Calvinism on the suffering of children

[This is taken from my post "As evil as it gets: Calvinism on babies and the unreached."  I'm breaking that longer post up into shorter pieces, to focus on one topic per post.  I'll intersperse this series with the Alana L series.]

About the suffering and abuse of babies and children: 

Remember that these are not my words.  These are Calvinist's own words, and so you can see that we are not misrepresenting them or putting words in their mouths.  This is hard stuff to read.  Really hard.  But you need to read it.  To know that they really do teach this garbage.  (And "garbage" is the nice word.  I was gonna use a stronger one.  Oh, yes, I was!  Note: All bold emphasis in all quotes has been added by me.)

a. Gordon H. Clark (Religion, Reason, and Revelation): “I wish very frankly and pointedly to assert that if a man gets drunk and shoots his family, it was the will of God that he should do it… Let it be unequivocally said that this view certainly makes God the cause of sin. God is the sole ultimate cause of everything…”

b. James White was asked [listen here] this question: “When a child is raped, is God responsible and did He decree that rape?”  

And White replied "If He didn't then that rape is an element of meaningless evil that has no purpose... Yes, [He decreed it] because if not, then it's meaningless and purposeless... [So in Calvinism, it's SO MUCH BETTER to have "meaningful" child-rape that was decreed/preplanned/orchestrated/caused by God than to have "meaningless" child-rape that was a result of evil people's free-will choices!?!  Better that God causes it than people!?!  That's sick!  And that's not a God to trust or seek comfort from.]  

[But if He decreed it], it has meaning, it has purpose, all suffering has purpose, everything in the world has purpose, so there's no basis for despair [other than the fact that a god like that - Calvi-god - is evil!  (The true God of the Bible is not.)]... But if we believe that God created knowing all this was going to happen but with no decree - He just created and all this evil is out there and there's no purpose - then every rape, every situation like that, is nothing but purposeless evil and God is responsible for the creation of despair...."  

[So let me get this straight: If Calvi-god doesn't decree all that evil and rape then he's responsible for despair, but if he does decree it then he's not responsible for despair!?!  What the...!?!  And how on earth can Calvinists trust a god who commands us not to do evil, but "ordains" us to do the evil he commanded us not do, giving us no ability to resist, and then he punishes us for doing the evil he ordained!?!  Sick and twisted!]

c. Jeff Durbin (see clips in The Madness of Calvinism or the full video in Jeff Durbin Answering 'The Problem of Evil') talking to a woman about evils like gang rape, which would also have to include when it happens to children (and things like human trafficking, which falls under "all evils"): “God actually has a morally sufficient reason for all the evil He plans… nothing happens in the universe apart from His will… So let’s say this evil happens.  How do [people try to] get God off the hook?... By saying 'He didn’t want that to happen, or He’ll fix it, or He wouldn’t mess with your free will'… [But] the truth is that all those answers make God unworthy of worship… He actually decrees all things."  [So, in Calvinism, God is only worthy of worship if He deliberately wants, plans, and decrees evils like gang-rape!?!]

d. From my Calvinist ex-pastor's February 2014 sermon: “There is nothing [God] cannot forgive, be it child abuse, murder, rape, adultery, cheating, defying, betrayal… [Later in the sermon:] The book of Numbers is all about who God is… A God who ordains everything that comes to pass for His own glory.  A God who is not watching history; He’s making history.  A God who doesn’t sit back and just look.  He’s a God who ordains everything that comes to pass to line up with His plan for His glory.”  [So clearly, in Calvinism, all of the "child abuse, murder, rape, adultery, cheating, defying, betrayal" was ordained and planned by God "for His own glory."]

e. From my ex-pastor's June 2022 sermon about Joseph and forgiveness: "Some of us are sitting here today and the pain is so very deep about the way we've been treated by somebody.  Any time we're physically abused, verbally abused, emotionally abused, lied about, oppressed, taken advantage of, wrongly blamed - the list can go on - here's the decision we face: 'Will I become bitter and hold a grudge, or will I choose to forgive and let it go?'  And here's the key: My choice at that point - how I choose to respond to someone who has abused me - shows what I really think about God... All of our bitterness is ultimately traceable to resentment of God.  Why?  Because it was God who brought these circumstances into our lives in the first place, painful as they may be."

f. A Calvinist grandfather-to-be said this about his unborn grandchild (see "The total depravity of certain Calvinists", and see my post about it): "This is an ultrasound photo of our first grandbaby... And even though I love this baby, I know God may not and may [have] created it for damnation."  

