Facebook comment: “So you’re a Calvinist”

"So you’re a Calvinist. That is one of the contradictions I was talking about.

You think it is God that chooses his followers. First of all if true, that only proves how cruel and self serving your god is, since he intentionally brought into being all the souls that will be cast into hell for not being chosen. A good god would not create something he, in his infinite knowledge, intends for eternal damnation and suffering.

As for scripture that counters your Calvinist beliefs, look in Matthew 16:24 where Jesus says, "If ANYONE would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me." ANYONE… not those chosen by god.

Additionally, John 12:26 states, "If ANYONE serves me, he must follow me; and where I am, there will my servant be also."

That kinda knocks you belief in the chosen out of the water.

But you will read into scripture whatever aligns with your personal dogmatic beliefs and ignore or negotiate your beliefs into any scripture that contradicts what you believe.

I’m not here to convince you, that is a journey you have to endeavor to take yourself. But you have to be willing to challenge your own immovable beliefs first. Every time you read scripture you have to ask yourself what the message is, and where scripture might have something else to say about the same subject. I can show you dozens of contradictions, and some outright fabrications.

For instance why is it that Moses is a central character in the Old Testament, impacting Egyptian, Canaanite, Amorite, and every other tribal culture of the region, and yet there is not one single extrabiblical mention of him. And why is the baby floating in the river story a borrowed tale from more ancient Semitic tribes?

Or, even better… why are there four accounts of the resurrection of Christ, and not a single one of them agree with the others? In one the stone was rolled away before anyone arrived, but is dramatically rolled away in the others. There are a varying number of women that go to the tomb, there are between zero and two angels that show up. The book of Mark originally ended with no appearance of Jesus, and later scribes made up a story and appended it to the last chapter.

There are so many more. From beginning to end, the Bible has dozens of voices with dozens of agendas, and they simply don’t always agree."

McCann reply:

I'd be glad to discuss the Bible's teaching on salvation (election) but I don't care about Calvin – have zero interest in his theology or any other theological position put forth by theologians of past or present.

Typically, people bring up Calvin to shoot down Calvin (find with me – again I don't care about him) but if you align yourself with a theologian (which I do not) a few things may be correct and a few things wrong. That's the problem.

All I know is that if God didn't save few (the elect), then none would have been saved. And as a Sovereign King and Lord, He had the right to view death row (all humanity) and according to His good pleasure (which is the only reason the Bible gives for God choosing one [Jacob] over the other [Esau] He made His choice). The church gets things backwards. They lie to people and tell them they have to choice Jesus – which has yet to save a single person. When the Bible plainly says it’s the other way around:

John 15:16 Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you, and ordained you

Furthermore, God even states that salvation is NOT of the will of man:

John 1:13 Which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.

And,

Romans 9:15 For he saith to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion.

16 So then it is NOT of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that sheweth mercy.

Secondly, the same church that lies to people to fill their pews via the instant pudding salvation they offer – also tells people if they don't accept Christ (again, which is impossible for man to do) then they will die and suffer forever and ever in a place of endless suffering. Another lie.

The true teaching of the God of the Bible is that there MUST be a limitation on punishment. In fact, God who submits Himself to His own law, gives the law for judges in Deuteronomy 25 wherein He stipulates that a judge cannot sentence an evil doer to more than 40 stripes else the evil doer seem vile unto you (see Deut. 25:1-3). Someone might say, so what? But that law is the most solid piece of Biblical evidence proving that God cannot sentence a man to eternal punishment wherein the man is consciously suffering forever and ever. Why not? Because Deut. 25:1-3 stipulates a limit placed on the judge regarding his sentence of punishment.

And since God is under His own law – that is, God cannot give a law for men to obey in which He Himself does not obey it. As a result, God cannot command earthly judges to limit punishment for evil doers while He Himself prescribes unlimited punishment (eternal conscious suffering) of the sinner.

Unfortunately, the God so many churches have taught to people is a God out of their own wicked imaginations.

The final judgment of the true God of the Bible is to destroy the sinner in death forevermore. The evil doer will be annihilated out of existence. He will cease to be. And while that is an eternal judgment (because he'll be no more forever), it is not the twisted sentence of punishment that the corporate churches have used as a cudgel to populate their congregations.

REGARDING BIBLE CONTRADICTIONS

There are many APPARENT contradictions in the Bible. Because God wrote it to trap proud men. But there are no ACTUAL contradictions in the Bible. I could get numerous examples of this. If anyone says there's a contradiction in the Bible and concludes it is fault, what is faulty is usually their careless skimming of the surface of Scriptures rather than serious in depth study.

A lot of people – probably in this group alone – come to the Bible to find fault. That's what they're looking for. So God accommodates them by moving the prophets to write the Scriptures with the look of error (apparent contradiction).

Here's a note I wrote clarifying a so-called contradiction a while back:

I gathered from the description of the link that it claims the Bible is full of errors. This is a common misconception often made by careless and superficial readers of the Scripture who find "contradictions" in the text. And while it is true that there are numbers of apparent contradictions in the Bible, the fact is that there are no actual contradictions. The so-called errors feeble minded men find in the Bible are always errors on their own end due to a failure to take the time and effort to reconcile the two seeming contradictory statements with each other and the whole of the Bible.

For example, in 2 Kings 8:25 the Bible says that in the 12th year of Joram Ahaziah began to reign over Judah. Yet, in the very next chapter, in 2 Kings 9:29 we're told that it was in the 11th year of Joram that Ahaziah began to reign over Judah. Now, this "contradiction" is striking because it is made literally from one chapter to another. And over the ages many have pointed to this one-year discrepancy and said, "Ahah, you see, you can't trust the Bible. It's not a holy book at all. It makes careless mistakes. How can it be holy?" However, as I said earlier, the Bible is full of apparent contradictions but no actual contradictions. The solution to this particular so called error is that the reign of the kings of Israel (as Joram was) could be spoken of as reigning according to either an accession year system or a non0accession year system. That is, the one reference to Joram's reign was calculating it from the year he began to reign, counting the initial year itself, to Ahaziah's starting to reign therefore it was said to be his 12th year. While the other reference did not begin to count Joram's first year until he had completed one whole year. Thus, the references to Joram's 11th year and 12th year were referring to the very same time. No actual contradiction. Only a seeming contradiction. Why would God write the Bible in such a way? Well, in order to set traps for natural minded men who wish to find fault with His Holy Word. God is very accommodating to men who seek to disbelieve the Bible is the Word of God.