The central motivations behind anti-Calvinism and Calvinism
Dec 21, 2013 8:00:48 GMT
Post by Colossians on Dec 21, 2013 8:00:48 GMT
This material is for the teaching of the Body of Christ, however the author reserves copyright over it.
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THE CENTRAL MOTIVATIONS BEHIND ANTI-CALVINISM AND CALVINISM
Anti-Calvinism
The central motivation behind anti-Calvinism, is two-fold:
Part A: the idea that to save someone ‘by force’, were an unloving act.
The problem with this idea is that it presupposes that one can in fact be forced to love God.
One can’t be forced to love anyone: not even God can force someone to love Him, for love of its very substance precludes any possibility of its having been forced.
The anti-Calvinist then is simply attacking a straw Calvinist: no Calvinist believes God can force anyone to love Him, for no Calvinist believes that love can be forced.
Part B: the notion that it would be unfair of God to love only certain ones and not others.
But his idea here actually contradicts his idea of Part A, for here at Part B the basis of his argument is that love begets love (and that it would therefore be unfair of God to love only certain people, for then only they would ever be able to love Him back). That is, he contradicts his presupposition of Part A that one can in fact be forced to love God.
You can’t have it both ways: if you say that it would be wrong for God to force people to love Him, you can’t then also object to the notion that God loves only certain people: the first idea presupposes that one can indeed be forced to love someone, the second that love can only be begotten through love.
Calvinism
The most striking characteristic of any debate between Calvinists and anti-Calvinists, consists of an omission. Specifically, the anti-Calvinist never asks the Calvinist how his doctrine accords with his personal experience.
The central motivation behind the Calvinist is not, as the anti-Calvinist presumes, a smug eliteness which declares him to be one of the lucky ones who are elect of God, but his own personal experience which tells him that the relationship he now has with Jesus Christ, could never have even imaginably come about by way of any activity on his own part – that the nature of what he has entered into is so supernatural, so sublime, so at odds with even the very best the world has to offer (let alone the worst), that it were absurd to suggest that he himself somehow contributed to the equation.
Commensurate with such experientially-based doctrine, is his sense that he not even dare consider that he had anything to do with the current state of affairs – that any such consideration were in contempt of the court of a very fearful God indeed – that it were the height of ingratitude and disrespect – that it were to tread the grace of God underfoot and declare it common ground.
The central motivation behind Calvinism then is in fact the intense awareness of, and sensitivity to, the holiness of God, on a very personal and intimate level.
The motivation is not opportunistic, not even scriptural, but experiential. It is a motivation ‘forced’ by the abiding presence of the Holy Ghost.
Amen.
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THE CENTRAL MOTIVATIONS BEHIND ANTI-CALVINISM AND CALVINISM
Anti-Calvinism
The central motivation behind anti-Calvinism, is two-fold:
Part A: the idea that to save someone ‘by force’, were an unloving act.
The problem with this idea is that it presupposes that one can in fact be forced to love God.
One can’t be forced to love anyone: not even God can force someone to love Him, for love of its very substance precludes any possibility of its having been forced.
The anti-Calvinist then is simply attacking a straw Calvinist: no Calvinist believes God can force anyone to love Him, for no Calvinist believes that love can be forced.
Part B: the notion that it would be unfair of God to love only certain ones and not others.
But his idea here actually contradicts his idea of Part A, for here at Part B the basis of his argument is that love begets love (and that it would therefore be unfair of God to love only certain people, for then only they would ever be able to love Him back). That is, he contradicts his presupposition of Part A that one can in fact be forced to love God.
You can’t have it both ways: if you say that it would be wrong for God to force people to love Him, you can’t then also object to the notion that God loves only certain people: the first idea presupposes that one can indeed be forced to love someone, the second that love can only be begotten through love.
Calvinism
The most striking characteristic of any debate between Calvinists and anti-Calvinists, consists of an omission. Specifically, the anti-Calvinist never asks the Calvinist how his doctrine accords with his personal experience.
The central motivation behind the Calvinist is not, as the anti-Calvinist presumes, a smug eliteness which declares him to be one of the lucky ones who are elect of God, but his own personal experience which tells him that the relationship he now has with Jesus Christ, could never have even imaginably come about by way of any activity on his own part – that the nature of what he has entered into is so supernatural, so sublime, so at odds with even the very best the world has to offer (let alone the worst), that it were absurd to suggest that he himself somehow contributed to the equation.
Commensurate with such experientially-based doctrine, is his sense that he not even dare consider that he had anything to do with the current state of affairs – that any such consideration were in contempt of the court of a very fearful God indeed – that it were the height of ingratitude and disrespect – that it were to tread the grace of God underfoot and declare it common ground.
The central motivation behind Calvinism then is in fact the intense awareness of, and sensitivity to, the holiness of God, on a very personal and intimate level.
The motivation is not opportunistic, not even scriptural, but experiential. It is a motivation ‘forced’ by the abiding presence of the Holy Ghost.
Amen.