The Not So Secret Rapture

reformed.org ^ | W. Fred Rice

[AnalogReigns]

I’ve read my bible and still do so daily, not Tim LaHaye’s novels.

Jesus is surely coming again...but, if the Pharisees are any example to us—on how they misjudged His first coming, we should NOT be dogmatic about the hows of His 2nd coming.

I firmly believe however the bible does NOT teach three or four 2nd Comings, rather only one—which all the world will know.

[Gargantua]

That the Bible teaches of one Second Coming of which all the world will be aware is a fact we can both agree upon. Amen.

:-|

[AnalogReigns]

Both radical charismatics(Pentacostals)and Roman Catholics do not accept the sufficiency of scripture, and look for revelation from God outside of it—one in supernatural experience, the other in a supernatural human institution...

Neither is satisfied with God as He has certainly revealed Himself in His Word, and have that in common contra classical magisterial Protestants.

Liberal Protestants also look for “revelation” from God outside of scripture, primarily in their own arrogant speculations and imagination...

[AnalogReigns]

One thing should be clear however: I’ve never (ever) heard of a Reformed or Presbyterian (Covenant-theology) assembly that would censure or excommunicate someone based on their understanding of the End Times.

There are though PLENTY of dispensational churches and organizations which hold huge dogmatisms on eschatology—and will throw a member out quickly—as an unbiblical heretic— who didn’t adhere strictly to their particular (multiple 2nd coming) interpretation.

[Cronos]

But, look here, Analog sola scriptura folks say they hold to scripture alone,

Yet they hold on to things like the Rapture "Accept Jesus as your personal Savior" --> this bears more time. This is never taught from scripture, yet parroted by many. While the Bible says that (Matt. 1:21 21And she shall bring forth a son, and thou shalt call his name JESUS: for he shall save his people from their sins, Acts 4:12 12Neither is there salvation in any other: for there is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved.) Jesus is the savior, but nowhere can one make the fallacious derivation -- where is it per sola scriptura? In fact the Bible says Matthew 28.20 20Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and, lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world. Amen. Revelation 2.10 10Fear none of those things which thou shalt suffer: behold, the devil shall cast some of you into prison, that ye may be tried; and ye shall have tribulation ten days: be thou faithful unto death, and I will give thee a crown of life. 1 Corinthians 15:58 58Therefore, my beloved brethren, be ye stedfast, unmoveable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, forasmuch as ye know that your labour is not in vain in the Lord. 1 Corinthians 15.1-4 1Moreover, brethren, I declare unto you the gospel which I preached unto you, which also ye have received, and wherein ye stand; 2By which also ye are saved, if ye keep in memory what I preached unto you, unless ye have believed in vain. 3For I delivered unto you first of all that which I also received, how that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures; 4And that he was buried, and that he rose again the third day according to the scriptures: Why do they hold on to these non-biblical beliefs?

[Cronos]

Analog, the problem is, also that sola scriptura is not sufficient -- it leads to the number of sola views as below

