Debate: Calvinism is Useless and Dangerous

Opening Banter and Debate Setup

Welcome to Apologetics Live. We're here to answer your questions and challenges about God and the Bible. Meet your hosts from Striving for Eternity Ministries, Andrew Rappaport, Dr. Anthony Silvestro, and Pastor Justin Pierce.

We are live, Apologetics Live, here to answer your questions, challenges, anything you have about God and the Bible, that is what this show is for. However, this week, we're not going to be having so many people come in for participation.

We're going to be doing this as a formal debate. So this will be a little bit different. We sometimes use this platform to do formal debates. It'll be a timed debate. I'll bring the moderator in, none other than Mr. or Pastor Justin.

So, welcome. So what we're going to do, I'm going to bring in, I'm going to try to pronounce his name. Why is he at a black screen? Hold on. Oh, where'd he go? Oh boy, it dropped out. Dr. Silvestro. Dr. Silvestro is actually sitting, look, here, wait, look.

Where's his camera? There's my hand. What's that stuff.

On his face? He's right there. Yes. What is that on his face? It is stuff that Julie does not like. Don't worry, my wife decided she doesn't like it either, so it's going. Ray.

Just disappeared. I hope that, I'll remove Anthony here. So yeah, I don't know what happened to our, so I guess we'll have to wait till he comes back in. Kind of hard to do a debate if he wasn't, so I don't know what happened.

So what we try to do is we, this show, Apologetics Live is a weekly show where we are here to answer any questions you have about God and the Bible. We usually have a topic. You can always go to apologeticslive .com to be able to see the show or to join in and participate.

You just go to the, I want a refund from Facebook.

Users. Facebook users are going to get a refund tomorrow in the mail. You can also.

Go to apologeticslive .com and get the instructions on how on Facebook to share your name with StreamYard so that we can see your name show up, you know, like D .A. Chan did where he, we can see his name.

So, and we now know who, and this is the same Facebook user, Kofi, who hasn't, you know, after so many weeks, months, he still hasn't figured it out. But this, this one's not Kofi because Kofi's not in the Philippines.

Says, hi, I'm watching from the Philippines. So here's the thing. We're waiting for Ray to get back in. We don't know what happened there, but we do try to use, have formal debates here. I'm looking to see if he's messaging me or anything.

No, Darryl, Darryl from the Philippines. Yeah, let's put that up there. Hello, Darryl. How are you doing brother? Okay. So the topic of debate, I'm going to try to answer some of this stuff while we wait for Ray to get back in here.

He was just in here and then his screen went blank and then he disappeared. So maybe his computer crashed and we're waiting for a reboot. So the topic of the debate is going to be Calvinism is useless and dangerous.

This was the topic that Ray had chosen. Ray is from the Philippines and was challenging. The way this came about was that I guess he was challenging any Calvinist pastors. I guess he was saying that there's no Calvinist pastors that could debate him.

Someone tagged myself and James White, a couple other people, and James and I both responded. I'll get to what his response was later on in the program. And so, you know, we might as well read that comment from D .A. Chan there.

Okay. Let's see what we got here. So D .A. Chan says, watching from the Philippines, although my concern is that R .A. Futez, I don't remember how to pronounce it, will just use this debate as a pad to pad his resume and make people think he's a credible debater because he has to quote unquote, quote unquote, debated professional debaters.

Okay. Well, that is an option. You know, honesty, though, it doesn't show up. That's true. But, you know, and then also honesty in the details, you know, comes from video and audio tape. So he can say what he wants, but we have it on the video.

And we don't cut out and edit videos to make ourselves look better or worse. We're just as good or bad as we can be, right?

Okay. So I see he is typing or he was typing something on Facebook. So I'm waiting to see what happens. So it's Fuentes. Yeah. That's why I'm going to call him Ray. That's a good idea. He said connection.

So he contacted me on Facebook, said connection was lost. I'm going to call him back in. Okay. So sorry, folks, that this is a slight delay. Someone is asking for a link to watch live. Okay. Okay. So.

