11 Dec 2011

A Wise Consistency

Religious 45 Comments

My friend and co-author Carlos Lara kept telling me about this really intense Bible study at his church, in which they work through the Westminster Confession of Faith. To give you a flavor of how hardcore this stuff is, consider what we studied today, from Chapter XI:

4. God did, from all eternity, decree to justify all the elect, and Christ did, in the fulness of time, die for their sins, and rise for their justification: nevertheless, they are not justified, until the Holy Spirit doth, in due time, actually apply Christ unto them.

I am pretty sure we spent the entire class (about 45 minutes) on just this sentence.

What I’ve been doing is going to Carlos’ (Presbyterian) church for this class, then I go to my church (which is a Fellowship Bible church where Dave Ramsey happens to go, I just found out…) and we sing really awesome songs and hear a sermon that is much more “let’s get out there and live like Jesus!” than the Presbyterian study sessions. It’s makes for a really interesting Sunday, sort of like going to the Rothbard Graduate Seminar in Auburn and then PorcFest.

Anyway, the thing that is really striking me as we go through the Westminster Confession is that you can’t push some of the “tough” doctrines of predestination, Original Sin, etc. only halfway. If you pull back from their implications, then you actually end up with something monstrous.

The most recent example I can give, concerns whether infants might die and not be elect. The pastor leading the study group said that yes, of course they can; there is nothing in Scripture that would lead us to believe otherwise. Then he mentioned how other sects had some type of “age of accountability” doctrine (see somehow who apparently endorses this doctrine, writing about it here). The idea is that if, say, a 3-month old dies, then obviously he must go to heaven, because after all he never got a chance to accept Jesus as his personal Lord and Savior.

So to be clear, the Presbyterian pastor leading our study group, completely rejected this concept and said humans had just made it up, because the alternative sounds like it’s not fair. But, he pointed out, the very idea of election isn’t “fair” either. After all, the group had been studying–in painstaking detail for months–that humans are sinners who don’t do anything to earn their salvation. On this most hardcore of interpretations, it’s not even that you are saved by your faith in Christ, per se. Rather, God decided from before time began that He was going to save you, and then when He effectively called you (working through the instrument of someone on earth sharing the gospel with you, perhaps), then the Holy Spirit began regenerating you from your spiritual state of death, and as a result of your re-birth, you exhibit faith in Jesus and repentance for your sins. (I hope I’m accurately recapitulating what he was teaching; this is all new stuff to me.)

So, if this is how one views the process of salvation, then in a sense it’s just as “unfair” that some other adult doesn’t believe in Jesus (and hence goes to hell), as it would be for an infant. It’s not that you distinguished yourself from the hell-bound sinner because you freely chose God while he didn’t. No, God chose you, and God rejected that guy.

Now admittedly, things do seem even more unfair in the case of the infant. With the sinning adults, at least you could limit the “unfairness” to the grace God gives to the one guy. In other words, the sinning adult does deserve to go to hell, but for some reason God decides to effectively call a subset of these sinners (who deserve damnation) and redirects them to heaven. But does that really work for a little baby…?

At this point, the guy discussed what happened with Adam, and how every human since him has a “sin nature.” I’m not going to dwell on this, because I know it will just set off the atheist libertarians.

The point I want to make in this post, however, came a bit later. Now I should stress that this Presbyterian pastor is not only extremely intelligent and knowledgeable, but also a “real guy” who understands perfectly well why a lot of people would have trouble with the idea of infants not “being saved.” Yet if we push that view, inventing doctrines such as the “age of accountability,” you run into trouble, as he pointed out.

The pastor said look, if you are going to say that an infant in the Bible belt gets a pass, because he was never old enough to understand the Scripture being shared by his neighbors, then you also have to give a pass to the people who have never heard of Jesus. After all, how could they possibly be sent to hell for failing to accept Jesus, if they don’t even know who He is?

