God's Control over Moral Evil
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Now consider the evidence for God's control over moral evil, the evil choices that are made in the world. Again there are specific instances and then texts that make sweeping statements of God's control.
For example, all the choices of Joseph's brothers in getting rid of him and selling him into slavery are seen as sin and yet also as the outworking of God's good purpose. In Genesis 50:20, Joseph says to his brothers when they fear his vengeance, "As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good in order to bring about this present result, to preserve many people alive." Gregory Boyd and others, who do not believe that God has a purpose in the evil choices of people (especially since he does not know what those choices are going to be before they make them), try to say that God can use the choices that people make for his own purposes after they make them and he then knows what they are.
But this will not fit what the text says or what Psalm 105:17 says. The text says, "You meant evil against me." Evil is a feminine singular noun. Then it says, "God meant it for good." The word "it" is a feminine singular suffix that can only agree with the antecedent feminine singular noun, "evil." And the verb "meant" is the same past tense in both cases. You meant evil against me in the past, as you were doing it. And God meant that very evil, not as evil, but as good in the past as you were doing it. And to make this perfectly clear, Psalm 105:17 says about Joseph's coming to Egypt, "[God] sent a man before them, Joseph, who was sold as a slave." God sent him. God did not find him there owing to evil choices, and then try to make something good come of it. Therefore this text stands as a kind of paradigm for how to understand the evil will of man within the sovereign will of God.
I find it amusing that Piper must rely on the English translation to explain not only that God had ordained the evil that was committed by Joseph's brothers, but that it was actually good in the eyes of God. Someone so scholarly should know better. His noun, verb, prefix explanation does not pass with ancient languages. In other words, he cannot prove his point from the original Hebrew, it does not read as he would like it. The death of Jesus offers another example of how God's sovereign will ordains that a sinful act come to pass. Edwards says, "The crucifying of Christ was a great sin; and as man committed it, it was exceedingly hateful and highly provoking to God. Yet upon many great considerations it was the will of God that it should be done." Then he refers to Acts 4:27-28, "Truly in this city there were gathered together against Your holy servant Jesus, whom You anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate, along with the Gentiles and the peoples of Israel, to do whatever Your hand and Your purpose predestined to occur" (see also Isaiah 53:10). In other words, all the sinful acts of Herod, Pilate, of Gentiles and Jews were predestined to occur.
Edwards ponders that someone might say that only the sufferings of Christ were planned by God, not the sins against him, to which he responds, "I answer, [the sufferings] could not come to pass but by sin. For contempt and disgrace was one thing he was to suffer. [Therefore] even the free actions of men are subject to God's disposal."
As for Herod, Pilate, and Jesus being predestined for that time and hour. I often tell Calvinists that prophecy is not the rule, it has always been the exception to the rule. It may be all Rick Warren-ish in present day to believe that we can all carry around a divine prophecy in our pockets, but that thinking is not scriptural. I cover this more under the Calvinism heading, in explaining that 'chosen, foreknown, elect, predestined' etc were not labels doled out to all Christians for all time, nor do those labels go hand in hand with salvation.
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These specific examples (which could be multiplied by many more instances) where God purposefully governs the sinful choices of people are generalized in several passages. For example, Romans 9:16: "So then it does not depend on the man who wills or the man who runs, but on God who has mercy." Man's will is not the ultimately decisive agent in the world, God is. Proverbs 20:24: "Man's steps are ordained by the LORD, How then can man understand his way?" Proverbs 19:21: "Many plans are in a man's heart, But the counsel of the LORD will stand." Proverbs 21:1: "The king's heart is a stream of water in the hand of the LORD; he turns it wherever he will." Jeremiah 10:23: "I know, O LORD, that a man's way is not in himself, Nor is it in a man who walks to direct his steps."
Romans 9:16 is only talking about God having mercy, Calvinists like to apply it to everything under the sun.
Proverbs 20:24, 19:2, and Jeremiah 10:23 are fairly potent for the Calvinist's argument of God controlling the paths of peoples lives, I commend him on using them, but I'm afraid John Piper forgot Proverbs 16:9, which says "A man's heart devises his way, and the Lord directs his steps."
Proverbs 21:1 in the opening line is talking about a king or ruler, not the common man, and must be interpreted in light of 16:9 and not void of it.
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Is God Less Glorious Because He Ordained that Evil Be?