And apparently, he also said that God may have even decreed his unborn grandchild to be a mass murderer... and "God can do what He chooses to do with His creation" and "God is not ashamed of Himself so why should I be."

And he said this about God decreeing rape: “God must then direct the rapist not just who to rape but how to perform the rape and how long… Amen, but I would go even farther than that, God originated every detail in His mind from all eternity and decreed it to be so.”   

g. Mark Talbot/John Piper (from Suffering and the Sovereignty of God, page 42-44, 70-77.  This is a long quote but one you need to read - and I mean really read.  Especially you Calvinists.  Repeat it, ruminate on it, stew in it.  It's Calvinism in a nutshell.  Calvinism at its finest!  Share it with your Calvinist friends.  Read it aloud at your next Bible study.  Quote it to your neighbors.  Tell it to your kids as a bedtime story.  See if you Calvinists can proudly and confidently proclaim this as biblical truth without tripping over your words and gagging on your own vomit.): "God brings about all things in accordance with his will.  It isn’t just that God manages to turn the evil aspects of our world to good for those that love him; it is rather that he himself brings about these evil aspects… This includes God’s having even brought about the Nazi’s brutality at Birkenau and Auschwitz as well as the terrible killings of Dennis Nadar and even the sexual abuse of a young child... God speaks and then brings his word to pass; he purposes and then does what he has planned.  Nothing that exists falls outside of God's ordaining will.  Nothing, including no evil person or thing or event or deed.  God's foreordination is the ultimate reason why everything comes about, including the existence of all evil persons and things and the occurrence of any evil acts or events.  And so it is not inappropriate to take God to be the creator, the sender, the permitter, and sometimes even the instigator of evil.

... In summary, this means that we should affirm the age-old Christian doctrine of God’s complete providence over all.  God has sovereignly ordained, from before the world began, everything that happens in our world... It should be beyond all doubt that no one suffers anything at anyone else’s hand without God having ordained that suffering.  

During his first hour or so in Birkenau, Elie Wiesel saw the notorious Joseph Mengele...casually directing [people] either to his left, so that they went immediately to the gas chambers, or to his right to the forced-labor camp.  In seeing Mengele, Wiesel was seeing a very evil man whom, nevertheless, God was actively sustaining and governing, nanosecond by nanosecond, through his evil existence.  And we can be sure that, from before time began, God had ordained that at that place those moments would be filled with just those persons, doing and suffering exactly as they did... that he actually brought the whole situation about, guiding and governing and carrying it by his all-powerful and ever-effectual word to where it would accomplish exactly what he wanted it to do.  

[Footnote: Mengele was a medical doctor who was nicknamed 'The Angel of Death.'  He carried out unspeakable experiments on some of his prisoners, including injecting chemicals into childrens’ eyes in an attempt to change their eye color from brown to the preferred Aryan blue.  He would visit the children, acting kindly and bringing them candy and clothing in order to keep them calm and happy, and then transport them in what looked like a Red Cross truck or in his personal vehicle to his laboratory beside the crematoria where he would perform his horrible experiments and then burn their bodies.  He specialized in experiments involving identical twins.  He was intrigued to see if he could make them differ genetically by, among other horrors, performing sex-change operations on one of them or removing one twin’s limbs or organs in macabre surgical procedures that were performed without the use of anesthesia and that had no scientific basis or value.]  

... Even though he ordains all of our free sinful choices, those sinful choices still 'count' and we are held responsible for them.... In ordaining the evil works of others, he himself does no wrong, 'upright and just is he.'... We can be sure, as Scripture confirms, that God has made everything for its purpose, even evil persons like Joseph Mengele or Dennis Rader.  We can be sure that God has made our lives’ most evil moments as well as their best.... 

