Run AWAY from Calvinism!

[Wynona]

hmm on another thread, im talking about 1 john there, and it would seem to be in the same context.
If it helps, understand that i dont think many people are saved in general. Its nothing personal, i just think God aint saving everybody. By far, i believe most, including myself, will end up in hell.

All the same, I forgive you.

 

[BarneyFife]

Let go Barn' I don't hold grudges against @Lifelong-sinner
J.

I don't know how to hold a grudge. I was raised and taught to see forgiveness as an attitude rather than an event. Christ had no time to kneel and pray to His Father for grace to forgive when he was struck in the face by the High Priest's guard. Believe it or not, this isn't about any of us. It's about Christian conduct and the character of God Himself. :)

 

[Lambano]

By far, i believe most, including myself, will end up in hell.

Maybe. But I'm prayin' like hell that you don't end up there.

 

[BarneyFife]

God’s days of mercy are over.

The very first sentence of the clarification of your stance on Christianity is utterly erroneous.

Psalm 136:2 KJV: O give thanks unto the God of gods: for his mercy endureth for ever.

The Calvary event, itself—the centerpiece of time, space, and matter—is the most supreme, sublime picture of God's mercy mingled with justice (judgment).

Everything God does is both just and merciful—EVERYTHING.

GOD IS NOT DIVIDED. He is not a wishy-washy man, that He should change His mind. And don't bother quoting the Old Testament to try to disprove this, because His own policy of progressive revelation (meeting people where they are—He even stooped to become a man to do it) required that He express Himself in ways that barbaric human beings could understand.

John 16:12 KJV: I have yet many things to say unto you, but ye cannot bear them now.

Numbers 23:19 KJV: God is not a man, that he should lie; neither the son of man, that he should repent: hath he said, and shall he not do it? or hath he spoken, and shall he not make it good?

Psalm 50:21 KJV: These things hast thou done, and I kept silence; thou thoughtest that I was altogether such an one as thyself: but I will reprove thee, and set them in order before thine eyes.

 

[BarneyFife]

Maybe. But I'm prayin' like hell that you don't end up there.

Never gonna happen; he ain't goin'.

 

[amadeus]

I don't know how to hold a grudge. I was raised and taught to see forgiveness as an attitude rather than an event. Christ had no time to kneel and pray to His Father for grace to forgive when he was struck in the face by the High Priest's guard. Believe it or not, this isn't about any of us. It's about Christian conduct and the character of God Himself. :)

My poor memory makes it hard to hold a grudge for any length of time because too quickly I have forgotten the event. Is that God alone... or is it also common to people who are simply aging? Maybe God is giving us a break by means of our flawed memories...

 

[BarneyFife]

When i go out, or am on this forum, im constantly thinking the majority of these people are going to hell.

1 Corinthians 13:6 Love takes no pleasure in evil, but rejoices in the truth.
1 Corinthians 13:7 KJV: Beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things.

You ever gone to the grocery store, and while waiting in line, look around and wonder how many around you will make it to Heaven??

I see them all as literal candidates for Glory and probably more faithful to what they do know of God than I am.

I may be headed for hell,

Not unless that's where you want to end up—and you don't.

but at least im honest about it

Those who ignore so great a salvation as was first announced by the Lord (Hebrews 2:3) will not be accounted as honest:

Revelation 22:15 KJV: For without are dogs, and sorcerers, and whoremongers, and murderers, and idolaters, and whosoever loveth and maketh a lie.

James 2:10 KJV: For whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all.

and without pride to think im someone special

But you are someone special:

Jeremiah 29:11 For I know the plans I have for you, declares the LORD, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, to give you a future and a hope.
Jeremiah 1:5 KJV: Before I formed thee in the belly I knew thee; and before thou camest forth out of the womb I sanctified thee, and I ordained thee a prophet unto the nations.

Do you really think this was recorded in Scripture so that we would know God thought about Jeremiah as being a prophet when he was still in his mother's womb? No, the Bible was written to you as a love letter from the
Sovereign of the universe, as if no one else would ever read it. We are all confused about God's intentions toward us. It's not a matter of whether or not we are confused, but in what manner and to what extent. We must allow our distorted views of ourselves to cause us to ignore so great a Salvation (which is Jesus, Himself). Jesus loves you just as you are. John Calvin would want you to know that above anything else.

I can have no peace, but that I cast myself at the foot of the cross. I must die daily. The salvation of my friends, family, and enemies depends on it, because God uses people to preach the Gospel. Please, L_S? You will never be good enough to stand before God. None of us ever are. Entrust your case wholly to Him now!!! I am not afraid to make a fool of myself to appeal to you. And no one here would dare think of you as humiliated or weak for surrendering to Christ. Even if you believe you have already done so, today is the day, for all of us!

