The Utterly Confused John MacArthur Jr.
While proudly calling himself a Calvinist, John MacArthur teaches in the following video clip that the believer’s baptism in the Spirit only occurs once. Yet, John Calvin and the Reformers in general believed that the believer’s baptism needed to occur daily through the death of deep repentance and the resurrection of new obedience. In other words, self-depravation brings about perpetual death with Christ, followed by the fruits of resurrection expressed in joy or some kind of manifestation of Christ’s obedience. That’s “revisiting the gospel afresh” through deep repentance and new obedience. As a result, the believer supposedly receives a perpetual forgiveness for sins that maintains our justification. It’s heresy of the first order.
Astonishingly, MacArthur also states that the baptism of the Spirit should not be sought or repeated. This completely contradicts what his associates teach in regard to “preaching the gospel to ourselves every day.” The very purpose of this mantra is to advocate a continual return to the gospel in order to “experience” death and rebirth. MacArthur cohort and Reformed hack Dr. Michael Horton stated it this way in his book on systematic theology:
Progressive sanctification has two parts: mortification and vivification, “both of which happen to us by participation in Christ,” as Calvin notes….Subjectively experiencing this definitive reality signified and sealed to us in our baptism requires a daily dying and rising. That is what the Reformers meant by sanctification as a living out of our baptism….and this conversion yields lifelong mortification and vivification “again and again.” Yet it is critical to remind ourselves that in this daily human act of turning, we are always turning not only from sin but toward Christ rather than toward our own experience or piety (pp. 661-663 [Calvin Inst. 3.3.2-9]).
Luther advocated the same in Thesis 16 and 17 of his Heidelberg Confession. There, he posits the Reformed mainstay that Christians need the same grace that saved them continually, and this saving grace should be continually sought. So, baptism does not signify a onetime event, but signifies the need to continually repent in order to receive the perpetual baptism that saved us.
Paul's Passing Thoughts 
Anyone ever read “The Swarm”? (lol)
This quote is taken directly form the wiki article on the novel. No, the novel has nothing to do with theology, lol. But this is perfect.
“During a task force meeting, Sigur Johanson finally announces his hypothesis: The phenomena are intentional attacks by an unknown sentient species from the depths of the oceans; he states that this is the only logical conclusion, since the attacks are outside the power of any human agency and cannot be a natural phenomenon. Johanson calls them “yrr”, after three letters he typed randomly on his computer. The goal of the yrr is to eliminate the human race, which is devastating the Earth’s oceans.
General Li and a small group of scientists take to the sea on the helicopter carrier USS Independence in an attempt to find the yrr and make contact with them. They discover that the yrr are single-cell organisms that operate in groups (or swarms, hence the novel’s title), controlled by a single hive-mind that may have existed for hundreds of millions of years. The yrr form a collective intelligence and have inheritable memories that are passed on by manipulating parts of their DNA. Individual yrr recognize each other by using a specific pheromone”
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“A Calvinist demanding to answer “Injustice” ??? What righteousness could you possibly have to be vindicated?”
Hmm. Since eli’s God controls every molecule, 24/7, then any perceived injustice is predetermined from God because God is controlling our words and deeds, too.
This is the part that is so amusing. One would think a Calvinist of all people would accept injustice as being from God for HIS own mystical benefit and let it go. That is what they tell us all the time. but somehow when it is them the doctrine does not fit. (wink)
I also find that same thinking amusing when look at Mahaney. Does he not believe his own doctrine? The lawsuit was predetermined by God to happen so how could it be wrong? It is happening for some cosmic reason. (You see this thinking on survivors all the time. It was not the plaintiffs who, using their God given brains, filed suit but God predetermined it to happen as discipline for Mahaney. They don’t realize how immersed they are in this thinking which is circular and breeds chaos since God determines everything)
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I guess the fact that one blogger attributes cherry-picked views on this post to me speaks for itself. That’s all they got. They know they are dead in the water on the systematic theology thing. But again, I have nothing to fear in regard to opposing views because I know what I believe. Of course, they focused on some here who reject the apostle Paul’s canonicity. In regard to their problems–not the point–they accept Paul and their definition of the believer is Paul’s definition of the unbeliever. And I will give you a buck for every post you can find about Luther and Calvin’s rejection of the book of James.
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Paul,
I took a gander at Randy’s website and he certainly believes that you are a heretic. The guilt by association is absolute … you let heretics post here… ergo you are hypocritical to call Calvinists heretics. Anyway…. sorry to mess up your reputation there Paul. Although he didn’t name me specifically … so maybe he likes me. LOL.
