Why is Calvinism so dangerous? #2 (God wants whom to perish?)

 [In this series, I'm breaking the long post "Why is Calvinism so dangerous?" into bite-sized pieces.]

2.
The Bible says ... God is not willing that any man should perish, He wants all to be saved, His saving grace is available to all.

But Calvinism says ... God predestined most people to hell for His pleasure and glory, His saving grace was never for the non-elect.


2 Peter 3:9:  "... He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance."  [However, Calvi-god predestines most people to perish, but then he says here that he doesn't really want anyone to perish.  Deceptive!  And if he gets glory for predestining people to perish, then isn't he denying himself glory by saying he doesn't want anyone to perish?  If predestining people to hell truly was glorifying to him, then shouldn't he - and Calvinists - celebrate people going to hell because it brings Calvi-god more glory?  If Calvi-god's okay with the non-elect going to hell, why isn't the Calvinist?  FYI: The ESV Bible translates this verse differently than any other version, making it much more Calvinist.  At least to me.  Click here to see.]

Ezekiel 33:11:  "Say to them, 'As surely as I live, declares the Sovereign Lord, I take no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but rather that they turn from their ways and live.  Turn!  Turn from your evil ways!  Why will you die, O house of Israel?'"  [Why will they die?  Well - duh - because you, Calvi-god, predestined them to die, for your glory and pleasure, and there's nothing they can do about it.]

Romans 11:32:  "For God has bound all men over to disobedience so that he may have mercy on them all."  [Calvinists say the first "all" means "all," but the second "all" means "only the elect."  Calvi-god only truly has salvation-mercy on the elect.  But to sound more non-Calvinist (more biblical), Calvinists will say that food, water, and sunshine are "daily mercies."  This way, they can say "See!  God does have 'mercy' on all people, even the non-elect."  Just not salvation-type mercy.  That's some wonderful mercy for the non-elect, isn't it!?!  Like feeding pigs lots of good food to fatten them up before slaughter.  But hey, at least they got some "mercy" while they were alive!  But let's not care about those headed to hell; let's just focus on the lucky few that get to go to heaven!]

Acts 2:38:  "Peter replied, 'Repent and be baptized every one of you ...'"  [Calvinists say that only the elect can repent, but that we have to tell everyone to repent because we don't know who's elect and who's not.  And they say that Calvi-god commands the non-elect to repent - even though he's predestined them to hell - because he needed them to be guilty of disobeying his command - even though that's all they could do, by his design - so that he could "justly" punish them for their disobedience.  As if they had a choice!  As if that's true justice!!  It's convoluted and sick!  See "Things my Calvinist pastor said #15: No altar calls, and replacing 'believe' with 'repent'" and "Calvinists, altar calls, and evangelism"]

Mark 16:16:  "Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned."  [Once again, in Calvinism, only the elect are predestined to believe.  The non-elect are predestined to be condemned.  And so in Calvinism, this isn't a call to believe or instructions on how you can be saved; it's merely informing us of the destiny of the elect and the non-elect.]

Romans 3:23-24:  "for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Jesus Christ."  [Once again, Calvinists will say that "all" have sinned but "not all" are justified.  But is this what the verse says?  The problem is, they interpret "justified" as "going to heaven."  They believe if Jesus died for you, you WILL BE saved.  And of course, in Calvinism, this only happens to the elect.  Therefore, since the non-elect don't go to heaven, Jesus didn't die for them.  But Calvinists severely misunderstand Jesus's death.  He died to pay for all men's sins, to justify us all before God, but we have to accept it.  The penalty for all our sin has been paid, but God leaves it up to each of us to decide to accept or reject it.  But since Calvinists do not believe it's possible for people to decide or to reject it, they say that if Jesus died for you, you will go to heaven, and so Jesus only died for "the elect" (those going to heaven, in Calvinism).  And then, they have to twist verses like the one above to make it fit, creating contradictions and conundrums and destroying God's character and Word.  But this whole mess would be fixed if they had a proper, biblical view of free-will, of God giving us all the right and responsibility to make decisions.  But they refuse to do this because they're convinced it strips God of His "sovereignty," as they define it, which is that God has to control everything or else He's not God.  Like I said: Telling God how He has to be in order to be God.]

Titus 2:11:  "For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men."

1 Timothy 2:3-4:  "This is good, and pleases God our Savior, who wants all men to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth."

Calvinists try to weasel out of the truth that Calvinism teaches "God predestines people for hell" by saying that God doesn't really predestine the non-elect for hell ... He just doesn't elect them for heaven, which means they end up in hell by default.  

