Why do some Arminians and their kin act like Calvinists have never seen
John 3:16?
The difference is in what is emphasized.
The Arminian stresses (or stretches) the "whosoever".
The Calvinist emphasizes the "whosoever BELIEVES'
shall not perish but have everlasting life.
Does God love the world? Certainly! He is the Creator of ALL!
Does God have a special love for His Bride?
You better believe it! He redeemed her for His own!
The Bride in Heaven will have no missing toes or fingers.
In other words, no one will be missing.
Matthew 1:21 says, "She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus,
for he will save his people from their sins.”
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Here is a "hymn" a pastor sent me recently. I asked if I could use it on my blog and give him full credit but, he wanted to donate it to the cause, without official credit:
(An Arminian Version of a Once Flawed Hymn)
To me be the glory, great thing I have done;
So loved I my God that I’ve chosen His Son,
Who yielded His life an atonement for sin,
And opened the life gate that ALL may go in.
Refrain:
Praise myself, praise myself,
I have made a good choice!
Praise myself, praise myself,
Such a cause to rejoice!
I’ve chosen the Father, and Jesus the Son,
Now give me the glory, a great thing I have done.
O perfect decision, which adds to His blood,
It causes salvation, or so hopes our God;
The vilest offender who we cause to agree,
That moment from Jesus a pardon receives.
(Refrain)
Great thing I’ve accomplished, in subduing my sin,
And great my rejoicing through my decision;
How pure, and how high, and how great I must be
It’s mostly of Jesus, but some is by me.
(Refrain)
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And now for a simple observation. You may have noticed this before...I just noticed it this morning while doing some anagrams. "Earth" and "Heart" both contain the same letters. I thought that went well with John 3:16.
And now, I close with a quote from Bruce Ware:
"As a wife is to relish, not resist, the exclusive love her husband has for her alone, so God’s people only know His deepest human-directed love as we relish, not resist, the fully unmerited and undeserved exclusive love that God has for His people alone. These are the people of His making, of His redeeming, whom He has called by name, and who are called by His name. To know the saving love of God in Christ is to know not merely the universal love of God for all people, but it is to know especially and most deeply this redemptive-covenantal love that God has exclusively for His own people. As we close, hear afresh these precious words of comfort and admonition from 1 John: “See how great a love the Father has bestowed on us, that we would be called children of God; and such we are. For this reason the world does not know us, because it did not know Him. Beloved, now we are children of God, and it has not appeared as yet what we will be. We know that when He appears, we will be like Him, because we will see Him just as He is” (1 John 3:1-2) “In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins” (1 John 4:10)
So, embrace this special love, this redemptive-covenantal love of God for His own. Be humbled by it, be filled with joy over it, and be empowered to live lives that express the depth of our dependence upon and gratitude for such unspeakably lavish, costly, and undeserved love.
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