1. does sola scriptura say one should believe in something as basic as Jesus was always God (Trinitarian position) or that Jesus Christ was man made God (Oneness PENTECOSTAL Protestant position) or the Angel Michael (Seventh Day Adventist Ellen G White teaching)
2. Does sola scriptura say that there is the REAL Presence of Christ in the Eucharist (Lutheran, some Anglicans, maybe even Methodists), or is it just a symbol (Calvinists)
3. Does sola scriptura say that one MUST talk in tongues (Oneness Pentecostal) to display faith or not?
4. Does sola scriptura say that there should be an episcopate (Lutheran, Anglican) or not (Presbyterians)?
5. Does sola scriptura say that apostolic succession is important (Anglican) or not (others)?
7. Does sola scriptura say that Baptism is for infants and sufficient (Presbyterian etc.) or not (Baptists)?
8. Does sola scriptura say that God pre-damns people to hell (Calvinism) or not (others)?
9. Does sola scriptura say that vestements are ok (or in the silly words of one poster allowing men in dresses and silly hats) (Anglicans, Lutherans, some Methodists, Presbyterians, even Baptists and Pentecostals) or not?
10. Does sola scriptura say that Jesus came only for the salvation of a few (Calvinists) or he was Savior of the world (everyone else)?
11. Does sola scriptura agree or disagree with soul sleep? (Calvin: "As long as (the soul) is in the body it exerts its own powers; but when it quits this prison-house it returns to God, whose presence, it meanwhile enjoys while it rests in the hope of a blessed Resurrection. This rest is its paradise. On the other hand, the spirit of the reprobate, while it waits for the dreadful judgment, is tortured by that anticipation. . .", Psychopannychia,
12. Does sola scriptura agree or disagree with worshipping on a Sunday (Presbyterians, Pentecostals etc.) or not (Seventh Day Adventists)
13. Does sola scriptura agree with the Adventists that one should follow kosher laws or not?
14. Does sola scriptura believe that we still have spiritual gifts like prophecy amongst us (Pentecostals) or not (Presbyterians)
15. Does sola scriptura agree with being "slain in the spirit" (Pentecostalism) or not (Presbyterianism, Lutheranism etc)
16. Does sola scriptura say that Regeneration comes through Baptism (Lutheranism) or not (Baptists)
17. Does sola scriptura say that grace can be resisted (Pentecostalism, Lutheranism, Methodism) or not (Calvinism)
18. Does sola scriptura say that baptism is three-fold (Mennonites) or not?
19. Does sola scriptura say that there is no free will (Calvinism) or that man has free will (Mennonites)
20. Does sola scriptura say that it is faith + works (Mennonites: Menno Simons told the followers of Luther and Calvin: “If you wish to be saved, you must walk in the way of the Lord, hear His Word, and obey it. For nothing avails in heaven nor on earth unto salvation, … not even Christ with His grace, merit, blood, and death, if we are not born of God, … if we do not believe His Word sincerely, and if we do not walk in the light and do right. As John says: …>If we say that we have fellowship with him, and walk in darkness, we lie.’” (Complete Writings of Menno Simons, p. 208)) or not?
21. Does sola scriptura say that there is imputed righteousness (Calvinism) or not (Mennonites)

[aruanan]

Question: is the thing that God executed, according to Luther, the free will of the individual, or predermination [sic] to hell? If you could indicate from these verses, I would be grateful.

The thing that God executed, according to Luther in the selection I quoted, is every single thing that has, does, or ever will exist. In the selection I quoted earlier from The Bondage of the Will, written when Calvin was a young teen, Luther declared:

1. that there was no will but God’s will

…by this thunderbolt, Freewill is struck to the earth and completely ground to powder….

2. that the appearance of contingency is an illusion

…all which we do, and all which happens, although it seem to happen mutably and contingently, does in reality happen necessarily and unalterably, insofar as respects the will of God. [emphasis added]

3. that everything in creation that happens involving man or apart from man is a product of God’s will

Hence it irresistibly follows, that all which we do [everything in which man has a part], and all which happens… [everything else in creation] does in reality happen necessarily and unalterably, insofar as respects the will of God.

4. that God is not limited either in will or in knowledge

If God does not foreknow all events absolutely, there must be defect either in his will, or in his knowledge ; what happens must either be against his will, or beside his knowledge

5. that everything that has happened since creation and that God is executing now in creation is identical with what God had planned since before the beginning of creation and had yet to execute at the time of creation

But the truth is, what he willed in past eternity, he wills now; the thing now executed is what he has intended to execute from everlasting; for his will is eternal: just as the thing which has now happened is what he saw in past eternity; because his knowledge is eternal.

This is iron-hard determinism that substantively is no different than what Calvin, then 14, would later develop with bigger tail fins, and massive chrome bumpers and grills. Luther's appeal to theological determinism probably had more to do with his polemical needs at the moment in his battle with Erasmus. I’m sure that later, upon reflection, Luther probably thought something along these lines:

“Oh, crap. This makes everything in human existence and even in scripture that appears to depend on contingency, or choice, a complete illusion within a totally deterministic universe where even my thoughts about illusion, determinism, and choice are determined, and even worse than that because what would have been the point of it all to begin with? For God’s praise and glory? Praise and glory from whom? From some sort of intra-trinitarian blackslapping? Or from automata who, like the cuckoo popping out of the clock on the hour, say “Praise and glory. Praise and glory” with no more awareness or understanding or will than the wooden cuckoo has of clock-making and timekeeping?”

