Calvinism is Gospel !

[brightfame52]

I have nothing more to say.

So you waving the white flag, that's commendable !

 

[JimiSurvivor]

You are attempting to redefine terms to fit your theology, but your arguments collapse under the combined weight of Scripture and basic logic. You admit that man has a sin nature and is "unable to know God," yet you immediately turn around and claim that this same unable man can master his own salvation. Let’s address your contradictions head-on:

1. Dismantling the Semantic Escape: "Depravity" vs. "Sin Nature"

Your refusal to use the word "depraved" because you think it means "incapable of doing anything" proves you are fighting a strawman.

• As previously established, Total Depravity does not mean a person is a completely inactive block of wood or a zombie. It means that sin has entirely corrupted every part of man’s nature—his mind, his emotions, and his will.
• A depraved man can run governments, perform surgery, and build civilizations. But what he is utterly incapable of doing is performing a spiritually good act, such as choosing, loving, or submitting to the true God (Romans 8:7-8).
• He is not physically paralyzed; he is spiritually dead (Ephesians 2:1). By admitting man is "unable to know God," you have conceded the entire definition of Total Depravity, whether you like the label or not.

A. I know what Luther wrote in his book The Bondage of the Will. He believed that, due to Adam's Original Sin in paradise God IMPUTED Adam's GUILT to every one of his descendents (except Jesus). As I have tried to explain before, this idea came from the speculative musings of Augustine of Hippo who was searching for a scriptural justification for the practice of INFANT BAPTISM.
He reasoned that since Baptism in adults was aimed at the removal of sin so it was in infants. His only problem was that infants were had always been considered to be innocent since they lacked the capacity to sin. Augustine had to come up with some species of sin that was not personal and voluntary but which still applied to an infant.

B. Luther looked to Augustine as his teacher who had lived in the Fifth Century. Augustine had attempted to understand Romans 5:12 through the distorted lens of Augustine who, because of his ignorance of Greek had depended on corrupted Latin versions to interpret Romans 5:12. The corrupted Latin translation, Augustine was reading from said:
Wherefore as by one man [Adam] sin entered into this world and by sin death: and so death passed upon all men,
IN WHOM [i.e., in Adam] ALL HAVE SINNED

However, in the original Greek text of Paul this phrase was
εφ ω παντες ημαρτον or on the basis of whom or BECAUSE of WHOM (because of Adam) all sin
Had Paul written this verse as IN WHOM [in Adam] all sinned, then mankind would indeed have been declared just as guilty of Adam's sin as Adam himself. However, Paul's original Greek verse explains that all men sin BECAUSE [or as a consequence of] Adam did.

Augustine should have finished his Greek studies instead of behaving as a petulant child and quitting because he did not like his Greek tutor. Of course, had Augustine not been so proud, he might have sought help in interpreting the verse from John Chrysostom on the other side of the Mediterranean. Chrysostom was a contemporary whose native language was the same Koine Greek in which the Apostles spoke and wrote.

 

[JimiSurvivor]

I agree. Calvin and Calvinists seek to understand reality from a mechanistic perspective. Human beings are like a machine with a missing gear, not able to function normally without it, But we know that we aren't machines with a missing gear. We know that Calvinism is not a good explanation for God's gift of salvation.

Jonathan Edwards was an intellectual Calvinist tried to explain man's total depravity in a way that exactly follows what I learned when I studied modern (Materialistic-Naturalistic) Behaviorism. On this point, Jonathan Edwards and John B. Watson were in perfect agreement. Both believed that man has no moral agency.

Humans are simply biological machines whose every decision and action is the result of Classical and Operant Conditioning. It was indeed, mechanistic. Jonathan Edwards, the theologian, reasoned that since man was bound to follow the sum total of his desires and drives, God intervenes by unilaterally imposing NEW DESIRES in him. However, this is simply another kind of determinism just as dehumanizing, in its own way, as Watson's materialistic Behaviorism.

 

[maximc]

Notice in 2 Pe 1:1, that true faith was given to them, but it didn't originate from them - it was through the righteousness of Christ, which righteousness is only given through salvation, along with "all things that (pertain) to life and godliness". So, salvation came first and from it, faith. We can know this because Peter referred to Jesus as their Savior with their faith a result of Him AS Savior.
Spiritually, 2 Peter 1 shows that God saves us, clothes us in the righteousness of Christ, puts His Holy Spirit in us to grant us "all things for life". Furthermore, verse 3 confirms that His divine power grants us 'all things that pertain to life and godliness.' Since spiritual life and godliness are impossible without faith, faith itself must come from that sovereign gift of salvation.

