Did God Sovereignly Decree What I'm Doing, or Not?

Let me throw this out for discussion, regarding my previous post concerning God's sovereign decree that I should lead others away from Christianity.

A Calvinist asked:

Is Loftus going to argue that God’s perceptive will and his decretive will are within the realms of “the same respect“?


BTW: I had a master's level class with the late Calvinistic professor Kenneth Kantzer, the "dean of evangelicalism," where we read through and thoroughly discussed Calvin's institutes.

Logical gerrymandering. That's what you do with these two distinctions. Your theology is a sham. Try to actually understand it, okay. I mean, really try to understand it. Either your God ends up acting just like the Arminian God with these distinctions, or your God is completely sovereign. Which is it, in the end?

If God is completely sovereign then God decreed what I am doing (could I have done otherwise?). I am leading people away from him. If I'm effective, more people will die without Christ. People will be in hell as a result of my efforts (according to this God). But I cannot do otherwise. God purportedly decrees this because the people who suffer in hell for all eternity bring him more glory than if they didn't suffer in hell for eternity. This is just laughable to me.

Think about it folks! The belief in the eternal suffering of billions of people for slighting God is one of the biggest problems atheists have with God, and one of the main causes to malign him. How could angels and the redeemed ever praise him for this, especially when those who suffer will be their spouses, children, parents, and friends? And God decreed this? These people could not have done otherwise? But this brings more glory to God than having everyone in heaven? Well glory to God, then. With that kind of glory who needs shame? So shame on God. Shame. Shame. Shame.

God should be ashamed of this...extremely ashamed. People who do such things to other people on earth get locked up in prison and/or are executed. The fact that he is God and thus bigger and more powerful than us makes no difference in the way he should treat us. It just makes him a thug, a horrible gang leader, a despicable potentate. That this brings God any glory at all is simply and absolutely laughable. He's a devil in disguise, who revels in refuse, feces and garbage under the guise of praise.

This sovereign God could have equally decreed that we all loved and obeyed him and that there was no sin on earth and no need for a Savior. Or, he could've decreed that everyone on earth heard and believed the gospel of Jesus. But these two scenarios purportedly don't bring him as much glory as the one we find ourselves in, where he decrees that I should lead people away from him who will suffer for all eternity with the billions (?) in hell.

Where's my laugh machine. I know I have it somewhere. Oh. Here it is.

hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha

9 comments:

William Zeranski said...

I can say that when I read works by Atheists I end up reading more about and by representatives of my religion. I learn more about it and appreciate it even more, so you are doing me a great serves.

I just found your site, and I don’t have the time to go back are read old posts. I am a Roman Catholic so this is my reference point and I can’t comment of Calvinists simple because I don’t have a background of knowledge to draw on.


Now, as you wrote: “I am leading people away from him. If I'm effective, more people will die without Christ. People will be in hell as a result of my efforts (according to this God). But I cannot do otherwise.”

You can’t lead people away unless they want to follow. And in ‘dying without Christ’ do you mean

1. Does the person believe in Christ and reject him.

or

2. Does the person just have no knowledge of Christ.

or

3. Such as you, an atheist, having no belief in Christ or God and any divine being.

Also, this thing about “People will be in hell . . . .” For your future debate knowledge, for the Catholic, Hell is not a place--that is--I cannot ‘be in Hell.’ Hell for the Catholic is a state of being, and that state of being is “without the presence of God” for eternity.


Now this: “God purportedly decrees this because the people who suffer in hell for all eternity bring him more glory . . . .”

Who the hell told you this lot of crap? If a Catholic told you this--give me his number I’ll straighten him out!

The best question is: “If Hell is an eternity without the presences of God, well, can’t we be in hell right now?” This is an old question and has been asked before and will be again. I like it. It’s a good one. The best answer I have is, if this is Hell why would children be born into it. Even an atheist knows a child is innocent. A child must be taught of good and bad.

So, no, we are not living in Hell.

Here’s another good one of yours:
“The belief in the eternal suffering of billions of people for slighting God is one of the biggest problems atheists have with God, and one of the main causes to malign him.”

I find this interesting for me alone because it goes against one important understanding: Who am I to presume to know the mind of God?

Do I know billions will suffer? No.

My question is: How do you know?

Did you figure it out for yourself or did someone tell you, or is your certainty of the answer a combination of elements?

No sarcasm intended, but I wish I could know the mind of God as well as you who don’t believe in him.

The theologians of my religion (remember: I’m an RC) have been puzzling over it for centuries, and we’ve got pretty smart people working on this stuff.


This is a long post and I’ve only dealt with, what, a half-dozen lines. I enjoyed your post, and I’ll drop by again sometime.

Anonymous said...

As the moniker states, we are debunking Evangelical Christianity. My post was directed at Calvinists who believe in eternal suffering in hell, and that only the few will be saved.

If this post doesn't deal directly with what you believe then stick around, something we post will!

Anonymous said...

I don't want to clutter your blog with my post which is in response to this one. You can find it here:

http://reformedphilosophy.org/hudgins/archives/64

If you interaction at all, I don't mind doing so on my blog or on yours. Just let me know what you prefer. Thanks!

Anonymous said...

