Was the Apostle Peter a Calvinist? Well, some say that he was. In fact, of course, all Calvinists will say that Peter’s a Calvinist.

If you don’t know what a Calvinist is just find my little lesson entitled, “What is Calvinism.”

Of course, all Calvinists will say that Paul was a Calvinist, and John was a Calvinist, and Jesus was a Calvinist, as well. Let’s look at something Peter wrote and see if he’s a Calvinist.

Did Peter Teach Calvinism?

Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, to those who reside as aliens, scattered throughout Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia, who are chosen… – 1 Peter 1:1

Oh boy, there you go! Peter must have been a Calvinist, because he believed that people were chosen. There you have it. That’s the basis to believe that Peter was a Calvinist.

However, in my Little Lesson describing what Calvinism is, I listed one of the cardinal doctrines of Calvinism as unconditional election. It’s the second of the five cardinal doctrines of Calvinism. Unconditional election means that God chooses some people to be saved and some people not to be saved.

Of course, it has to be that way. If he chooses someone to be saved, by default he’s choosing some people not to be saved. And he does it unconditionally. There’s no reason, there’s nothing that he sees in the person that he chooses. Nothing.

He just chooses some and doesn’t choose others. So, as I described to you, that is random chance. It’s not a choice at all. There’s no such thing in the whole universe as really unconditional election. That’s an oxymoron completely, no election, no choice. It could be considered unconditional. If it is unconditional, it’s not a choice because every choice, you do it for a reason. Every choice God makes, He does it for reason.

A Closer Look

And, in fact, Peter, goes on to say something here. And here’s the important part looking at the context, “…who are chosen according to the foreknowledge of God” (emphasis added).

So, no one can deny that God’s foreknowledge has something to do with his choosing people. And it almost goes without saying, of course, that if God is choosing anyone, He has to know them.

And in this case, He foreknows them. He foreknows everything, and so He foreknows everybody. And He knows what they’re going to do. One way of interpreting the fact that God has chosen us according to his foreknowledge is that God looked ahead, as it were, from our time frame. He looked ahead in time, from the foundation of the world and saw those who would, under His gracious drawing, repent and believe in Jesus. And so, those are the people that He chose.

He chose that He would save everybody, He would forgive everybody, who would repent and believe in Jesus. It’s not an unconditional election. Something that doesn’t exist anywhere in the universe. It’s a conditional election. They met God’s conditions and He said, “All right, you’re the person that I’ve chosen, you’re the kind of person that I’m choosing, those who repent and believe.”

Peter a Calvinist? Think Again.

Well, not only that little bit of context helps us understand if Peter was a Calvinist. We can go to Peter’s second epistle, where he says,

But false prophets also arose among the people [he’s talking about the days of Israel and the Old Testament], just as there will also be false teachers among you, who will secretly introduce destructive heresies, even denying the Master who bought them, bringing swift destruction upon themselves. – 2 Peter 2:1

Now listen to this, he more specifically defines the destructive heresies, at least one of them. “Even denying the master,” listen closely, “who bought them, bringing swift destruction upon themselves.”

The third cardinal doctrine of Calvinism is limited atonement. That Christ didn’t die for everyone. He only died for the alleged ones who are unconditionally preselected. But here, Peter says that the Master, obviously Jesus, who bought them, they will deny him by their destructive heresies and false teachings. Still the master bought them.

He, Jesus, died not just for our sins, John wrote. He’s not just a propitiation for our sins, but for the sins of the entire world (see 1 John 2:1-2).

Peter Taught That Salvation Could Be Forfeited

For if, after they have escaped the defilements of the world by the knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are again entangled in them and are overcome, the last state has become worse for them than the first. For it would be better for them not to have known the way of righteousness, than having known it, to turn away from the holy commandment handed on to them. – 2 Peter 2:20-21

“For if, after they have escaped the defilement’s of the world…” How do you do that? By the knowledge of our Lord, Jesus Christ. They know, they understand the Gospel and they believed it because it’s worked. They’ve escaped the defilements of the world.

So, the fifth cardinal doctrine of Calvinism is the perseverance of the saints. Obviously, if God has preselected you unconditionally, if you get saved, you can never get into a state of being unsaved. But, yet here, Peter believed that was possible.

Peter Was Not a Calvinist

But do not let this one fact escape your notice, beloved, that with the Lord one day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years like one day. The Lord is not slow about His promise, as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing for any to perish but for all to come to repentance. – 2 Peter 3:8-9

Why is God waiting so long and taking so long to send Jesus back? Because He’s waiting for people to be saved. So, obviously, human free will has something to do with salvation. Because if it was all a sovereign act of God, that verse would make no sense. God doesn’t just want some to be saved. He doesn’t wish for any to perish, but for all to come to repentance.

Answering our question, Peter was not a Calvinist.

All right, thanks so much for joining me.

The post Was the Apostle Peter a Calvinist? appeared first on David Servant.

Today’s question, “What is Calvinism,” is a great question. Calvinism is a theological belief about how God saves people, that is how he keeps them out of hell and gets them into heaven. Calvinists uniquely believe that God has sovereignly selected some to be saved, but not all. It’s not God’s will for all people to be saved in Calvinistic theology. He only selected some, in fact, he selected a minority to be saved. The rest, of course by default, he has selected them not to be saved. You can’t have one without the other, okay?