However, I will say that my Venn Diagram Two-Step certainly applies to Randy’s blog. He draws and absolute-flexible division between himself and Calvin’s doctrine. he is fully persuaded the he believes pure bible faith and that anything that does not square with his understanding is either irrelevant or error or perceptual misunderstanding.
and then, because of Lydia’s comments about the “Quiet Revolution” i did some reading on a few SBC blogs and noticed the exact same thing. The need for the revolution is based on getting the “True” gospel back into the church, but they can’t be plain about the source of the true gospel because people reject Calvin. And yet there is no apparent problem with the doctrine . . only Calvin. There is an institutional disconnect between the roots of the doctrine (Calvin) and their identification WITH Calvin. They see no rational conflict between the disconnect. They see no mutual exclusivity.
And i am at a loss how to deal with this kind of intellectual schizophrenia.
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John,
Well stated. I will be writing an article next week entitled, “The Platonist Curve-ball: the Perfect Deception.” Calvinists use a little known epistemology referred to as “emphasis.” I call it the emphasis hermeneutic. It divides “truth” into two categories: “good things” and the “best thing.” Or, the “root” verses the “fruit.” The good things are the lesser forms of Christocentric works and redemptive history. Christocentrism leads to the true forms. The works of Christ as seen in the Bible are the true forms. Manifestations of the true forms are out of our control and subjective.They are imputed through gospel contemplationism. This enables them to relegate the new birth and the other two members of the Trinity to insignificance while proclaiming them true. This is how they get around the new birth.
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John,
“Infinity is not an identity”.
Yes and yes. Exactly. This is utterly true. Infinity is a VALUE which is undefined, and further, cannot be defined. It is the extension of a thing or an idea that cannot logically have a beginning or an end because in its (the object, or, more loosely, an abstract idea) own strict context, ALL that can be said about it is that it is what it is. It is a singular SELF, beyond which nothing exists except what can be only relatively described. This is why Argo’s Universal Truth number seven is: All that exists are objects (infinite selves) and relative movement. Everything else is abstraction.
I touched upon this on my last blog post. I call it Argo’s law of the Infinite Value of the Infinite Singularity (an object which is purely SELF). What I mean is precisely what you said. Infinity is NOT a means by which a thing can act…meaning, infinity does not, like any other abstraction, cause or Create. It is merely a way in which man can define the concept of the relativity of SELF. It is what I meant when I was talking with Paul (Dohse) about why I denied the Trinity, and yet affirmed the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit (and ANY manifestation of God). It is because God is an infinite SELF…and anything that is infinite cannot, by definition, be given a numerical value, whether one, three or a million. However God wishes to manifest Himself, as one, three, or ten “persons” does not change the fact that His metaphysical reality is ONE. Just as human beings are individually ONE; but, again, not numerically, but metaphysically. A human being is what they are, period. They are not one, they are not anything but self. And self is infinite, and so the numerical value of one is purely a metaphysical distinction, it is not an actual THING which produces the self.
To determine that infinity must necessarily remove God from an ACTUAL relationship with man in a real third party environment is to fall for the usual logical fallacy of saying that God can both BE everything and yet PERCEIVE something external to Himself so that He can actually relate to man (which is why I deny “first cause” because it inevitably leads to this idea). This is something Calvinist theology affirms with deadly consequences. All of TULIP is in service to the idea that ALL is God, and there really doesn’t exist anything beyond Him. So, whatever abuse is perpetrated on the masses isn’t really abuse, it is merely the outworking of God’s SELF in service to Himself. The circular logic is like a tilt-a-whirl on coke.
The real truth of infinity is that at the root of everything that exists is the individual self, whether we are talking about people, or rocks, or stars, or God. Everything that IS, is a singularity existing only relatively with all other things. In short, everything is what it is, and at the root of it, nothing more can be said. IF we have a relationship with God, it is relative because BOTH He and Us are infinite individuals (infinite again, meaning, of undefined, limitless value) relating in a common environment for the sake of mutual respect and life.
This is why the the core of Christ’s gospel message was the incomprehensible worth and value of self aware individuals, God and man both. ALL morality rests at the feet of the inherent worth of individual self-aware life because with out it, literally NOTHING exists. And here is where the heretic cat calls will come out, but Argo’s Universal Truth number eight:
Just as man is not man without God, God is not God without man
This forms the core of my theory of everything; which is both metaphysical and physical (because it has to be).
