By ThereforeGodExists.com Contributor

Do you believe in compatibilism when Satan is tempting man?

• Yes. Compatibilism entails that all created beings (which would include Satan) are under the sovereign hand of God. The devil is a responsible, evil, moral agent. But the fact that Satan is an agent with such characteristics does not mean that he ever makes God absolutely contingent. The mistake that people often make is by envisioning two hermetically sealed off competing players—God and the devil. People tend to reason in this way, “The weather is nice—God did that. A tsunami hit Florida—the devil did that. I won the lottery—God did that. I was tempted and sinned—the devil did that.” This is false. God is the sovereign ruler. I submit that, like is taught in the story of Job, God has Satan on a very tight leash. God uses Satan, his deceit, his lies, his temptations (all of it), to accomplish His purposes.

Is the parable of the great banquet a problem for the doctrine of unconditional election?

• No. As Compatibilism would assert, the Jews (the ones who made excuses about coming to the banquet that they were originally invited to) were not acting apart from God’s sovereign plan. The Great Banquet points to the future messianic banquet, to which the people of Jesus’ day would have understood that only “godly Jews” would be invited. Jesus, however, uses the parable to teach his listeners, contrary to their expectations, that the guests invited originally will miss the banquet (v. 24) and will be replaced instead “the poor and crippled and blind and lame” and the outsiders (who are the Gentiles) found in the “highways and hedges” (vv. 21, 23). Paul, who himself was a Jew from the tribe of Benjamin, addresses the tremendous theological difficulties that come with the realization that God’s people, His chosen nation, has corporately rejected Him. In verse 6 of Romans 9, Paul argues that “it is not as though the Word of God has failed.” Indeed, this seems to be a severe problem. However, it is not. In reality, God is sovereign over Israel’s rebellion and rejection. Paul says that “a partial hardening has come upon Israel, until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in” (Romans 11:25). But why did the Jews reject the Messiah? Because “God gave them a spirit of stupor, eyes that would not see and ears that would not hear, down to this very day” (v. 7). Is this fact inconsistent with God’s unconditional election? Not in the eyes of Paul. Paul seems to be a proponent of Compatibilism, because in his same argument, he states that God continually cries, “all day long I have held out my hands to a disobedient and contrary people” (Romans 10:21). The rebellion is real, and man is therefore held responsible for it; God’s electing purposes are real. Both are true.

In Romans 9, Paul refers to Sarah and the Pharoah. Is he talking about salvation in regard to those two example?
• In Romans 9, I do not think that Sarah and Pharaoh are being spoken of in the terms of salvation. However, both of these historical figures are of significant importance when it comes to the logical flow of Paul’s argument in this passage. We shall start with Sarah. Paul has just introduced the idea that “it is not the children of the flesh that are the children of God, but the children of promise who are counted as offspring [that is, true descendants of Abraham who receive God’s covenant promises]” (9:8, emphasis mine). “The promise” (Gen. 18:10, 14) was not given to Hagar (Gen. 16) but was specifically given to Sarah and her offspring. This underscores the selective choice of who God uses in His redemptive plan. Now, Pharaoh is brought into the discussion as Paul begins to address his first rhetorical objection. The question, in light of the jaw-dropping statement “Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated,” is whether or not God is just! For, after all, how could He be good if He elected Jacob to be a chosen child of promise, and reprobated Esau, excluding him from His covenant promises before these persons were born! Paul argues that God “will have mercy on whom [He] has mercy, and [He] will have compassion on whom [He] has compassion” (Rom. 9:15). The assumption, of course, is that God is working with sinful, undeserving people; for the terms “mercy” and “compassion” imply that these people are in need of it! Furthermore, God says to Pharaoh, “For this very purpose I have raised you up…” What purpose?—“that I might show my power in you, and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth.” Paul then asserts this incredible statement, “So then He has mercy on whomever He wills, and He hardens whomever He wills” (v. 18). In the flow of Paul’s argument, he asserts this to show that God is sovereign over evil. Even the wrath of man praises God (Ps. 76:10), for God indeed installed Pharaoh as ruler and hardened his heart so that His own saving power and glorious name would be spread throughout the whole world! This underscores God’s sovereign right to do what He will with what He has created.
But this immediately raises another objection! “Why does He still find fault? For who can resist His will?” (v. 19). Boy, oh boy! Don’t ever complain that Paul failed to ask the tough questions! Of course, no one in their right mind would dare to argue that God Paul even considered the silly idea that God was contingent upon Pharaoh! Paul’s questions wouldn’t make sense unless he was arguing that God is sovereign over human choices!

