Dan Chapa

James Anderson was kind enough to share a chapter of an upcoming book he’s working on.  ( link )  The chapter is titled Calvinism and the First Sin and the book will be titled Calvinism and the Problem of Evil.  Dr. Anderson will remove the online version once the book is published, so read it while you can. Dr. Anderson addresses the challenges unique to Calvinism regarding the problem of evil including: 1) God’s determining the first sin makes Him the author of sin, 2) Calvinists must be compatiblists and there are some fairly strong arguments against compatibilism, and 3) and given Adam’s good nature, there’s no causal explanation for the first sin.  To his credit, Dr. Anderson openly embraces the idea that Calvinism is indeed divine determinism.  Now in true Van Tillian fashion, he spends a great deal of time explaining what this does not mean without elaborating on what it does mean.  Dr. Anderson argues that Calvinists need not be causal dete...

Thought this was coming, but it was quicker than I would have guessed.  This will of course lead to corruption in society, but also to the purification of Christ's Church, as many will now see their choice is between their Pope and God's word. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/07/29/pope-francis-gays_n_3669635.html

The book begins with a brief but helpful account of the life and times of Jacob Arminius, but points readers to Bangs work for a more detailed biography (Bangs, Carl.  Arminius – A Study in the Dutch Reformation.  Wipf & Stock Publishers, 1998).  Then it dives into the foundation of Arminius’ theology - his explanations of God’s attributes.  On the simplicity of God, Aquinas taught God’s attributes are distinct only in the way we think about them, but are really united in God, but Arminius disagreed and rather followed John Dun Scottus who taught God’s attributes really are distinct in God even though they are absolutely inseparable.   On omniscience, Arminius followed Luis De Molina in affirming middle knowledge – and this book is the first I have seen to acknowledge that Arminius’ view of predestination is based on God’s middle knowledge of faith rather than so called simple foreknowledge.  Then in a rare low point in the book - Arminius is accus...

I recently was reading a book that accused James Arminius of a Trinitarian heresy:  denying Christ’s aseity (self existence).  This relates to the “auto-theos” controversy in which Arminius denied a specific sense in which Christ is God “from Himself”.  ( Works of James Arminius.  Apology Article 21 )  That is to say, Arminius defended the doctrine in the Nicene creed: ” And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only-begotten Son of God, begotten of the Father before all worlds , Light of Light, very God of very God, begotten, not made, being of one substance with the Father ”. In short, Arminius defended the Father’s eternal generation of the Son.  In this post, I will briefly provide the biblical basis for eternal generation and then defend it from a specific charge: that affirming the eternal generation of the Son implicitly denies the aseity of the Son. 1 John 5:18 says “  We know that everyone who has been born of God do...

Obama argues we should keep Christ out of politics in the ironically titled The Audacity of Hope.   The following is a block quote from chapter 6 on faith, interspersed with my responses. What our deliberative, pluralistic democracy demands is that the religiously motivated translate their concerns into universal, rather than religion-specific, values. It requires that their proposals must be subject to argument and amenable to reason. This is ambiguous.  Is Obama saying democracy demands Christians drop our values in politics or just drop them to be more persuasive?  On the one hand, the government does not demand that we drop our values - it grants freedom of religion.   (Notwithstanding the fire religious freedoms comes under from time to time, like the US government's seeking to deport a German family on the grounds that homeschooling is not a religious freedom ( link ) - generally the government grants religious freedom).  So I doubt Obama means the g...

The New Living Translation (the most popular English version of the bible) has numerous translation errors that favor Calvinism and oppose standard Arminian or Traditional Baptist interpretation of the texts.  For example, Ephesians 4:30 in the ESV states “ And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption .”  However the New Living Translation has “ And do not bring sorrow to God’s Holy Spirit by the way you live. Remember, he has identified you as his own, guaranteeing that you will be saved on the day of redemption .”  There's no basis in the Greek for the NLT's additions and it appears to be more of a commentary than a translation.  The attached study documents these errors. The New Living Translation and Calvinism

In John 10:26 Christ says “ you do not believe because you are not of my sheep ”.  A good friend of mine said this was the clincher for him; the reason he became a Calvinist.  Calvinist argue that Christ’s sheep are the unconditionally elect and the reason some don’t believe is because they are not unconditionally elect.  But there’s good reason to think this is not what the passage means.  In this post I will argue that Christ's statement should be understood as providing reasons to know the Jews have rejected Him rather than stating reprobation causes unbelief.   John 10:24 says: Now it was the Feast of Dedication in Jerusalem, and it was winter. And Jesus walked in the temple, in Solomon’s porch. Then the Jews surrounded Him and said to Him, “How long do You keep us in doubt? If You are the Christ, tell us plainly.” About two months had passed since Christ’s Good Shepard discourse in John 10:1-19.  Now the Jews try to trap Jesus by asking if He wa...