So there. So if you want a link to share, you can share it. The Apologetics live .com. That's the link you can share for people to watch from there. They watch can watch the YouTube version. Now, I will say the reason to go to that site is because we are going to be moving away from YouTube soon.

We're going to be moving to Odyssey. And so you will want to you'll want to be aware of that because we are going to eventually probably be kicked off YouTube before it looks like.

We have Kofi. Well, it could be him or it could be a hijacked account. You know, you never can trust that. You may want to just delete that and block it. So here's here's.

The thing that why don't you go over, Justin, why don't you go over the way that when Ray gets back in here, how we're going to conduct the debate. So that way, at least we won't.

Have to go over that again. Okay. So we've talked about it. Both parties have agreed that we're going to have an opening statement for each 10 minutes each. Then there'll be a rebuttal time, 15 minutes each, and then they'll start in the cross examinations, 20 minutes each cross examination, one minute question and two minute response.

And what that basically is going to detail is this for the person asking the question, you have one minute to ask the question, not make a statement. This isn't glory time. This is a and two minutes to respond.

You need to answer the question that's given any way you want to answer it. Just make sure that it stays within the question area, the genre of the question. And and we're going to go back and forth. If you decide you don't want to answer the question and want to go somewhere else with it, we'll stop the debate.

We'll start the time back over again for the question to be asked until it is answered. We're not going to go further and just let it be like a glory show. They're going to be the cross examinations, two 10 minute rounds.

And then when we get finished with that, we'll have a closing 10 minutes each. And just for everybody to know, if you have questions from the audience, type them in here as they go. And I will try to get them typed up myself.

And we'll go through those as best we can at the end. And so that's the way we're going to format this.

Okay. So Benson is saying, I probably won't go to work for this. Kidding. No, you should go to work. This is recorded. We also have someone asking, which gentleman is Andrew Rappaport? It's the one that says Andrew Rappaport right there.

But then there's the guy that's handsome and he's right here. What's his name? Justin. Oh,.

That's him. Look at him. That scared him. That scared him. He didn't know he was coming up on camera. He put himself on camera when you said the handsome one, but you know, he's learning humility. It comes with a beard.

Yeah. So yeah, this is where we're still waiting for him to connect. He was here, folks. So we know that he was able to connect. We were able to hear him. And so it's going to be hard since he is the one that's going to start the debate, since he's taking the pro position.

We kind of need him here to start the openings. So yeah, I should turn this on here. That way you can see my prettier face. See? So now I'm in the light. All right. We have some people that are asking where he is.

Uh, that's a good question right now. Um, we are prepared in case I told him this debate was happening one way or the other. Um, so in case he didn't show, we are prepared.

With the empty chair. And in his defense, he didn't show up at the beginning. Well,.

Before, before the beginning, before the beginning. So, so he was here, uh, and for folks who don't get the humor of the empty chair, uh, I'll give that while we wait for him to get. I had been for a year and a half had black Hebrew Israelites.

If you don't know what they're about, um, you can go to our YouTube channel, striving for eternity, check out some of the shows that we've done about them. You can actually see the two debates I did. We had some guys that actually backed out of a debate.

Uh, we, we actually had several debates set up and they brought it all back out over a year and a half. Well, we had three guys. It was going to be three against one, three black Hebrew Israelites and me, and they, they blocked us.

So we couldn't tell them the link to join. And so what, uh, Tom, the moderator did was I said, Hey, let's just do it. Anyway, we ended up doing the debate. I did the opening and I just told the moderator, Tom, hey, just introduce, uh, let the, our guests introduce himself when it comes time.

And so when it came that time, I brought up the empty chair for me to debate. So he said, well, we'll let our guests introduce himself. And there he was the empty chair, which did get a couple of good laughs.

