemed. If you are a Christian today you are so because of God's work in your life. Not because you had something extra in your "free will" that decided to choose God. In fact, He chose you.