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This is a fundamental truth that helps explain some perplexing things in the Bible, namely, that God often expresses his will to be one way, and then acts to bring about another state of affairs. God opposes hatred toward his people, yet ordained that his people be hated in Egypt (Genesis 12:3; Psalm 105:25 - "He turned their hearts to hate his people."). He hardens Pharaoh's heart, but commands him to let his people go (Exodus 4:21; 5:1; 8:1). He makes plain that it is sin for David to take a military census of his people, but he ordains that he do it (2 Samuel 24:1; 24:10). He opposes adultery, but ordains that Absalom should lie with his father's wives (Exodus 20:14; 2 Samuel 12:11). He forbids rebellion and insubordination against the king, but ordained that Jeroboam and the ten tribes should rebel against Rehoboam (Romans 13:1; 1 Samuel 15:23; 1 Kings 12:15-16). He opposes murder, but ordains the murder of his Son (Exodus 20:13; Acts 4:28). He desires all men to be saved, but effectually calls only some (1 Timothy 2:4; 1 Corinthians 1:26-30; 2 Timothy 2:26).
Psalm 105:25 must be read in context, as well as history. As above with Proverbs 16:9 it is a man's own heart that devises his ways. The Egyptians were no beacon of light to begin with, so turning their collective 'heart' against the nation of Israel is after the fact.
Pharaoh's heart
The above are used often by skeptics and scoffers to show contradictions in the Bible, as there are many events which in one verse are credited to God, but elsewhere are credited to a person, or more often than not, to satan. John Piper has only addressed the verses where some deed is credited to God, because he was of course only trying to further his own agenda of showing God makes things happen that He also forbids.
The question is not so much why God would ordain something He also opposes, but why in these examples (and many others) does the Bible credit something to God in one place, but to someone else in a different place? I'm currently working on an article about that, but it goes much further into another topic that it would detract from this email about Calvinism. Suffice to say that if a Calvinist would like to make those stories an issue, he will have to tell them from the perspective of other scriptures, and explain those verses as well.
I had explained Acts 4 and the predestined crucifixion above, and God wanting all but calling only some is actually rebutted in my first section on Piper.
The numbering of Israel
Absalom's wives
Rebellion against Rehoboam
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Are There Two Wills in God?
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Another line of Biblical evidence that God sometimes wills to bring about what he disapproves is his choosing to use or not to use his right to restrain evil in the human heart.
Proverbs 21:1 says, "The king's heart is like channels of water in the hands of the Lord; he turns it wherever he wishes." An illustration of this divine right over the king's heart is given in Genesis 20. Abraham is sojourning in Gerar and says to king Abimelech that Sarah is his sister. So Abimelech takes her as part of his harem. But God is displeased and warns him in a dream that she is married to Abraham. Abimelech protests to God that he had taken her in his integrity. And God says (in verse 6), "Yes, I know that in the integrity of your heart you have done this, and I also kept you from sinning against me; therefore I did not let you touch her."
What is apparent here is that God has the right and the power to restrain the sins of secular rulers. When he does, it is his will to do it. And when he does not, it is his will not to. Which is to say that sometimes God wills that their sins be restrained and sometimes he wills that they increase more than if he restrained them.
It is not an unjust infringement on human agency that the Creator has the right and power to restrain the evil actions of his creatures. Psalm 33:10-11 says, "The LORD brings the counsel of the nations to nought; he frustrates the plans of the peoples. The counsel of the LORD stands for ever, the thoughts of his heart to all generations." Sometimes God frustrates the will of rulers by making their plans fail. Sometimes he does so by influencing their hearts the way he did Abimelech, without them even knowing it.
But there are times when God does not use this right because he intends for human evil to run its course. For example, God meant to put the sons of Eli to death. Therefore he willed that they not listen to their father's counsel: "Now Eli was very old; and he heard all that his sons were doing to all Israel, and how they lay with the women who served at the doorway of the tent of meeting. And he said to them, `Why do you do such things, the evil things that I hear from all these people? No, my sons; for the report is not good which I hear the Lord's people circulating. If one man sins against another, God will mediate for him; but if a man sins against the Lord, who can intercede for him?' But they would not listen to the voice of their father, for the Lord desired to put them to death" (1 Samuel 2:22-25). Why would the sons of Eli not give heed to their father's good counsel? The answer of the text is "because the Lord desired to put them to death." This only makes sense if the Lord had the right and the power to restrain their disobedience—a right and power which he willed not to use. Thus we must say that in one sense God willed that the sons of Eli go on doing what he commanded them not to do: dishonoring their father and committing sexual immorality.