But really what was good about that was it actually got someone to actually debate me. And so we did that debate. Uh, and you know, one way of knowing that, uh, you've kind of won a debate is when everybody that agrees with that person's position, in this case, black Hebrew Israelites, um, they ended up contacting me saying that guy didn't do a good job.

I can debate you. And we're like, okay, Thursday nights come in and no one has come since.

So, um, yeah. So here, here comes a question or maybe a statement, uh, DHN again, he says, I truly hope that my dear fellow Calvinists won't stoop to the level of ad homs, and that'd be ad hominem. Uh, Andrew, what's an ad hominem?

Well, an ad hominem is a logical fallacy when you discredit a person's argument by attacking the person. So it's when you make a, a personal attack of someone, for example, um, you have someone you're, you're making a argument.

In this case, it would be something like, you know, that Calvinism is, is dangerous if, if he was to say, well, Calvinism is dangerous because it teaches that, uh, everything is determined. I'm hoping that's not going to be his argument, but that everything is determined by God and we have no choice if that's going to be his argument.

And I was to turn around and say something like, well, that's just because you're not intelligent enough to understand it. What am I doing? I'm discrediting the argument being made by attacking the person.

Um, and at this point, I'm going to ask him if he's coming back in.

Yeah. And so, uh, DA, just, just so you know, we don't operate that way. Um, number one, uh, despite the Calvinist, uh, question, it's not Christian. Um, uh, that's the most important issue. Would Christ want us to behave in such an unbecoming manner?

And the answer is no, we don't, uh, we don't go out and attack people and try to try to, uh, disabuse them of their names and their reputation just by going after people in that, that context. What we want to do is we want to use, uh, the, the grammar, the history.

We want to use the con the context of the word of God. We want to use the writings and let the authorial intent take place. Uh, when it comes to Calvinism and the debate there, it's going to be based upon the scripture.

Um, and we will talk about the history of, of Calvinism and, and where it comes from the Armenian side as well. Um, so that's, that's just where we stand. And so I hope that settles,.

Settles that question. And, um, if there's any more. Yeah. I mean, sorry, folks, for the folks who, who came in at this point, um, the person I was supposed to be debating Ray was here, uh, in the pre-show, uh, for about five minutes or so.

And, um, then as soon as we went live, uh, he disappeared. He said he is, his connection was lost and he's going, coming back in, but that.

Was some time ago. Yeah. So, so just so everybody can have a real good example of an ad hominem. Um, if I was to say something like, like drew Bonita is, um, he's always wrong because well, he's ugly.

That would be a, that would be an ad hominem. You know, it's like, it's like, I'm not really appealing to, to anything. And I'm telling the truth, but I'm just kidding.

Yeah. And Andrew was saying there that the comment you put up, you put the comment up,.

But you never read it. Oh, sorry. I've never heard Andrew use an ad hominem. I use them all the time against drew, but he's a great brother. He's so, no, I'm just kidding. Oh, so Brett's.

Asking, where's the beef? That's, that's, that's okay. Uh, so for those in the Philippines, they won't get that. That's from a commercial in the, what, the nineties, um, Wendy's commercial. Um, so, all right, why don't we do this?

Uh, because I don't, you know, we're, we're 15 minutes in. Um, and so, uh, why don't I, we'll at least give some updates on some stuff, uh, ministry wise and a projects live wise waiting. We'll give them a couple more minutes and then assume that, uh, we're going to do this debate without them, but, uh, the, um, and so, uh, some people are putting comments in Philippine, so I can't read that.

Sorry. Um, it might be good to, uh, for folks from the Philippines, if you have comments to put them in English, especially if you're asking questions. Um, so here comes, here comes someone. Let's see if this is.

Ray. Is that you? Oh, it's me pastor. Uh, Andrew, uh, after Nilo from Emos committee. How are you doing pastor? Yeah. I was monitoring your progress about the debate, but, uh, it seems I, I was contacting Ray, uh, what's, what's happening and, uh, he hasn't answered yet.

Okay. Okay. So we'll wait for him. I will also, I will try to get, get in touch with.

