And the disciples studied the Word of God and learned much of and about......
John Calvin, Oh I'm sorry he wasn't even born.

As to preachers in pulpits it may be quite good for every single one of them to consider prayerfully what.....
Jesus Christ, the Son of the Living God, requires of them for that matter what He requires of us too.

But yet once again, where is Jesus Christ in all of this discussion on the 5 points of Calvinism? He seems quite left out like what is at state, what is really important is whether or not a person is one of the elect.

And those who fail to point people to studying the Scriptures for themselves such as Roman Catholics and other false religions are most likely suppressing the reality that the Scriptures will expose their errors and set an individual free from their control.

And yes some professing to be Calvinist have some quite excellent sermons may I say despite Calvin.

Paul told us that we see through a glass darkly why then would we be forced to think that Calvin, how many years after the apostles, figured it all out and if we disagreed with him we must be wicked and damned?

As to ignorance of Calvinism this is one of the same arguments Roman Catholics use when people refuse to bow to what Rome teaches.

This verse does not say that God only draws the elect with irresistable grace does it. But it does say that lost sinners on their own cannot come to Christ.

Mike don't forget Jesus taught in a parables concerning the feast where people where given invitation that people made excuses of not coming to the feast they were invited to, apparently they could resist and did.

Perhaps you've never witnessed an individual under great conviction of sin who holds to a the pew in front of them to keep from coming forward at an invitation to come forward at a meeting and recieve the Lord Jesus Christ - the very same kind of thing.

But I've never witnessed someone who has never heard Christ Preached (this can be in writting by the way) who has never "felt" the conviction of sin ever crying out to Him to save them from their sins.

It seems Calvinists act the same way that if anyone ever dares to leave 5 point (TULIP) Calvinism they must not be one who is persevering (the P in TULIP) and therefore must not be one of the elect and have to be on their way to hell.

What kind of mind control is this! Jesus told us that His sheep hear His voice and that He knows them and they follow Him and that no one is able to pluck them out of His hand.

Well if they are so incapable of responding, because they are like a dead person physically, Calvinists seem to forget a truly dead person (physically dead) can not only do nothing good but also nothing evil. They can't eat or drink or sing or ride a bicycle or sit down - nothing.

Now if you wanted to say a lost person is quite incapable of saving themself from sin you would be much more accurate and we do see lost people attempting to do this very thing in Roman Catholicism and other religions so Calvinism makes a serious error in presuming lost people are incapable of responding to the gospel.

Sometimes the respond is humble thankful acceptance and at other times furious hatred against Christ but if they where so incapable of responding there would be no response one way or the other.

But again where is Jesus Christ in all of this? Shall we argue and argue over the 5 Points of Calvinism and in these 'discussions' leave Christ outside the church knocking to be let in?

That he cannot possibly be saved if he/she is not one of the elect and still God loves them having predestined that He will eternally damn them and rightfully so because of their sins which they have no hope of being forgiven of because of limited atonement and not being elect? And if he is one of the elect it doesn't matter what he/she does or how evil they live because God will irresistably draw them, even against their will because they have no ability to choose (which would also mean they would have no ability to choose sin but that would be another matter) because they are elect.

From what 5 Point TULIP people tell me you teach Limited Atonement, correct?

That would mean you would never go to the lost and tell them that Jesus Christ loves them and died for their sins because they may or may not be one of the elect.

Quote,
This helps to validate the Calvinist position which gives ALL the glory to God.
End of Quote

Somehow in all these discussions the professing Calvinists seem to say so little about the Worth of Christ, of how much they did not deserve the salvation He provided in His shed blood, how radically He changed their lives to where they now love people they once hated, to where they now hate the sin they once loved and how His Word, Scripture has become to them a greater treasure than all the learned writtings of the famous and popular religous men through the centuries combined.

Why to listen to some Calvinists it is like we cannot possibly understand the Bible unless we have the right (Calvinistic) commentaries.

He really does know a lot more about salvation and obedience to God than Calvin, Luther, Wesley, Whitefield, Watts, Billy Graham, Benny Hinn, Rick Warren and even the Pope. And if anyone understands what wretches we truly are He does.

Is it not high time that if we profess to believe in Him that we actually love Him as our first and foremost love? He quite deserves this don't you think. The Word of God tells us, how much more shall the blood of Christ cleanse our conscience from dead works to serve the Living God.

It should (figure of speach) take our breath away that Christ died for us and that He is risen from the dead and truly break our hearts that we allow ourselves to be distracted from Him and treat others He died for so unkind.

Yet if I may humbly suggest those who hold to Christ, who hold Scripture as Truth, who are genuinely born again of the Spirit of God, can simply be called Christians.

Consider the focus of much of the discussion here is it to lift of Christ and encourage one another to love Him, to obey His Word, to proclaim Him to the lost that they might be saved or is it to convince people to become Calvinists like if you are not a Calvinist you must be disobedient to God, a moron, or a heretic?

Please understand I am quite aware that not all who call themselves Calvinists behave this way but then again some do.

As to offense have we forgotten that Jesus Christ had to die for us that we might be forgiven? Have we forgotten such things as, 'Thy word I have hid in my heart that I might not sin against Thee'?

It has been my observation that Calvinists act like 5 Point TULIP Calvinism is true Christianity yet John C was born how many years AFTER Christ had risen, assended into heaven, sent the Holy Spirit and had been preached by the Apostles. Why it is as if the 5 P T C's would reinterpret Scripture to say that the believers where first called Calvinists at Antioch.

So do we have a different gospel here one that teaches Christ came to save not sinners but the elect, and the elect only, the rest where predestined to be damned in hell eternally with no hope of ever asking God for His mercy?

Yet there is much that instructs us to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, the One who loved us and paid the death penalty of our sins with His own precious blood. The Holy Spirit will glorify Him, not Calvin, not Wesley and Whitefield, not Augustine let alone C.S. Lewis or Rick Warren.