[2Pe 1:1-3 KJV]
1 Simon Peter, a servant and an apostle of Jesus Christ, to them that have obtained like precious faith with us through the righteousness of God and our Saviour Jesus Christ:
2 Grace and peace be multiplied unto you through the knowledge of God, and of Jesus our Lord,
3 According as his divine power hath given unto us all things that [pertain] unto life and godliness, through the knowledge of him that hath called us to glory and virtue:

2 Pet. 1 is speaking to Christians who are already saved and are currently being sanctified. Just by throwing any response does not make it an answer. My question is for you to provide me a biblical reference which states that regeneration happens before the preaching of the gospel.

 

[maximc]

So you waving the white flag, that's commendable !

At least that way, you pat your own back.

 

[brightfame52]

A. I know what Luther wrote in his book The Bondage of the Will. He believed that, due to Adam's Original Sin in paradise God IMPUTED Adam's GUILT to every one of his descendents (except Jesus). As I have tried to explain before, this idea came from the speculative musings of Augustine of Hippo who was searching for a scriptural justification for the practice of INFANT BAPTISM.
He reasoned that since Baptism in adults was aimed at the removal of sin so it was in infants. His only problem was that infants were had always been considered to be innocent since they lacked the capacity to sin. Augustine had to come up with some species of sin that was not personal and voluntary but which still applied to an infant.

B. Luther looked to Augustine as his teacher who had lived in the Fifth Century. Augustine had attempted to understand Romans 5:12 through the distorted lens of Augustine who, because of his ignorance of Greek had depended on corrupted Latin versions to interpret Romans 5:12. The corrupted Latin translation, Augustine was reading from said:
Wherefore as by one man [Adam] sin entered into this world and by sin death: and so death passed upon all men,
IN WHOM [i.e., in Adam] ALL HAVE SINNED

However, in the original Greek text of Paul this phrase was
εφ ω παντες ημαρτον or on the basis of whom or BECAUSE of WHOM (because of Adam) all sin
Had Paul written this verse as IN WHOM [in Adam] all sinned, then mankind would indeed have been declared just as guilty of Adam's sin as Adam himself. However, Paul's original Greek verse explains that all men sin BECAUSE [or as a consequence of] Adam did.

Augustine should have finished his Greek studies instead of behaving as a petulant child and quitting because he did not like his Greek tutor. Of course, had Augustine not been so proud, he might have sought help in interpreting the verse from John Chrysostom on the other side of the Mediterranean. Chrysostom was a contemporary whose native language was the same Koine Greek in which the Apostles spoke and wrote.

"Your frantic lecture on church history, infant baptism, and Latin translations is an elaborate smoke screen designed to mask a massive failure in basic Greek grammar. You accuse Augustine of failing his Greek studies, but your own manufactured translation of Romans 5:12 completely violates the rules of Koine Greek syntax.

Let’s look at exactly where your linguistic and historical arguments completely self-destruct:

1. Your Severe Greek Grammar Blunder in Romans 5:12

You confidently assert that the Greek phrase ἐφ᾽ ᾧ (eph hō) means 'because of whom' or 'on the basis of whom,' trying to force the pronoun to refer directly back to the person of Adam. You have completely botched the grammar.
In Koine Greek, ᾧ (hō) is a neuter singular relative pronoun. If the Apostle Paul had intended this phrase to refer back to the masculine noun 'man' (Adam, henos anthrōpou), syntax requires that he use the masculine relative pronoun: ἐφ᾽ οὗ (eph hou).
Because Paul used the neuter, it is grammatically impossible for the phrase to refer to the person of Adam. In New Testament Greek, the idiomatic phrase ἐφ᾽ ᾧ uniformly means 'because,' 'in view of the fact that,' or 'in that.'

Therefore, Paul’s original Greek text literally reads: '...and so death passed upon all men, because all sinned.'

This leaves you in an inescapable logical trap: When did every single human being sin to cause death to pass upon them? You claim infants are born completely pure and only sin later in life. But Paul explicitly states in Romans 5:14 that death reigned over infants who had not personally or voluntarily sinned after the similitude of Adam’s transgression.

Think through the courtroom law: Death is the penal wages of sin (Rom 6:23). If an infant dies, they are enduring the legal penalty of sin. If they are enduring the penalty, they must legally possess the guilt. Since they haven't committed voluntary sins yet, their guilt can only be the imputed guilt of their Federal Head, Adam. They sinned in him when he fell, exactly as the text demands.

2. Your Historical Claim About John Chrysostom is Factually False

You smugly tell me to look at John Chrysostom to prove that native Greek speakers rejected imputed guilt. You are counting on me not checking your sources.