... I myself find it very difficult to understand how [God can ordain evil for our good] with some of the worst things that human beings do, like sexually abusing young children or raping or torturing someone mercilessly.  And, of course, something much less horrible than these sorts of things can happen to us and still leave us wondering how God could be ordaining it for our good.  I have seen marriages break apart after thirty-five years and felt to some degree the grief and utter discombobulation of the abandoned spouse.  I have watched tragedies unfold that seem to remove all chance for any more earthly happiness.... Many of us have tasted such grief....Yet these griefs have been God’s gifts.... [And in the end, when we see Jesus face-to-face] we will see that God has indeed done all that he pleased and has done it all perfectly, both for his glory and our good..."

[Talking to myself: "Deep breaths, Heather.  Count to three and relax: one... two... three.  Take a deep breath and calm down.  You've still got a long way to go."  

If someone can't see how blasphemous this is, then I'm worried for them!  

Just wondering, but how much more of a hand would Calvi-god have to have in evil - how much more than planning, foreordaining, creating, and instigating it - before Calvinists will finally just call him evil?  Is any level he plays in it okay with them - even if he does the same things Satan does - merely because "he's god"?

As we saw before in snippets #2: Yes, Calvinists think God can do any evil, even the same things Satan and wicked men do, but it's okay because "He's God" and because it comes from His "good, sinless nature" (not an evil one like ours and Satan's) and because God does it for "good reasons" (not bad like ours).  

They'll say things like "Well, what's sin, evil, and injustice to us is not necessarily sin, evil, and injustice to God, because He's sinless and He sees and judges things differently than we do."

For examples (briefly):

A Calvinist on reddit (see this post) said this (paraphrased): "Sin is when we break God's laws.  But since He didn't give Himself these laws - since He didn't tell Himself that He can't do those things - then it's not sin for Him to do them."  

John Calvin said this in Concerning the Eternal Predestination of God: "... God may be free of guilt in doing the very thing that He condemns in Satan and the reprobate and which is to be condemned by men... For what man wickedly perpetrates, incited by ambition or avarice or lust or some other depraved motive, since God does it by His hand with a righteous though perhaps hidden purpose - this cannot be equated with the term sin.  Sin in man is made by perfidy, cruelty, pride, intemperance, envy, blind love of self, any kind of depraved lust.  Nothing like this is to be found in God." [Translation: "Our motives and natures determine if it's sin or not.  And so what's sin for man and Satan is not sin for God because He doesn't have our sin nature and because the evils He ordains flow from His good character and pure motives, which makes it okay for Him, but not for us."  What kind of bull-dung is this!?!  I mean, seriously!?!]

John MacArthur said this in Doctrine of Election, part 1: "... God is not to be measured by our understanding of what is just... God has ways and thoughts that are to us incomprehensible, unresolvable, inscrutable... It is an essential understanding of God that he is holy... morally flawless and perfect... Everything in him and of him and for him and from him and by him is perfect... And whatever it is that he wills is by definition just because he is just.  It is just because he wills it." [Translation: "Anything that God decrees, even sin, evil, and unbelief, is okay - it's perfect and just - because He is a perfect and just God.  And don't question us on this because you can't figure it out anyways."]

Jonathan Edwards said this in "Remarks on Important Theological Controversies, Chapter III": "... God has decreed every action of men, yea, every action that is sinful... he determines that there shall be such actions, and just so sinful as they are... God does not decree the actions that are sinful as sin, but decrees them as good... God decrees that they shall be sinful, for the sake of the good that he causes to arise from the sinfulness thereof; whereas man decrees them for the sake of the evil that is in them." [Translation: "God decreed all sin but since He does it for good reasons, it's not sin for Him; but since we do it for bad reasons, it is sin for us."] 

Ligonier Ministries from "Vessels of destruction": "As Christians in the Reformed tradition, we affirm the biblical view of providence that affirms the world is governed by God’s sovereign ordination... everything else that ever happens was decreed by God.... How can God be just and yet punish some people if their wickedness and condemnation is foreordained?... As the Creator, God has the right to do with His creation as He pleases.  [Translation: "So shut up and don't challenge us on this."  Just wondering, but do you know how cults take over and brainwash people?]  God is just and His glory is manifested in punishing those whom He has ordained to do evil ["because we Calvinists say it is!"]..."

