Whether Calvinist or Arminian…both Camps are Predestinarian and miss the more important questions and answers in their perpetual “sound and fury signifying nothing” worthless debates.
“The chicken came first!” bellows the Calvinist.
“No, you heretic! The egg is first!” retorts the Arminian.
“Monergism, Predestination, Sovereignty!” shouts the Calvinist.
“Synergism, Foreknowledge, Free Will!” howls the Arminian.
Then they both construct pyres and burn each other at the stake.
I’ve participated in a zillion of the Calvinist vs. Arminian circle-jerk grudge matches. I can write the script of how the debates go and how they always end up. What is fascinating to me is that both Camps miss the forest from the trees and completely miss the much more important questions:
How does a created sentient human being have a real “choice” if they never hear the Gospel and never hear of Jesus?
Does God have Free Will or his he bound by some sort of eternal contract?
These two questions, and the answers, render the perpetual Calvinist vs. Arminian debate an exercise in sound and fury signifying nothing.
Let me esplain….
Fact: The vast majority of humans today and throughout history have never heard the “correct” Gospel* and have never been informed of the “correct” Jesus*…this is indisputable verifiable fact and truth. To assert differently is a lie and the presuppostionalist would assert that the “devil is the father of lies!” so if you state differently then you are of the devil, according to a presuppositionalist fundamentalist perspective.
Here’s just a small glimpse of the evidence as fact: The Chinese were a closed society for centuries with no Christian* missionaries, no Gospel, no knowledge of Jesus etc. We can verify this fact because the Chinese have recorded history and for most of their history…nada, no Gospel message, no Jesus, they simply didn’t know and had no real choice. Multiply this by a zillion other peoples and cultures like the Aztecs, Incas, Mayans, Sumerians, Egyptians, etc. and multiply that again by the Aborigines in the Amazon, the Aborigines in Australia, the Native Americans (before the good Christians* brought them the Gospel after killing them and driving them off their land). Then multiply that again by the Muslims, the Hindus, the Japanese etc. who for many many centuries and even to this day…many if not most have not heard of the “correct” Gospel and the “correct” Jesus.
All these sentient human beings haven’t heard the Message, don’t have the “correct” information…and they live and they die and you assume they are in hell burning for eternity with no end at the hands of a “Loving, Holy, Just, Righteous, Merciful, Forgiving, Good” God. They never had a true “choice”…whether you profess a Calvinist or Arminian philosophy. Even the Arminian is forced (if intellectually honest) to acknowledge the fact that most of humanity doesn’t get to hear the Gospel.
The Arminian will assert that “man has a choice!” and that the Gospel is for “all” and anyone can respond freely to it and be saved and that each human has enough good in them to respond freely (Free Will) in a Synergistic manner (their will acts first, God responds in a quid pro quo fashion) and they are saved from hell. The Arminian would argue against a Predestinarian position and claim God’s “Foreknowledge” to avoid a “God picks winners and losers” dilemma.
Well, the problem with the Arminian “we’re not Predestinarian” position is that it assumes everyone has a fair shot at hearing the Gospel which is pre-requisite to having a fair shot at “choice”. The overwhelming fact is that most don’t have a chance to hear the Gospel, let alone respond. Therefore, in the truest sense, even the Arminians are Predestinarians as God picks winners and losers depending on the slim minority in history that gets to even hear the “correct” Gospel message about the “correct” Jesus in the first place.
Calvinists are a bit more black and white with this issue. They believe that God Monergistically (basically God chooses you and causes you to be saved without your ability to make the first move of your own free will) saves you and doesn’t save others…but they’ll hedge and dance and say the Atonement is for “all” and that salvation is for all who believe…but that is dishonest as they believe in Monergism which is God unilaterally making a person saved without their ability to thwart the invasion.
This forces us to rethink our belief system on a much broader level. If (fact) the vast majority of created sentient human beings never hear the Gospel…ergo never have a true choice in their salvation…then both the Calvinist and the Arminian are really in the same Camp: God picks winners and losers…the vast minority for heaven and the vast majority for eternal hell (if you are a presuppositionalist fundamentalist conservative). Is that fact: Good, Loving, Merciful, Just, Holy? Well, not according to our human definitions of those terms.
Caveat: I’ve heard the very weak apologetic around the fact that most of humanity doesn’t hear the Gospel: “Well, there’s testimony that a native in the jungle had a Jesus dream and responded when the missionary finally got to them”…weak stuff. The vast majority of humanity doesn’t have a “Jesus dream”…they either hear the “correct” Gospel or they don’t. They either have a true informed “choice” or they don’t. Most don’t have a choice, they are hell fodder.
The other weak apologetic around this fact goes something like this: “Well, I believe God reaches out to them outside of the Gospel and he reveals himself to them in his creation”. OK, then you are asserting that all roads lead to God and that anyone, like say a Muslim or a Deist or a Native American (Great Spirit) who just has some sort of belief in a Creator God is saved…and that is antithetical to your Christian* fundamentalist position that “salvation is through the Gospel of Jesus Christ ONLY!” and all other beliefs in a God are damned to hell.
Is God bound by some eternal contract that he has to exact wrath and vengeance on the “enemy” and damn them hell? Can God “repent”? Can God “change his mind”? Has God repented or changed his mind in the presuppositionalist bible? If God sends the Gospel to only a few and some respond and some don’t…has man done something to deserve the sending of the message? From the Calvinist perspective, has man done something to deserve the monergistic saving? Nope. You assume the act of God is Unilateral. Instead of Unilaterally forgiving only a few, instead of Unilaterally presenting the Gospel to only a few (and even the Synergist assumes God causes the saving)…CAN GOD UNILATERALLY FORGIVE AND REDEEM THE WHOLE OF HIS CREATION? If not, why not?
Is God bound by something outside of his own Will? Is God forced to nuke those who hear the Gospel and reject it AND those who never hear the Gospel and those who don’t hold a “correct” belief in the “correct” Jesus and the “correct” Gospel?
What must I do to be saved? Can I save myself? What saves? How does Jesus fit into man’s eternal dilemma? Was Jesus always Messiah, was he always Redeemer, was he always Savior…or did he become such things? Was God’s hand forced to respond reactively to man’s sin?
Now the big question: Does God have Free Will? What does “Good, Merciful, Loving, Just, Holy, Peace, Patience, Kindness, Self-Control, Forgiveness, Love Your Enemy, Turn the Other Cheek, Forgive 70 times 7, Grace” etc. look like?
Personally, I’m more optimistic about who God is and what he’s really like. I don’t think he’s the Quid Pro Quo and Pick-a-few and Damn-the-many God of the OT and the vast majority of Fundamentalist Conservatives. I think God is loving, I think he is good, I think he is forgiving, merciful, peaceful. I think he turns the other cheek, forgives 70 times 7 and I think he LOVES his enemies and I think he will bless those who curse him…as is expressed in part of the bible narrative.