And now the coup de grace: If it’s true that people can’t go to hell if they never really had a chance to accept Jesus, then the obvious thing for all Christians to do is to stop sharing the gospel, cancel all mission trips, and indeed burn all the Bibles as fast as they can. In just one generation, if we all work together, we can ensure that nobody ever goes to hell–we just have to wipe out all evidence of Jesus.

In conclusion, I realize the atheist readers are going to be amused or horrified at how much mental energy Bible-believing Christians spend, trying to reconcile what seem to the atheists as blatantly contradictory doctrines.

However, I would suggest to the actual believers, that you push your doctrines to their logical conclusions. If you think the Bible clearly says something, but you dismiss it because “that can’t possibly be right,” I would encourage you to suspend your disbelief. I bet that the passage in question is leading to “problems” only because you are also “helping” some other beliefs with your own earthly interpretation. The Bible definitely teaches us to transform our minds and stop thinking as mere men and women. If we pull back from this Godly perspective because a certain part doesn’t seem to fit, and substitute something more “reasonable,” then the whole thing will come crashing down.

45 Responses to “A Wise Consistency”

  1. Sjaak says:

    I’m a big fan of your economics and political philosophy, but it seems like wherever Bibles open, minds close.

    What do you make of the passages that say that non-believers should stoned to death?

    “If thy brother, the son of thy mother, or thy son, or thy daughter, or the wife of thy bosom, or thy friend, which is as thine own soul, entice thee secretly, saying, Let us go and serve other gods, which thou hast not known, thou, nor thy fathers; Namely, of the gods of the people which are round about you … Thou shalt not consent unto him, nor hearken unto him; neither shall thine eye pity him, neither shalt thou spare, neither shalt thou conceal him: But thou shalt surely kill him; thine hand shall be first upon him to put him to death, and afterwards the hand of all the people. And thou shalt stone him with stones, that he die.” — Dt.13:6-10

    Or disobedient children:

    “If a man has a stubborn and rebellious son who will not obey the voice of his father or the voice of his mother, and, though they discipline him, will not listen to them, then his father and his mother shall take hold of him and bring him out to the elders of his city at the gate of the place where he lives, and they shall say to the elders of his city, ‘This our son is stubborn and rebellious; he will not obey our voice; he is a glutton and a drunkard.’ Then all the men of the city shall stone him to death with stones. So you shall purge the evil from your midst, and all Israel shall hear, and fear.” — Dt. 21:18-21

    Or women who are not virgins at marriage:

    “If it is discovered that a bride is not a virgin, the Bible demands that she be executed by stoning immediately.” — Dt. 22:13-21

    Adulterers:

    “If a married person has sex with someone else’s husband or wife, the Bible commands that both adulterers be stoned to death.” — Dt. 22:22

    Couples having sex while the woman is on her period:

    “The Bible forbids a married couple from having sexual intercourse during a woman’s period. If they disobey, both shall be executed.” — Lv. 18:19

    Sex with a prostitute is also fine for the guy but not for the girl, polygamy is cool, slavery no problem, sex with girls from 11 and upwards is also allowed, the list goes on. How do you ‘interpret’ that? It seems like it requires a lot of mental gymnastics to ignore that. Or do you just cherry-pick the things that you like from the Bible? Like you say, push your doctrines to their logical conclusions. Like the statist that by supporting the state and not allowing me to act upon my dissenting opinion is thereby advocating my imprisonment or death upon resistance. You as well, by your support of this system of beliefs, are also advocating my death.

    • Bob Murphy says:

      Sjaak, I don’t consider myself a Jew bound by the Mosaic Law. I consider myself a disciple of Jesus Christ. The Jewish leaders took a woman allegedly caught in the act of fornication, presented her to Jesus, and asked if they should stone her. He said, “Let him who is without sin cast the first stone.” So they all walked away, feeling like cr*p. Then Jesus said to the woman, “Neither do I condemn you, go and sin no more.”

      I don’t know exactly what to do with that stuff in the OT about how the Jews were supposed to enforce morality in their odd situation. But it is crystal clear that Jesus doesn’t want his followers going around stoning people who sin. This isn’t some weird “interpretation” on my part, that is clearly what Jesus taught.

