Luther and Erasmus: The Controversy Concerning the Bondage of the Will

Protestant Reformed Theological Journal ^ | April 1999 | Garrett J. Eriks

[marbren]

Thank you for the interesting article. Did Martin Luther believe in eternal security?

[blue-duncan]

"Where do you Protestants get these ideas?"
Eph. 4:11-13, 2 Tim. 2:2, 15, 3:15-17, for starters.

Now I would ask you, where in the scriptures do you find anything close to this?

"both taught that The Church was defined as a group of Christians,laity and priests and deacons, headed by a bishop (they actually use that word) in succession from an Apostle who stood in the assembly in "the place of Christ" and who the people are instructed to respect and obey in all things, gathered around the Holy Eucharist."

The closest you will come is Paul's instruction to Timothy, Pastor of the assembly at Ephesus (not an Apostle) that lays out the requirements for overseer and deacon, however, Timothy was the overseer and not in Apostolic succession, neither was James, pastor of the Jerusalem assembly and half-brother of Jesus or Jude, another half-brother of Jesus or Titus, the pastor of the assembly at Crete. If your quotation is correct for the church you would have thought one of the letters instructing the churches concerning their government would have made it into the canon some 250 years later, especially with all of the trouble the churches were having with controls. The only mention of any instruction or rule that is able to bring a person to perfection is the inspired Word of God as it illumines the mind and heart of the believer by the Holy Spirit.

[kosta50]

He is the author of all emotion and actions, and only He has that perfect balance, because, well, He's the only one who is perfect

You are confusing the creature with the Creator. You are saying that the uncreated God is subject to His own Creation -- by necessity! Moreso, you are using yourself as a model (and proof of what God is like): since to you love must be balanced by hate, so then you surmise God must be "just like you."

It's like a table comparing itself to the carpenter! Being a Protestant of some sort I suppose, you surely have missed that part of the Scripture where God reveals that His ways are not our ways and His thought are not our thoughts! (Isa 55:8)

[Kolokotronis]

"I did not say that God was everything...." Is He "anything"? The Cappadocian Fathers were fond of saying "I believe in God; God does not "exist"."

God is "O WN".

[Kolokotronis]

Read the Letters of +Ignatius of Antioch to the Smyrneans for starters, then try his letters to +John; they are all available online. Are they scripture? No. Were they written under the tutelage of an Apostle? Yes.

Since the people who determined that +Paul's epistles were to be included in the canon of scripture were bishops of The Church, why do you suppose they didn't just close up shop and set up independant protestant type assemblies right then if they had been so very wrong in their ecclesiology for the previous 400 years?

[ItsOurTimeNow]

>> You are confusing the creature with the Creator.<<

No, I'm not - I'm using His Word which explains what I've just stated.

He pours out His love just as much as He pour out His wrath. In fact, to the saved, He disciplines us out of love. The path to perdition is wide and densely populated, the road to life is narrow and sparse. Sounds to me like His justice is being meted out.

>>You are saying that the uncreated God is subject to His own Creation -- by necessity!<<

I said no such thing - please don't put words into my posts.

>>Moreso, you are using yourself as a model (and proof of what God is like)<<

I use myself as a model for nothing but perpetual sin saved through His perfect Grace according to His good pleasure.

>>since to you love must be balanced by hate, so then you surmise God must be "just like you."<<

Again, no, as I clearly stated in my reponse to your quote from Matthew - we are to imitate Him.

>>God reveals that His ways are not our ways and His thought are not our thoughts!<<

Amen - because He is perfect, and we are not. Otherwise, there'd be no need for love, justice, heaven, or hell.

[Forest Keeper]

Well, if you insist on being anthropomorphic about it, yes, He is indifferent.

God is indifferent to sin? If so, then from what do we need saving and why did He bother to send His Son?

God is "just"? By whose standards? You don't know God's standards, none of use do and clearly God is not "just" at all by man's standards."

Well, by God's standards of course, by definition. We are given a million clues in the Bible as to what God's justice is, and all I know is that I don't want it.

Your definition creates a God to be saved "from" not "by"...

That's the whole point of my belief in grace. That's what makes all the difference.

[kosta50]

Beggin' your pardon, but He does [choose]

Does He force or does He offer? I would say the latter (Love does not impose itself.

Oh, yes He does choose -- to give us blesisngs and to let us accept or reject them. He does not make the choices for us, but He helps us if we ask (Love does not refuse). He also chose Adam and Eve, since you are making up a list! And even when they transgressed He offered them a chance to repent -- a choice to change their mind, to repent.

According to your theology -- He must have created Adam and Eve in order to tempt them to sin so He could fulfill His plan of our salvation! That is a strange Christian God indeed.

[kosta50]

Kolokotronis: Your definition creates a God to be saved "from" not "by"...

