Unconditional Election: Calvinism’s Divine Lottery
I. Introduction
In this short article we will examine the Calvinist doctrine of unconditional election. I will argue that in order to hold this doctrine, one must deliberately omit or misinterpret the very clear teaching of Scripture, a practice which is beneath any theologian who claims the authority of Scripture. To make my case, I will be quoting from the Westminster Confessions and Canons of Dort, documents which enshrine the fundamental doctrines of Calvinism.
II. Unconditional Election Defined
What is the Calvinist doctrine of unconditional election? The Westminster Confession states that:
Before the creation of the world, according to his eternal, unchangeable plan and the hidden purpose and good pleasure of his will, God has chosen in Christ those of mankind who are predestined to life and to everlasting glory…This choice was completely independent of his foreknowledge of how his created beings would be or act. Neither their faith nor good works nor perseverance had any part in influencing his selection. (Westminster Confession of Faith, Chapter 3. 5)
The words, ‘completely independent of his foreknowledge’ are stated to directly refute the Arminian position that God’s foreknowledge is directly tied to election. For the Calvinist, every person is totally depraved from conception, no person can either seek or desire God unless first regenerated, and humans are ‘completely passive’ in that we play no role in our salvation. Therefore, we have the statement that ‘neither their faith nor good works nor perseverance had any part in influencing his selection’.
The Arminian position is that God’s plan in creation was for human beings to ‘seek, reach out for Him and find Him’ (Acts 17:27), that we are commanded to seek with all our hearts (Jeremiah 29:13) and rewarded for diligently seeking (Hebrews 11:6). God would not give such commands if they were impossible, indeed Romans 2:7 proves that we do have the capability to seek. For the Arminian, God’s election is based on His foreknowledge of who has obeyed His command, a doctrine firmly established in Scripture, as we shall see.
III. Hidden Purpose or Foreknowledge?
According to the Westminster Confessions and Calvin, what did ‘influence His selection’? The answer; His ‘hidden purpose and good pleasure of His will’. Calvin said it was by His ‘secret council’.
My first question to Calvinists is this. If God’s purpose is hidden to you, and is a ‘secret council’ then by what criteria do you make these adamant and arrogant statements that ‘his choice was completely independent of his foreknowledge’? Did the ‘god’ you serve reveal its hidden purpose and secret council only to you? Do not claim that God’s purpose is ‘secret’ and ‘hidden’ and then claim to know what it is!
Unconditional election is a doctrine that dictates to God the conditions by which He is allowed to choose. Calvinists will not allow God to be influenced in His calling people by even His foreknowledge of the life of an individual. This is exactly what it means to create a ‘god’ to suit your own sordid belief system, and is nothing less that idolatry.
From a human perspective, unconditional election is based on nothing more than luck, a divine lottery, that which I call ‘sola lucktora: by luck alone’. However, the apostles Peter and Paul told us exactly how God chooses the elect. 1 Peter 1:1-2 states,
To God’s elect, exiles scattered throughout the provinces of Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia and Bithynia, who have been chosen according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, through the sanctifying work of the Spirit, to be obedient to Jesus Christ and sprinkled with his blood. (1 Peter 1:1-2)
And, the apostle Paul, in Romans 8:29 states that ‘those God foreknew He also predestined’.
To claim that God’s choice was completely independent of his foreknowledge, when Scripture categorically states that ‘God’s elect are chosen according to the foreknowledge of God’ is to arrogantly deny the authority of Scripture and place yourself above it. For those of us who have studied Calvin’s Institutes and the Canons of Dort, we find that the authors deliberately never quote 1 Peter 1:1-2, or Romans 8:29, rather they begin from Romans 8:30 to ensure the word ‘foreknowledge’ is never mentioned. Consider Article 7 of the Canons of Dort:
Election is God’s unchangeable purpose by which he did the following:
Before the foundation of the world, by sheer grace, according to the free good pleasure of his will, God chose in Christ to salvation a definite number of particular people out of the entire human race, which had fallen by its own fault from its original innocence into sin and ruin. Those chosen were neither better nor more deserving than the others, but lay with them in the common misery. God did this in Christ, whom he also appointed from eternity to be the mediator, the head of all those chosen, and the foundation of their salvation…
As Scripture says, “God chose us in Christ, before the foundation of the world, so that we should be holy and blameless before him with love; he predestined us whom he adopted as his children through Jesus Christ, in himself, according to the good pleasure of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace, by which he freely made us pleasing to himself in his beloved” (Eph. 1:4-6). And elsewhere, “Those whom he predestined, he also called; and those whom he called, he also justified; and those whom he justified, he also glorified” (Rom. 8:30). (Canons of Dort, Article 7)
Why exclude Romans 8:29? For the simple reason that it contains the word ‘foreknew’ prior to ‘predestination’ (election) which, as in 1 Peter 1:1-2, entirely contradicts the Calvinists’ statement that God’s foreknowledge plays no role in His election! I consider this the behavior of cultists, of willful deception, and not the behavior of honest Christian theologians.