Him. Okay. Thank you. Good. Thanks. And, uh, if you stay in here, since you're in here, there's a private chat, I'll put you in backstage and you can still communicate with us through private chat if you hear anything.

All right. And then let's see, we have, uh, equipping the saints.

How are you, sir? We can't hear you now. Uh,. Hey, uh, Andrew, while we're waiting, I wanted to ask you a question. I've been trying to think through.

Introduce yourself for folks who don't know who you are.

I'm sorry. I'm Rob Barnhart. I have the resident confessional Lutheran that every once in a while pops in and that bothers Andrew.

For folks who don't know you, you've also been, we've had, usually I'm moderating the debates on this channel, not always doing them, but you, I moderated two debates, I think with you and,.

Uh, Ken cook. Right. Did you do two or was it one? It did one for me. Uh, two other for maybe a different Lutheran guy. Yeah. I believe Evan Fisk, if I can't remember. Uh, so I wanted to have a, I wanted to ask you a question about predestination and election, uh, and a predestination for knowledge.

Do you, I know that you would probably say that they're linked, but would you say that they're the same thing?

Hmm. Theologically? No. Um, and I see Ray coming in, but I'm going to wait until this camera comes up and we'll bring them back back in. Uh, theologically they're, they're addressing kind of two different, two different things.

Some might see it as, as, you know, two sides of the same coin. They, they do have some interplay, but I would argue, and I'll make this case when, when we get into the debate, I, I make the argument that when we talk about things like predestination and election, those are terminology that we use or that God uses for things we can't comprehend.

And so God, we always have to remember God is outside of time and God is omniscient being omniscient. He knows all things. It's not that he has to observe something happening to know what's going to happen.

He knows it. And because he's eternal, he's outside of time. These things will, you know, are all in, if we could think about it, the same eternal now for God and being such, I think that as we examine that the reality is that we're, God's going to speak in a language that we can comprehend things like saying we're elect before the foundation of time.

I refer to that as being of baby talk, God speaking down to us to try to explain what we can never really comprehend. I mean, the main point of that is not to explain a chronological events, but to say you had nothing to do with your salvation.

All right. Can I ask you one more question before you have your guest?

Yeah, I'm waiting for his camera to come up. It looks like I'll add him screen. That's what.

We're seeing. I just wanted to ask you, if you think that the eternal decree as the Calvinists understand it, is necessary for God to have foreknowledge. Is the eternal decree necessary.

For God to have foreknowledge? Well, foreknowledge, the way we think of foreknowledge is to know beforehand, right? And that's a human thinking. God, in a sense, doesn't have foreknowledge the way we often think about it, right?

Because he has omniscience. He has a complete knowledge, and it's not based upon what we do. He doesn't have to observe it, if that makes sense. Now, when it comes to his decree, we get into a whole thing there of, is he forcing things,.

Or is it just that he knows what's going to happen? No, no, no. I'm just trying to think through our confessions on election, in conjunction with the Calvinists, and trying to figure out how to Well, since Ray's here, why don't we

Separate the two, and see what the distinctions are.

Yeah, why don't we try to pick that up next week on Apologetics Live? Sure. Ray, is your microphone.

Working there? Yes, I think. Sorry for that.

All right. A slight delay, about a 20-minute delay, but we will get started. Yeah, no problem. Are you ready? Yes, I'm ready here. Okay. I'll start the clock on my side, and you can start the clock.

Okay, ready? Are you ready to start the clock? Andrew, are you ready? Yes. Okay, three, two, one, start.

Ray, you start with your opening. All right, so my opening statement, right? Okay. All right. Good morning, and good night. I mean, good evening, everyone, and good morning here in the Philippines. Thank you for the opportunity that we can discuss here in this format, StrivingForEternity .org, and thank you for inviting me and for taking up the challenge, Dr. Rapaport, and how they pronounce it.