Now, you might be surprised about this, but that’s what Calvinism is all about. Anyone who says otherwise doesn’t understand Calvinism at all. More specifically Calvinists can be delineated by their five cardinal doctrines, that happen to be easily remembered by the acronym TULIP. It stands for T, total depravity, U, unconditional election, L, limited atonement, I, irresistible grace and P, perseverance of the saints. Calvinists, of course, use that easy way to remember their five cardinal doctrines themselves.

Let’s take them one by one. They’re all really inter-related. Really if you believe one, you have to believe the others, because they’re completely dependent upon each other. In fact, if you knock out one, that would knock out the rest as well.

Let’s start with the T, total depravity. Now, you don’t have to read much of the Bible to find out that people are sinful; they fall short of the glory of God, they’re rebels without a cause and they’re in big trouble because of that rebellion against God. I think it’s safe to say from the Bible that people are depraved; you can even go so far as to say they’re totally depraved. Calvinists have a unique spin on this: human beings are so totally depraved, that given the opportunity, they would never, ever repent and turn to Jesus.

Of course, that is partially true, because Jesus did say that no one can come to the Father, no one can come to Him, unless the Father draws them. Apart from the Holy Spirit drawing us, none of us would ever come to Christ. But this leaves out the thousands of other scriptures that indicate that we do have a free will, and that under the influence of the Holy Spirit and the conviction of the Holy Spirit, free moral agents can exercise that will and take that little tiny step of saying, “I am sorry I sinned, and I am going to make my best effort to change.” Of course, the Holy Spirit goes right to work when you do that. This is not salvation by human works. This is salvation by grace through faith. The Holy Spirit goes right to work in someone who has, under the influence of the Holy Spirit, begun to take steps of trying to submit. The Holy Spirit helps that person submit. Okay, lots more to be said about that.

Then U, unconditional election. That is, God has elected certain persons from before the foundation of the world. Out of everyone He has created, Calvinists say He selected some to be saved, and then by default, selected some not to be saved. It was an unconditional election. Nothing he foresaw in them, like faith in Jesus, that caused him to select them. It was unconditional, just by “God’s good pleasure”, some Calvinists say. Well, the whole phrase “unconditional election” is an oxymoron, right? All elections are conditional. You elect political candidates because they meet your conditions. In fact, all choices are conditional. If it’s not a conditional choice, then it’s not a choice at all. It’s just random chance. If Calvinists would think about this, they’d have to agree that people are saved not by grace, but they’re saved by chance. A flip of the coin. There’s nothing that God saw in anybody that caused him to select them. He just selected them. It’s random. It’s not an election at all.

We ought to pray, “Oh, thank You for the luck that has saved me,” but it’s not luck at all. That’s unconditional election. Of course Scripture does talk about the fact that we’ve been elected, but again, Calvinists have added the word unconditional before that. They’ve redefined what an election is and created an election that really isn’t an election whatsoever. I believe in a conditional election. God foresaw those who would, under his gracious influence, repent and make an attempt to believe in Jesus Christ, and then He went to work for them.

Hurrying along here, L, limited atonement. Of course, if God has only pre-selected a minority of people to be saved, why would Jesus die for everyone? That’s a great question. In Calvinist theology, Jesus didn’t die for everyone. He only died for those whom God pre-selected. Even though the Bible says that God “desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth” (1 Timothy 2:4). Even though John wrote that Jesus “is the propitiation for our sins; and not for ours only, but also for those of the whole world.” That’s not what Calvinists subscribe to. It’s amazing the lengths they go to to undo those scriptures that I’ve just quoted, and many like it.

Then irresistible grace, that’s the I in TULIP. Those whom God has pre-selected at his chosen time, he zaps them with a grace that’s irresistible and that’s what causes them to be born again, against their wills, as it were. Even though the Bible is a book, practically from cover-to-cover, about people who resist God, and God lamenting it, and God calling everyone to repentance, and God telling us to go preach the Gospel to everyone in the whole world, calling everyone to repent… but you’re not going to repent unless God has pre-selected you and zapped you with some irresistible grace, according to Calvinists.

Finally, perseverance of the saints. Obviously if God has pre-selected some people to be saved, those people will be saved. When they come to faith in Christ and are born again, they’ll never fall away. They’ll never turn the other way. Even though the Bible is full of examples and warnings of that very thing happening! We’re saved by grace through faith and we have to continue to believing to be saved, and that is why there are so many admonitions to continue in the faith in the New Testament. But this is not a possibility in Calvinistic theology.

Where do Calvinists come up with these ideas? By isolating scriptures from the rest of the Bible. That’s how all wrong and bad theology is concocted. You have to harmonize your doctrine with the other 30,000 verses in the Bible. I could easily take the Calvinistic proof text and harmonize them with the rest of the Bible and it fits my theology quite well. Calvinists can not harmonize their proof text, rather their interpretation of their proof text, with the rest of the Bible. They love Romans 9, of course taking that out of its context, saying this is how God chooses someone and doesn’t choose the other, whereas Paul was not talking about people being individually saved. He was arguing about the fact that if God wants to, He can sovereignly choose to save Gentiles by faith, the same way He’s been saving Jews for all that time. He can save Gentiles if He so desires, and he does so desire. That’s up to God. Praise the Lord! Not by works, not because of what the Gentiles did, but because of God’s love and his grace.

I’ve written many articles on Calvinism and all the specifics of it and taken a look at all their various arguments on my website. You can read some of what I’ve written here.

In closing, we love Calvinists, but we don’t like their doctrine. Thanks for joining me. God bless you.

The post What is Calvinism? appeared first on David Servant.