Archive for June, 2024

BETTER-Better Bible Preparedness

June 26, 24

BETTER-Better Bible Preparedness

So I just thought up this superhero analogy on the fly while chatting with youth.

Calvinists generally know their Bible more than the average pew sitter. This is because what churchgoers have learnt since Sunday school is that God loves everyone, Jesus died for everyone’s sins, God wants everyone to be saved and they can accept the Gospel. (At this point, several people made the comparison to Mormon or JW missionaries.)

Hence if a Calvinist comes along and tells them those things are all untrue, they have to be prepared to show Bible passages and back up their shocking claims. Hence hence, Calvinists are better prepared than the regular churchgoer because they’re taking the initiative.

So someone who wishes to argue against Calvinism needs to be BETTER-better prepared with their Bible to counter them.

It’s like how every superhero or action film has the villains better prepared with their plans and taking initiative. The hero has to react and can only win if he’s quicker moving then the villains. The Joker always comes with a new plan and is better prepared to carry it out than the cops are to counter it, and Batman can only outmaneuver him because Batman is already BETTER-better prepared with many contingencies and can adapt one that is closest to whatever Joker schemed up this time.

And so, when the Calvinist comes with better preparations than the unsuspecting layperson on such things as Romans 9, John 6 or Ephesians 1… The aspiring counterer needs to be BETTER-better prepared with how to debunk their interpretation of those passages. (For this, the TULIP Shotgun in comments might be of use.)

Posted in Christianity, Soteriology | Leave a Comment »

PSALM 139 DOESN’T TEACH CALVINISM

June 26, 24

Psalm 139 is like almost every other alleged prooftext in that it does not actually state what Calvinists need it to say. (See TULIP Shotgun in comments.)

1) Meaningless & redundant to say God has searched David and tried his thoughts, if God is the one who determined David’s thoughts & choices.

2) God discerns David’s thoughts, not determines them.

3) God knows what words will be on David’s tongue, not God chooses or causes them.

4) That God wrote every day of David’s life does not necessitate determining them – like all the above points, it merely describes God’s knowledge of David’s future which fits other models such as simple foreknowledge, Molinism, Dynamic Omniscience. Neither does it imply that what is written cannot be changed, compare being added to or blotted out from the Book of Life.

5) And even if I give way on every point above, they actually would encompass determinism more than Calvinism qua Soteriology.

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Dynamic Moliscience

June 26, 24

A further musing after my posts on Open Molinism and Minarchical Molinism.

Okay so now, take the Dynamic Omniscience view. God creates the universe, including free willed agents called humans, and lets them run their course while interacting with them in ‘real time’.

All good? Now take all the entirety of this universal history, from start to end (if there is an ‘end’) and frontload it all into the mind of God back before the creation moment. God with the knowledge of how everything would play out, including the FREE choices of all humans, creates the universe to play out exactly the same way it ‘already did’ in His mind’s eye. Including all the times He would/will interact with the universe and humans to achieve His goals.

No, God didn’t ‘hop into the Delorean and see what would happen’ because none of it is actually real until God speaks the universe into existence. It’s all in the mind of God via Middle Knowledge, simple foreknowledge, God exists at all points in time like Dr Manhattan, or something.

Aha, and there is the reconciliation between Dynamic Omniscience and Molinism… the latter is just the former + frontloading the knowledge of all ‘future’ history to before the creation moment. Everyone chooses freely through all of history, and God knows it without having caused their choices.

And this also answers the question, “Could God add one more raindrop to a storm?” …The answer is yes God could, but God wouldn’t because the timeline we exist in is already the one God decides He wants to obtain – raindrop numbers, human free choices, when & where He intervenes, and all.

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EIGHT CHALLENGES NO CALVINIST COMMENTOR HAS MET

June 12, 24

When we post these memes as a challenge, the usual response is to either suddenly drop out of the comment thread entirely… Or divert to a different point!

1) You accuse nonCalvinists of being Pelagian / Semi-pelagian? Tell us the definition of those terms without checking first. Related: If you bring up Pelagius being condemned as a heretic, tell us what the actual charges were.

2) You used to be Arminian before discovering the truth of Calvinism? Name the Articles of Remonstrance without checking first.

3) You object to our memes because they ‘mock fellow believers’? Well, have you ever similarly scolded Calvinist memers who are much longer established and with far larger fanbases?

4) If Total Depravity is true, why would Jesus use parables to prevent the unbelieving crowd from understanding? Why would the devil snatch the word, or blind those born already blind to the Gospel? Why would God harden already stone hearts? This is the Total Redundancy problem that helped people like Leighton Flowers, Michael L Brown, Bobby Conway, Alana L realize Calvinism is wrong.

5) John Calvin and others have described Evanescent Grace as indistinguishable from genuine saving grace to the Reprobate. If so, then how does ANYONE know for sure whether they are really saved or just being tricked by God? Note that citing Bible passages reassuring believers does not work, since it doesn’t answer how one knows whether they are a real believer or not in the first place. (This epistemic problem is related to Tim Stratton’s Deity of Deception Argument and Idol Killer’s Total Depravity & Spiritual Truths Problem.)

6) If Calvinism is taught by the Bible, and Paul & Jesus were basically teaching it… Then why do actual scholars – including Calvinists like Boettner, Bavinck & Berkhof – admit that nobody in the first 400 years of the early church taught what former Manichean Gnostic Augustine introduced into Christianity?

7) If you believe that God from eternity past already unchangeably decreed everything that comes to pass, then why are you complaining about the memes that God decreed we make? (Or shall we say, God decreed you to come see our memes and complain?) Whereas as we always say, we believe you came here of your own free will!

8.) Related to the above… When you complain about us ‘wasting time on the Internet making memes’, did you forget what platform you are on where you freely chose to spend your time browsing our memes and complaining?

Posted in Christianity, Fun Fun Doodle Dum!, Soteriology | Leave a Comment »

Why Always the Children?

June 12, 24

The cause is never or almost never because of genetics or nature. If it were just DNA, a behavior that actively discourages viable reproduction would die out like a Reverse Selfish Gene.

By contrast, just look at the background of people like Elton John (no affection from dad) or Milo Yiannopoulos (childhood sexual abuse by men). Search for examples of the sons of Hollyweirdos dressed as girls, what an odd coincidence so many of them – including adopted children with no genetic relation – somehow turn out non-normative. It’s clearly environment, influence and nurture.

They know it, which is why they insist “People are born that way” so they can push it onto more children and thereby grow their numbers. It ain’t rocket science, but it sure could be gender studies ‘science’.

Posted in Liberal Values, The World | Leave a Comment »

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