Let’s actually read John Chrysostom’s Homilies on Romans (Homily 10), where he comments directly on Paul's Greek text in Romans 5:

“What is the meaning of the phrase 'for that all have sinned'? It means that when he [Adam] fell, even they who had not eaten of the tree became mortal from him... How then did death come in and reign? 'By the sin of one.'... For that we should be punished for another's sin is not reasonable; but that we should be made mortal through his disobedience is not unjust.”

Chrysostom explicitly teaches that the entire human race was legally bound, altered, and condemned to mortality by the single disobedience of Adam. Your historical revisionism is completely exposed.

3. Your Theology Makes God Arbitrary and Unjust

You claim that Adam could not pass down his personal guilt, but you admit that humanity is born with a ruined sin nature because of Adam.

Think through the horrific implications of your own system: You are arguing that God forces billions of innocent babies to be born with a corrupted, diseased nature that guarantees they will sin and face damnation, purely as a 'consequence' of a garden event they had no part in. In your view, God inflicts a penal curse (a ruined nature) without any legal cause.

In High Calvinism, God is perfectly just. Adam was our Federal Head. When he stood in the garden, he stood as the legal representative for the entire human race. When he broke the covenant, the entire race legally broke it in him.

By denying Imputed Guilt, you completely destroy the Gospel. If the first Adam could not legally represent his seed so that his guilt was imputed to them, then the Second Adam (Jesus Christ) cannot legally represent His spiritual seed so that His everlasting righteousness is imputed to them (2 Cor 5:21). You have torn down the legal mechanism of Substitutionary Justification just to protect the imaginary free will of a fallen race. You are fighting against the text, against grammar, and against the very cross of Christ."

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[brightfame52]

2 Pet. 1 is speaking to Christians who are already saved and are currently being sanctified. Just by throwing any response does not make it an answer. My question is for you to provide me a biblical reference which states that regeneration happens before the preaching of the gospel.

Your attempt to dismiss 2 Peter 1:1 by claiming it only applies to people who are 'already saved' is a total logical collapse. Look at how Peter defines the origin of their faith: “...to them that have obtained like precious faith with us through the righteousness of God...”

The inspired Greek word for 'obtained' is λαγχάνω (lanchanō), which means to receive by divine lot or sovereign allocation. Peter is explicitly telling these Christians that their faith was not a product of their own unregenerate free-will choices; they possess it because it was sovereignly allotted and given to them as a gift by God!

 

[Standard]

No. By the Father’s mercy and grace, through Jesus Christ the Savior, nothing is required for the salvation of His elect. Everything including their faith is given to them from salvation.
Were it otherwise, it would mean that Jesus Christ isn't the Savior.

[2Pe 1:1-3 KJV]
1 Simon Peter, a servant and an apostle of Jesus Christ, to them that have obtained like precious faith with us through the righteousness of God and our Saviour Jesus Christ:
2 Grace and peace be multiplied unto you through the knowledge of God, and of Jesus our Lord,
3 According as his divine power hath given unto us all things that [pertain] unto life and godliness, through the knowledge of him that hath called us to glory and virtue:

It's the word of God and your response is "No."
All scripture is true, not only the parts we may like or that agree with what we want to be true

 

[rogerg]

It's the word of God and your response is "No."
All scripture is true, not only the parts we may like or that agree with what we want to be true

I am not saying no to scripture, you are; I am saying no to you and to your interpretation of the gospel. You do not want to accept the predominant and most fundamental/foundational tenet of the gospel - that Christ alone is the Savior. Explain then how you perceive the role of Jesus Christ as Savior, and as being the Savior, what His contribution is to someone becoming saved. If you do not believe that He alone is the Savior, then say so. In the verses you quoted you confused having faith with it being the cause of salvation. But those verses were only demonstrating faith as a barometer to indicate someone who has been saved but not saved because of their faith -faith is a byproduct of salvation, not its cause. Otherwise, scripture would be wrong when it claims that Jesus is THE (singular) Savior. There is simply no way nor wiggle room for you to get around this scriptural truth.

[Jhn 14:6 KJV] 6 Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.

 

[maximc]

Your attempt to dismiss 2 Peter 1:1 by claiming it only applies to people who are 'already saved' is a total logical collapse. Look at how Peter defines the origin of their faith: “...to them that have obtained like precious faith with us through the righteousness of God...”

The inspired Greek word for 'obtained' is λαγχάνω (lanchanō), which means to receive by divine lot or sovereign allocation. Peter is explicitly telling these Christians that their faith was not a product of their own unregenerate free-will choices; they possess it because it was sovereignly allotted and given to them as a gift by God!

