{"id":10769,"date":"2023-12-09T04:54:00","date_gmt":"2023-12-09T04:54:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/?p=10769"},"modified":"2026-10-02T01:32:45","modified_gmt":"2026-10-02T01:32:45","slug":"gaining-glory","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/?p=10769","title":{"rendered":"GAINING GLORY?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The Calvinist God apparently says, &#8220;I do not take pleasure in the death of the wicked (Ezekiel 33:11). However &#8230; it sure does wonders for My glory to send them to everlasting torment in hell.&#8221;\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Among the many philosophical weaknesses of Calvinistic theology, the question of God&#8217;s motives for &#8220;passing over&#8221; the reprobates ranks pretty high in indefensibleness.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">In the midst of explaining the doctrine of unconditional election, the Calvinist has to anticipate the question, &#8220;Well, if it glorifies God to save some people, why not go all the way and save everybody?&#8221;<\/p>\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">I have only ever heard four responses from Calvinist teachers and not one holds water:<\/p>\n\n\n<ol class=\"wp-block-list\">\n\n<li>\u00a0That some are saved demonstrates God&#8217;s mercy. That most are damned, his justice.<\/li>\n\n\n<li>\u00a0God gains glory by saving some but He also gains glory in damning some.\u00a0<\/li>\n\n\n<li>\u00a0&#8220;Who are you, o man, to question God?&#8221;<\/li>\n\n\n<li>\u00a0Since humans are such vile, sinful creatures, what&#8217;s really amazing is that He chooses to save any at all!<\/li>\n\n<\/ol>\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Only a fellow ideologue imagines any of those to be valid and legitimate defenses of the Calvinist position.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Calvinist God apparently says, &#8220;I do not take pleasure in the death of the wicked (Ezekiel 33:11). However &#8230; it sure does wonders for My glory to send them to everlasting torment in hell.&#8221;\u00a0 Among the many philosophical weaknesses of Calvinistic theology, the question of God&#8217;s motives for &#8220;passing over&#8221; the reprobates ranks pretty [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10769","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10769","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=10769"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10769\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10770,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10769\/revisions\/10770"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=10769"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=10769"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=10769"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}