John MacArthur again, in "Why does God allow so much suffering?": "He's absolutely in charge of everything.  Everything.  He controls everything... He is governing history in every minute detail.  There's not one molecule in the universe that's out of line with His purposes.... So, while liberal theology and assorted other so-called evangelicals [hear the insult, discrediting those who don't see it his way] feel desperately the need to rescue God from [being the cause of evil and suffering], God is quite content to make it clear that He is, in fact, unhesitatingly sovereign over everything that exists, without a hint of reluctance.  He's not asking to be rescued from bad press that's fallen upon Him because He's been blamed for all the bad things that are in the world... He's content to leave the responsibility for evil's existence and even its action, with Himself... God wills evil to exist.... Again, and again, God takes full responsibility for the existence of evil unfolding in this world.... The reason God ordained evil is for His glory.  We praise Him because of what He has done to overcome evil."  [Uhh, so we praise Him for "overcoming" the evil that He Himself planned and caused (isn't that a little schizophrenic, duplicitous, and self-defeating?), the evil He preplanned us to do, but then commanded us not to do, but then causes us to do, and then punishes us for!?!]

... You either believe in the God who is in complete control of evil, or you believe evil is in control of God, and He's reacting to it the best He can.  [First of all, he means that God controls evil, not just is "in control" of evil, which is very different.  And second of all, it's a false dichotomy to say that God must control evil or else evil would control Him, as if those are the only two possible options.] 

Calvinism erases the line between good and evil, between justice and injustice.  It tries to convince us that they can be one and the same, that there really isn't ultimately any difference between the two, and that God is glorified by both equally.  

Can you not see how satanic this is, and how brilliantly-satanically-powerful Calvinism's manipulations and deceptions are to get such a stranglehold on the Church!?!  It's freakin' incredible!

But C.S. Lewis (love him!!!), in The Problem of Pain chapter 2, says that "if God's moral judgment differs from ours so that our 'black' may be His 'white,' we can mean nothing by calling Him good; for to say 'God is good,' while asserting that His goodness is wholly other than ours, is really only to say 'God is we know not what'.  And an utterly unknown quality in God cannot give us moral grounds for loving or obeying Him.  If He is not (in our sense) 'good' we shall obey, if at all, only through fear - and should be equally ready to obey an omnipotent Fiend.  The doctrine of Total Depravity - when the consequence is drawn that, since we are totally depraved, our idea of good is simply nothing - may thus turn Christianity into a form of devil-worship."  

Amen and amen!

If there is no real, clear dividing line between true good and true evil - if good can be evil and evil can be good, as Calvinism is saying in order to justify their belief that God "ordains" evil - then we cannot call God good or just.  

"Good" loses all meaning when it looks and acts just like evil or when it's used as an excuse for evil.  "Justice" loses all meaning when it behaves like, and covers for, injustice.  The words "good and evil/justice and injustice" become meaningless when they can mean the same as their opposites.  (And therefore, we - if Calvinism were true - would be totally unable to obey any verse that talks about doing good or seeking justice.)  

Calvinism erases the line between good and evil, which essentially erases the line between God and Satan.  This lowers God to Satan's level... which, consequently, elevates Satan to God's level.  

And who do you think benefits from this?

And keep in mind that even though Calvinists use words like "permit/allow" - "take God to be... the permitter" - they never mean merely "permit/allow," that God knew what people would voluntarily choose to do and He permitted/allowed it anyway.  

No, they always mean that God first preplanned it to happen exactly the way it did, and then He "permits/allows" what He preplanned, orchestrating and directing it to happen, even sin and evil and unbelief.

Mark Talbot/John Piper (from Suffering and the Sovereignty of God, page 42-44): “God speaks and then brings his word to pass... God's foreordination is the ultimate reason why everything comes about, including the existence of all evil persons and things and the occurrence of any evil acts or events.”  

John Calvin (Institutes, book 3, chapter 23): "... it is impossible to deny that God foreknew what the end of man was to be before he made him, and foreknew, because he so ordained by his decree."

Erwin Lutzer (this quote was found at Examining Calvinism): "In ordinary discussions about human events, we can say that God permitted evil, as long as we understand that he thereby willed that the evil happen... In a word, what God permits, he ordains." (The Doctrines That Divide, pg. 210)

Vincent Cheung (The Problem of Evil, emphasis added): "Scripture teaches that God's will determines everything.  Nothing exists or happens without God, not merely permitting, but actively willing it to exist or happen… God controls not only natural events, but he also controls all human affairs and decisions… God controls everything that is and everything that happens."