Hebrews 3:13 KJV: But exhort one another daily, while it is called To day; lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin.

You don't have to reply. God knows your heart. We need no display.

 

[ChristisGod]

And, yes, I want people who are "flaky in their beliefs" on here (especially if "flaky" means those who are not obsessed with the doctrine of election). Are we here to admire each other's orthodoxy or are we yoked up with Him Who has come to seek and save that which is lost?

Amen

 

[ChristisGod]

I've been a calvinst for over 40 years and have lately been reexamining those beliefs. I no longer consider myself one just a Christian now. I do believe in predestination/election just not in the same way I use to believe.

 

[BarneyFife]

hmm on another thread, im talking about 1 john there, and it would seem to be in the same context.
If it helps, understand that i dont think many people are saved in general. Its nothing personal, i just think God aint saving everybody. By far, i believe most, including myself, will end up in hell.

It could be viably argued that the few there be that find the narrow way are the 'parable of the sheep' 99 out of 100, by God's reckoning, no? One lost one is one too many(?)
(Especially considering the universal intelligences, about which we know little, who are themselves protected from a 2nd rebellion by the blood shed at Calvary and the marks He still bears in His Body) :)

 

[amigo de christo]

I certainly did miss your point. It must be old age setting in.

My friend , IF methusulah heard that , He would be like , someone bring this kid a blankie .
You aint that old my friend . Older yes . The good thing is , we wont always be in these bodies my friend .
Death has no victory over a lamb . FOR JESUS holds the KEYS and in HIM we simply shall be present with HIM at that hour .
Till then , You march on in the LORD my friend . POINTING always to CHRIST as the only , and i do mean ONLY HOPE FOR SALVATION
a soul can have .

 

[BarneyFife]

Edit to post #204

added:

a soul-tormenting extreme view of

:)
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ATTN: @Johann @Cassandra @Christophany @amadeus @Lifelong_sinner @Lambano @Wynona

 

[amadeus]

And, yes, I want people who are "flaky in their beliefs" on here (especially if "flaky" means those who are not obsessed with a soul-tormenting extreme view of the doctrine of election). Are we here to admire each other's orthodoxy or are we yoked up with Him Who has come to seek and save that which is lost?

What a mighty God we serve!
Angels stand before Him...
Heaven and earth adore Him...
What a mighty God we serve!

 

[Johann]

1 Corinthians 13:6 Love takes no pleasure in evil, but rejoices in the truth.
1 Corinthians 13:7 KJV: Beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things.

I see them all as literal candidates for Glory and probably more faithful to what they do know of God than I am.

Not unless that's where you want to end up—and you don't.

Those who ignore so great a salvation as was first announced by the Lord (Hebrews 2:3) will not be accounted as honest:

Revelation 22:15 KJV: For without are dogs, and sorcerers, and whoremongers, and murderers, and idolaters, and whosoever loveth and maketh a lie.

James 2:10 KJV: For whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all.


But you are someone special:

Jeremiah 29:11 For I know the plans I have for you, declares the LORD, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, to give you a future and a hope.
Jeremiah 1:5 KJV: Before I formed thee in the belly I knew thee; and before thou camest forth out of the womb I sanctified thee, and I ordained thee a prophet unto the nations.

Do you really think this was recorded in Scripture so that we would know God thought about Jeremiah as being a prophet when he was still in his mother's womb? No, the Bible was written to you as a love letter from the
Sovereign of the universe, as if no one else would ever read it. We are all confused about God's intentions toward us. It's not a matter of whether or not we are confused, but in what manner and to what extent. We must allow our distorted views of ourselves to cause us to ignore so great a Salvation (which is Jesus, Himself). Jesus loves you just as you are. John Calvin would want you to know that above anything else.

I can have no peace, but that I cast myself at the foot of the cross. I must die daily. The salvation of my friends, family, and enemies depends on it, because God uses people to preach the Gospel. Please, L_S? You will never be good enough to stand before God. None of us ever are. Entrust your case wholly to Him now!!! I am not afraid to make a fool of myself to appeal to you. And no one here would dare think of you as humiliated or weak for surrendering to Christ. Even if you believe you have already done so, today is the day, for all of us!

Hebrews 3:13 KJV: But exhort one another daily, while it is called To day; lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin.

You don't have to reply. God knows your heart. We need no display.

Heck, what a powerful witness and preachin'
Still reverberating...
J.

 

[Lambano]

Never gonna happen; he ain't goin'.

Hell, no, he won’t go!

