This Week in Calvinism - October 26, 2012

• This is why I avoid online "discussion" forums.
  
  
• Of Calvinisms five points, which is the most dangerous? One blogger answers: "P in TULIP is the most dangerous point since the TRUTH is that we cannot serve two masters and be saved in our sins – and Satan knows it. This doctrine might cause people to easier fall for temptations, and then their SOULS are at risk!"
  
  
• Apparently, Frank Schaeffer prefers a god with no control over evil to One who actually ordains it for a greater purpose. Oh, you were expecting at least some attempt at a biblical refutation of Calvinism? Come on. This is Frank Schaeffer we're talking about.
  
  
• Eric Goranson begins examining the five points of Arminianism and Calvinism.
  
  
• Hurry! There are only a few hours left in Ligonier's $5 Friday Sale.
  
  
• Tim Challies and David Murray interview Tullian Tchividjian about his new book, Glorious Ruin, covering the subject of suffering.

This Week in Calvinism - October 19, 2012

• Fred Calrk "would like to see science fiction used to explore what it would mean if Calvinism were true." I think what he meant to say was, "if my biased assumptions of Calvinism were true."
  
  
• Should a pastor be fired from an Arminian church for teaching the doctrines of grace?
  
  
• Questioning Calvinism.
  
  
• If an unregenerate man is able to respond to the gospel invitation, but the problem is that he is simply unwilling to respond, does that mean a dead man is able to rise again, but so far just hasn't been persuaded to do so?
  
  
• Kevin DeYoung on the doctrine of scripture.

This Week in Calvinism - October 12, 2012

• What Peter Lumpkins gleaned from the vice presidential debate:

  Let Joe Biden's nauseating performance illustrate how Calvinists many times come across to average Southern Baptists. While many criticisms have been levelled against Baptist Calvinists through the years (some true, some false), one charge, at least in some ways, outranks them all--Calvinists are arrogant, know-it-all, theological prigs who appear to think all others are intellectual buffoons.

  
  
• Can Calvinism be proven by quoting a few partial, out-of-context verses? No, Calvinism can only be refuted by quoting a few partial, out-of-context verses.
  
  
• Intuitive Calvinism:

  My eleven year old son intuits the idea that so many things in the past have led to the uniqueness of his birth. His mom and I had to meet, and that would not have happened if I didn't go get coffee one day, and if mom had married her high school sweetheart, etc. He then goes beyond that to say the same complicated line of events had to happen for my parents, my wife's parents, their parents, their parents, and so on and so on. So he and I eventually settle on this: EVERYTHING in history had to happen in order for him to be born.

  
  
• What Jesus says to Rome.
  
  
• Jacob Arminius was born this week (Oct. 10) in 1560.

Marriage Hypocrisy

This November, voters in my state will be asked to answer yes or no to the following question:

Shall the Minnesota Constitution be amended to provide that only a union of one man and one woman shall be valid or recognized as a marriage in Minnesota?

So, during the last few months, we have been bombarded with ads like this:


I cannot help but wonder why this supposedly fair and open-minded individual wants to limit marriage to only "two people." What kind of bigoted, hateful person would tell polygamists that they have no right to marry whomever they please?

This Week in Calvinism - October 5, 2012

• C. J. Mahaney's Sovereign Grace Church begins worshiping in Louisville.
  
  
• Dan Phillips seems to imply that anything less than a vote for Mitt Romney is a sin. I'm not really sure how else to interpret his post.
  
  
• Apparently, Jesus never taught perseverance of the saints. That's true, if you eliminate John 6:37-39, John 10:27-28, Romans 8:29-30, 1 Corinthians 1:8, Philippians 1:6, Hebrews 10:14, 1st Peter 1:5, and all those other passages that do teach perseverance of the saints.
  
  
• Kevin DeYoung's book, The Hole in Our Holiness, is available for $10 for a limited time.
  
  
• David Platt on the doctrine of suffering.
  
  
• In order to better understand history, it helps to have a grasp on the concept of total depravity.