      • Daniel Kuehn says:

        I don’t usually like those sorts of arguments that he made against Christians for precisely the reason you state – Christ fulfilled the law and the prophets. That should be entirely clear.

        Where I think his points pose deeper problems is in thinking about who God is, completely aside from what is expected of Christians from that God. If you think that the God of the OT an the God of the NT are the same God, this is something of a problem because the God of the OT looks very much like a tribal god like any number of other tribal gods that you don’t believe in.

        But if you reject that the God of the OT and the NT are the same, that raises serious concerns about the authority and even the purpose of Christ fulfilling the covenant.

        • Tzadik says:

          Even the God of the OT is inconsistent with the behavior of the God of the OT.

      • Tzadik says:

        Obeying any of Sjaak’s quotes would violate Jewish law. The Rabbis did not allow capital punishment except under near-impossible circumstances, which is why Jews had stopped executions long before Jesus came around. That parable sounds like a mob action, not a legal outcome. Jews do not stone, and this is in no way a conflict between their behavior and their god-given commandments.

    • Tzadik says:

      Sjaak,

      It appears you know little about Jewish law. Executions are virtually impossible under Jewish law and are not even considered anymore. It has been thousands of years since the rabbis executed anyone.

  2. Tel says:

    It’s not that you distinguished yourself from the hell-bound sinner because you freely chose God while he didn’t. No, God chose you, and God rejected that guy.

    Isn’t this just the free will question all over again? Look, I’m not a believer and I’m not bothered to say it (but if other people want to believe, that’s their choice). If there is an all powerful God out there and it was in his mighty plan that I be a believer, then he would find a way to make me believe. The fact that I don’t believe either proves that God is not almighty or that God is not particularly interested in what I do (or both).

    Maybe I’ll finally start believing 10 minutes before I die, maybe that is the almighty plan. In the meantime I’ll just wing it because at least if I concentrate on everyday stuff I can justify that I have some evidence and some tangible outcomes.

    • Silas Barta says:

      I think there’s a parallel secular question in the form of Newcomb’s problem, which hinges on the same issues. Basically, a super-intelligent, awesome predictor called Omega offers you two boxes. Box A has visible contents: $1000.

      Box B’s contents are concealed. It either has $1 million or nothing.

      You may take either Box B alone, or both boxes. If Omega predicted you would take both boxes, B is empty. If he predicted you would take just box B, he put $1 million in it.

      Omega has already made his decision and left. What do you do?

      There, the same free will issues arise: Omega has already left, so can’t you take the contents as given and take both boxes? But then, Omega is also an extrremely good predictor, and so if you’re a “one-boxing-kind of person” (parallel to being “saved”), you would take just box B. Does Omega’s awesome predictive power negate your free will?

      I’m currently tangling with “applied theologian” [1] Scott Aaronson on the issue of what this predictability of humans would apply on the linked thread.

      [1] Aaronson has referred to theoretical computer science as “applied theology” because it answers the question of what different kinds of gods (compuation models) would be capable of.

      • Tel says:

        It’s a rigged game. Suppose I just take box B, and then I take a look inside and it happens to be empty… then I’d feel ripped off so I might as well grab what’s in box A as well.

        There’s no way Omega can predict wrong.

        In fact, I’d argue there’s no way Box B can contain anything, so I’d just take box A and walk away without ever looking in box B. I know the rules tell me not to do that, but what’s Omega going to do to stop me huh?

        • Silas Barta says:

          It’s a rigged game. Suppose I just take box B, and then I take a look inside and it happens to be empty…

          Yes, that’s the transparent-boxes version of the problem. And in that one, if Omega believes you would two-box on the basis of seeing box B empty, it would never fill box B.

          There’s no way Omega can predict wrong.

          In fact, I’d argue there’s no way Box B can contain anything

          But it’s only your *belief* that it can’t contain anything that leads Omega to predict you will two-box, and therefore make it not contain anything!

          Want to try a different strategy?