By ThereforeGodExists.com Contributor

The devastating tornado that occurred on May 20^th in Moore, Oklahoma has been on my mind constantly the past few days. I’m not sure about many of you, but in my experience, I have always thought of storms—even the most devastating of storms—as nothing more than “nature acting-out.” Mother Nature, if I may call it that, is likened to some blind force in the universe. One day its 70 degrees and sunny—everybody is happy; the next day it’s cold and raining—everybody is complaining. There’s no one in control of the weather, really. The weather just is, so I reasoned. To be honest, it has not been until recently that I have thought about such things theologically.

Last Monday evening (the same night the tornado hit), I was standing outside my front door in the suburbs of Chicago, watching the dark and distant clouds approach. As they moved closer, distant flashes of lightning became visible. You could hear the distant rumbles of thunder. Soon it started to drizzle. I stood, watching, waiting, thinking. Some time passed, and the sky suddenly lit up as though it was day time, only for a brief moment, and then it went back to blackness. Within a second my pupils adjusted to the shocking brightness, and then readjusted to the darkness again. As I watched the lightning hurl through the sky, Job 36:32 was on my mind:  “He fills His hands with lightning bolts and hurls each at its target.” With anticipating excitement I thought to myself, “Where will you send the next lightning, God?”

Then the rain began to poor down as the gushing wind swept it along diagonally. A steady stream of rain ceaselessly smacked against the pavement. I stood underneath the cove to the front door of my house, watching this spectacle with wonder: the rain, the wind, the lightning! Oh and who could forget the roaring thunder? It was so piercingly loud. First came the blaze of light; then the “CRACK!” and then, within less than a second, the echoing “BOOM!” which sent violent reverberations shooting at me. I jumped several times, being shaken to my core by the sheer rebound of the thunder. It was all so spectacular.

He fills His hand with lightning bolts and hurls each at its target. The thunder announces His presence; the storm His indignant anger. My heart pounds as I think of this. It trembles within me. Listen carefully to the thunder of God’s voice as it rolls from His mouth. It rolls across the heavens, and His lightning flashes in every direction. Then comes the roaring of the thunder—the tremendous voice of His majesty. He does not restrain it when He speaks. God’s voice is glorious in the thunder. We can’t even imagine the greatness of His power. (Job 36:32-37:5)

During the storm, I read this passage numerous times. “This storm, this horribly beautiful and terribly fantastic storm was created by God Himself!” I cried. Surely, just as His infallible, inerrant, authoritative Word declares, God was sovereignly sending each drop  of rain down from His heavenly storehouses; He was breathing out every gust of wind; He was shooting lightning bolts like arrows with point-precision; He was ushering down screams of thunder with His voice. God was behind everything. Suddenly I realized that the storm—what I once considered “blind mother nature”—was not a random, blind force! No, not at all! It was God Himself. “This God is big, and powerful, and terrible” I thought to myself. “He is not to be trifled with.”

I awoke to the news of a catastrophic tornado which killed numerous men, women, and children (death toll 24). I frantically watched video after video of the footage of this F-5 tornado ripping through the town of Moore, Oklahoma. The tapes reveal the jaw-dropping repercussions: homes demolished, schools obliterated, debris scattered for miles, families without a home, eagerly desperate people on the scene, trying to help in any way they can. It was a nightmare. It is a nightmare. I have felt a heavy pit in my stomach ever since hearing about this horrible event. Looking back, I know that the root of this queasiness was planted in my stomach the night the storm hit. And here is why: Whereas before I was ignorant of God’s providence over the weather, ever since that night, I cannot contemplate such happenings without doing so theologically. God did send the storm, did He not? I mean to be frank with you, if you’re a Bible-believing Christian (and I suspect that most of you who are reading this are) then you must heed the basic fact that God did not simply allow the tornado, but rather, He created the tornado.