 

[BarneyFife]

What a mighty God we serve!
Angels stand before Him...
Heaven and earth adore Him...
What a mighty God we serve!

AMEN, my friend!

 

[Johann]

AMEN, my friend!

Nice, if people cannot praise and worship while we have still breath I guess we will be like fish out of water on the other side.

 

[Johann]

can you be more specific??? I gotta be honest, i cant keep track of everyone i offend around here and why. Im on this forum where theres like 5, or 6 of us reformed folk, and im not used to what i would consider wild or crazy or bizarre beliefs. Most days on here for me have me :: at my screen.

No confusion, look at my signature..that we may KNOW we HAVE eternal life at present dear friend.
Shalom
J.

 

[Johann]

The very first sentence of the clarification of your stance on Christianity is utterly erroneous.

Psalm 136:2 KJV: O give thanks unto the God of gods: for his mercy endureth for ever.

The Calvary event, itself—the centerpiece of time, space, and matter—is the most supreme, sublime picture of God's mercy mingled with justice (judgment).

Everything God does is both just and merciful—EVERYTHING.

GOD IS NOT DIVIDED. He is not a wishy-washy man, that He should change His mind. And don't bother quoting the Old Testament to try to disprove this, because His own policy of progressive revelation (meeting people where they are—He even stooped to become a man to do it) required that He express Himself in ways that barbaric human beings could understand.

John 16:12 KJV: I have yet many things to say unto you, but ye cannot bear them now.

Numbers 23:19 KJV: God is not a man, that he should lie; neither the son of man, that he should repent: hath he said, and shall he not do it? or hath he spoken, and shall he not make it good?

Psalm 50:21 KJV: These things hast thou done, and I kept silence; thou thoughtest that I was altogether such an one as thyself: but I will reprove thee, and set them in order before thine eyes.

Ol' Barn, we need anointed preaching like this here in South Africa.
You are an amazing God-fearing man!
Praise God for brothers in Christ.
AMEN!!
J.

 

[Johann]

It could be viably argued that the few there be that find the narrow way are the 'parable of the sheep' 99 out of 100, by God's reckoning, no? One lost one is one too many(?)
(Especially considering the universal intelligences, about which we know little, who are themselves protected from a 2nd rebellion by the blood shed at Calvary and the marks He still bears in His Body) :)

Ah! The nail scarred hands and feet and side of our blessed Lord and Savior, the shed blood...


The Hound Of Heaven
By Francis Thompson (1890)


I fled Him, down the nights and down the days;

I fled Him, down the arches of the years;

I fled Him, down the labyrinthine ways

Of my own mind; and in the mist of tears

I hid from Him, and under running laughter.

Up vistaed hopes I sped;

And shot, precipitated,

Adown Titanic glooms of chasmèd fears,

From those strong Feet that followed, followed after.

But with unhurrying chase,

And unperturbèd pace,

Deliberate speed, majestic instancy,

They beat—and a Voice beat

More instant than the Feet—

‘All things betray thee, who betrayest Me.’

I pleaded, outlaw-wise,

By many a hearted casement, curtained red,

Trellised with intertwining charities;

(For, though I knew His love Who followèd,

Yet was I sore adread

Lest having Him, I must have naught beside).

But, if one little casement parted wide,

The gust of His approach would clash it to.

Fear wist not to evade, as Love wist to pursue.

Across the margent of the world I fled,

And troubled the gold gateways of the stars,

Smiting for shelter on their clangèd bars;

Fretted to dulcet jars

And silvern chatter the pale ports o’ the moon.

I said to Dawn: Be sudden—to Eve: Be soon;

With thy young skiey blossoms heap me over

From this tremendous Lover—

Float thy vague veil about me, lest He see!

I tempted all His servitors, but to find

My own betrayal in their constancy,

In faith to Him their fickleness to me,

Their traitorous trueness, and their loyal deceit.

To all swift things for swiftness did I sue;

Clung to the whistling mane of every wind.

But whether they swept, smoothly fleet,

The long savannahs of the blue;

Or whether, Thunder-driven,

They clanged his chariot ’thwart a heaven,

Plashy with flying lightnings round the spurn o’ their

feet:—

Fear wist not to evade as Love wist to pursue.

Still with unhurrying chase,

And unperturbèd pace,

Deliberate speed, majestic instancy,

Came on the following Feet,

And a Voice above their beat—

‘Naught shelters thee, who wilt not shelter Me.’

I sought no more that after which I strayed

In face of man or maid;

But still within the little children’s eyes

Seems something, something that replies;

They at least are for me, surely for me!

I turned me to them very wistfully;

But just as their young eyes grew sudden fair

With dawning answers there,

Their angel plucked them from me by the hair.