John Calvin (Concerning the Eternal Predestination of God): “... how foolish and frail [it is to suggest] that evils come to be, not by His will but by His permission... It is a quite frivolous refuge to say that God otiosely permits them, when Scripture shows Him not only willing, but the author of them."

R.C. Sproul in "Discerning God's will: The three wills of God: "The Permissive Will of God: The distinction between the sovereign will of God and the permissive will of God is fraught with peril, and it tends to generate untold confusion... What is usually meant by divine permission is that God simply lets it happen.  That is, He does not directly intervene to prevent its happening.  Here is where grave danger lurks.  Some theologies view this drama as if God were impotent to do anything about human sin.  [Strawmanning.]  This view makes man sovereign, not God.  God is reduced to the roll of spectator or cheerleader, by which God’s exercise in providence is that of a helpless Father who having done all He can do, must now sit back and simply hope for the best.  He permits what He cannot help but permit because He has no sovereign power over it.  This ghastly view is not merely a defective view of theism; it is unvarnished atheism.  [Translation: "If you say God merely permits/allows sin without ordaining/controlling it, then you're saying that God's not sovereign, that God's not God, but that mankind is.  If you say God doesn't control sin, you're an atheist."  Not only is this strawmanning, accusing non-Calvinists of something they don't believe, but it's also a false dichotomy: "Either God controls everything or God controls nothing."]...  [In Calvinism/reformed theology] Whatever God 'permits' He sovereignly and efficaciously wills to permit... He will only permit me to do my worst if my worst coincides with His perfect providential plan."

From my ex-pastor's August 2022 sermon on suffering and God's love: "[Atheists] argue that the sheer amount of suffering, brutality, carnage, violence, and misery on our planet rule out a loving God... [But] what is the Bible's perspective on God and suffering?... He is good and even what He does is good, even when cancer strikes, even when I'm lied about, even when we lose a child, lose a job, lose a dream, tragedy strikes, we lose somebody we love.... [God's] providence means He's all-powerful, all-wise, and He governs all things... But providence is more than God just having advanced knowledge... God's providence means His sovereign, wise leading and active directing of all things for His glory, and of all events, everything, the good, the bad, and the ugly.  Friends, this is tonic to a weary soul [bullcrap!], to know that a good God is all-wise and all-powerful, that whatever He's doing, no matter how much I'm confused by it, is ultimately being done for my good and His glory..."  [Translation: "All evil, violence, abuse, murder, rape, affairs, divorce, tragic death, disease, etc. is deliberately orchestrated by God for your good and His glory."  Bullcrap, bullcrap, bullcrap!  How can a god like that be trusted or considered truly good?  What does "good" mean when it acts just like evil?  How much more would it take to become a bad, evil god?  And what kind of a god is glorified by causing evils, not just glorified in spite of evil, but by it?]

And from my ex-pastor's November 2019 sermon about Job, about trusting God in our times of confusion, pain, suffering, and uncertainty (he started this sermon with a true-life story of a young father who died early of cancer): "God is in full control of His universe, including suffering and tragedy... Too often when Bible-believing Christians in the west see tragedy, see calamity or experience it in their own lives, we want to immediately go to blaming Satan or his demons, that anything uncomfortable, anything painful, anything that smacks of suffering, uncertainty, betrayal, pain, misery, automatically comes only from Satan.... As western evangelicals, our immediate default is to try to get God off the hook.  'God could not have been involved in that tsunami... in the events of 9-11... in my cancer... in the death of that child, and on and on.'

... You may not like everything you hear this morning...but I'm not going to try to fix it up... I am supposed to get [it] accurate as the Author intended.  And Job is very clear that God is in full control of the universe, including suffering and tragedy.  And when I want to go to default and get God off the hook for suffering and tragedy, it's interesting that - in the Bible - God always puts Himself right back on the hook... He alone sends and withholds calamity... God is in full control of His universe, including suffering and tragedy.  And frankly, He's not interested in trying to get off the hook.

