This is my 16th and final episode of posts on a series of 16 short video clips from RC Sproul found on the jcr4runner channel that I have been commenting on in my blog. It is called, “What is the gospel?” Its transcript is as follows:
“Sometimes when I look at the state of the church today, I am concerned about many things; but my deepest concern is with the gospel itself. I am really afraid that we are in a time where the gospel is in eclipse, because everything but the gospel is called the gospel. Again in the 16th century, at the heart of the Reformation, Luther warned his contemporaries. He said, anytime the gospel is preached clearly and boldly, it will produce conflict; and people don’t like conflict. And so as a result, they will change the gospel, water it down; or try to take away its offense. And so instead of preaching the gospel, which has to do with the person and work of Jesus Christ—it focuses on Christ and on his work—instead we tell people, here is the gospel, I preached the gospel today. I told people, ‘Come to Jesus, and all of your problems will be over; Come to Jesus, and find happiness in your life’.
“Well I believe it is true that the source of happiness is Jesus; but that is not the gospel. Those incentives and why, I have heard worse; I hear preachers saying, ‘God loves you unconditionally’. And I say, whoa, what does that person in the pew hear? When they hear somebody say, ‘God loves them unconditionally,’ That means, he loves me just exactly as I am and precisely, he is glad I turned out nicely. It is like Mr. Rogers’ neighborhood. And he is saying, I don’t have to repent, I don’t have to come to Christ, I don’t have to be convicted by the law of God.
“You know, the law of God is perfect, the Bible says, and converts the soul. That is, the conversion is not by the law itself, but by the word of God, because his word is law. That is the way the language of the Old Testament functions. But we hide the law; and where there is no law, there is no awareness of any need of the gospel. We tell people, they don’t need to repent, because God loves them just the way they are; and the only reason to come to Jesus is to have greater peace, or greater happiness, or a better trip than they will get from drugs. That is not the gospel at all.”
The problem with that is that it is Calvinism which promotes that ideology more than anything else, with its doctrines of predestination, Unconditional Election, and a denial of freewill. If man’s destiny is sealed, and there is nothing he can do to change it, then that ideology of life is what comes closest to it. Calvinism denies the essential feature of the “gospel” more than anything else, by denying freewill.
As far as God loving people “unconditionally,” there is an element of truth in that expression, depending on how it is understood. It appears God loves sinners enough that he has chosen to suffer and die to atone for their sins, and wants them to repent and be saved:
John 3:
16 For God so loved the world [of sinners], that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.
17 For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved.
Romans 5:
8 But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.
Hebrews 2:
9 But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death, crowned with glory and honour; that he by the grace of God should taste death for every man.
So it looks like God loves sinners enough to be willing to die for and atone for their sins. Elsewhere RC Sproul has argued against the idea of saying that God “loves the sinner, but hates the sin,” by saying that God “sends the sinner to hell, not the sin!” The answer to that is that God does not send the sinner to hell out of “hatred,” but to meet the demands of justice according to the law. Elsewhere in the Bible God has clearly stated that he has no pleasure in the death of the wicked, and prefers all sinners to repent and be saved:
Ezekiel 18:
23 Have I any pleasure at all that the wicked should die? saith the Lord God: and not that he should return [repent] from his [evil] ways, and live?
• • •
31 Cast away from you all your transgressions, whereby ye have transgressed; and make you a new heart and a new spirit: for why will ye die, O house of Israel?
32 For I have no pleasure in the death of him that dieth, saith the Lord God: wherefore turn yourselves, and live ye.
Ezekiel 33:
11 Say unto them, As I live, saith the Lord God, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked; but that the wicked turn from his [evil] way and live: turn ye, turn ye from your evil ways; for why will ye die, O house of Israel?
That is not too different from saying that God “loves the sinner, but hates the sin”. God loves sinners enough [all sinners] that he has atoned for their sins [all their sins], so they can repent of their sins and be saved. God does not want to see any sinner punished in hell or be damned, but prefers all sinners to repent of their sins and be saved. That is the obvious meaning of the Ezekiel quotes. Hence he has also atoned for the sins of all men without exception—so they can repent and be saved.
According to Calvinism, God does not want all sinners to be saved, but has predestined some to be damned—which does not square with the Ezekiel quotes. According to Ezekiel, God wants all sinners to repent and be saved, without exception—which would only be possible if God had also atoned for all their sins without exception. If some are not saved, it is entirely their choice, not God’s:
Matthew 23:
37 O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets, and stonest them which are sent unto thee, how often would I have gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would not!
Luke 19:
41 And when he was come near, he beheld the city, and wept over it,
42 Saying, If thou hadst known, even thou, at least in this thy day, the things which belong unto thy peace! but now they are hid from thine eyes.
That is hardly the picture of a God who hates sinners, and likes to send them down to hell. The Ezekiel quotes are in direct contradiction to Calvinism. The two are diametrically opposed. They can’t both be true. RC Sproul had acquired all of these twisted ideas from his adherence to the heresy of Calvinism, and its doctrines of predestination, Unconditional Election, Limited Atonement, denial of freewill, and TULIP etc., all of which are unbiblical, heretical, and false.
I have now responded to all of the series of 16 short video clips found on the jcr4runner channel, in which RC Sproul effectively summarizes Calvinism, or its salient distinguishing features. Special thanks to the owner of the channel for extracting these video clips from the original documentary, and presenting them in small, bite-size pieces, that makes it convenient to comment on them individually.
RC Sproul was the king of Calvinism in his time, and contributed much to the promotion of that theology in his day. He was a gifted and able theologian, and very knowledgeable about the history of the development of Christianity. He was familiar with the original languages, including Latin, and also I believe with Dutch, in which he has studied the original Protestant sources. I also think that he was sincere in his beliefs. I think that he was swept away and deceived by the prevailing Protestant theological climate of the time. But ultimately he was not justified in overlooking the obvious logical inconsistencies and fallacies, and biblical contradictions that constitute Reformed theology and Calvinism.
This has been a marathon exercise in blogging; but Calvinism is such a serious heresy that no amount of time and effort spent on defeating it will have been wasted.
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