          • Tel says:

            But it’s only your *belief* that it can’t contain anything that leads Omega to predict you will two-box, and therefore make it not contain anything!

            I didn’t pick two box, I picked one box, it just happened to be box A.

            Actually, with further thought I have come up with a better strategy. I pick box B, and walk away from box A. So if box B has a million dollars then I’m rich enough that I don’t need to care about box A anyhow.

            However, I still maintain that it’s a rigged game so box B will almost certainly be empty, however now I realise that finding box B empty means that Omega has broken it’s own rules and demonstrated itself to be a cheater. This means I can (with clear conscience) never need to play dumbarse Omega games ever again which in itself is certainly worth more than the contents of box A, and probably might be worth close to the million that was supposedly in box B.

          • Tel says:

            Yes, that’s the transparent-boxes version of the problem. And in that one, if Omega believes you would two-box on the basis of seeing box B empty, it would never fill box B.

            If I’m going to pick box B under any circumstances then sooner or later I am going to end up looking inside of it. What’s the point of having a million dollars (or even one dollar) that you can’t spend?

            If box B is supposedly something that I carry around my whole life and never open, then it’s surely the most useless gift anyone could ever offer. A box of old sox and bow ties I can at least find a use for.

  3. Daniel Kuehn says:

    I went to a Presbyterian church and for our confirmation class we went through all the confessions. It was very interesting to see how they evolved over time, as well. My church was very studious, but I didn’t know if that was a reputation Presbyterians had generally.

    In fact, I first started to lose my faith at that church (no to cast aspersions on them – it happened in my own head). I would go to a bible study after service that was lead by a guy that was ordained himself but ended up going off and starting a software company. One of the most brilliant guys I’ve ever met. He was a big fan of Karl Barth and we read a lot of Barth in class. Anyway, we had several classes where we were discussing authority – Scriptural authority and God’s authority, and I started to be bothered by how circular a lot of the claims about authority were. I think this class was a big influence on my brother too, and now he’s getting a doctorate in theology from the University of Chicago.

    Speaking of pushing beliefs to their logical conclusions and grounding them in Scripture, I’d love to hear a defense of Scriptural or divine authority (maybe you’ve done this in the past, but I think it’s been a while if you have).

    Logic has a fairly sound basis. What about Scripture?

    • Daniel Kuehn says:

      Sorry – a little off topic I know. But talking about Bible studies in a Presbyterian church brought back a lot of memories. Very fond memories, in fact. I loved going to church and I’m not the sort of guy that resents the church generally – and certainly not that particular congregation.

    • P.S.H. says:

      “Logic has a fairly sound basis.”

      Logic does not have a basis. It is fundamental.

      • Bala says:

        just trying to rephrase what you said.

        Logic does not have a basis. Logic IS the basis.

        Hope it sounds fine.

        • Daniel Kuehn says:

          What exactly do you two mean by this? Basis of what?

          Casually speaking, I think “fundamental” is fine to apply to logic. I have nothing against logic and it certainly has a lot to be said for it. But ultimately any “knowledge” that comes from logical thought is still going to be contingent knowledge.

          Better to think of it as a fundamental algorithm for thinking about the world. As a route to knowledge, though, I wouldn’t go farther than “sound basis”. I certainly wouldn’t say anything like “IS the basis”.

          But that’s only as a route to knowledge… perhaps you are talking about something else. When you say “logic is the basis”, could you be more specific? Basis of what?

          • Bala says:

            Starts with the question “What is ‘knowledge’?”

            • Daniel Kuehn says:

              Do you mind being a little less cryptic – I’m not sure exactly what you’re trying to say.

            • Bala says:

              It’s not cryptic at all. At least I wasn’t trying to be. You were using the phrase “as a route to knowledge”. To use that phrase, you need to first define the term “knowledge”, failing which you would be guilty of using it rather carelessly (which is what I believe is the reason for your error).

              • Daniel Kuehn says:

                OK – I thought you were answering my question about what it is the basis of… and I wasn’t getting why you were answering it by asking a question.

