How should we view people who believe in Calvinism? Yeah, you know, that's a great question. And it's something that in many ways is one of the most important conclusions that we can take away from all this. So I'll say a couple things. So because of Calvinism's basic stance on who God is, and we talked a lot about that in the course that the portrayal of God is one that I think any notion of justice or righteousness is difficult to square the God of the Bible with the God of Calvinism there.
I would say and I recognize this is a strong statement to make, but that the Calvinist view of God is if not outright blasphemy is awful close to it where you are making statements about God. We talked about this in the course. It's the idea from Roger Olson that what's the difference between God and Satan in Calvinism? In some sense, God is even worse than Satan because Satan doesn't create humans, whereas God does.
And in Calvinism, God is creating all these humans and then electing before the foundation of the world that the majority of his humans that he's made are damned eternally to hell. He foreordains it. He renders it. And so yeah, so we have this god who is morally, I think, absolutely horrific in Calvinism. And so in the same way that I would look at someone who doesn't believe in the Trinity or I mean, I think this is even worse, maybe, who just has such a defective view of God.
We ought to be reasoning with them and saying like, hey, consider what you're believing here. Consider what you are lifting up. And with all of the talk of God's glory, with all of the talk of us wanting to lift up God's glory, which I would certainly agree with, why would we then completely counteract that with these depictions of God that are so contrary to, I would say, both the Bible and then any reasonable sense of what justice and goodness look like.
And so I think there is a just cause to plead with them on that basis. The other thing I'll say is the P and perseverance of the saints. So a lot of people when they hear Calvinism, they think, oh, it's just so theoretical and theological and unconditional election and limited atonement. I don't get it all. But when you think about the P, the perseverance of the saints, that's probably the most practical of all the five, right?
And it's the one that you can forget about all the complex theology about and just answer the question, what does the Bible teach on this? And there's a I don't know if there's some way we can share it, but I was I had shared it this morning with Bryant that there's a great document that I originally got from Scroll Publishing where I modified a little bit, but it's a list of 86 passages and verses from the Bible that all affirm conditional salvation. So it's things like the parable of the vine.
So you know if you stay in the vine and you are fruitful, then you'll stay. If you're not, then you'll be cut off. The olive tree and the natural branches, the unnatural branches, Paul obviously says the unnatural will be cut off. The parable of the man who is forgiven a great debt like millions of dollars and he goes and chokes someone who owes him a few pennies or a few dollars and he's thrown back into prison and 1 Corinthians 10, I mean, there's so many places in the Bible where this is affirmed.
I always like to point this out that as far as I can tell, and I'm open here to revision, but Augustine did not believe in perseverance of the saints. The Lutherans didn't believe in perseverance of the saints. It's such a peculiar teaching that it took 1,500 years for anybody to find this. And even then their fellow reformed compatriots didn't go along with it. So it's so biblically outlandish. And so again, to have a view that is so contrary to plain, easy passages of scripture.
It's hard to just say, oh, that's fine. So I in general take the posture of trying to have conversations and say, don't believe this. Consider coming back into the fold of the true historic faith, the true faith that's been once for all delivered to the saints. And in doing that, I believe God will bless you because you're upholding his honor. You are promoting a system that the biblical system that is much more glorifying to him.
And then frankly, I think once you get into this Calvinist mentality where the way that they read passages, it is very rare that you will ever find a Calvinist who strongly affirms things like non-resistance, separation from the world, not swearing oaths, you know, some of the bread and butter teachings. And again, you think like, how is this possible that you miss all those things despite the very strong biblical emphasis?
But I think it's because there's such allegiance to this system that's been imposed onto the Bible that they're able to then take other passages that similarly don't align with their system. And so there's a lot at stake in this because you have at the root of it, you have this pre-commitment to a system, to this man-made, relatively late system over and against the simple, luminous, beautiful words of Jesus and his apostles there. And I don't like that setup.
Now, I'm not saying that every last Calvinist is lost or anything like that by no means. But it's a dangerous place to be. And I think I would urge those who can to have dialogue. And I think something like watching these lectures, reading some of the books that we referred to in the course, I think that would be an excellent thing to do just to raise awareness.
And I'll tell you right now, there's just such a lack of even knowledge of the counter, knowing that there's another well-thought-out articulate view on the other side. And when, in fact, I've been having conversations with two young men, very smart young men, both in their 20s, both Harvard graduate students. They had not read and experienced the other side. And I've been getting emails over the last couple of weeks with these light bulbs like, wow, like, I didn't know about this. Who are these people?
Who are these authors? And these views make so much sense. And so I think it's an enterprise that's well worth it. And hopefully that will be the beginning of a journey of that individual to experience a whole new depth to their Christian walk that involves a lot more just simple reading of Scripture that I think they will find incredibly refreshing. That's really great. I appreciate that.
And I think the thing that I've noticed, and I'm not real well versed in the principles of Calvinism and the roots of it and where it all came from. But it seems like the strong idea and desire to engage in the sovereignty of God has unfortunately blinded what God is actually saying. And that's unfortunate because they're very counter to each other. And what seems good ends up being the worst thing possible. Yeah. It's very, very sad.
And looking at that as an opportunity to engage with those on the other side of this debate and a healthy discussion. I really appreciate that.
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