... God allows and appoints suffering for His own good reasons... God allows-slash-appoints tragic disasters.  These are really two sides of one coin.  Saying 'God allowed it' is too soft.  God clearly is orchestrating what is going on here [Job's tragedies]... and He ordains suffering for His own good reasons.... God is running the universe, and He knows what He's doing, even if we're absolutely confused and grieving at the moment... God ultimately allowed and orchestrated these disasters.... God doesn't want to get off the hook."  [To most people, "allows" and "orchestrates" are not the same thing.  God can allow something He doesn't preplan/orchestrate.  He can let people make their own decisions to do things He doesn't want them to do, and He can work it into His plans somehow.  This is "allows."  This is biblical.  But in Calvinism, God "allows" only what He preplans and orchestrates, exactly as it happens, even things He commands us not to do.  This contradicts the basic commonsense understanding of "allows," and so it's deceptive whenever Calvinists use the word "allows."]

... In the end, the devil is God's devil.  Satan is a puny pawn in the hand of an almighty, holy God.  And even though he thinks he's waging war, in the end he will find out he did exactly as God sovereignly decreed, under God's sovereign decree.  And that God is good and Satan is evil... Now I don't know how to put all that together [because his theology is garbage!] and it gives me a headache, but I do know that if your theology doesn't give you a headache sometimes, it's probably a product of your own creation."  [Gaslighting - trying to trick you into shutting off your alarm bells and distrusting your own judgment, into accepting something you know sounds wrong by making you feel like it's good that Calvinism's contradictory nonsense gives you a headache, doesn't make sense, and damages God's character by making Him just like Satan - because, according to Calvinists, all our confusion over Calvinism's contradictory garbage proves that it's biblically accurate.  "So don't worry about it or try to figure it out, just accept it."  Manipulative gaslighting!] 

In Calvinism, God only "permits/allows" what He first preplanned and then orchestrates and causes to happen.  So don't be fooled by a Calvinist's use of "permits/allows."  They do not mean that we make truly free-will choices to sin that God allowed to happen and will turn into something good.  No, they mean God preplanned our sins and then "permits/allows" us - orchestrates, directs, causes us - to do the sins He preplanned, and we could have never chosen anything different.  

A Calvinist's "permits/allows" is very different than a non-Calvinist's "permits/allows," very different than a proper commonsense definition of permits/allows.  Watch out for Calvinism's bad definitions of words.  That's how they get you!]

h. John Piper ("What is the will of God and how do we know it?"): "... God is sovereign over all things and yet disapproves of many things.  Which means that God disapproves of some of what he ordains to happen.  That is, he forbids some of the things he brings about.  And he commands some of the things he hinders.  Or to put it most paradoxically: God wills some events in one sense that he does not will in another sense.... That’s the first meaning of the will of God: It is God’s sovereign control of all things.  We will call this his 'sovereign will' or his 'will of decree.'  It cannot be broken.  It always comes to pass. ... For example, if you were badly abused as a child, and someone asks you, 'Do you think that was the will of God?' you now have a way to make some biblical sense out of this, and give an answer that doesn’t contradict the Bible.  You may say, 'No it was not God’s will; because he commands that humans not be abusive, but love each other. The abuse broke his commandment and therefore moved his heart with anger and grief.  But, in another sense, yes, it was God’s will (his sovereign will), because there are a hundred ways he could have stopped it.  But for reasons I don’t yet fully understand, he didn’t.'... But in fact we should not approve of sin or do it, even though it is part of God’s sovereign will."

[Do you really think God is supposed to be this confusing, this duplicitous and self-contradictory!?!]