                “Knowledge” is a little too abstract for me which is why I put it in quotes in the first place. I think when a lot of people talk about knowledge they’re talking about understandings of the world that have proven reliable and useful. Perhaps you could take a go at defining knowledge, but I’m not sure how helpful that will be.

                I’m pretty sure I’m not making obvious errors. It might be the case that we’re getting at two different ideas, though.

            • Bala says:

              “But ultimately any “knowledge” that comes from logical thought is still going to be contingent knowledge.”

              For instance, could you try identifying knowledge that doesn’t come from either deductive or inductive reasoning?

              • Daniel Kuehn says:

                A lot of people that defend logic epistemologically are thinking of deductive reasoning. It’s precisely because of the value of induction and even the value of weaker induction and convention that I don’t personally think of deductive reasoning as having any particular advantage. Practically speaking, weak induction and convention get people along at least as well as deduction, which is often poorly executed.

              • David says:

                “It’s precisely because of the value of induction and even the value of weaker induction and convention that I don’t personally think of deductive reasoning as having any particular advantage.”

                The epistemological validity of induction is only as good as its presupposed premises.

                Induction presupposes constancy in the subject matter, which is accommodated by finding regular relationships between observable factors.

                This is all well and good when the subject matter actually does follow constancy and determinism between factors.

                But when the subject matter isn’t consistent with that assumption, then induction becomes an invalid epistemology.

                Austrians, specifically Miseseans, hold that human action, the subject matter of economics, cannot be logically categorized as constant in nature, which means deduction is the only valid epistemology in economics.

                Just consider a person who utilizes induction-based reasoning in economics, and what happens to them when they engage in inductive reasoning, in order to understand how it cannot be possible for induction to work on humans.

              • Daniel Kuehn says:

                David –
                The epistemological value of anything is dependent on its premises. Anyway, this is why I wanted clarification on “basis of what”. I’m not convinced we make any epistemologically airtight claims, and a cautious inductionism can often get us much more useful information than a self-confident deduction that doesn’t have all the relevant premises. If you are interested in epistemological soundness, then (1.) I think you’re fooling yourself in a lot of cases, and (2.) you and I are interested in completely different things – which is what I had suspected initially.

              • Bala says:

                DK,

                The key is to know when to use induction and when to use deduction. Each has its uses and limitations. Using deduction where induction is to be used and vice versa can lead to fairly ridiculous results. Such is the attempt to use induction, however weak, in the study of human action (a study of which Economics is a part).

                However, (unlike what it appears David is doing), I do recognise the importance of inductive reasoning. You couldn’t form a single concept of anything at all if you didn’t use inductive reasoning. I am therefore with you on that.

              • David says:

                Daniel:

                The epistemological value of anything is dependent on its premises.

                Of course. It’s just that as thinking and acting entities, we are bound to the premise that everything else not us is guided by causes which are constant, which does not apply to things that learn and act.

                You find value in induction? I hope only for subject matter that doesn’t itself think and act. For subject matter that does think and act, they must be treated logically different, and cannot be presumed to act according to constant causes. The premise of constancy is inapplicable for human thinking and action.

                In order for us humans to even be able learn from reality using an epistemology that contains the premise of constant causes, we ourselves could not coherently consider ourselves to think and act also according to such constancy. Learning and acting are categorically different phenomena than the behavior of atoms and molecules, and rocks and trees.

                Induction is suited to the non-thinking and non-acting portion of the world, which is why it works fantastic in the natural sciences, but not suited to thinking and acting things like us humans, which is why doesn’t work and when attempted works terribly, in economics.

                Anyway, this is why I wanted clarification on “basis of what”. I’m not convinced we make any epistemologically airtight claims, and a cautious inductionism can often get us much more useful information than a self-confident deduction that doesn’t have all the relevant premises. If you are interested in epistemological soundness, then (1.) I think you’re fooling yourself in a lot of cases, and (2.) you and I are interested in completely different things – which is what I had suspected initially.