I'm sorry if I pronounce it incorrectly. Now, I do apologize, first of all, for the theme or the proposition that I made. It might sound offensive, but that's the only way that I can make up the theme or the proposition for this debate tonight, and first of all, I would like also to put some scope of limitation.

When I say that Calvinism is useless and dangerous, I'm talking about the soteriology of the reform. That would be the TULIP, right? T stands for Total Depravity and U, Unconditional Election, Limited Atonement, Irresistible Grace, and also the Perseverance of the Saints.

So that is what I meant of Calvinism. So the proposition here is that Calvinism is useless and dangerous. That is my proposition for this debate. So first off, the useless side. Now, I think if I were a Calvinist, or if we are going to embrace Calvinism, the TULIP, I think it's useless, first of all, in the area of evangelism.

So in the area of evangelism, to the unsaved or to the unbelievers, I think it is useless because as far as I know, at least from my friends, Calvinist friends, they said to me that Calvinism is meat for unbelievers.

They cannot understand it. So they don't have to know it. First, my Calvinist friends, they go out there doing evangelism, presenting the gospel. You don't want to go out there and present the TULIP to the unbelievers.

So I think that in that sense, Calvinism is useless to the unbelievers. If I were a Calvinist, I think I have to share straightly the gospel and you're going to present the gospel to them, but they don't have to know Calvinism or the TULIP.

So in that sense, it's useless. Now, after that, presenting the gospel to the unbelievers, and then if they are going to believe and receive that gospel, put their trust in the Lord Jesus Christ, then they will be baptized.

And after that, they will be added into the local church. Now, after that, we are going to disciple them. If we're going to disciple them, we're going to teach them as what the Bible says in Matthew 28, verse 19 and 20.

It says there, go ye into all the worlds, or teach all nations, baptizing them, the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you. And lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world.

So the believers, I mean, the newly saved person or the newly professed believers, we're going to teach them the way of Christ and the commandments of Christ, to do giving and evangelism, do missions, and everything that you can do.

By the way, when I say we can do as believers, I'm not saying that we are doing it on ourselves. We believe that in the Philippians chapter 2, verse number 13, that it is God which worketh in us, both to will and to do of His good pleasure.

So I'm not saying, just don't misunderstand me when I say that those things that we're going to do in order for us to serve the Lord Jesus Christ. So we have a saying that we are saved to serve. So when we are going to teach as a young pastor, I will be teaching these newly baptized, saved and baptized believers or professed Christians, we are going to teach them the way of Christ and the commandments of Christ and to do things that are pleasing in the sight of God.

And you don't have to tell, you don't have to know Calvinism in order for you to do this, in order for you to serve the Lord Jesus Christ, the King of Kings, Lord of Lords, in order for you to do missions, in order for you to give everything you can give to support the ministry and to sing in the choir and everything, all of that stuff that we're doing, you don't have to know Calvinism.

So it's still useless for we as non-Calvinists, we don't have to be a Calvinist in order for us to do these things that we are doing right now. And I believe also that Calvinists also are doing like evangelism, do missions and everything that they're doing for the glory of God, for their service to the Lord Jesus Christ.

What you're doing now is we are also doing it on our side as a non-Calvinist. So Calvinism really is useless to the unbelievers and also here in our camp, like the non-Calvinists in our camp. We don't have to know it.

We don't have to embrace Calvinism in order for us to serve our Lord Jesus Christ. And we can do those things that you're doing as Calvinists are doing. And we also as non-Calvinists, we are also doing what we can in order for us to serve better the Lord Jesus Christ till he comes.

So everything that we're doing, we can do it even as a non-Calvinist. So that is useless in that sense. Now let's go to the danger because that is my theme. The danger of Calvinism, if we're going to embrace Calvinism, Calvinism, first of all, makes Christians liars in evangelism.

Why does I say so? Calvinism makes Christians liars. Why? In Article 5 here, there's a link here on my presentation, but I cannot share it right now. But there is a link here, Article 5, there in Canons of Dort number 2.