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“Of course, they focused on some here who reject the apostle Paul’s canonicity.”
Yeah. Well, a big problem I have is that Paul is not always interpreted through Christ. Even Peter said Paul was hard to understand. :o)
And not only that but they interpret Paul literally when he is using metaphorical language many times. They totally ruin the book of Romans!. They do the same with the Psalms, too. And when one says that, the charge is that I don’t believe in inerrancy in which they would be right. I don’t think “translations” can be inerrant. But that is the typical straw man just like Sovereignty is used as one, too.
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and then, because of Lydia’s comments about the “Quiet Revolution” i did some reading on a few SBC blogs and noticed the exact same thing. The need for the revolution is based on getting the “True” gospel back into the church, but they can’t be plain about the source of the true gospel because people reject Calvin. And yet there is no apparent problem with the doctrine . . only Calvin. There is an institutional disconnect between the roots of the doctrine (Calvin) and their identification WITH Calvin. They see no rational conflict between the disconnect. They see no mutual exclusivity.
And i am at a loss how to deal with this kind of intellectual schizophrenia.”
Hee Hee,. You can do what my brother did after being immersed in trying to figure this out when his daughter became a Piper worshipper.
He threw up his hands and proclaimed that “obviously Calvin was not a Calvinist”!
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“This is why the the core of Christ’s gospel message was the incomprehensible worth and value of self aware individuals, God and man both. ALL morality rests at the feet of the inherent worth of individual self-aware life because with out it, literally NOTHING exists. And here is where the heretic cat calls will come out, but Argo’s Universal Truth number eight:
Just as man is not man without God, God is not God without man”
Argo,
My take on your Universal Truth is that if it is not true then there is no relationship. It is all relational. Yes, we get our moral worth from God and God cannot be God without man because it is all about relationship. There is NO love without relationship. Relationship is how we define love. So many will call me out on that but let’s face it, there is a lot of very bad teaching on “relationship” which is usually very one sided which is no relationship at all. That is just another reason the determinist God is so insidious. There is no real relationship with a determinist God who has forced you to choose Him. . And that is the crying shame of all of this horrid doctrine out there.
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Lydia,
Yea… I guess that makes sense. Calvin wasn’t a Calvinist. And Marx wasn’t a Marxist. And Islam isn’t a religion of War. .
I’ve been thinking throughout the day that I see this same disconnect in contemporary political discussions and evaluations about Islam.
When I talk to people about American fiscal policy and point out that it is rooted in Marxist ideology … Openly advocated tax policy straight out of National Socialist Germany and the old Soviet Union (and every other failed Marxist economy) I get the same outrage… the same refusal to see the causal relationship between ideas and outcomes. The same denials of intellectual pedigree.
When I talk to people about Islam I get the same refusal to diagnose the absolute epidemic of Muslim violence with the core of Islamic ideology. It is always attributed to some fringe “extremist” elite.
Each of these examples is eerily similar to the self righteously bellicose denial of the Calvinist obsession with rejecting Calvin all the while acting on his very doctrines.
This kind of mass self imposed blindness, across so many ideologies cannot be an accident. There is something exceedingly potent at work here… There is something profoundly corrupt about American culture that has leaked into the very core of our willingness to identify the stated, the intentional, overt relationships between ideas and outcomes.
I think I’m going to have to figure out what this is… because this is a cataclysmic bankruptcy. No culture can survive this kind of mass intellectual forfeiture.
PS… I bought a copy off Amazon today of the book you mentioned. Quiet Revolution
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John Immel,
Lydia said, “I really liked your description of us being “contractual beings”. That really sums it up nicely.”
Can you touch on man as a contractual individual, especially since it’s Independence Day? 🙂
Doesn’t abolition of ambition destroy man as a contractual person? For instance, we would not have innovation or invention, cars/airplanes or teeth at 40. The Bible does not teach that desire is bad. What you desire and how you attain/obtain it is the key. When ambition is called sin, doesn’t that set the stage for common good = communism = dictatorship? In the Calvinist construct, doesn’t ambition threaten the “glory story and centrality of Christ through faith alone can’t remember any good deed I’ve ever done, thank you Jesus for obeying for me”? Which came first, abolition of ambition (chicken) or total depravity (egg)?
Ironically, not many Calvinists have relocated or booked vacation to North Korea in the last few decades (today’s Dark Age equivalent, IMO).
Interested in your thoughts.
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