Moreover the word for "desired" in the clause, "the Lord desired to put them to death," is the same Hebrew word (haphez) used in Ezekiel 18:23,32 and 33:11 where God asserts that he does not desire the death of the wicked. God desired to put the sons of Eli to death, but he does not desire the death of the wicked. This is a strong warning to us not to take one assertion, like Ezekiel 18:23 and assume we know the precise meaning without letting other scripture like 1 Samuel 2:25 have a say. The upshot of putting the two together is that in one sense God may desire the death of the wicked and in another sense he may not.
Another illustration of God's choosing not to use his right to restrain evil is found in Romans 1:24-28. Three times Paul says that God hands people over (paredoken) to sink further into corruption. Verse 24: "God handed them over to the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves." Verse 26: "God handed them over to dishonorable passions." Verse 28: "And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God handed them over to a base mind and to improper conduct." God has the right and the power to restrain this evil the way he did for Abimelech. But he did not will to do that. Rather his will in this case was to punish, and part of God's punishment on evil is sometimes willing that evil increase. But this means that God chooses for behavior to come about which he commands not to happen. The fact that God's willing is punitive does not change that. And the fact that it is justifiably punitive is one of the points of this chapter. There are other examples we could give, but we pass on to a different line of evidence.
I don't disagree with what Piper has presented here, at least not to the extent that he has written it. But of course I disagree with the conclusion he is trying to imply from it. Probably because I see in these examples that these people were already evil by the time God gives them that little extra 'push' over the edge, to meet their end. This is pretty mainstream and non-Calvinistic. Heshbon, like Egypt, was no beacon of light, and Sihon is in the same way applicable as the Pharaoh previously.
With the sons of Eli in 2nd Sam 2:22-25 we see their hearts were already wicked, in keeping with Proverbs 16:9.
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Total Depravity
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When we speak of man's depravity we mean man's natural condition apart from any grace exerted by God to restrain or transform man.
There is no doubt that man could perform more evil acts toward his fellow man than he does. But if he is restrained from performing more evil acts by motives that are not owing to his glad submission to God, then even his "virtue" is evil in the sight of God.
Romans 14:23 says, "Whatever does not proceed from faith is sin." This is a radical indictment of all natural "virtue" that does not flow from a heart humbly relying on God's grace.
The terrible condition of man's heart will never be recognized by people who assess it only in relation to other men. Romans 14:23 makes plain that depravity is our condition in relation to God primarily, and only secondarily in relation to man. Unless we start here we will never grasp the totality of our natural depravity.
The Calvinist explanation of Romans 14:23 has always been terribly open-ended, if I may. Though a Calvinist will not want to entertain this possibility that their definition leaves alot of loose threads. Notice that Paul does not say "Whatever doesn't proceed from a believer in Christ is sin" which is what many people would like to read into it, ignoring, or never bothering to read what on Earth Paul might be talking about in this chapter. The verse must be taken in context of the verses before it.
If we are to take the Calvinist's near literal reading of this verse, then one could say getting a glass of water is sinful. You've paid your bills this month, you just did your dishes, you know water is going to come out of the faucet, there is no faith involved. Throwing a piece of trash away is also sinful, as you can see the trash can, and you know gravity is not going to suddenly stop working, no faith needed. Breathing is sinful too...
Obviously it can't be so literal, but then again it can't be implying something else either. A Calvinist says it's extremely literal, but at the same time, putting their own interpretation into it. This is one of my pet peeves when dealing with Calvinism, if you've noticed on the website.
In Romans 14, Paul is talking about whether or not a person may believe in their own mind that eating or drinking something is wrong, slightly hinting at the Old Testament bondage of ordinances (which he also rebuked Peter for falling back into). If your own conviction says that eating bacon is sinful, then to you it is sinful. He goes into more detail about this in 1st Timothy 4. If it had something to do with being 'evil by default' or coming out of the womb as a depraved little imp, he would have said something about it there. Clearly that is not the point he was getting across.
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Our rebellion against God is total.
Apart from the grace of God there is no delight in the holiness of God, and there is no glad submission to the sovereign authority of God.