i. From my ex-pastor's August 2015 sermon about God "ordaining" suffering: "[Some people] say that evil and suffering are the result of [free-will choices]... [But] God is in full control of every detail of the universe, including the suffering, evil, and tragedy in our lives.  ["In control of everything" (in authority over everything) is biblical, but Calvinists mean "God controls everything, even sin and evil " which is not biblical.  Very different.]  God is in full control of everything that happens to us.  And God is good and that whatever He does, He does for His own glory and for the advancement of His name among the nations... The Puritans remind us that we don't need to get God off the hook when it comes to evil and suffering...  [We] rush to get God off the hook for human suffering [by saying things like] 'Well, this is not what He really intended; this is not really Plan A.'...  And every time we do that, God puts Himself back on the hook and says, 'I am in charge, thank you, and I will run the universe as I see fit, and I don't owe you an explanation.'... Are you trusting God in the midst of your past, present, and future in whatever He has ordained and appointed for you as far as suffering, tragedy, abuse, or trials or difficulties or illness or disease or betrayal?  [Translation: "Your childhood abuse, or cancer, or rape, or divorce, or whatever, was God's Plan A for your life, for His glory and the advancement of His name.  So you'd better trust Him."  Hogwash!  Frickin' hogwash!]

... Or are you murmuring against Him?... You may get an answer someday about why you were abused or why you lost a child or why a spouse walked away.  ["You may get answer why" is another way of saying "God might tell you why He deliberately did it to you."  You know, it's one thing for God to have allowed abuse, death, divorce, etc. to happen because He allows people to make free-will choices and allows nature to run its course to a certain degree - but it's a totally different thing for God to have deliberated "ordained and appointed" these things, to have preplanned that people would do evil things to you, to children, evil things He commands people not to do but then causes people to do and then punishes them for it.  Oh, does this get my blood boiling!  Oh, the damage this does to God's character and people's faith and hearts!]

... Do you perhaps need to repent of your murmuring and the chip on your shoulder against God, and surrender today and say 'Lord, I don't understand the way You run the universe, and I don't necessarily like it, but You're God and You're good.'... Find refuge and hope in a good and holy God who says 'I have all things under My control.  Everything that's going on in your life, or has gone on in your life, or will, I know about and have ordained for you.  And you can find comfort and hope and trust Me.'"  [Brilliant manipulative-shaming!  So first he tells people that God preplanned and caused them to be abused or cheated on, and then he shames them for being upset about it, accusing them of sinning against God.]  

[That was the sermon I knew I was done with that man, that pastor, that church!  And yet we were there for four more years before we left - until his "babies go to hell" sermon, as you'll see later.  Ugh!

And though it's not in these quotes, one verse that Calvinists use to "prove" that God preplans, controls, "ordains" everything in our lives is Psalm 139:16 (NIV): "Your eyes saw my unformed body.  All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be."  It sounds very Calvinist, right?  Like God "ordained" the length of our lives, which would support Calvinism's idea that everything in our lives was preplanned by God from the beginning, right?

But now read it again in the KJV, which I think is the most accurate translation: "Thine eyes did see my substance [my body as it was being formed in the womb], yet being unperfect; and in thy book all my members were written, which in continuance were fashioned [or "what days they should be fashioned"], when as yet there was none of them."

This is very different.  It's not saying that God preplanned/ordained all the days of our lives from the beginning, but it's saying that God planned the days of how the body forms in the womb, the stages of growth of a baby, which is what the whole section is about.  This is very different, and Psalm 139:16 does not support Calvinism like Calvinists think it does.  

(You'll find this out time and time again the more you research the verses they use to support Calvinism.  Their proof-texts fall one at a time until they have nothing left to stand on.)]

j. From my ex-pastor's March 2014 sermon about finding hope in hard times: "Random evil doesn’t just happen to people.  Random loss doesn’t just occur in our lives.  God is in control of each aspect of every detail... God is sovereign over our losses… God is sovereign over those who seek to harm us.  Who of us hasn’t been harmed by somebody?... We’ve had people betray, lie, steal, vilify, slander, and do unspeakable things to us.  Some of us have undergone horrific abuse at the hands of parents or aunts or uncles or brothers.  God is sovereign over those who seek to harm us... That means, friends, that there is no such thing as random evil or random acts of tragedy... God [uses evil people in our lives] for a reason..." 