I drove my little sister to school this morning. On our drive, we listened to 103.5 Kiss FM (the popular radio station for Chicago). If you’ve ever tuned in to 103.5, it won’t be news to you that the talk-show hosts are, well, secular. As my sister and I listened, the broadcasters were dialoguing about the recent tornado in Moore, Oklahoma. They were “reasoning” (to use the term loosely) with one another about why God allow such a thing to happen. (There is that term again! Allow!).The few who even believed in any kind of God/gods argued that he (or she, or it) allowed this to happen. One guy said something about how he grew up in the catholic church but that he now doesn’t know what he believes on the topic anymore. I was growing frustrated at this point. They then played a clip of some moronic pastor insisting that “if only people would have prayed harder, then God would have answered their prayers and stopped the tornado.” This one set me over. I thought to myself, “These people have absolutely no idea what they’re talking about!”

At that moment in time, it dawned on me. “If I were to be on the radio right now, being interviewed by these people, and was asked to explain why God would ordain something so terrible, what would I tell them?” Frankly, I don’t know what I’d tell them. The Bible tells me that God sends the rain, and the thunder, and the lightning, and the tornado; He ACTUALLY CREATES, SENDS, SUSTAINS, EMPOWERS, and DETERMINES the appointed ends for such things. But surely that would not satisfy the demands of the listeners. The reason why we’re made so distraught over these types of occurrences is because we want an explanation for why it happened, why God didn’t stop it. Hearing someone say, “God didn’t stop it because God made it happen” is hardly a comforting thought to most.

And you see, this event, this tornado, it was different than other devastating occurrences. It was different! It wasn’t like 9/11 or the bombing in Boston, Massachusetts or the school shooting in Newtown, Connecticut! Why?—because it wasn’t brought about my people. Typically when Christians are asked to explain how an all-powerful, all-good God can exist when there is so much evil in the world, the response is that “God created free creatures who He allows to do bad things.” To be honest, this response has never satisfied me. It doesn’t satisfy me when we’re talking about evil committed by people; but it certainly doesn’t satisfy me when we’re talking about natural evils, such as this tornado. Why?—because, in the case of natural evils, God is the One creating, sustaining, and governing the nature.

Today I watched a video of someone recording the footage of the tornado. He kept saying, “Dear God, please keep those people safe. Oh dear God, please” as this massive twister is ripping through a neighborhood. (Video can be found here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xTpceWd8UE4). Bless this man for his prayers. But let’s just think about it. Am I the only one made uneasy when the thought of God’s providential ordination of this storm is placed alongside of the prayer that God would simultaneously protect those who the tornado is destroying? God is the one causing the tornado, and we’re asking Him to keep persons safe? This seems extremely paradoxical, doesn’t it? It is a huge dilemma to me. I do not know what to do about it.

I hope you feel the tension as well. If you don’t feel it then you probably don’t believe in God at all. It was Miguel de Unamuno who once said, “Those who believe that they believe in God, but without passion in their hearts, without anguish in mind, without uncertainty, without doubt, without an element of despair even in their consolation, believe only in the God idea, not God Himself.”

At this point in my life, I am content not having all of the answers. To be honest, most of the writers who I love the most acknowledge their intellectual frailty as well. How foolish it would be for someone to act as though he had answers to all of the questions. I will not attempt to defend God on this one. I know what he has revealed about Himself, and I will go no further than what He has told me. It is moments like this, moments when my mind is tired and confused, that I find my consolation, not in a proposition, but a Person.

God is good. God is sovereign. God is bigger than I am. He is incomprehensible. His plan works all things for the good. He is sovereign over everything that happens. He is in control—I believe all of these things with my whole heart. And, to be frank with you, I am comfortable letting what I do know about God shine light upon that which is unknown to me about Him. There are some of you who will think about the overwhelming amount of evil that exists in this world (evil such as this tornado), and will want to chuck God because of it. But what good does that do? By chucking God, you have not only chucked the solution to the problem, but you have also thrown the entire notion of objective evil out the window, and so too have lost the problem to the problem!

God is the only satisfying answer to this problem. Let’s trust Him.

By ThereforeGodExists.com Contributor

I would like to quickly pause and address some issues that have been raised by my opponent Richard. He has repeatedly said that I am defining humans as being “free to do what God has already chosen for us to do.” This is simply a straw man. He has misrepresented my position, and pointed out the flaws. In order to do some damage control, I will explicitly define my terms.