Of course totally depraved men can be very religious and very philanthropic. They can pray and give alms and fast, as Jesus said (Matthew 6:1-18). But their very religion is rebellion against the rights of their Creator, if it does not come from a childlike heart of trust in the free grace of God. Religion is one of the chief ways that man conceals his unwillingness to forsake self-reliance and bank all his hopes on the unmerited mercy of God (Luke 18:9-14; Colossians 2:20-23).
The totality of our rebellion is seen in Romans 3:9-10 and 18. "I have already charged that all men, both Jews and Greeks, are under the power of sin, as it is written: None is righteous, no not one; no one seeks for God....There is no fear of God before their eyes."
It is a myth that man in his natural state is genuinely seeking God. Men do seek God. But they do not seek him for who he is. They seek him in a pinch as one who might preserve them from death or enhance their worldly enjoyments. Apart from conversion, no one comes to the light of God.
Some do come to the light. But listen to what John 3:20-21 says about them. "Every one who does evil hates the light, and does not come to the light, lest his deeds should be exposed. But he who does what is true comes to the light, that it may be clearly seen that his deeds have been wrought in God."
Yes there are those who come to the light—namely those whose deeds are the work of God. "Wrought in God" means worked by God. Apart from this gracious work of God all men hate the light of God and will not come to him lest their evil be exposed—this is total rebellion. "No one seeks for God...There is no fear of God before their eyes!"
Notice further down that the Calvinist tries to connect hypocrisy with not trusting the Lord, and black labeling it as 'religion'. In Luke 18 the theme is not that the Pharisee was trusting in himself, nor that he had 'religion', but that he was a prideful showman. The moral at the end of Colossians 2 was not that those people were not saved because they had gone back to Jewish customs, but that the people who actually had Christ were reverting back to following Jewish customs, and Paul was telling them to snap out of it.
He also says it is a myth that man in his natural state never genuinely seeks God, and then says man only seeks for God in a pinch to preserve him from death. Of course he gives no verses for this, and the Calvinist definition of "natural state" is never in line with John 1:9 (few people ever notice this verse, that every person starts their life with the light of Christ). The writer quotes Romans 3:10, perhaps without knowing that Paul was quoting Psalms 14 and 53. Paul quotes them because he is making a point about being under the law, but why did David say those words in the first place?
In Psalms 14/53, David is speaking in contempt, and in a very present tense about the wickedness of his people, and even implies that they WERE righteous, but are not anymore. This effectively nullifies using these verses to prove total depravity, as they are not related.
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In his total rebellion everything man does is sin.
In Romans 14:23 Paul says, "Whatever is not from faith is sin." Therefore, if all men are in total rebellion, everything they do is the product of rebellion and cannot be an honor to God, but only part of their sinful rebellion. If a king teaches his subjects how to fight well and then those subjects rebel against their king and use the very skill he taught them to resist him, then even those skills become evil.
Thus man does many things which he can only do because he is created in the image of God and which in the service of God could be praised. But in the service of man's self-justifying rebellion, these very things are sinful.
In Romans 7:18 Paul says, "I know that no good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh." This is a radical confession of the truth that in our rebellion nothing we think or feel is good. It is all part of our rebellion. The fact that Paul qualifies his depravity with the words, "that is, in my flesh," shows that he is willing to affirm the good of anything that the Spirit of God produces in him (Romans 15:18). "Flesh" refers to man in his natural state apart from the work of God's Spirit. So what Paul is saying in Romans 7:18 is that apart from the work of God's Spirit all we think and feel and do is not good.....
Man's inability to submit to God and do good is total.
Picking up on the term "flesh" above (man apart from the grace of God) we find Paul declaring it to be totally enslaved to rebellion. Romans 8:7-8 says, "For the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God; it does not submit to God's law, indeed it cannot; and those who are in the flesh cannot please God."
The "mind of the flesh" is the mind of man apart from the indwelling Spirit of God ("You are not in the flesh, you are in the Spirit, if the Spirit of God really dwells in you," Romans 8:9). So natural man has a mindset that does not and cannot submit to God. Man cannot reform himself.
Ephesians 2:1 says that we Christians were all once "dead in trespasses and sins." The point of deadness is that we were incapable of any life with God. Our hearts were like a stone toward God (Ephesians 4:18; Ezekiel 36:26). Our hearts were blind and incapable of seeing the glory of God in Christ (2 Corinthians 4:4-6). We were totally unable to reform ourselves.