 

k. From my ex-pastor's October 2019 sermon on forgiveness: "How you handle and respond to mistreatment, when someone has hurt you, wounded you, lied about you, betrayed you, abused you... directly reflects what [you] really believe about God deep down inside... The Bible teaches that God sometimes strategically uses sinful people in our lives to refine us and humble us, to do His good work in our lives... One of the things the Puritans got really, really well was God's providence, God's sovereignty, God's authority... They understood that God sovereignly chooses to use evil people and sinful people in our lives as believers - if we know Christ - ON PURPOSE to humble us and teach us dependence on Him.  ["Using" evil people is one thing, but controlling evil people is another, and that's exactly what Calvinism teaches.]... God is orchestrating events and He's still sovereign over the process... Biblical forgiveness is an affirmation that God is good and that He has A RIGHT to use ANYBODY in our lives for His purpose, His glory, and for our good... Sometimes He will use evil, sinful people to get us where He wants to get us."  ["So your tragedies - even childhood abuse - were caused by God for His glory, for your good, and to humble you, so that you can become the person God wants you to be."  Hogwash!  And on a different note - and in light of the fact that my ex-pastor repeatedly quotes the Puritans as though they were theological experts we need to emulate - did you know that essentially every Puritan ended up dying in terror, not knowing for sure if they were truly saved or not?  See Andy Woods' sermon Neo-Calvinism vs. The Bible, starting at the 46:00 minute-mark.]

[And here's Calvinist John Piper's "brilliant" advice about how we should respond to the evil things that God "ordains" (from this article): "How can we hate what is evil if God has ordained it to happen?  You hate what God wills to happen if he wills that you hate what he wills to happen.  God might will something precisely so that you would hate it... We must be careful not to oversimplify things to where we can't hate something and be thankful for it at the same time.  You can hate something and consider it evil and yet still see it as an expression of God's will."]  

l. From my ex-pastor's September 13, 2020 sermon on God being in control: "God is in complete control of all world events... He exerts not merely a general influence but actually runs the world which He has created... whatever's going on in our lives, even if it's painful, it is being directed by an all-knowing, good and loving and wise heavenly Father, who does everything for His children out of His love... 

... Bottom line is this, how I respond to any mistreatment, how you respond to any mistreatment from anybody, righteous or unrighteous, my response shows my view of who God is...  And unless I humble myself [Translation: "Don't get upset when we tell you God did it to you on purpose"] and seek Him, I'm going to get bitter and perhaps invite further discipline, if I don't understand what He's doing.  God sometimes uses unjust people to discipline, refine, and humble His saints... 

[But] God will punish those who do the evil to us.  God will punish them.  The Bible serves us notice that no matter what God's Will might be for the decisions and choices of others and how those choices impact our lives, that in the end, all human beings are accountable for their moral choices and what they do to other people... In other words, there are times when God will seem to will things in one direction...but then it 'appears' God wills something in the exact opposite direction simultaneously.  Here we come to something that theologians throughout history call 'the two wills of God' [unbiblical!]...meaning that when God wills something on one level, He will appear to will its opposite on another level at the same exact time.  [And yet Calvinists trust a dishonest, double-minded, self-opposing god like this!?!]... Do you find it strangely comforting that God's ways are mysterious?"

m. From a Soteriology 101 post called "Frustrated by the state of the world?", non-Calvinist Fromoverhere asked: "But in Calvinism, yesterday's abortion was what God wanted or it would not have happened.  Simple question to you Calvinists: Were yesterday's abortions in your city what God wanted?"

The Calvinist Filemon responded with “The answer is Yes... Now using the negative logic, I ask you, ‘If God hadn’t wanted this abortion to happen, do you think it would ever have happened?’  And as evil as it is [Notice that he calls what Calvinism's god wanted "evil."  So what does that say about Calvinism's god?], the abortion was no more evil than the death of Jesus, which was the worst sin ever committed on earth.  And I ask you, ‘Who did plan this death and who controlled everything and everybody to fulfil His plan?’"  [God can work our self-made decisions into His plans without preplanning/causing/controlling our decisions.  Only in Calvinism does He have to control our decisions to make His plans work out.]

Rhutchin (another Calvinist) affirms Filemon: “Even Fromoverhere knows that God is always present at every abortion and has the power to stop any abortion at any time.  It is God’s choice to have the abortion continue, and because God chooses for the abortion to continue, we say that the abortion was God’s will.  Calvinists say that God made this decision before He created the world so that it was part of His decree to create.”  [A false inference Calvinists make: that because God didn't stop an evil, it means He wanted it and planned it.  It's bad theology built on their bad presuppositions and incorrect definitions of things like sovereignty, God's Will, etc.]