Since we have run a few posts on compatibilism in the past couple weeks, I thought I would draw your attention to an excellent full article we recently added on free will and determinism: Robert Hamilton, "Philosophical Reflections on Free Will"

19 By this we shall know that we are of the truth and reassure our heart before him; 20 for whenever our heart condemns us, God is greater than our heart, and he knows everything. 21 Beloved, if our heart does not condemn us, we have confidence before God; 22 and whatever we ask we receive from him, because we keep his commandments and do what pleases him.

This is a passage talking about assurance. Now we who have been involved in the C/A debate know about assurance. Calvinists often say that they are assured of their salvation because they have been predestined before the foundation of the world, and know that they cannot loose what they have been given.

Monergism.com admitted, "It should be noted that this position [that of Compatibilism] is no less deterministic than hard determinism ~ be clear that neither soft nor hard determinism believes man has a free will." So, the Arminian is not misrepresenting the view of Compatibilists in admitting the same.

For the Compatibilist, the major contention for a libertarian view of human freedom is reduced to a matter of genuine choices. If God foreknew what a person would choose (and we are not speaking of choosing Christ at this point), and only what God foreknows is actually going to happen, then how can one admit that the human being has any real choices? What happens, happens necessarily.

Please click on the attachment to view Robert Hamilton, "Philosophical Reflections on Free Will".

It is no secret that the majority of Arminians hold to what is known as libertarian free will. We believe in such a thing because we see evidence for it throughout the Bible. God gives men and women options from which to choose and calls for them to choose wisely. Many times rewards and punishments, respectively, are distributed according to the choice one makes.

According to the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, "Compatibilism offers a solution to the free will problem." The Arminian, however, is unaware of any problem. But I digress. "This philosophical problem concerns a disputed incompatibility between free will and determinism. Compatibilism is the thesis that free will is compatible with determinism. Because free will is taken to be a necessary condition of moral responsibility, compatibilism is sometimes expressed in terms of a compatibility between moral responsibility and determinism."

This was originally a blog post, comments may be posted HERE

As an Arminian, one frustration I have is with the dominance of the Calvinist view on the internet. In this post I want to do a little musing on why this is the case. Why is the Calvinist web presence so dominant?

Reasons for the Calvinist dominance on the internet:
1) Calvinists are writers and authors. They love studying doctrine. They are articulate. Arminians are too busy "changing the world" to spend time writing. Unfortunately these differences in approaches have resulted in a disproportionate Calvinist presence on the web.

2) Calvinists have lots of big names: Piper, MacArthur, Sproul, White, etc. These big names have big web sites, with lots of free resources. There are no really big Arminian names out there.

I'm sure you have heard it before: "I used to be an Arminian, so recognize that I know what I'm talking about."

The conversion argument is actually a common argument among all forms of debate, especially religon. It is the argument of personal experience and a claim to understand both sides. I've used it myself before, since I have changed my mind on several topics.

It is worthy to note that we are not dealing with a logical fallacy here. First of all, one cannot refute personal experience. I cannot argue with you about whether or not you truly experienced something: I wasn't there. Secondly, if one was fully committed to one point of view, and understood it, and then changed sides, then there is probably a truly powerful reason for it. Finally, given the same two conditions of the second point, the person would understand both conditions.

Well, since so many Calvinists have in fact converted from an Arminian position, shouldn't this argument bear a lot of wieght? Well, in this case, no. Why?

Among such biblical texts as Romans 8 and 9 and Ephesians 1, Calvinists are convinced that John 6 secures the notion that Jesus taught a Calvinistic soteriology. I am convinced, however, that Calvinists tend to see Calvinism in every text. I know. I used to be one.

My zeal for Calvinism clouded my interpretation of Scripture. Whatever scriptures I encountered which contradicted Calvinism, I had to find a way to make it mean something other than its simplistic meaning. I am not saying that all Calvinists are necessarily guilty of this very thing. But I will admit that I was immersed in the writings of John Calvin, John Piper, John MacArthur, R. C. Sproul, Martyn Lloyd-Jones, Iain Murray, John Owen, Martin Luther, Loraine Boettner, John Murray, and others, and was raised, spiritually speaking, on a strict Calvinistic hermeneutic of Classical Reformed theology.

Toward a Definition of "All People"
James M. Leonard
Arminian Baptist

http://jmleonardfamily.googlepages.com/towardsadefinitionofallmen

This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers. 17 If anyone has material possessions and sees his brother in need but has no pity on him, how can the love of God be in him? 18 Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth.

It is a real shame that John never made it to the third chapter in his other epistles, because he seems to have this magic touch with the sixteenth verse of third chapters. Oh well.

Coming out of his analogy of Cain as the bad example, John is commanding us to do the opposite. While Cain laid down his brother's life for his own, Christ laid down His own life for us. Thus, we should emulate Christ, laying down our own lives for our brothers.