HOGWASH!  

It's the same thing.  And they know it.  (Which is why they have to write theology books that are hundreds of pages long to try to explain it, to try to make it make sense.  Which they fail at, because it just gets more convoluted, confusing, and contradictory.)  

They are just trying to soften up Calvi-god's image, to make it seem like he's not really a bad, unjust, unrighteous, monster god who predestines people for hell; he just "passes over them, doesn't choose them for heaven."  (If he's such a good, righteous god, why the need to soften his image?)

But it's nonsense!  If Calvi-god is the one who predestines who goes to heaven and the rest have to go to hell, then he does indeed predestine who goes to hell.  It's two sides of the same coin.  You can't have one without the other.  Not choosing someone for heaven is choosing them for hell.    

Calvinists really think that by simply saying "We don't SAY God predestines people to hell and we don't SAY He causes sin and unbelief" that they can convince us that their theology doesn't ultimately teach it.  But it does!  They just won't admit it.  They won't SAY it.  (If a man says "I don't say I'm beating my wife" while he's beating his wife, are you going to believe him?)

And do you know why Calvi-god had to predestine people to hell?

To show off his wonderful attributes of justice and love/grace, so that he could get glory for them!  He needed to have non-believers to punish so that he could demonstrate - and get glory for - his justice/wrath against sin (because without sin, he could never show off these attributes of his, which would've been stifling to him) and so that his grace/love for the elect would shine more brightly by comparison.  

But why then, I wonder, did he have to predestine most people to hell ... if he could have demonstrated his justice/wrath by predestining only one person to hell?  Is there only a limited number of spaces available in heaven or something, that he has to be so stingy with salvation?  Why is damning most people and saving just a few people more glorifying to him than damning a few and saving most?

But Calvi-god did predestine most people to hell (for sins he made them do), and so now we can truly see and celebrate his wonderful love (for the elect), his amazing grace (for the elect), and his righteous justice (for punishing the sin/unbelief that he caused) for the rest of eternity!  Glory be to our wonderful, righteous, trustworthy Calvi-god!!!  If he didn't predestine people to hell, we might never have realized how loving and gracious and just he is!   

[So then in Calvinism, God must have somehow been less of a God, less glorious, before sinners came along to punish, right?  I mean, think about it, that's what Calvinism is saying - that God needed sinners to punish in order to be fully God, to be most "glorious."  And so therefore, His "God-ness" and His glory depend on sinners.  And so then, I wonder, what was He before sinners came along?  Calvinism thinks it elevates God and His glory, but it's really just elevating sinful man, making God and His glory dependent on us, on sinners.]

Imagine something with me for a moment.  Imagine that you are at a busy park, and there's children and adults all around you.  And someone walks up to you and says, "I love you so much.  I'm taking you for my own.  And now watch what I do to show you how much I love you."  And then he takes out a sword and starts slicing up people, left and right, indiscriminately hacking away at whoever he can reach, randomly killing people.  And after he's done and there's bodies everywhere, he turns to you, grabs your arm, and says "See how much I love you!  See how gracious I am to you!  I could've done that to you too, but I spared you because I love you.  But I destroyed them because I decided to hate them before they were even born.  Now doesn't that make you feel grateful and humbled and loved!?!"

Do you know what we would call someone like that?

A psychopath!  A dangerous, deranged, unstable lunatic!

But Calvinists call him "God," and they worship him.  And since "He is the Potter and we are the clay," He can do whatever He wants with us and we have to be okay with it, because "it's all for His pleasure and glory," and so it's all good. 

"Besides, what's sin/evil for us is not sin/evil for God because He made the rules for us, not for Himself.  He didn't say that He can't do those things, just that we can't.  And He sees things differently than we do; what's evil to us is not necessarily evil to Him.  And even if something seems like injustice to us, it might be justice to Him, because He gets to decide what's just and what's unjust, not us.  And who are we to question Him?  He is God, and we are not.  We just have to trust Him.  So don't be unhumble, and don't talk back to Him." 

Yes, I've read something basically exactly like this from Calvinists (for one example, see "Exposing Calvinism: Causing evil isn't sin for God"), that what we see as evil may be good in God's eyes (since it glorifies Him), that what we see as injustice may be justice in God's eyes.  Calvinism erases the line between good and evil, between justice and injustice.  It tries to convince us that they can be one and the same, that there might not really be a difference between the two.  (Can you not see how satanic Calvinism is yet!?!)  