I have the link here if you want the link because that is taken this online. So it says here, Article 5, the mandate to proclaim the gospel to all, moreover, and I quote, quote, unquote, moreover, it is the promise of the gospel that whosoever believes in Christ crucified shall not perish, but have eternal life.

This promise together with the command to repent and believe ought to be announced and declared without differentiation or discrimination to all nations and people to whom God in his good pleasure sends the gospel.

So they believe, Calvinism also believes, believe that the proclamation of the gospel is for all. It says here there's no discrimination and differentiation. So in Article 8, also the saving effectiveness of Christ's death, for it was the entirely, quote, for it was the entirely free plan and very gracious will and intention of God, the Father, that the enlightening and saving effectiveness of his son's costly death should work itself out in all the elect.

It says there, in order that God might grant justifying faith to them only and their lead them without fail to salvation. So did you catch that? The evangelism is for all, no discrimination, no differentiation, but the effectiveness of that is in all the elect, just only to the elect, and God might grant justifying faith to them only.

So that makes Christians liars in evangelism because when you go out there, you don't know who are the elect, you don't know who are the non-elect, and you're going to use John 3, 16, for God to love the world.

And then maybe you are going to use, because in evangelism, I'm using, of course, I need to use how that God demonstrate his love. So I'm going to use Romans chapter 8, verse number 5, verse number 8, that you're going to say to them that Christ died for you.

But if that is non-elect, I believe that you believe also that you've been doing evangelism that you cannot avoid to share the gospel to the non-elect. And you're going to say to them that God loves you and Christ died for you, but that is not so in Calvinism because God only loved the elect, and he also loved, I mean, he will, Christ died for only that salvation is for the elect, only for the elect.

So that makes us a liar if we're going to embrace that. And also, yes, in article 9, the fulfillment of God's plan, also the call.

Okay, Ray, we've about 30 seconds over. We will go ahead and start. Good job. Thank you. Okay. All right. So let's try to stick to our time. So everybody has a fair chance to go back and forth. It would be Andrew's time.

We're going to start at 10 minutes and let me see if I can pull this up. I think it pulls up, doesn't it, Andrew? Well, anyway, there it is. We'll start it and then we'll, I'll let you have your, are you ready, Andrew?

You're muted. I think you are. There we go. Sorry. It helps if I unmute. Here we go. You ready? Yep.

All right. So the topic today is Calvinism is useless and dangerous. I appreciate Ray coming on. The thing about this is when we talk about something being useless or dangerous, obviously some would say that if it's dangerous, it's therefore going to be useless.

But when we say something is useless, it means it has no use. One of the things I believe we're going to see when we get to the cross-examination is the fact that I don't believe that Ray knows what Calvinism is.

I know he, in our exchanges that we had in pre-debate, I was trying to get definitions. So we do not misrepresent each other's side so that we could be, not waste your time as a audience who are watching and listening.

Now with that, I got the definition that you guys heard, which is TULIP and then what the acronym stands for. So what is Calvinism? Well, in a high level, let's start with the fact that Calvinism is the understanding that God is the one who has saved us, that we have, for those of us who know Christ, that God did all of the work.

It was not our choosing, but God's choosing. In other words, God did a hundred percent of the work. If we do any of it, if we add to any of it, the idea then is the fact that we have saved ourselves. So at a high level, that is what Calvinism would be.

It is a focus on the sovereignty of God. Now I will tell you that I would much rather stand before God and claim that God is greater than he is than to stand before God and say that man is greater than he is.

It is a much safer position to put more trust in God's sovereignty than human sovereignty. Therefore, to call it useless, and even worse to call it dangerous, is just plain wrong. The fact is that what you will see often with people that argue strongly against Calvinism is they don't understand it.

One, they usually will give a misrepresentation of it. The other thing that we have to recognize is that what many people do is try to explain what cannot be fully comprehended by human beings. God works through us in such a way that the choices we make are as exactly as God intended them to be.