I had addressed Romans 14 above, and all of the verses given do not say that there can be no choice, just that keeping in line with many other scriptures, that the fleshly side has nothing good. That we were fallen, yes, that we could not see the glory of God, fine, that we were not in the Spirit, alright. This fallen nature however, is not what Calvinists want it to be. For as I say on my site, that if man were totally evil and therefore devoid of the ability to do good, then man could do nothing but evil all the time. He could not resist harming all others he came in contact with, stealing at every opportunity, and living as a nihilistic anarchist. Such a culture would make 'cavemen' look civilized.
If you look around yourself, we don't live on such a planet, and non-Christians make up much more than 2/3rds of the world.
Matt Slick actually had to invent another doctrine to explain why we don't see this, whereas most Calvinists (including John Piper) never address it. R.C. Sproul completely dodges the issue by contradicting himself in some of his own literature.
Creation, Fall, Redemption, and the Holy Spirit
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John 3:1-10 Now there was a man of the Pharisees, named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. This man came to Jesus by night and said to him, "Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher come from God; for no one can do these signs that you do, unless God is with him." Jesus answered him, "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born anew, he cannot see the kingdom of God." Nicodemus said to him, "How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother's womb and be born?" Jesus answered, "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not marvel that I said to you, 'You must be born anew.' The wind blows where it wills, and you hear the sound of it, but you do not know whence it comes or whither it goes; so it is with every one who is born of the Spirit." Nicodemus said to him, "How can this be?" Jesus answered him, "Are you a teacher of Israel and yet do not understand this?" (John 3:1-10)
Can the Ethiopian change his skin, or the leopard his spots? Then also you can do good who are accustomed to do evil. (Jeremiah 13:23)
John Piper makes a mess of things by comparing scriptures that have nothing to do with eachother. God in Jeremiah 13:23 was speaking in a particular situation, much like as I addressed Psalms 14 and 53 above. It was a metaphor to show His disgust with them at that time, and why they needed to be reprimanded. Clearly they had been righteous before, and would be righteous again.
Can a man in love with his money enter into the kingdom of God? "It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle" (Matthew 19:24).
I find it funny how he rephrases Matthew 19:24, it is clear that at one time he had the wherewithal to understand context, and only quotes exact verses where it will fit with what he has to say.
Can the natural man welcome the things of the Spirit of God? "They are foolishness to him and he is not able to comprehend them, because they are spiritually assessed" (1 Corinthians 2:14).
1 Corinthians 2:14 in the context around it is only saying that we as believers understand things of the Spirit that nonbelievers don't. Note that these are not sermons, or the basic gospel message, or some kind of coded language. Many people, Calvinist or other, will try to use these verses as a way out when frustrated with tough atheists who they aren't getting through to. It's not that the atheist doesn't understand the message because many of them understand it pretty darn well, they simply don't accept it.
The Bible tells us the things of the Spirit of God are the gifts and fruits. This is what is not comprehended by nonbelievers. I would say the fruits are not understandable because we are commanded to show them in all, even the most unlikely of (unnatural) situations. The gifts are not understandable because they defy explanation, they are supernatural. So 1st Corinthians 2 can't be used to say that the nonbeliever cannot accept Christ because he can't understand the gospel message, because the basic gospel message is not what it's talking about. Nor does it say a nonbeliever can have no desire to choose, which leads me to.....
Romans 8 is very easily misunderstood, as many people think when Paul is talking about the fleshly, or carnal mind, and the mind of the spirit, that he is comparing 2 separate people, when really they both exist within the same person. Multiples sections of my site cover this under the Teachings heading, that was originally published in 1995.
If Paul was comparing separate people whenever he talks about "spirit and flesh", then there would honestly be no reason for Paul to give instruction or exhortation on how to live, or what to do and not do, as these things would come by themself, upon salvation. Think about it. It would be extremely redundant, even asinine for him to go on long tirades chastising some of the churches, as they could do no wrong, and would need no guidance. The believers wouldn't need Paul's writings, and the unbelievers would never benefit from it.
In some places it looks like Calvinists realize that spirit and flesh are not different individuals, but in other places I believe they conveniently ignore it.
Piper spins the story in John 3 of Nicodemus into a Calvinistic altar call, heavily reinforcing that it must be literal, and therefore impossible, which leads him to the conclusion (after 20 more redundant paragraphs) that Calvinism must be true. I see no need to copy and paste them here, since it is the same generic call of Calvinism, which I have covered every point of already.