But then I wonder: If we can't tell the difference between good and evil, if we can't judge between justice and injustice because they are one and the same, because there's no real difference, then how in the world can we choose the good over the bad or seek/exercise justice on earth, as commanded in verses like these:

Isaiah 1:16-17: "... Stop doing wrong, learn to do right!  Seek justice ..."

Micah 6:8: "He has showed you, O man, what is good.  And what does the Lord require of you?  To act justly ..."

Psalm 106:3: "Blessed are they who maintain justice, who constantly do what is right."

Lev. 19:15: "Do not pervert justice..."

Jer. 22:3: "This is what the Lord says: Do what is just and right..." 

Prov. 31:9: "Speak up and judge fairly..." 

Psalm 37:27: "Turn from evil and do good..."

Amos 5:15: "Hate evil, love good; maintain justice in the courts..."

Zec. 7:9: "This is what the Lord Almighty says: 'Administer true justice...'"

And these are just a few.  All of these verses mean nothing if we are to believe that evil can be good and that injustice can be justice!  (And if the evil we do is really good in Calvi-god's eyes, why does he punish us for it?  Isn't he then just punishing us for doing "good" things that bring him glory?  Calvi-god is a sick, twisted psychopath!) 

You know what's funny?  

Proverbs 28:5 tells us "Evil men do not understand justice, but those who seek the Lord understand it fully."  

Proverbs 2:6,9 says "For the Lord gives wisdom, and from his mouth come knowledge and understanding... Then you will understand what is right and just and fair - every good path."  

And Hebrews 5:14 tells us "But solid food is for the mature, who by constant use have trained themselves to distinguish good from evil."

But Calvinists tell us that we can't tell the difference between good and evil, between justice and injustice, because there may not be one.  So then what does this tell us about Calvinists?

Do not buy into Calvinism's ridiculous nonsense and double-talk.  Do not let them convince you that their contradictions are insignificant, that the conundrums don't exist, that their arguments make sense.  They talk out of both sides of their mouth and expect you to not notice.  They destroy God's character and Jesus's sacrifice and then tell you that you "have to accept it" if you want to be a "good, God-honoring, humble Christian."  They turn evil into good, darkness into light, lies into truth, and they expect us to swallow it whole, without any push-back.  Like good little Calvinists! 

For more of their "talking out of both sides of their mouth" thing, more of how they qualify what they first say to change it into something completely different (I touched on this earlier):  

At first, they will agree with you that "God wills that no one perishes, He wants all men to be saved," which makes them sound biblical because it's exactly what the Bible says, making you think they believe that all people have the opportunity to be saved.  

But what they really mean (and will admit, when pushed) is that He has two different (contradictory) Wills and two different levels of "want".   He has a revealed Will in His Word where He doesn't want anyone in hell, but then He has a "deeper, secret" Will where He predestines most people to hell for His glory.  (And who are the only people God told this secret to?  That's right: Calvinists!)  And He has two levels of 'want.'  On one hand, He wants all men to be saved; it hurts His heart to put the non-elect in hell.  But on the other hand, what He wants more is to get glory for displaying His justice by punishing sinners in hell.  

Umm ... yeah ... predestining/causing them to sin and reject Him, giving them no choice or ability to do anything differently, but then punishing them for it ... yep, sounds like justice to me!  

  

 

This is far different from what they wanted you to think they were saying at first.  Do not trust what they "say."  There is always a deeper/unbiblical layer underneath the surface/biblical layer they first said, and the deeper layer reverses/negates the surface layer.  

It would be like someone saying on the surface "I never torture animals," but the deeper, hidden, more-true layer is "... in my dreams."  It's what they don't say, what they hide, that changes everything.  And if you don't push them, if you don't ask questions (the right questions!) and dig deeper and challenge what they say and ask them to explain it more fully, you'll never uncover the deeper layer.  If you settle for the surface/biblical layer (which is exactly what they want), you'll think they are right on track, and you'll trust them more, listen to them more, and eventually become a Calvinist just like them.

But if I may point out, regarding their whole "two different Wills of God" thing, notice what Paul tells us in Acts 20:27: "For I have not hesitated to proclaim to you the whole will of God."  The whole Will of God!  Paul's consistent message was "God wants you to be saved: to repent and believe in Jesus and be baptized in His name," and he calls it "the whole Will of God."  Where is there room here for a secret, deeper, contradictory Will where God really does want people in hell for His glory?  If there is a deeper, hidden Will, then Paul is lying.