‘Come then, ye other children, Nature’s—share

With me’ (said I) ‘your delicate fellowship;

Let me greet you lip to lip,

Let me twine with you caresses,

Wantoning

With our Lady-Mother’s vagrant tresses,

Banqueting

With her in her wind-walled palace,

Underneath her azured daïs,

Quaffing, as your taintless way is,

From a chalice

Lucent-weeping out of the dayspring.’

So it was done:

I in their delicate fellowship was one—

Drew the bolt of Nature’s secrecies.

I knew all the swift importings

On the wilful face of skies;

I knew how the clouds arise

Spumèd of the wild sea-snortings;

All that’s born or dies

Rose and drooped with; made them shapers

Of mine own moods, or wailful or divine;

With them joyed and was bereaven.

I was heavy with the even,

When she lit her glimmering tapers

Round the day’s dead sanctities.

I laughed in the morning’s eyes.

I triumphed and I saddened with all weather,

Heaven and I wept together,

And its sweet tears were salt with mortal mine;

Against the red throb of its sunset-heart

I laid my own to beat,

And share commingling heat;

But not by that, by that, was eased my human smart.

In vain my tears were wet on Heaven’s gray cheek.

For ah! we know not what each other says,

These things and I; in sound I speak—

Their sound is but their stir, they speak by silences.

Nature, poor stepdame, cannot slake my drouth;

Let her, if she would owe me,

Drop yon blue bosom-veil of sky, and show me

The breasts o’ her tenderness:

Never did any milk of hers once bless

My thirsting mouth.

Nigh and nigh draws the chase,

With unperturbèd pace,

Deliberate speed, majestic instancy;

And past those noisèd Feet

A voice comes yet more fleet—

‘Lo! naught contents thee, who content’st

not Me.’

Naked I wait Thy love’s uplifted stroke!

My harness piece by piece Thou hast hewn from me,

And smitten me to my knee;

I am defenceless utterly.

I slept, methinks, and woke,

And, slowly gazing, find me stripped in sleep.

In the rash lustihead of my young powers,

I shook the pillaring hours

And pulled my life upon me; grimed with smears,

I stand amid the dust o’ the mounded years—

My mangled youth lies dead beneath the heap.

My days have crackled and gone up in smoke,

Have puffed and burst as sun-starts on a stream.

Yea, faileth now even dream

The dreamer, and the lute the lutanist;

Even the linked fantasies, in whose blossomy twist

I swung the earth a trinket at my wrist,

Are yielding; cords of all too weak account

For earth with heavy griefs so overplussed.

Ah! is Thy love indeed

A weed, albeit an amaranthine weed,

Suffering no flowers except its own to mount?

Ah! must—

Designer infinite!—

Ah! must Thou char the wood ere Thou canst limn

with it?

My freshness spent its wavering shower i’ the dust;

And now my heart is as a broken fount,

Wherein tear-drippings stagnate, spilt down ever

From the dank thoughts that shiver

Upon the sighful branches of my mind.

Such is; what is to be?

The pulp so bitter, how shall taste the rind?

I dimly guess what Time in mists confounds;

Yet ever and anon a trumpet sounds

From the hid battlements of Eternity;

Those shaken mists a space unsettle, then

Round the half-glimpsèd turrets slowly wash again.

But not ere him who summoneth

I first have seen, enwound

With glooming robes purpureal, cypress-crowned;

His name I know, and what his trumpet saith.

Whether man’s heart or life it be which yields

Thee harvest, must Thy harvest-fields

Be dunged with rotten death?

Now of that long pursuit

Comes on at hand the bruit;

That Voice is round me like a bursting sea:

‘And is thy earth so marred,

Shattered in shard on shard?

Lo, all things fly thee, for thou fliest Me!

Strange, piteous, futile thing!

Wherefore should any set thee love apart?

Seeing none but I makes much of naught’ (He said),

‘And human love needs human meriting:

How hast thou merited—

Of all man’s clotted clay the dingiest clot?

Alack, thou knowest not

How little worthy of any love thou art!

Whom wilt thou find to love ignoble thee,

Save Me, save only Me?

All which I took from thee I did but take,

Not for thy harms,

But just that thou might’st seek it in My arms.

All which thy child’s mistake

Fancies as lost, I have stored for thee at home:

Rise, clasp My hand, and come!’

Halts by me that footfall:

Is my gloom, after all,

Shade of His hand, outstretched caressingly?

‘Ah, fondest, blindest, weakest,

I am He Whom thou seekest!

Thou dravest love from thee, who dravest Me.’

— Francis Thompson (1859–1907)