I submit that the Bible as a whole, and sometimes in specific texts, presupposes or teaches that both of the following propositions are true:

• God is absolutely sovereign, but His sovereignty never functions in such a way that human responsibility is mitigated.
• Human beings are morally responsible creatures—they significantly choose, rebel, obey, make decisions, and so forth, and they are rightly held accountable for such actions; but this characteristic never functions so as to make God absolutely contingent.

I have already listed numerous examples of explicit biblical passages in which these concepts are stated. Richard has unfortunately failed to address any of them; he simply asserts that my interpretation is “a stretch” to him. I do not doubt Richard’s sincerity in that he desires to discover what the Bible teaches on this most complex doctrine, however, if he truly is eager then I encourage him to show it by actually wrestling with these texts, and to reveal his well-reasoned thoughts about them. This is not too much to ask for, since this is a debate. I, along with many others, do not find these passages to be so trivially brushed off, as Richard seems to think.

What I find interesting is that my opponent has already confessed that the Bible teaches, in at least one place (namely, Acts 4), that God’s sovereign determination is presented as being compatible with human freedom. Richard has dug himself into a hole. If there is even a single example of compatibilism in the Bible (which he has already conceded) then, at the very least, there is no necessary contradiction between these two propositions. At that point, what reason can be given to reject compatibilism? Richard insists that this is hogwash; that I’m defining humans as being “free to do what God determined that we should irresistibly do.” To say it bluntly, I am not insisting that God is enigmatically holding a gun to the back of our heads, whispering into our ears, “Do what I have decreed or else!” and then blaming us for our decisions. God is not some puppet-master playing with His human toys.

That is why I insist that we cannot leave the bounds of the two above propositions. There is indeed mystery in them, but I submit that the problems involved in holding to the truth of both of the propositions are profoundly tied to the very nature of God Himself. As Dr. DA Carson argues, “We are reasonably well placed to isolate some of the things we do not know about God; that is, we see that the Bible describes God as both transcendent and personal, and in part we justify this strange pairing because we can identify some of the things we do not know about Him. But some of these things that we do not know about God turn out to be facets of ignorance that make it reasonable to hold that both the propositions of compatibilism are also true, even though we do not see how they can be true.” Indeed, I know that God presents Himself as personal, but I have absolutely no idea how a personal God can also be transcendent. Do not ask me to explain such mysteries. The mystery of this dilemma is in the first instance not located in debates about decrees, free will, and the like; rather, it is located in the doctrine of God. In a very real sense, this debate belongs in the subject of theology proper.

Two Wills?

Yes, God’s will of disposition is that all men be saved. However, God will ordain what is evil (what He does not desire), in order to accomplish a higher purpose. I think that this is sufficient to defeat his rebuttal. After all, God’s holiness also means that He desires to recompense all men—which would mean that all would go to hell—but He does not effectuate that state of affairs!

Conclusion

Now, I am aware that I have taken a long time to address specific issues. I do not want my opponent to point out that I haven’t responded to all of his rebuttals directly without my first acknowledging it!

An important distinction needs to be made here between, namely between Pentecostal and Oneness Pentecostal, as the Pentecostal denomination as a whole is not a Christian cult. However we can indict the Oneness Pentecostalism denomination, manifesting today under groups such as the United Pentecostal Church International, and we might catch them nicknaming themselves Apostolic. So is this charge justified? Is the Oneness Pentecostal church a cult?

As is the case with most Christian cults, the Oneness Pentecostal church rejects basic scriptural theology, regarding the trinity as condemnable and abhorrent heresy. They falsely tell their parishioners that the trinity is the view that there are three gods. But this sort of lie is consistent with most cult groups, and as one would expect, we find that sort of thing in other places in their bibliology.

As repulsive as their misrepresentation of the trinity is, they also preach that other denominations do not believe in the Holy Spirit. They teach ritualistic salvation, wherein people have to say chants and magic formulas, and unless they do that, they cannot be saved. They even impose legalistic strictures upon their members. From every angle, it is very difficult to distinguish between them and a Mormon group.

Jesus’ Name Baptism