IV. A Biblical Standard
I am not interested in playing biblical ping pong with Calvinists. One cannot reason with someone whose disregard for the clear teaching of Scripture is so blatantly obvious, a person who willfully contradicts God’s word in order to portray Him as a malevolent tyrant who just rolls a dice. Such people should be exposed, rebuked and considered outside of Christian orthodoxy.
In the introduction of my Practical Systematic Theology I assert the following standard for theological students, preachers and teachers.
If we believe that Scripture is inspired by God, and there is one verse or passage which, when correctly interpreted within its context, contradicts us, then we have got it wrong.
This is the standard that we must apply to ourselves or just admit we do not believe that all Scripture is inspired by God. Furthermore, if someone violates a verse to support a doctrine that contradicts the character of God revealed in Christ, it is obviously misinterpreted, taken it out of context, or deliberately twisted in its meaning. Why Calvinists are so determined to portray the Lord as a malevolent tyrant devoid of any sense of justice or love, is simply a testimony that they have no experience of the God who is revealed in Jesus Christ. One can make no other conclusion!
God has chosen the elect according to His foreknowledge. Does this mean that they were chosen according to their merit, no, but rather of His foreknowledge of the loving relationship he has with them, a relationship He knew before the foundation of the world. Please watch my video entitled the foreknowledge of God on this topic.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KutOsAPoEgo
V. Confusing the Gullible with Contradictions
How are the gullible so easily seduced to the teachings of Calvinists? Simply because their leaders are willing to utterly contradict their own doctrine when they need to sound biblical. For example, if one reads a few pages on in the Westminster Confessions they find this statement under chapter 5 on Providence.
God, who created everything, also upholds everything. He directs, regulates, and governs every creature, action, and thing, from the greatest to the least, by his completely wise and holy providence. He does so in accordance with his infallible foreknowledge and the voluntary, unchangeable purpose of his own will, all to the praise of the glory of his wisdom, power, justice, goodness, and mercy. (Westminster Confessions 5.1)
So here, God’s unchangeable purpose of His will, is to direct, regulate and govern every creature, ‘in accordance with his infallible foreknowledge’. According to the Westminster Confessions, God chooses the elect ‘completely independent of his foreknowledge’, but He ‘directs, regulates and governs every creature in accordance with his infallible foreknowledge’. His original choice is by his ‘hidden purpose’, but the rest by his ‘unchangeable purpose’.
Is it any wonder that your average Calvinist sitting under this teaching is utterly confused about what they actually believe, for their leaders use the tactic of demonic double talk and Satan is the author of confusion. I would suggest that ‘Westminster Confusions’ would be a better title for this document.
VI. Defaming the Character of God
And to my point about defaming the character of God and Christ, consider these statements from The Westminster Confessions:
God’s providence reveals his almighty power, unknowable wisdom, and infinite goodness. His providence extends even to the fall and to all other sins of angels and men. These sins are not simply allowed by God, but are bound, ordered, and governed by him… However, the sinfulness still belongs to the creature and does not proceed from God. (Chapter 5:4)
God does not simply ‘allow sin’ but, by his almighty power, he binds people to sin, he orders sin and governs sin, and this includes Adam and Eve at the fall. Yet, somehow this ‘god’ is not responsible for his binding, ordering and governing sin. This sounds like a serial killer who salivates over his lust for blood in one breath, and denies he did it in the next, and then blames his victims for the evil committed.
And if you thought for a moment that perhaps you misunderstood that God ordered sin, the Confession makes it clear in chapter 6.