Calvin, though, completely jumped the shark and, from a young age, embraced total determinism. Maybe he needed some angle to distinguish himself from Luther to establish his own niche in the turmoil of the new religious ecosystem and went full-tilt, retro-boogie with what, from Augustine, he had already become infatuated even as a youth. Calvin admitted this kind of determinism was a horrible decree,¹ but maintained his theological system was somehow revelatory of the hidden counsel of God, which, of course, he had deduced,² but which others should not inquire into.³ And who could blame him, a really smart, fresh twenties-something law student who loved Latin so much that he changed his name to the Latin version? It was all just so darn logical! It followed so neatly from his premises. And God had created reason, so how could he, Calvin, possibly be wrong, assuming, of course, that Calvin had, according to his system, been regenerated and his pre-sin operating system restored, at least restarted in safe-mode to come up with his post-adolescent, theological über-ouvre?

If anyone questioned that perhaps such conclusions didn’t necessarily follow from his theological presuppositions and that such conclusions or presuppositions were possibly faulty, Calvin declared them heretics that should be exterminated.⁴ If anyone asked why God would ever have done such a thing and how in the world what he proposed about God’s hidden counsel made any sense at all when it made everything experienced by everyone in daily life and what God said in the scriptures completely meaningless unless one first attributed special meanings to them to juke their otherwise apparent sense into line with Calvin’s theology, he claimed that it was a mystery and that further inquiry along these lines was sin. ⁵

The truly weird thing is that if Calvin (and Luther and Augustine) was correct, all sorts of nutty things follow: My writing this is, to the very last letter, God's creation since before the beginning of time. Those Calvinists who claim they are defending God's sovereignty are, in reality, God himself, by definition the only non-contingent being in existence, saying, through the mouths of those utterly contingent upon his will for their every thought, action, heartbeat, and mistaken appearance of will, "I, who control every motion of every subatomic particle toward the end I intend, I am contending for my sovereignty against the wicked and the sinners, uh, whom I've also created before the worlds came to be, who claim by their willful misdeeds, that I have also planned and executed in their entirety, that they have some kind of independent will that reduces my sovereignty even though they are, through my sovereign will before all came to be, doing exactly as I had planned for them to do."

King James had an interesting thing to say about the entire system:

"This doctrine is so horrible, that I am persuaded, if there were a council of unclean spirits assembled in hell, and their prince the devil were to put the question either all of them in general, or to each in particular, to learn their opinion about the most likely means of stirring up the hatred of men against God their Maker; nothing could be invented by them that would be more efficacious for this purpose, or that could put a greater affront upon God's love for mankind, than that infamous decree of the late Synod [of Dort], and that decision of that detestable formulary, by which the far greater part of the human race are condemned to hell for no other reason, than the mere will of God, without any regard to sin; the necessity of sinning, as well as that of being damned, being fastened on them by that great nail of the decree before-mentioned." James Arminius, The Works of James Arminius, Vol 1, p 3.

1. “The decree, I admit, is dreadful; and yet it is impossible to deny that God foreknew what the end of man was to be before he made him, and foreknew, because he had so ordained by his decree.” Calvin, Institutes, III, xxi, 1.

2. Regarding free will and foreknowledge: “If God merely foresaw human events, and did not also arrange and dispose of them at his pleasure, there might be room for agitating the question, but since he foresees the things which are to happen, simply because he has decreed them, they are so to happen, it is vain to debate about prescience…. If this frigid fiction is received, where will be the omnipotence of God, by which, according to his secret counsel on which everything depends, he rules over all?” Calvin, Institutes, III, xxiii, 6,7.

3. “Let us not be ashamed to be ignorant in a matter in which ignorance is learning. Rather let us willingly abstain from the search after knowledge, to which it is both foolish as well as perilous, and even fatal to aspire.” Calvin, Institutes, III, xxi, 2.