                OK, what about cautious deduction as opposed to self-confident induction? It’s easy to create two artificial positions, consider them the only possibilities, and then say “Obviously we must choose the cautious induction as opposed to the self-confident deduction.”

                And you just contradicted yourself by the way. You say we cannot be sure that humans make any airtight epistemological claims, and that you hold “cautious” induction to be more often useful than “self-confident” deduction, and that in a lot of cases, we are “fooling ourselves” in deduction.

                Well, that is a “self-confident” position regarding human epistemology as such. The more you attempt to consider yourself “skeptical” of all human epistemological claims, the more sure you would have to be to yourself that human epistemology as such consists of the premise “humans can’t know anything in the objective world with certainty and cannot know any epistemological claims with certainty.” That is contradictory because by making that argument, you are explaining human epistemology in a very precise, limited, and detailed way, namely, that human epistemology is such that the human mind cannot know anything with certainty, including epistemological claims.

                To think you are sure of what A is not capable of, or what A lacks, is to thinking you are sure about the nature of A. To argue or be convinced of what attributes A does not have, is to make an argument of what constitutes an attribute of A by construction.

                If I say that “Humans are not immortal”, I am also saying that humans are mortal. I can’t then say something that would require humans to be immortal.

                If you say you are sure that humans can’t know any epistemological claims with certainty, then you cannot say you are sure of any claims you make, including claims about human epistemology. So the more antagonistic you are to certain epistemological claims, the more you would be contradicting yourself, by positioning yourself more and more towards the epistemological claim that human epistemology is such that it cannot know anything with certainty.

                You say you are not convinced we can make any airtight epistemological claims, and that induction is more useful than deduction. And yet, this means you are convinced that induction is more useful than deduction, which is a conviction concerning human epistemology, and you are convinced that deduction can only be self-confident while induction can be cautious, which is another conviction concerning human epistemology.

                Human induction and deduction are both open to error, but that doesn’t mean that ALL induction and ALL deduction is erroneous. We can however rule out particular deductive claims and particular inductive claims as erroneous. In your case, I can rule out the claim you are making that induction can usefully apply to economics, and thus to human thinking and action. I can rule that out as being incoherent and not logically possible.

                You may believe you are doing economics when you propose an economic hypothesis, collect economic data, form equations, run regressions, then confirm or falsify your hypothesis, then claim to have found and learned of some economics theory via the data.

                In reality of course you’d be doing something akin to astrology.

            • Bala says:

              “Basis of what?”

              Forming concepts. Gathering knowledge.

  4. Thomas L. Knapp says:

    “I don’t consider myself a Jew bound by the Mosaic Law. I consider myself a disciple of Jesus Christ.”

    Would that be the same Jesus Christ who said “For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled?”

    Or are we talking about some other Jesus Christ?

    • Bob Murphy says:

      Same one, Tom.

    • Tzadik says:

      Stoning an adulterer to death is a gross violation of Jewish law, almost bad enough to warrant an execution, if executions were allowed under Jewish law, which they are not.

    • Gene Callahan says:

      It’s just hilarious when atheists present this is if no Christian had ever stumbled upon that quote over the last two thousand years.

      • Bob Murphy says:

        Gene wrote:

        It’s just hilarious when atheists present this is if no Christian had ever stumbled upon that quote over the last two thousand years.

        Gene, let me play atheist’s advocate here for a minute. Knapp gave what appears to be a serious problem with my view, and your response is to say, “Oh c’mon, we already know about that ‘problem.'” But when you raise issues about methodological individualism on your blog, and I say, “C’mon Gene, Rothbard specifically deals with that,” you still think you blew it up and that you raised a devastating objection.

        (This doesn’t affect who’s right or wrong on the two issues, I’m just saying the hilarity you feel right now, is exactly how I feel when you say, “Of course France can shell Germany. Duh!”)

      • Thomas L. Knapp says:

        Gene,

        On what basis do you jump to the (false) conclusion that I’m an atheist?

  5. david stinson says:

    Great title for the post.

    “I would suggest to the actual believers, that you push your doctrines to their logical conclusions.”