Our first parents were led astray by the cunning temptation of Satan and sinned in eating the forbidden fruit. It pleased God to allow them to sin, because in his wisdom and holiness he planned to order their sin to his own glory. (Westminster Confessions, 6.1)
This ‘god’, in his ‘wisdom and holiness’ had planned to order sin to his own glory, and Satan helped him to achieve this. God’s holiness is the absolute antithesis of sin, and no holy God could ever plan to order it, bind the innocent to it, and govern it. The God of Calvinists is no more than a demonic caricature of Jesus Christ, a topic discussed more deeply in my video on the sovereignty of God. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2bgG-NoBLsk
VI. The Election of Children and Character of Christ
And what of the election of children? According to chapter 10 of the Confessions,
Elect infants, dying in infancy, are regenerated and saved by Christ, through the Spirit, who works when, where, and how he pleases. (Westminster Confessions 10.3)
If your dead child was lucky enough to have won the divine lottery, then they are instantly ‘regenerated and saved’. If not, they are doomed to everlasting torment in hell. This foul doctrine is taken from Calvin’s teaching that even unborn children from conception, are ‘a seed-bed of sin, repulsive and an abomination to God’.
For Calvinists, the lucky ‘elect child’ can be born again even before they are born, whilst the vast majority are lost forever by virtue of Adam’s sin which was ordered and planned by God. Calvinists insist that this ‘god’ condemns millions of infants to eternal conscious torment because they were unfortunate enough to have been conceived and inherit Adam’s sin, a sin God only ‘allowed’ because he intended to order it for his own glory. The ‘god’ of Calvinists is the most sadistic and demonic tyrant of demented imaginations.
Jonathan Edwards preached that;
Reprobate infants are vipers of vengeance, which Jehovah will hold over hell in the tongs of his wrath until they turn and spit venom in his face.
(Jonathan Edwards (1703-1758), Sermon, The Eternity of Hell's Torments)
Voddie Baucham, a Calvinist who regularly speaks regarding the raising of children, states that children are ‘vipers in diapers’. When Baucham looks at his children he sees snakes, and he stated in sermon on total depravity that:
One of the reasons that God makes human babies small is so they won’t kill their parents in their sleep. They’re evil.
As far as I’m concerned Mr Baucham, if your children have become so full of hate for you that they desire to murder you in your sleep, you should take a long, hard look at how you are raising them. I would suggest Baucham get to know Jesus Christ and start seeing children as Christ saw and loved children. Did Jesus say that ‘unless you become like vipers, desiring to kill your parents in their sleep, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven’…is that how Baucham understands the Lord’s attitude and teaching regarding children?
Men like Edwards and Baucham have zero regard for the character of Christ, or the teachings of Christ regarding children. How any so-called evangelist can make the statements these men make and be considered servants of Christ is impossible to reconcile.
But Calvinists are not just content to deny God the right to use His foreknowledge to choose the elect, they also claim He is complicit in deception, further defaming God’s character in the claim. In the chapter on the effectual call in the Confessions it states:
Others, not elect, may be called by the ministry of the word, and the Spirit may work in them in some of the same ways he works in the elect. However, they never truly come to Christ and therefore cannot be saved. (Westminster Confessions 10.4)
In this statement, the Spirit may work in a person’s life in a similar way to the elect, by the ministry of the word, but He has no intention of saving them as they did not win the divine lottery…this created god of Calvinists just gave them a bit of false hope for his own demented pleasure.
VII. In Summary
The elect are chosen according to the foreknowledge of God as Scripture clearly states in 1 Peter 1:1-2. Can we mere humans who are bound in time, ever fully understand God’s foreknowledge? Only an arrogant fool would make such a claim, or invent terms such as ‘secret council’ or ‘hidden purpose’ to try and force Scripture to submit to their erroneous doctrines. In Romans 8:28-29 Paul ties God’s foreknowledge of those He predestined to those who love him and are called according to His purpose. God’s purpose and calling are intrinsically tied to His foreknowledge of the loving relationship He has with those who have chosen to obey the greatest command, to love Him with all their heart, soul, mind and strength.
God knew that love before He created the world, for He is not bound to time as we are. We can never fully comprehend God’s foreknowledge this side of the grave, however, to deny and contradict the inspired words of Peter and Paul in order to ground election in nothing more than a demented divine lottery, is to despise the clear teaching of Scripture, is utterly deceitful and defames the character of God in the extreme.
Steve Copland