We know that in other areas of doctrine. When we look at the doctrine of inspiration, who wrote the book of Romans? Some of you will say Paul. And if I ask it again, you'll realize what I'm asking and say, no, no, no, it was actually God, right?

God, the Holy wrote scripture through the human authors in such a way that God gets 100 of the credit. Man can take no credit. He did actually write it. Paul chose in his style different than John's or Peter's.

They had their own style. They chose what they wrote, but God inspired it, meaning that God gets 100 of the credit. Now, that's the same thing we see when we talk about sanctification. Who does good works as a believer?

Well, we can't take credit for doing good works. Those good works are something God does through us. Even though we choose to do good works, those good works are exactly as God intended them to be. God gets 100 of the credit.

Well, that is the same thing when we talk of what Calvinism is. It is the belief that God works through us so that he gets 100 of the credit. Now, I would argue that what Calvinism teaches when we look through this is going to be, it teaches that human beings are sinful beings, that we cannot, in and of ourselves, we cannot choose God, that we need God to do something within us.

And so, God needs to do the first work. Now, he starts it before he regenerates us in convicting the unbeliever. So, we'll see that. Now, what you end up seeing in this is you see that this is what most people have the problem with.

They want to rationalize something that, in our finite minds, we cannot understand the infinite. And so, this is an issue that we're going to have to wrestle with tonight. But what you end up seeing is Calvinism, or at least the teachings of Calvinism, that people are sinful, that we can't save ourselves, that we need God to do the work to save us.

That is the gospel. So, my opponent is right, and this is really more of the rebuttal. He's right when he says, you don't need to understand Calvinism to become a Christian. You don't need Calvinism to be able to serve God.

Those things are true. And for those of you who know my background growing up Jewish, you know that I didn't understand anything about the Trinity when I got saved. I didn't need to know the Trinity. I did need to know Jesus is God.

So, I had to understand the teaching of the Trinity, even if I didn't know the definition, even if I didn't know all the details of it. But I had to know Jesus is God in order to be saved. So, what you end up seeing is when he says, well, if we say, well, it's something we don't need.

Well, if we don't need to know that God is sovereign, that he's the one that saves us, then we can't be saved. So, it's not useless. It's necessary. It is necessary to understand the points that Calvinism was teaching in order to be saved.

Now, does this mean you must be a Calvinist to be saved? No, I'm not saying that. Because many people who don't understand Calvinism, it hasn't been taught, they don't have a wrong definition. But what you end up seeing is those who are regenerate understand the teachings that Calvinism is trying to teach, whether you believe in the arguments of the tulip or whatnot.

Now, one of the things that I'm hoping that we can get to is discussing what Calvinism actually is and go through this. What we end up seeing as we look at Scripture, here's the one verse that you have to deal with.

Because the real issue is, who is the one who believes? Does God choose us or do we choose God? That is the discussion. To say that it is useless, well, if Scripture says that God chose us first, then Calvinism would be necessary, at least the teachings of Calvinism.

If you don't understand Calvinism itself and the teachings, here's a verse for you, Philippians 1 .29. Philippians 1 .29 says this, for to you it has been granted for Christ's sake, not only to believe in him, but also to suffer for his sake.

Well, that's a real problem for someone who thinks that Calvinism is useless, because it says there that God grants us our belief. Well, if God is the one to grant us our belief, then we cannot turn around and say, we don't need it.

We don't have that belief unless God first grants that to us. So, the whole discussion that we're going to end up having here, I'm sure, will be on this issue of who believes. Now, if you were to ask me experientially, did I believe in Christ?

Yes, my experience said that I experienced me believing in Christ. Theologically, though, as we just saw in Scripture, God granted me that belief. In other words, God worked through me so that my choice to believe was exactly as God intended it, so that God gets 100 of the credit.

So, therefore, experientially, I believed in Christ. Theologically, Christ chose me. So, you can say both chose in one sense, because God was working through us so that, yes, we did choose, but we can't claim the credit.