No, no universalism here RK. And I wasn't trying to put down our TULIP brethren Joe. I reckon I was referring to limited atonement being also a limitation, in my opinion, to Gods Grace and God's calling. So again the question, are there limitations to God's Grace. I mean after all, the Savior did say who-so-ever didn't he? No debate RK. I Promise... Just a little reasoning session with this feeble old preacher.
I agree with you on that, along with other subject matters that nobody can actually prove, that always devolve to needle threading (academic or not) of some sort in the end, or worse, clobber matches. Seen it, hate it, won't participate in it. Because no.
I didn't take it as an insult, brother. Yes, he did say whosoever. I don't want to sidetrack your thread down a road on that discussion. Nor would I wish to sidetrack with a limited atonement discussion. But all theologies except universalism have some sort of limit on atonement.
Not all Joe I don't believe. But maybe give me a few examples of what you believe our Baptist brethren have on the subject.
Arminians would say grace is limited (although offered to all) by the response to it. Calvinists would say grace is limited by being offered to the elect only. Only universalists would say that grace is without any limits. I'm with the Trusty one here.
It's fine. Calm down. There there. Shhhh. (PS for the record, while I do hope for ultimate reconciliation and believe we have plenty of biblical encouragement to do so, I just don't think we have liberty to pronounce people's eternal destinies upon their heads, one way or another ... so I'm more of a Barthian in that regard ... I blame Kierkegaard, he got me back on Barth, although from there I'm now venturing into Moltmann also; ha. )
But he hurt my wittle feelwings. When I was 11, my mom took us to a very large Baptist church in Atlanta. Charles Stanley was the pastor. We seldom made it to Sunday School however. That's because my mom had a talent for constantly being fashionably late. The day I did make it to SS, the teacher was talking about salvation. I did pay close attention because as a new convert, I wanted to learn all I could. The problem was that this teacher was a universalist. Not sure that Brother Stanley even had a clue what she was teaching us, but even at that ripe young age, hearing her teach this, turned my stomach in flip flops and went against the truth I'd already learned from the scriptures. Tried to tell mom what this lady was trying to get us to believe, but mom just wouldn't accept that such a thing was being taught there. Not really a point there... Just thought I'd share that one. It really made an impression on me.
It's also fodder for another thread Joe. Most of the early churches didn't believe that a congregation should get so large that the pastor couldn't know and work with the congregation personally. They would help start a new work. Shoot, I never got to meet brother Stanley because of the size of the congregation. Neither did we get to sit in the main sanctuary. Had to watch the sermon on a monitor in one of the classrooms. Told mom we just needed to go home and watch it on TV. Got a smack over that one...
No, but it can be rejected (per the obedience / disobedience paradigm). I also don't care for the debate as each side has its concerns e.g. 'you believe grace can be rejected?!' vs 'you believe God only chooses to save some people (i.e. distributes his unlimited grace in a limited sense)?!'. These questions allowing, of course, for the supposed different kinds of grace. Also, forum discussions on broadly 'Arminianism vs Calvinist' tend to be worst in class.