4. "Whoever shall maintain that wrong is done to heretics and blasphemers in punishing them makes himself an accomplice in their crime and guilty as they are. There is no question here of man's authority; it is God who speaks, and clear it is what law he will have kept in the church, even to the end of the world. Wherefore does he demand of us a so extreme severity, if not to show us that due honor is not paid him, so long as we set not his service above every human consideration, so that we spare not kin, nor blood of any, and forget all humanity when the matter is to combat for His glory." as quoted in History of Political Thought in the Sixteenth Century, J.W. Allen, London, 1951, p. 87.

5. “How sinful it is to insist on knowing the causes of the divine will, since it is itself, and justly ought to be, the cause of all that exists…. Ignorance of things which we are not able, or which it is not lawful to know, is learning, while the desire to know them is a species of madness.” Calvin, Institutes, III, xxiii, 4,8.

From The Bondage of the Will cited earlier in the thread.

"God foreknows nothing contingently, but foresees, and purposes, and accomplishes every thing, by an unchangeable, eternal, and infallible will. But, by this thunderbolt, Freewill is struck to the earth and completely ground to powder. Those who would assert Freewill, therefore, must either deny, or disguise, or, by some other means, repel this thunderbolt from them."

"Hence it irresistibly follows, that all which we do, and all which happens, although it seem to happen mutably and contingently, does in reality happen necessarily and unalterably, insofar as respects the will of God. For the will of God is efficacious, and such as cannot be thwarted; since the power of God is itself a part of his nature: it is also wise, so that it cannot be misled. And since his will is not thwarted, the work which he wills cannot be prevented ; but must be produced in the very place, time, and measure which he himself both foresees and wills."

"If God does not foreknow all events absolutely, there must be defect either in his will, or in his knowledge; what happens must either be against his will, or beside his knowledge. Either he meant otherwise than the event, or had no meaning at all about the event, or foresaw another event, or did not foresee any event at all. But the truth is, what he willed in past eternity, he wills now; the thing now executed is what he has intended to execute from everlasting; for his will is eternal: just as the thing which has now happened is what he saw in past eternity; because his knowledge is eternal."

[Cronos]

What Luther thought!!

“Oh, crap. This makes everything in human existence and even in scripture that appears to depend on contingency, or choice, a complete illusion within a totally deterministic universe where even my thoughts about illusion, determinism, and choice are determined, and even worse than that because what would have been the point of it all to begin with? For God’s praise and glory? Praise and glory from whom? From some sort of intra-trinitarian blackslapping? Or from automata who, like the cuckoo popping out of the clock on the hour, say “Praise and glory. Praise and glory” with no more awareness or understanding or will than the wooden cuckoo has of clock-making and timekeeping?”

ha! ha! It was left to the French lawyer CAlvin and the cheese-eating surrender monkeys that are the followers of Calvin to make their entire non-Christian theology based on that point!!

[aruanan]

What Luther thought!!

Based on the big shift from what he wrote in The Bondage of the Will and his position and that of the Lutherans later.

[Natural Law]

"They are Roman Catholic, are they not?"

No, actually Charles Schumer is Jewish.

The facts are that Catholics comprised only about 30% of congress and Protestants about 60% of the last 10% congresses. Are you prepared to discuss abortion, homosexual rights and any number of other social issues in that context?

[aruanan]

, I was simply providing an accurate quote

No, you didn't, as anyone can see from reading the post.

You added the word "only" to my statement, completely changing the meaning of the sentence.

Apparently Roman Catholics play fast and loose not only with the words of Scripture, but also the words of other FReepers.

I see that in this reply and in the preceding one you are confusing me with Cronos. I had said that I was providing an accurate quote. As I went back, I discovered that what I was quoting was something written by Cronos, which I commented on. Whether or not he had added "only" to something you had previously written is something I don't know and didn't know at the time. As it stands, though, I accurately quoted Cronos, whether or not he accurately quoted you is another matter. In addition, your post previous to this that I am replying to now referenced me with regard to another post #2700. But I wasn't the author of that post:

2,700 posted on February 2, 2011 1:46:44 AM CST by Cronos
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[aruanan]

You added the word ONLY to my statement.

Your post stands as evidence against your defense. Try to post within the rules.

Again, no, I didn't add anything to your statement at all. I see now that it wasn't Cronos I was quoting, but YOUR quote of Cronos's quote.