Steve Gregg's description of Calvinism puts the discussion in the right perspective:
One solution is found in Calvinist doctrine. This view holds that God does not really love all men redemptively, nor does He truly desire to save them. God is sovereign, and can save whomever He chooses. However, He chooses to save only some, while passing over others, whom He could just as easily have included among the elect , had He wished to do so. It is difficult to say that God loves those whom He has not chosen to save— especially if this neglect of choosing them means that they will endure eternal torment, from which He could have easily delivered them, as well as the others. No contradiction must be assumed to exist between God’s vindictive wrath for the one group and His sacrificial love for another. God loves His elect, and demonstrates His love in saving them; but He hates the non-elect (Rom. 9: 13), and makes that fact unmistakably clear by consigning them to eternal torment. If this view is taken, it becomes difficult to affirm with Scripture that “God is love,” apart from the addition of some caveat— that is, God is love to those whom He chooses to love. To the rest, He is apparently as unforgiving and vengeful as is the most graceless character on earth. A being whose personality is about equally divided between extreme love and extreme hatred may well exist, but one could hardly explain why such a bipolar entity would be admired for His grace and His loving character, when the very opposite of love burns in Him toward the majority of the unfortunate people whom He has not chosen to love, even though (unfortunately for them) it was He who chose to bring them into existence. Those on the fortunate side of that ledger could be thankful to be among the few who escaped this default attitude of wrath, and, when thinking only of His conduct toward themselves (which is how people often think ), might regard the God who saved them as a loving and gracious being. This would seemingly require blocking out of the mind the fact that multitudes of others, including many of their own loved ones, were denied that same grace, by a God who could as easily have given it to them, at no extra cost to Himself , had He simply been willing to extend His infinite grace more broadly. What Calvinism gains in terms of affirming God’s prerogatives, it seems to lose in terms of God’s character. The Calvinist sees God’s anger as being visited upon rebels whose rebellion was divinely ordained, and who are thus being eternally punished for living in bondage to forces they had no power to resist, and from which God did not choose to deliver them when He could have. If anything about this scenario seems morally objectionable, the Calvinist has one answer ready at hand: “O man, who are you to reply against God?” (Rom. 9: 20).-Gregg, Steve (2013-11-05). All You Want to Know About Hell: Three Christian Views of God's Final Solution to the Problem of Sin (pp. 22-24). Thomas Nelson. Kindle Edition.
Scientists create computer models that should reproduce observed reality IF the program's premises are true.
A computer model programmed according to Calvinism would not reproduce the following scriptures:
And He Himself is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the whole world. (1Jo 2:2 NKJ)
16 "For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.
17 "For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved.
18 "He who believes in Him is not condemned; but he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.
19 "And this is the condemnation, that the light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. (Joh 3:16-19 NKJ)
Therefore Calvinism isn't scriptural.
One solution is found in Calvinist doctrine. This view holds that God does not really love all men redemptively, nor does He truly desire to save them. God is sovereign, and can save whomever He chooses. However, He chooses to save only some, while passing over others, whom He could just as easily have included among the elect , had He wished to do so. It is difficult to say that God loves those whom He has not chosen to save— especially if this neglect of choosing them means that they will endure eternal torment, from which He could have easily delivered them, as well as the others. No contradiction must be assumed to exist between God’s vindictive wrath for the one group and His sacrificial love for another. God loves His elect, and demonstrates His love in saving them; but He hates the non-elect (Rom. 9: 13), and makes that fact unmistakably clear by consigning them to eternal torment. If this view is taken, it becomes difficult to affirm with Scripture that “God is love,” apart from the addition of some caveat— that is, God is love to those whom He chooses to love. To the rest, He is apparently as unforgiving and vengeful as is the most graceless character on earth. A being whose personality is about equally divided between extreme love and extreme hatred may well exist, but one could hardly explain why such a bipolar entity would be admired for His grace and His loving character, when the very opposite of love burns in Him toward the majority of the unfortunate people whom He has not chosen to love, even though (unfortunately for them) it was He who chose to bring them into existence. Those on the fortunate side of that ledger could be thankful to be among the few who escaped this default attitude of wrath, and, when thinking only of His conduct toward themselves (which is how people often think ), might regard the God who saved them as a loving and gracious being. This would seemingly require blocking out of the mind the fact that multitudes of others, including many of their own loved ones, were denied that same grace, by a God who could as easily have given it to them, at no extra cost to Himself , had He simply been willing to extend His infinite grace more broadly. What Calvinism gains in terms of affirming God’s prerogatives, it seems to lose in terms of God’s character. The Calvinist sees God’s anger as being visited upon rebels whose rebellion was divinely ordained, and who are thus being eternally punished for living in bondage to forces they had no power to resist, and from which God did not choose to deliver them when He could have. If anything about this scenario seems morally objectionable, the Calvinist has one answer ready at hand: “O man, who are you to reply against God?” (Rom. 9: 20).-Gregg, Steve (2013-11-05). All You Want to Know About Hell: Three Christian Views of God's Final Solution to the Problem of Sin (pp. 22-24). Thomas Nelson. Kindle Edition.
Scientists create computer models that should reproduce observed reality IF the program's premises are true.
A computer model programmed according to Calvinism would not reproduce the following scriptures:
And He Himself is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the whole world. (1Jo 2:2 NKJ)
16 "For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.
17 "For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved.
18 "He who believes in Him is not condemned; but he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.
19 "And this is the condemnation, that the light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. (Joh 3:16-19 NKJ)
Therefore Calvinism isn't scriptural.
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