Steve recently asked: " I've been thinking about Matthew 11:21-23 as a non-Calvinist. If God knew the people in Tyre and Sidon (or other places) would repent under certain circumstances, why did not God bring about those circumstances? E.g. do the mighty works there ." The passage states: 21 “ Woe to you, Chorazin! Woe to you, Bethsaida! For if the mighty works which were done in you had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes. 22 But I say to you, it will be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon in the day of judgment than for you. 23 And you, Capernaum, who are exalted to heaven, will be brought down to Hades; for if the mighty works which were done in you had been done in Sodom, it would have remained until this day. Christ is rebuking Bethsaida and Chorazin for their stubborn unrepentance in light of His mighty works and witness among them.  So the question amounts to, why did the Father send Christ to the Jews knowing t...

I was recently told that I was misrepresenting Calvinism when I said they interpret Romans 9 to mean God hated Esau before he was born or did anything evil.  However, this is exactly what Calvin said: 11. We come now to the reprobate, to whom the Apostle at the same time refers ( Rom. 9:13 ). For as Jacob, who as yet had merited nothing by good works, is assumed into favor; s o Esau, while as yet unpolluted by any crime, is hated . If we turn our view to works, we do injustice to the Apostle, as if he had failed to see the very thing which is clear to us. Moreover, there is complete proof of his not having seen it, since he expressly insists that when as yet they had done neither good nor evil, the one was elected, the other rejected, in order to prove that the foundation of divine predestination is not in works. Then after starting the objection, Is God unjust? instead of employing what would have been the surest and plainest defense of his justice—viz. that God had recomp...

Pope Francis recently said:   “The Lord has redeemed all of us, all of us, with the blood of Christ. All of us, not just Catholics. Everyone!” he declared. “‘Father, the atheists?’ Even the atheists. Everyone! And this blood makes us children of God of the first class! We are created children in the likeness of God and the blood of Christ has redeemed us all!” “And we all have a duty to do good. And this commandment for everyone to do good, I think, is a beautiful path towards peace,” Francis continued. “If we, each doing our own part, if we do good to others, if we meet there, doing good, and we go slowly, gently, little by little, we will make that culture of encounter. We need that so much.” “We must meet one another doing good,” the Pope asserted. “‘But I don’t believe, Father, I am an atheist!’ But do good. We will meet one another there.” ( link ) The Pope is of course equivocating two vital terms ("Sons of God" and "meeting there") to teach universalism or a...

Last night I discussed unconditional election with a few friendly Calvinists.  For the most part, they picked the texts we discussed in their making a case for unconditional election (i.e. we didn’t discuss 1 Timothy 2:4-6 or the like). While rehashing the whole discussion isn’t possible I wanted to at least summarize the major points of disagreement on each text we discussed at length. Matthew 11:20-30 20  Then He began to rebuke the cities in which most of His mighty works had been done, because they did not repent: 21  “Woe to you, Chorazin! Woe to you, Bethsaida! For if the mighty works which were done in you had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes.  22  But I say to you, it will be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon in the day of judgment than for you.  23  And you, Capernaum, who are exalted to heaven, will be brought down to Hades; for if the mighty works which were done in you had be...

Rick Warren has been heavily criticized over his son’s suicide.  I agree that only jerks would use this tragedy as a chance to attack the Warrens, but I would also like to address the reasons why the complaints are invalid, not just rude.  One specific complaint I would like to address is the idea that since Christians are supposed to be different, how can this happen in a Christian home? When God regenerates a sinner, he does change their lives resulting in great moral reform.  So how is it that a regenerate person can suffer from chronic mental illness?  Science tells us that those with mental disorders have differences in their brains: www.bipolar-lives.com   Regeneration takes place in the person’s soul, not their body or brain.  Sure, Christ healed the sick in the past and he could heal a person’s brain.  But just as regeneration does not normally result in removing physical blindness, so also it does not normally resolve men...

This post is a response to Scott Christensen’s article “Prevenient Grace and Semi-Pelagianism”. ( link ) One of the main aspects of Mr. Christensen’s article is calling Arminians Semi-Pelagian. Pelagius was a heretic condemned by the early church for teaching man does not need God’s grace to repent and believe. Semi-Pelagianism (a watered down form of Pelagianism which might be characterized as God helps those who help themselves) was likewise condemned by the early church. So calling someone Semi-Pelagian is serious and unwelcome. It’s the mirror image of calling someone a hyper-Calvinist. Both “Semi-Pelagian” and “hyper-Calvinist” are pejorative terms. Worse real Semi-Pelagians and hyper-Calvinists exist, so one does not want to get lumped in with those crowds. So this post will defend Arminianism from the charge by defining Semi-Pelagianism, addressing arguments that Total Depravity is undone by Prevenient Grace, that free will procures God’s grace, that Libertarian Free will acts...