Comments on: Is salvation available for all men?

By: Can all freely choose, or are we totally depraved? | Reason To Stand

Can all freely choose, or are we totally depraved? | Reason To Stand — Mon, 28 Dec 2009 12:09:03 +0000

[...] Earlier I posted a portion of a conversation I recently had with a friend (Mike) regarding salvation…. Here is the continuation of that conversation (reposted with premission) where our conversation logically turns to whether everyone has the ability to accept the offer of salvation if it were freely offered. [...]

By: Wes Widner

Wes Widner — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 23:56:00 +0000

The guy who challenged me to a debate. The title to his challenge is "The Arminian Engineereth, Speaketh"

I am an engineer, but I'm not an Arminian…

By: Wes Widner

Wes Widner — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 19:57:36 +0000

I misspelled earlier. Grace, brother

By: Mark | hereiblog

Mark | hereiblog — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 19:51:46 +0000

Make up your mind. Is it Armenian or Arminian?

By: Mark | hereiblog

Mark | hereiblog — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 18:37:19 +0000

Who called you an Armenian?

By: Wes Widner

Wes Widner — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 18:19:48 +0000

Why do Calvinists continually insist on calling me an Armenian? Are they really that poorly read that they don't know that pretty much all of Christianity holds to the Biblical notion that man does in fact have libertarian freedom except for Calvinism?

By: Mark | hereiblog

Mark | hereiblog — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 17:39:29 +0000

It looks like you've been challenged to a debate. The Challenge.

By: Joel

Joel — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 18:11:12 +0000

There's no question that a word's meaning is determined by it's usage in a given context. But when you said, "The response from my new friend was along the lines many proponents of limited atonement use which is to claim that verses that contain unqualified references to mankind aren’t really talking about mankind but rather are talking about all ethnic groups, tribes, tongues, nations, etc.," you were insinuating that PAS meaning have but one meaning when in reference to "unqualified mankind," namely, everyone without exception. Will you confirm that this is an incorrect assumption on your part?

Further, are you familiar with F.F. Bruce's commentary on John? Specifically, are you aware that he mounts a very good contextual argument – based on John's usage – for understanding PAS in John 12.32 as a reference to everyone without distinction?

Finally, what does the verb "to draw" in John 12.32 mean to you and what lexical support will you offer for your understanding of the verb?

By: Joel

Joel — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 13:24:55 +0000

Wes says: "So taking into account the fact that John makes his intentions of referring to tribes, nations, and ethnic groups explicitly known in Revelation 5:9, and the fact that his overarching theme is that Jesus is indeed the promised messiah sent to the whole world, why would we question the plaintext reading of all referring to all mankind unless we have a particular a-priori barrier to such an interpretation we've imported from another source?"

Joel says: What can I say, Wes? You continue to beg the question. You say you recognize that PAS has a semantic range and yet you assume that if John is going to express the concept of everyone without distinction, then he'll do it a la Revelation 5.9, failing to acknowledge that PAS can also express the concept of everyone without distinction. You seem to think understanding PAS as everyone without exception is the "plaintext reading," again demonstrating your question-begging and your tendency not recognize PAS's semantic range.

By: Wes Widner

Wes Widner — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 12:28:31 +0000

William D Mounce has a great line in his introduction to Greek course about letters requiring specified arrangements to form words and words requiring specified arrangement to form sentences and sentences in specified arrangements to form ideas and that we communicate not on the letter or word or even sentence level, but on the level of whole units of thought.

So while the meaning of pas is important, afterall John did choose pas as opposed to another Greek word such as μέρος (http://bit.ly/37FE67), we ought to be discussing whole units of thought expressed by the author (John) while assuming he wasn't schizophrenic (like claiming that the holy spirit draws all men to Christ in one part but explicitly denying it somewhere else).

We should also look at what the author uses (references such as the one to the bronze snake made by Moses in Numbers 21:4-9 as an agent of salvation for the whole nation of Israel including those who didn't accept it made not once but twice by John) to help us understand what he really wanted to get across to his audience.

So taking into account the fact that John makes his intentions of referring to tribes, nations, and ethnic groups explicitly known in Revelation 5:9, and the fact that his overarching theme is that Jesus is indeed the promised messiah sent to the whole world, why would we question the plaintext reading of all referring to all mankind unless we have a particular a-priori barrier to such an interpretation we've imported from another source?

I think the fact that proponents of "all here really means all kinds of people, not really all people" have to do hermeneutical calisthenics in order to make their presupposed favoritism of God fit the text speaks far more about the weakness of their position than it does the validity of the simple interpretation that in these passages John really meant that all men were freely offered salvation and that it is up to us to accept it or not just like the Israelites in Moses's time.