Forest Keeper: That's the whole point of my belief in grace. That's what makes all the difference

So, you believe in God out of fear, not love? Why am I not surprized.

[annalex]

I have nothing to add or subtract from Kolokotronis's excellent posts in response to you.

[Forest Keeper]

God feels? Is He subject to pleasure? Is He subject to passions? Is He subject to pride and desires? Does God need, is He deficient, unsatisfied?

I think Kolkotronis was trying to tell you that your idea of a God who is just "like us" except bigger and stronger and immortal, and subject to passions and pleasures just as we are, is not a Christian God, but a Hellenistic pagan god.

Matthew 3:17 - "And a voice from heaven said, 'This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased.'" God needs for nothing, he is not deficient.

I do not at all think that God is "just like us", only super-sized. God is without sin, we are not, and neither were the pagan Gods. Gods ways are not our ways. I am saying that there are countless examples in the Bible where God shows expressions of love, mercy, wrath, dissatisfaction, anger, pleasure, etc. This does not make God a human-like figure in the way that you mean. How do you interpret away all of these verses?

[Kolokotronis]

"We all sin, but God's love for His people are what make the difference in how our sin is satisfied to Him."

Satisfied to Him? Like I said earlier, you write of a God to be saved from, not by.

What, exactly, do you believe God's purpose was in creating us?

[kosta50]

we are to imitate Him

Right, so don't be fooled into believeing otherwise that we are anything like the Original, or even similar to Him. And do not take our emotions and needs and desires and necessities and ascribe them to Him Who was before all ages, before the world.

And if we do become Christ-like in our life-time, it will be only in our Christian hearts.

[annalex]

I believe, Luther himself shied away from the necessary conclusion that denial of free will leads to predestination of the reprobates as wll as the elect, and hence to God as author of evil as well as the good. Others did that step for Luther, most notably Calvin and Zwingli.

I don't think it bears more than a purely historical interest, who of the leaders of the reformed communities thought what. If you drop your computer from the window, it will stop working. What part of the computer broke in what order following the impact is a quandary for the curious mind, but that knowledge is not going to fix the computer.

[Kolokotronis]

"If so, then from what do we need saving...."

From the power of death over us.

"...and why did He bother to send His Son?""

To destroy the power of death over man, of course. "God became man so that men might become gods", in other words, so that we might attain theosis which is our created purpose.

[AlbionGirl]

This looks very interesting, and will take me a little while to fully read and absorb.

But for starters, how can this author make the following statement without some serious back up documentation, proving this or at the very least lending serious weight to the contention:

Erasmus was a Renaissance rationalist who placed reason above Scripture. Therefore the truth of Scripture was not that important to him.

If this is elaborated on further on in the piece, please disregard the question.

[blue-duncan]

" why do you suppose they didn't just close up shop and set up independent protestant type assemblies right then if they had been so very wrong in their ecclesiology for the previous 400 years?"

We don't know what they did after the councils. What we do know is the church lost its vitality and for the next 800 years or so nothing of significance came out of the church which is indicative of institutionalization. If you want to drain the life out of an assembly take the power out of the hands of the people and centralize it in the hands of the professionals. Keep people ignorant of the heritage promised in the scriptures except what the professionals want them to know and you have darkness. Make them keep coming back to the professionals to insure their salvation rather than the freedom of seeking it and finding it personally by faith through the Word of God.

When light finally breaks and people can understand for themselves their inheritance, surely there will be excesses, but there will also be be truth that saves and empowers them to be the stewards of the promises given to them and to those they are responsible for. The church was never meant for the professionals. It was meant for the people to personally know their God and in knowing to do great deeds.

[Forest Keeper]

Is He "anything"? The Cappadocian Fathers were fond of saying "I believe in God; God does not "exist"."

God is His nature, which does not include evil. God is who is revealed to us in the Bible, and more.

[annalex]

The church was never meant for the professionals. It was meant for the people to personally know their God

Here is one professional charged with the sheep:

When therefore they had dined, Jesus saith to Simon Peter: Simon son of John, lovest thou me more than these? He saith to him: Yea, Lord, thou knowest that I love thee. He saith to him: Feed my lambs. He saith to him again: Simon, son of John, lovest thou me? He saith to him: Yea, Lord, thou knowest that I love thee. He saith to him: Feed my lambs. He said to him the third time: Simon, son of John, lovest thou me? Peter was grieved, because he had said to him the third time: Lovest thou me? And he said to him: Lord, thou knowest all things: thou knowest that I love thee. He said to him: Feed my sheep. (John 21:15-17)

And this is what that professional thought of finding salvation "personally".

Understanding this first, that no prophecy of scripture is made by private interpretation. (2 Peter 1:20)

[Forest Keeper]

So, you believe in God out of fear, not love? Why am I not surprized.

God is absolutely to be feared. He is also to be loved. Does not a child both fear and love his parents? Is this really a strange idea?