Posted on 07/23/2002 7:40:31 AM PDT by xzins
The Cross-Work of Christ
Is It Limited or Unlimited?
What Does the Bible Teach?
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SALVATION |
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Unlimited Salvation |
Limited Salvation |
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"For therefore we both labour and suffer reproach, because we trust in the living God, who is the Saviour of all men..." (1 Tim. 4:10a). "For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son... "The Father sent the Son to be the Saviour of the world" (1 John 4:14; compare John 12:47). "For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through Him might be saved" (John 3:17; and compare Matt. 18:11; Luke 9:56; 19:10; 1 Tim. 1:15). "We know that this is indeed the Christ, the Saviour of the world" (John 4:42). "That was the true Light, which lighteth every man that cometh into the world" (John 1:9). "For the bread of God is He which cometh down from heaven, and giveth life unto the world" (John 6:33). "...if any man eat of this bread, he shall live forever: and the bread that I will give is My flesh, which I will give for the life of the world" (John 6:51). "For the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared unto all men..." (Tit. 2:11a). Also compare Acts 4:12 and Acts 5:31. |
"...specially (especially, particularly) of those that believe" (1 Tim. 4:10b). "...that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life" (John 3:16b). "God sent his only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through Him" (1 John 4:9). "And thou shalt call His name JESUS: for He shall save His people (Israel) from their sins" (Matt. 1:21). "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved" (Acts 16:31). "And as many as were ordained to eternal life believed" (Acts 13:48). "I have much people in this city" (Acts 18:10). "That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised Him from the dead, thou shalt be saved" (Rom. 10:9). "And the Lord added to the church daily such as should be saved" (Acts 2:47). "For whosoever shall call upon the Name of the Lord shall be saved" (Rom. 10:13). "...teaching us...looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour, Jesus Christ" (Tit. 2:12b-13). "but unto us which are saved" (1 Cor. 1:18). "And being made perfect, He became the author of eternal salvation unto all them that obey Him" (Heb. 5:9). "He that hath the Son hath life" (1 John 5:12). |
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REDEMPTION |
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Unlimited Redemption (Universal Redemption) |
Limited Redemption (Particular Redemption) |
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"Behold the Lamb of God, who taketh away the sin of the world" (John 1:29). "Who gave Himself a ransom for all" (1 Tim. 2:6 and compare verse 1-"all men," and verse 4-"all men"). "But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death, crowned with glory and honour; that He by the grace of God should taste death for every man" (Hebrews 2:9). "There shall be false teachers among you, who privily shall bring in damnable heresies, even denying the Lord that bought them, and bring upon themselves swift destruction" (2 Peter 2:1). "All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the LORD hath laid on Him the iniquity of us all" (Isaiah 53:6). Compare John 12:32-33 (John 3:14) |
"He entered in once into the holy place, having obtained eternal redemption for us" (Heb. 9:12). "In whom we have redemption through His blood" (Col. 1:14). "For ye are bought with a price" (1 Pet. 1:18-19). "Who gave Himself for us, that He might redeem us from all iniquity" (Tit. 2:14). "But of Him are ye in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us...redemption" (1 Cor. 1:30). "Being justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus" (Rom. 3:24). See also Romans 4:25; 14:15; 1 Corinthians 8:11; John 10:11; Acts 20:28; Revelation 1:5; Galatians 1:4; 3:13; Ephesians 5:25; 1 Thess. 5:10; Hebrews 1:3; 1 Peter 2:24. |
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RECONCILIATION |
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Unlimited Reconciliation (Universal Reconciliation) |
Limited Reconciliation (Particular Reconciliation) |
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"To wit, that God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto Himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them; and hath committed unto us the word of reconciliation" (2 Cor. 5:19) |
"And all things are of God, who hath reconciled us to Himself by Jesus Christ" (2 Corinthians 5:18) "We pray (beg) you in Christ's stead, be ye reconciled to God" (2 Corinthians 5:20) |
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PROPITIATION |
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Unlimited Propitiation (Universal Propitiation) |
Limited Propitiation (Particular Propitiation) |
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"...and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world" (1 John 2:2). |
"And He is the propitiation for our sins..." (1 John 2:2a). |
FIVE INDISPUTABLE FACTS
1. Without question, the Bible teaches that not all men shall be saved:
Matthew 7:13-14; 25:41,46; 2 Thess. 1:8-9; Rev. 20:11-15; 21:11,15; etc.
2. The Bible teaches that God desires all men to be saved and to come to a full-knowledge of the truth:
1 Timothy 2:4 (cf. Matthew 18:14; 2 Peter 3:9; Ezekiel 18:23,32; 33:11) and see our study called, God's Willingness and Man's Unwillingness.
3. The gospel is to be preached to every creature and all men everywhere are commanded to repent:
Luke 24:47; Acts 2:38 "every one of you"; Acts 3:26 "every one of you"; Acts 13:38; 17:30; 20:21; 26:17-20; Romans 16:26; 1 Cor. 1:23.
4. Salvation is offered to all men and "whosoever will" may take of the water of life freely.
Matthew 11:28-30; John 1:12; 3:15-17; 4:13-14; 6:35-37,47,51,54,58; 7:37-38; 10:9; 11:25-26; 20:31; Acts 2:38; 3:19; 10:43; 13:38-39; Romans 1:16; 6:23; 10:11-13; Revelation 3:20; 22:17.
