The Slander of Calvinism

The tenets of Calvinism present Satan’s original argument to Eve, accusing God of saying what was not true in order to prevent His human creation from their best good, and ensure that they would do wrong so that God would have occasion to demonstrate His power and authority over them. Satan’s first question to Eve contained a factual error that lured her into her attempt to correct the record of God’s words. Satan worded the question in such a manner as to imply a fault on God’s part, impugning God’s character by the implication, which Eve naively corrected in her response:

“Has God said that you may not eat of the trees of the garden?”

“Yes, we may eat the fruit of the trees of the garden. But of the fruit of the tree in the midst of the garden, God has said we may neither eat it nor touch it, or we shall die.”

We assume that Satan knew what God did say to Adam about the two symbolic trees, and that his question was a deliberate baiting of a new creation lacking any prior experience with deceit or malice. We need to remember that Satan is not omnipotent, nor does he know or see all that is. A created being is limited in his abilities, and most particularly the ability to perceive all things, because a created being is necessarily finite, and necessarily less complex than the mind of the Being Which created it.

If Satan did know what God had said, his first question implied a deliberate lie to manipulate his hearer, in order to establish the environment in which he could mislead his victim. If he was not privy to the exact instruction God gave to Adam, he would necessarily still have recognized that his question implied a falsehood, because the garden contained all the trees for food that God had created for man’s nourishment; obviously God would not place the man in a limited space with the resources for physical life, then prohibit the man from eating what he needed to live.

In the same way, the doctrines of Calvinism call into question God’s own words, implying that God did not actually say what the record of Scripture presents:

God did not really say that:

“For God so loved the world…”

“And the Spirit and the bride say, ‘Come.’ And let him who hears say, ‘Come.’ And let him is thirsty come. And whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely.” Re 22:17

The second element of Satan’s deception of Eve was to openly accuse God of deliberately lying to them about the serious matter of the consequences of doing what God had forbidden.

“You shall not surely die!” God has told you falsehood; God is a liar from the beginning. What God did say does not hold a positive truth value, but was intended to cause fear in you to keep you from doing what He prohibited.

In the same way, Calvinism accuses God of communicating verbally facts that possess negative truth value; in other words, God has continued throughout history to lie to His human creation, and now does so through the written record of His word to His apostles and prophets. God deceives men into thinking they understand what He has clearly said, in order to demonstrate His power and authority over all aspects of creation, and particularly the affairs of men. The obvious meaning of words and sentences does not match what God knows to be true.

God knows that is not true:

“all” does not mean “all”

God does not love sinners, but hates them, loving only the “elect”.

Christ did not die for the sins of the world, but only for those of “the elect”

1Jo 2:2  “… and he is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world.”

Thirdly, Satan sought to persuade Eve that God desired to deprive them of some benefit. As nothing is higher than God, the ideal of becoming like God would entice the person who could not understand that “like God” meant far more than the possession of raw knowledge. Moreover, Eve could not understand, because she had to that time had no experience of evil, what it meant to “know” evil. God desired His creation to be innocent of all wrong; in violating a clear precept, given personally by Him to Adam, humanity would then certainly come to “know” evil, because they would become guilty of wilful rebellion against the universal jurisdiction of God. Satan already knew this evil, because he sought to lift himself to God’s position, believing himself both worthy and able, and in his bid to dethrone God, he began early to seek a following of God’s highest creation, man, created by God to bear God’s image in the universe. By enticing man to follow him in defiance of our Creator God, Satan might imprint his rebellious image over the image of God, and display his power and influence to all creation through his subversion of God’s image-bearer.

To ensure Eve’s acceptance of Satan’s smooth argument, Satan slandered God’s character completely by stating that He knew the exceptional advantage that humanity would acquire if they performed what God had forbidden. God lied to ensure that they did not benefit from a gain only offered through the action He had prohibited; clearly God’s intentions toward humanity were at least dishonourable and selfish, and possibly openly malicious. In order to protect His apparently vulnerable position among His created beings, God would have to keep them from experiencing a desirable and profitable outcome that would also give them the ability to vie for God’s position, or at least live independently of God’s authority.

