Whoa!
I have spent the last two days working on a refute for what the good calvinist brother brought up in the other section. Here it is, remember that it is meant to be on the other section, so it wil seem to not fit. But if read throught it will clear up I think the calvinist view and prove that it is not personal predestination at all.
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I am sure you point to verses 15-18. I think you most likely point to personal election here, which is a slanted and an entirely wrong view of Romans 9. I will let the People’s commentary explain because I am not gifted with doctrinal expression to this degree. Please read the ENTIRE post before you offer a rebuttal, I am weary of people refuting my posts without reading them through, and in all honesty I am weary of this debate.
“SUMMARY. --Paul's Deep Sympathy for His Nation. God's Promise to the Jewish Race not Void. The Argument that it is not. The Promise is not to the Seed According to the Flesh, but a Spiritual Seed. God has a Right to choose what Race He Will. As the Potter has the Right to choose what Race He Will. As the Potter has the Right to Shape His Clay, so God can exalt or Reject a Race. The Acceptance of the Gentiles and the Rejection of the Jews Foretold. A Remnant of Israel Saved. To understand the reasoning of this chapter, the reader must keep in mind the aim of the apostle. He had in the beginning of this letter shown that the gospel was God's power of salvation . . . "to the Jew first, and also to the Greek." But the Jews as a nation had rejected Christ, and God had rejected them. They were soon to be destroyed as a people and their land taken away. But the Jew fell back on the promises made to Abraham. Has God broken his promises? If Christ was the true Messiah, and the Jewish nation rejected, he held that the promise was made void. To answer their objection Paul shows (1) that the promise was not to all the fleshly seed of Abraham, but to the seed according to the promise; and (2) that God, in his sovereignty, has the right to choose a race or to pass it by at his will. The subject of individual and personal election is not in the mind of the apostle, but of the election of the Jews to be the chosen people, their rejection afterwards, and the choice of the Gentiles. Isaac, Esau and Jacob are the representatives of races.”
This portion of scripture does not in any way support unconditional election or limited atonement. This chapter is not personal, but national, Jews and Gentiles. That was a rather feeble attempt to justify your stance. But to further show that you are indeed wrong, let me further cite the exact verses so that you can see for yourself.
Verse 15, “For he saith to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion.”
Comment on 15, “I will have mercy upon whom I will have mercy. This is in and is in answer to a request of Moses for a high privilege. The Lord grants it, not because he merits it, but of grace, because he "will be gracious to whom he willeth, and will have mercy where he will." The passage, as applied by Paul, asserts that God favors nations according to his pleasure. He exercises free choice.”
Verse 16, “So then it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that showeth mercy.”
Comment on 16, “So then it is not of him that willeth. When God is gracious, it is not because a human will (him that willeth), or a human work (him that runneth) lays him under obligation, and forces him to give, but the gift is of him, due to his mercy, which he has the right to bestow where he will. Isaac willed to bestow the blessing on Esau, and the latter run to obtain the venison but Jacob had been chosen to become the founder of the chosen people, and received the blessing, which promised that he should be the father of a great nation.”
Verse 17, “For the scripture saith unto Pharaoh, Even for this same purpose have I raised thee up, that I might show my power in thee, and that my name might be declared throughout all the earth.”
Comment on 17, “ The Scripture saith to Pharaoh. It is not said that Pharaoh was born for, but was raised to the throne for a particular purpose. That purpose was that I might shew my power in thee. It is not said that God raised him up to destroy him. His power might have been shown by Pharaoh yielding to his power. Pharaoh's conduct made it necessary to abase him. Here, again, the election is not of an individual to destruction, but of a man to be a king for a particular purpose. The destruction came upon him because, in that position, he resisted God.”
Verse 18, “Therefore hath he mercy on whom he will have mercy, and whom he will he hardeneth.”
Comment on 18, “verse 15 has shown that he hath mercy according to his own sense of right, not according to any human code. The case of Pharaoh shows, in addition, that whom he will, he hardeneth. "What must not be forgotten, and what appears distinctly, from the whole narrative in Exodus, is that Pharaoh's hardening was at first his own act. Five times it is said of him that he himself hardened, or made heavy his heart before the time when it is at last said that God hardened him and even after that it is said that he hardened himself. Thus he at first closed his own heart to God's appeals; grew harder by stubborn resistance under God's judgments, until at last God, as a punishment for his obstinate rejection of right, gave him over to his mad folly and took away his judgment."--Godet.
At first Pharaoh hardened his own heart; God's judgments only made it harder, and then God "gave him over." God only made harder, by his judgments and by leaving him to his folly, one who had already hardened his own heart. That he was given over to madness is shown in the record. Even his magician said, "This is the finger of God” He himself once said, "I have sinned; the Lord is righteous” Had he not hardened himself again, the result would have been different. Then God gave him up to his own folly, "to hardness of heart and reprobacy of mind."
The Jews approved of all this in the case of Pharaoh but held that God could never abandon them on account of their sinful course. Paul's argument is, that if they, the favored people, should pursue Pharaoh's course, they might experience Pharaoh's fate. They, also, hardening themselves, might be "delivered over to hardness," for God is not limited by race, or by any limitation, but hardens whom he wills. He wills to harden those who harden themselves.
I have dwelt upon this passage at greater length than usual because it is so little understood. Godet well says that in this whole passage Paul is not writing theology, but answering the arrogant pretensions of Jewish Pharisaism, and hence he asserts the Divine liberty. Had he been replying to those who have exaggerated this liberty into a purely arbitrary and tyrannical will, he would have brought out the opposite side of truth.”
Please brother, I really do not want to debate with you, or anyone, along the lines of Calvinism and Arminianism any longer. And if you still insist on posing arguments, let us move to the Doctrine and Theology section. I wont stand mute if you pose refutes or rebuttals, but I will no longer resurrect this debate.
I am an Arminian in theology, and a Christian in practice, and again I say, God will not judge me by your opinion. I care not what you think about my theology, just like you don't care what I think of yours. So I guess we are at a stalemate.