5. It is the responsibility of all men to obey the gospel by believing on the Lord Jesus Christ.
John 3:18; 3:36; Acts 16:30-31; 17:30; 2 Thess. 1:8; 1 Peter 4:17.
Sir Robert Anderson, in the preface to his book Forgotten Truths, said this: "In the early years of my Christian life I was greatly perplexed and distressed by the supposition that the plain and simple words of such Scriptures as John 3:16; 1 John 2:2; 1 Timothy 2:6 were not true, save in a cryptic sense understood only by the initiated. For, I was told, the over-shadowing truth of Divine sovereignty in election barred our taking them literally. But half a century ago a friend of those days—the late Dr. Horatius Bonar—delivered me from this strangely prevalent error. He taught me that truths may seem to us irreconcilable only because our finite minds cannot understand the Infinite; and we must never allow our faulty apprehension of the eternal counsels of God to hinder unquestioning faith in the words of Holy Scripture."
Life is offered unto you, Hallelujah!
Eternal life thy soul shall have,
If you'll only look to Him, Hallelujah!
Look to Jesus who alone can save!
Look and live, O sinner live!
Look to Jesus now and live!
'Tis recorded in His Word, Hallelujah!
It is only that you "look and live."
--William A. Ogden (John 3:14-16)
They cannot look honestly in the eyes of a crowd and say, "Christ died for you." Why can't they do that? Because they believe a lot of those folks are eternally doomed, and all the prayer in the world, all the repentance in the world, all the faith in the world will NOT avail unto the salvation of one who God picked to be damned from before the foundation of the world.
File this away. It's proof of God's love for you IN CHRIST!!
Nice spin, xzins, but you're arguing against a position the Calvinists do not hold. The faith, repentance, and prayer to which you refer are not present in those who are not elect. Under your Arminian theology, anyone who would have these God would "foreknow" and elect. Calvinist theology maintains that only those elected could possibly have those things in the first place because in man's natural state these are not present. Whether it's your theology or ours, there will never be a case in which there's some poor man who believes upon the Lord, repents and prays for forgiveness and is subsequently denied because God decided to save a random number of people irregardless of their depravity (arbitrarily) instead of saving some from their just deserves and leaving the others to the same (mercifully and graciously).
What you now seem to be doing is trying to trap us by saying that if we are right then we must be completely dishonest in our evangelism because we can't say truthfully that "Christ died for YOUR sins" when we don't know if they are elect or not. Clever, but at best your argument would then be a call for Calvinists to stop making blanket statements like that. It still doesn't strike at the truth of Calvinism.
All the table shown above shows me is why this debate continues after all this time. Clearly there are verses that on the surface do not reconcile with each other. You no doubt feel that no Calvinist has successfully and reasonably reconciled many of the above verses about "the world" and "all men" just as I feel that no Arminians have successfully and reasonably reconciled verses about "those the Father has given Me" and those "chosen before the foundation."
I look forward to standing beside you in the New Jerusalem laughing at how simpleit will seem to us then:) Until then...
So all men everywhere ARE already saved correct? They need do nothing more than exist?
"For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son... "The Father sent the Son to be the Saviour of the world" (1 John 4:14; compare John 12:47).
Mat 11:27 All things are delivered unto me of my Father: and no man knoweth the Son, but the Father; neither knoweth any man the Father, save the Son, and [he] to whomsoever the Son will reveal [him].
Jhn 6:37 All that the Father giveth me shall come to me; and him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out.
That is a LIMITED all ..all that the Father gives
"For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through Him might be saved" (John 3:17; and compare Matt. 18:11; Luke 9:56; 19:10; 1 Tim. 1:15).
Is the whole world saved? "We know that this is indeed the Christ, the Saviour of the world" (John 4:42).
The word " world "here means
8a) the Gentiles as contrasted to the Jews (Rom. 11:12 etc) 8b) of believers only, John 1:29; 3:16; 3:17; 6:33; 12:47 1 Cor. 4:9; 2 Cor. 5:19
Read it xzins are you so desprate that you would mis state the word of God?
This announces that salvation has also come to the Gentiles..
Or are you saing that all the men in the entire world ARE already saved? Do you REALLY want to go with that rendering?
"That was the true Light, which lighteth every man that cometh into the world" (John 1:9).
Jhn 1:5 And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not.
Jhn 1:10 He was in the world, and the world was made by him, and the world knew him not. "For the bread of God is He which cometh down from heaven, and giveth life unto the world" (John 6:33).
Jhn 3:19 And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.
Job 24:13 They are of those that rebel against the light; they know not the ways thereof, nor abide in the paths thereof.
1Cr 2:14 But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know [them], because they are spiritually discerned.
"...if any man eat of this bread, he shall live forever: and the bread that I will give is My flesh, which I will give for the life of the world" (John 6:51). "For the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared unto all men..." (Tit. 2:11a).
Tts 2:14 Who gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works.
Act 13:48 And when the Gentiles heard this, they were glad, and glorified the word of the Lord: and as many as were ordained to eternal life believed.
Note to self - what a charming Christian
BTW last time I looked a Bitch is a female dog..call PETA
His page says his hobby is "bitch-slapping" arminians. Rev points this out above.
If he (or the rev that first posted it) were really interested in the correction of a young brother in Christ he would have sent him a personal rebuke as per the scripture admonition.
Instead they wanted to publically embarrass him and by extrention all the Calvinists
A BTW word to the Arminians people that live in glass houses should know better than throw stones
Thank You!
(bookmarked)
Maranatha!
m
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