"through the righteousness of God" means "because God was righteous", he made us partakers of this faith. But it still does not answer my question where I am asking you to give me a biblical reference where it explicitly says that regeneration occurs before the preaching of the gospel.

 

[Roger316]

Not so, Satan attained legal ownership of humanity, at the fall. Mankind has been under His rule, ever since. Only those who were saved by the Lord Jesus are liberated from bondage to sin and Satan.

Believers have 3 enemies, 1 is our sin nature, 2 is Satan and 3 is the world. We still have to grapple with these enemies, for the rest of our lives. They can't make us lose our salvation, but they can and do hinder us and accuse us and try everything to in their power to destroy us, but we already have the victory.

I hate to repeat myself, but if we are Satan's slaves, then we are not slaves of sin. It can't be both.

Secondly, the bible doesn't teach that Satan obtained legal ownership of humanity.

 

[Roger316]

Jonathan Edwards was an intellectual Calvinist tried to explain man's total depravity in a way that exactly follows what I learned when I studied modern (Materialistic-Naturalistic) Behaviorism. On this point, Jonathan Edwards and John B. Watson were in perfect agreement. Both believed that man has no moral agency.

Humans are simply biological machines whose every decision and action is the result of Classical and Operant Conditioning. It was indeed, mechanistic. Jonathan Edwards, the theologian, reasoned that since man was bound to follow the sum total of his desires and drives, God intervenes by unilaterally imposing NEW DESIRES in him. However, this is simply another kind of determinism just as dehumanizing, in its own way, as Watson's materialistic Behaviorism.

Really? I believe Edwards taught that human freedom was bounded by personal motives,

 

[brightfame52]

The Ironclad Word Order of Acts 13:48: Ordination Precedes Faith

The Word of God declares a definitive, unalterable rule regarding the origin of saving faith: Only those who have been sovereignly ordained, appointed, and predestined by God to eternal life will ever believe the Gospel. Look at the absolute finality of the text across multiple authoritative translations:

• KJV: “...and as many as were ordained to eternal life believed.”
• NKJV: “...And as many as had been appointed to eternal life believed.”
• NABR: “...All who were destined for eternal life came to believe.”

Your synergistic free-will theology attempts to reverse the Holy Spirit's word order by claiming that man believes first, and then God ordains them. But the original Greek syntax completely silences this error.

The text uses the periphrastic pluperfect passive participle τεταγμένοι (tetagmenoi), from the root verb τάσσω (tassō). Standard, authoritative Greek lexicons define this word as to arrange, assign, or dispose to a certain position or lot, or to decree. Thayer’s Greek Lexicon explicitly states that Acts 13:48 means: “as many as were appointed (by God) to obtain eternal life, or to whom God had decreed eternal life.”

Linguistically, the participle underlines that faith itself is not a human initiative; rather, saving faith springs entirely from God's prior arrangement. This perfectly harmonizes with Ephesians 1:4-5, anchoring our assurance in His immutable, eternal purpose.

The subject of the sentence is a specific, finite group: 'as many as' (hosoi) were appointed. Not a single soul who was passed over in that decree believed, and not a single soul who was ordained to life failed to believe. The prior divine appointment is the absolute cause, and the personal act of believing is the infallible effect. Man does not take the initiative to make himself a candidate for life; the Sovereign Potter designates His elect sheep, and His irresistible grace ensures they will believe '+ nothing'. 50

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[rogerg]

2 Pet. 1 is speaking to Christians who are already saved and are currently being sanctified. Just by throwing any response does not make it an answer. My question is for you to provide me a biblical reference which states that regeneration happens before the preaching of the gospel.

Those verses demonstrate exactly that, so you are either unable or unwilling to see it in the text. You are trying to change the subject to be the timing of preaching, but 2 Peter 1 is explicitly about the source of faith. Peter identifies Christ as their Savior and as the prior cause of their faith. Because Christ is already their Savior (per the verses), they obtain their faith through His righteousness, not their own power. So, salvation came first, and faith flowed from it as a direct result. But I'll throw in a bonus verse as corroboration

[Jhn 14:6 KJV] 6 Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.

---

 

[maximc]

Those verses demonstrate exactly that, so you are either unable or unwilling to see it in the text. You are trying to change the subject to be the timing of preaching, but 2 Peter 1 is explicitly about the source of faith. Peter identifies Christ as their Savior and as the prior cause of their faith. Because Christ is already their Savior (per the verses), they obtain their faith through His righteousness, not their own power. So, salvation came first, and faith flowed from it as a direct result. But I'll throw in a bonus verse as corroboration

[Jhn 14:6 KJV] 6 Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.