Correction, "If you want interaction..."

Anonymous said...

Nice emoting...


Mr. Loftus, at the end of the day, you like every other modernist convinced of this thing called "autonomy" expect that you and God (though you perhaps even deny such a being) are the same ontologically. You therefore think you can probe into his mind and judge him as either righteous of unrighteous- or perhaps you prefer the terms rational an irrational?

Ironically, you find yourself in the same place as Adam and Eve in the garden. The temptation to have an equal say with God in things pertaining to truth and error, right and wrong, justice and injustice is simply too strong for you. And so you like your (and my) federal representative, Adam, succumb to temptation and conceive of yourself as fit to question God's ways and call him to account.

Should anyone be suprised that once you have made this mistake you want to laugh at God? No. Actually, I was waiting for your so called "laugh track" throughout the blog once I saw the "argument" you were making. It has always been the way of fallen man to find fault and plot against God (Ps 2:2). Perhaps I should remind you that while you laugh at God he laughs at you (Ps. 2:4).

You refuse to accept your creaturely role which requires you to submit to your infinite, eternal, unchangeable Creator who in his being is wisdom, power, holiness, justice, goodness, and truth. Because you have refused your obligations to him, you have now taken it upon yourself to re-construct his creation according to your own personal feelings and opinions -which you have confused with things that you like to believe are really "facts", "truths", or "logical arguments."

Why do I tell you this? Because you are "off the reservation"- so to speak. You have taken skills and abilities, and perhaps we could even say methods for making sense of the world around us, and you have used them falsely. You realize that you cannot make sense of the world without logic, morality, science but you will not use them properly to the glory of God. If you were using them properly you would see the vast ontological gulf that seperates you from God. You would see that on your best days you can only think God's thoughts after him, and that even then you can only parrot his thoughts in a simplistic creaturely way (like all people).

Why do you find fault with God? Not because you have finally broken free from the shackles of "theistic" opression. You find fault with God because it is in your heart to reject him well before your mind has ever come up with even one of your so-called "reasons" for rejecting God. Surely if it ever would enter your mind first, you would cast off such unbelief as foolishness (Ps 14:1).

In conclusion, I can only point you to the source of the problem. Your sin before your Creator which can only be dealt with by his Son. Until you come to terms with this reality, you will forever reject him and be in bondage to faulty reasoning.

But as for the one holy catholic and apostolic church. Don't worry about us, we know our proper place, because we know it was an act of condescension for Christ to come down and dwell among us (John 1). That for Christ to be made sin again was an emptying of himself (Phil 2). In short we know our proper place in the world.

-Brandon Wilkins

"The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge, but fools despise wisdom and instruction." -Proverbs 1:7

Anonymous said...

I'm not sure if the Calvinist and Evangelical labels apply to me. All I know is that God is all powerful, He is also all loving, all just, etc. Truly Holy (literally complete - whole).

He created us to be like Him, to have free will. If God made everyone believe in Him, we wouldn't have free will. If He didn't punish wrong doers, He would not be just. He loves us. He wants us to draw near to Him. So He gave up His only Son, for us to beat and murder.

Men are just bad. We revel in wrong doing. I don't know why. Something in the flesh.

Nihlo said...

"We revel in wrong doing."

Speak for yourself.

Anonymous said...

What's amazing is that you clowns actually think that,if there is a God,He actually cares what you think or say. Before him,you are dust in the balance and accounted as less than nothing. After you get to hell,the universe will never hear from you barking dogs again.

Unknown said...

"I am leading people away from him. If I'm effective, more people will die without Christ. People will be in hell as a result of my efforts (according to this God). But I cannot do otherwise. God purportedly decrees this because the people who suffer in hell for all eternity bring him more glory than if they didn't suffer in hell for eternity. This is just laughable to me."

Your not leading anyone away from him, it his he and he alone who saves the lost. You cannot stop him even if you had the ability to live outside of his sovereignty, you should know that if you have gone through his institutes. Dont contradict yourself, you are asking legit questions.
Remember that Christianity is founded on the most evil act ever committed, the murder of the son of God, which was entirely planned and orchestrated by God himself. Explain to me why it is that you think God sins in thereby ordaining that sin happen. IF you can show that then the gospel is a sham. Good luck.
Also, you seem to forget that Calvinism never denies, in fact it promotes the free will of man as it is taught in the Bible. Only that on the issue of who initiated the salvation of a Christian was God.Do not try to reconcile the free will of man and the sovereignty of god. The Bible teaches both clearly and yet no reconciliation. Jesus admitted this himself.
My question to you would be why is it that you are spending so much time "debunking" christianity if you do not believe it is true. Seems like there are allot of better ways to be spending your time if you were actually a good athiest. You are religiously criticizing Christianity, as if it was the only thing that has done you any sort of wrong. And why do you hate Chritianity so much among other religions? If you had ever studied religion or taken a philosophy course for that matter you would know there are far more ridiculous things that far more people believe besides christianity.

You also alomst exclusively only talk about what christians say they believe. I see know criticism of what the bible says about christianiy. Should i judge shake spear by what my english professor says or should i read it myself and then make a judgement? if the former you are Quite illogical and foolish. if the latter, you have allot of reading ahead of you.