In the same way, Calvinism accuses God of having determined before ever creating, and before any individual, angelic or human, had ever demonstrated its willingness to submit to Him, that God would create both spirit and fleshly beings with tremendous abilities, and imbue into most a wicked character, establishing before creation that thousands of angels and all of humanity would rebel against God, bringing evil into the universe and requiring that God destroy them. God would ensure that creatures thus created, would be completely powerless to see their wrong, desire to change, or take hold upon any means by which change could occur, and would ultimately be condemned to everlasting hell for their wickedness.

But, because God wanted to demonstrate not only His absolute authority but His kind and loving nature, He would select from among the masses of humans created to fail, a small number of individuals with no special meritorious characteristics, whose minds He would miraculously free from the bondage of that evil condition, so they would be able to recognize what is good and desire God’s favour, so that He could snatch them from the everlasting fire of judgment and bring them to live in paradise with Himself, changed from wicked humans to spiritually-new creatures pleasing to God.

God would awaken these chosen individuals by calling them out of darkness, which call they would be able to hear because He had miraculously restored their ability to hear His call, from among the billions whose ability He had prevented. Of these few, when they would hear God’s call, God would cause them to believe Him and trust Him, and then He would cancel the consequences of their original wicked condition by bearing those consequences Himself, so that they would not have to suffer everlasting torment for the wickedness of their being.

Calvinism argues that God did not ‘author’ sin, while accusing God of having planned, purposed, and ensured from before the foundation of the world, everything that comes to pass, and arguing that, because God is “sovereign”, everything must happen in accordance with His will. Calvinism twists language and the Scripture to argue that, on one side, God is not responsible for human sin, while on the other side, that humans can do nothing else but fulfill the will of God, which God fore-ordained from eternity past. This last slander is, in many ways, worse than the first three, in that God is painted in the character of Satan himself, who lied to Eve to entice her to do what he knew would destroy her, in order to show himself powerful and influential over God’s highest creation. This is the “blasphemy of the Holy Spirit” that Jesus warned was without forgiveness in any era: that God’s spirit was equal to Beelzebub, the prince of demons, which is a reprehensible slander against the righteous character of the holy God.

God pre-planned to create a powerless creation that would be subject to all manner of evil without the ability to change, in order for God to “glorify His name” and “demonstrate His power” over His creation. God determined before time began to imprison and destroy countless people so that God would look mighty in the eyes of those He created, so that all would fear Him and recognize Him as the highest over all. This reprehensible slander makes a mockery of the goodness and love of God, contradicting the clear record of Scripture on every point, and creating among its proponents the same harmful, loveless, and graceless attitude as the “God” they confess to serve.

God seeks to deprive you of benefits to promote His own image and protect His own interests.

God creates billions of people foreordained to destruction, in order to show His supremacy in His creation.

God selects a few individuals from the mass of humanity, all of whom deserve destruction because of its wickedness, to place His favour upon them for no merit of theirs, in order to show that He is loving and kind.

God calls sinners, who are incapable of hearing or responding to His call, so that He can condemn them for refusing Him, and consign them to eternal prison of hell.

John Calvin was a murderous heretic who followed his Gnostic-influenced mentor, Augustine, in embracing a theology that impugns the character of God exactly as Satan did in the beginning in the garden. Jesus told His disciples that they would know teachers of truth and followers of Christ “by their fruit”. (Matthew 7:15-20; Luke 6:44) Paul enumerated what fruit would be produced by the Spirit of God in the life of His saints – love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, and moderation – and the apostle John, “whom [Christ] loved”, wrote that “… no murderer has eternal life living in him.” (Galatians 5:22-23; 1 John 3:15) On only the basis of his life, Calvin should be rejected by all saints as outside of Christ, and unqualified to teach the people of God. It is disgraceful that so many millions of people not only have accepted Calvin as an historical theologian of merit because he stood up against the Roman pope, but have accepted his blasphemous theology that assigns the reality of evil to the express will and fore-ordination of the righteous Lord God, while dissembling that they in no wise hold God accountable for evil. If evil is foreordained according to God’s ‘express will’, God is entirely and fully responsible for evil, and malice, and harm, exactly as Satan implied to Eve in that paradise garden so long ago, when men had not known sin, and walked in fellowship and innocence with their loving Creator.

Follow