---

To put it in plain English, 2 Pet 1:1 simply says that we are in this faith because of the righteousness of Jesus. What does it have to do with my question, "Where does the Bible explicitly say that a person is regenerated before he hears the preaching of the gospel?"

 

[Magenta]

2 Pet. 1 is speaking to Christians who are already saved and are currently being sanctified. Just by throwing any response does not make it an answer. My question is for you to provide me a biblical reference which states that regeneration happens before the preaching of the gospel.

We have been waiting years for one verse articulating free will of the natural man, but
we know it does not exist. The hypocrisy of free willers seems to escape their attention.

 

[brightfame52]

"through the righteousness of God" means "because God was righteous", he made us partakers of this faith. But it still does not answer my question where I am asking you to give me a biblical reference where it explicitly says that regeneration occurs before the preaching of the gospel.

If God as Saviour made one partaker of Faith, then evidently man by nature doesnt have it. 2 thess 3:2

2 And that we may be delivered from unreasonable and wicked men: for all men have not faith.

---

And Faith is the fruit of the Spirit according to Gal 5:22 so when the Spirit gives life [regeneration] He gives Faith

 

[maximc]

We have been waiting years for one verse articulating free will of the natural man, but
we know it does not exist. The hypocrisy of free willers seems to escape their attention.

Probably, you were asking all the wrong people who do not believe in free will. Rom. 10:13-15 clearly states how a person is saved. It is through the preaching of the gospel. When the gospel is preached, faith is built up within the person who hears the gospel, and this is when the person exercises his free will to choose Christ.

According to Rom. 10:17, faith is built up as the person hears the Word of God. As you know very well that faith is a gift of God. Faith cannot be produced by a person. It comes from God. Acts 2:37 tells us the process of how faith works in a person. That verse says,
"Now when they heard this, they were pricked in their heart, and said unto Peter and to the rest of the apostles, Men and brethren, what shall we do?"
Here the phrase, "pricked in their heart" signifies conviction in their heart. Their response was, "what shall we do?" This is free-will.

 

[brightfame52]

"Where does the Bible explicitly say that a person is regenerated before he hears the preaching of the gospel?"

"Your demand for an 'explicit verse' that spells out a chronological timestamp is a standard, worn-out debate tactic used to avoid actual systematic exegesis. Biblical truth is established by matching Scripture with Scripture to reveal the unbending laws of God's covenant. [1]

You claim that an unregenerate sinner must hear the Gospel and choose to believe it while they are still in their lost state in order to get born again. I can show you from the explicit text of Scripture that your timeline is a logical and spiritual impossibility. [1, 2]
Look at the absolute forensic condition of a lost person in 2 Corinthians 4:3-4: [1]

“But if our gospel be hid, it is hid to them that are lost: In whom the god of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them.”

Think through the unbending legal and physical mechanics of this text: Paul explicitly declares that while a person is lost, the Gospel is completely hidden from them, and their minds are completely blinded. [1, 2]

If a sinner's mind is spiritually blind, and the light of the Gospel is completely hidden from them while they are lost, how can they possibly see it, understand it, and choose to believe it to escape being lost?

According to your synergistic theology, a blind man must look at the light of the Gospel while he is still blind to trigger God to open his eyes. It is an absolute absurdity. The Holy Spirit explicitly states that they believe not because they are blind. [1]

Therefore, unless a person is sovereignly regenerated and given spiritual sight by the immediate power of the Holy Spirit, the Gospel remains permanently hidden from them, resulting in inescapable unbelief. God must move first to remove the blindness through the New Birth so that the soul can look to Christ and believe '+ nothing.' Is that explicit enough for you, or are you going to keep fighting against the plain mechanics of the text?" [1, 2]

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[maximc]

If God as Saviour made one partaker of Faith, then evidently man by nature doesnt have it. 2 thess 3:2

2 And that we may be delivered from unreasonable and wicked men: for all men have not faith.

---

And Faith is the fruit of the Spirit according to Gal 5:22 so when the Spirit gives life [regeneration] He gives Faith

You guys are making me forget what my question was. Can I call this strawman? I totally agree that faith is both a gift of God and the fruit of the HS. No person can generate faith on his own. I totally get that. But you had said earlier that Cornelius was regenerated even before he heard the gospel from Peter, I had asked you this question, "Where does the Bible explicitly say that a person is regenerated before he hears the gospel". Now you are telling me about faith. Faith is not the answer to my question. How and when does faith come? Faith comes only as we hear the gospel, and not before that. This is clearly mentioned in Rom. 10:17 So, your answer does not fit my question.