    It strikes me that this is wise advice in any field of thought, not only theology.

  6. Brian Shelley says:

    Bob,

    I support anyone digging deeper into the scriptures, but keep in mind that there is rigorous Protestant thought outside of the “Reformed” theology of the Presbyterians.

  7. Mattheus von Guttenberg says:

    Bob, this is just the same deterministic argument all over again.

    The pastor says that it’s not human beings who decide whether to believe in Christ and be saved, it’s that God has already decided which people should believe in Christ and be saved. There’s no role for independent, actual thinking or will involved in this. You are mechanistically led from God’s decision to believe in Christ, just as I am not.

    So how exactly am I liable for my own sins?

    • Gene Callahan says:

      “So how exactly am I liable for my own sins?”

      Under this view, liability does not enter into the picture. God is perfectly free to save whomever he wants to, and cast aside whomever he wants to.

      • Mattheus von Guttenberg says:

        True enough, but then my sins are not of my own doing as I have no control over whether I praise Jesus or ignore him.

        Don’t you think this is just a teensy problem for the idea that the deserving get into heaven? If it’s already been decided Gene, then nobody should worry at all.

        • Bob Murphy says:

          Mattheus, this is one of the most fiendishly difficult questions of human existence, so I won’t be able to satisfy you. But, I think the pastor would say (and I’d probably agree with him) something like this: You have free will, and you freely choose to sin, so you don’t deserve to go to heaven in the absence of Jesus’ redemptive work. The point I was making in the blog post is that even though there are spots in the Bible that, in isolation, suggest that the sinner can save himself by believing in Jesus, there are other parts that say that God decided beforehand that He was going to save you, and so “it had to be” that you would choose to believe in Jesus.

          Believe me, I get what you are saying–if it’s my own fault for sinning, then I should at least get credit for having faith in Jesus. But that’s not the way the Bible talks about things, and the whole point of my post was that someone who actually believes in the Bible shouldn’t pick and choose among its clear doctrines. If there is an apparent contradiction it might be that you are filling in an axiom that isn’t supposed to be there. (For example, we are here noting a “contradiction” that actually rests on some other assumptions, such as that your decision to sin is the same type of thing as your decision to have faith in Jesus. Maybe that’s not right.)

          Anyway, next Sunday I’ll try to answer Thomas Knapp’s question better. That might give you more fodder for incredulity.

  8. K Sralla says:

    Ok. Have not been able to read in a while due to a move across the pond. However, I am delighted you have found one of these PCA study groups. I could not help but smile when I read your post.

    • Austin says:

      Yes, same here! Join the an-calvs! (anarcho-calvinists) :>

  9. Brad D says:

    Some of this discussion reminds me of Calvinism versus Arminianism. If you are interested in delving into this topic more, I suggest reading some of Vincent Cheung’s work. You can read it here: http://www.vincentcheung.com

    Very good, deep stuff.

  10. K Sralla says:

    Man gets *full* responsibility for his sins, despite the fact that he is destined from the moment of birth to fall into sin, and yet God takes total and complete credit (and glory) for his redemption.

    Now take this simple rule, and apply it to many of the most difficult theological questions that may be asked, and don’t stop until the question has been exhausted. Call it Calvinism if you must, but this is doctrinal center of gravity that is set forth so brilliantly in the Westminster Confession of Faith. The 17th century Puritan divines masterfully used this simple formula to expound the doctines set forth by the Bible. They saw this rule as the great systematic truth of the scriptures from beginning to end.

    Yet the radical extension of this rule was clearly not invented by the Puritans or even Calvin or Luther. It is just as clearly evident in many of the giant theologians that pre-dated the Protestant Reformation, including several of the Doctors of the Church, and specifically also in several of the early Church Fathers. I would further argue that it is the great liberating truth set forth in Paul’s letter to the Romans.

  11. RichardsDay says:

    Hhmmm…

    At the risk of being a little bit lumpen, if it’s a “bible study”, why are they going through the Westminster Confession, having “original” sources at hand?

    Good last paragraph though.

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