All right, I’ll admit it right from the start. I’m committing a blogging “no-no” in cross-posting (I believe that’s the practice of not writing your own post for a blog entry, but instead posting what someone else has written; not necessarily to pass it off as your own, but to garner support and followers for your site – this is my definition/understanding, not an official one, by the way). But at least I wrote the original post and am also posting it here today. So, to quote Richard Dawson, “Let’s get running!”
I’m jumping ahead just a bit due to a few excellent questions asked regarding my position as a Calvinist. I’m hoping that the one(s) doing the asking are genuinely interested in the answers and not just seeking to stir the pot, but I’ll take pot-stirrers for a little bit, anyway.
Here is a paraphrase of one of the main questions:
“As a Calvinist, you claim not to believe in ‘free will’; that it’s the Lord who chooses – elects and predestines – those who will be saved. And yet I’m a bit troubled over passages of Scripture, such as 2 Peter 3.9, where it says, ‘The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance’ (2 Peter 3:9 ESV).”
(There was actually more to the initial question, but let me deal with it in pieces for the sake of brevity of posting.)
The question is, “Does ‘any’ and ‘all’ in this verse mean ‘any’ and ‘all’ literally? Or do they simply refer to ‘the elect’?
Let’s start with context first, since context is always “king” when seeking to interpret any verse or passage. Peter is responding to scoffers who mock the faithful and their insistence that God is still coming, that He hasn’t forgotten or already come. Verse 9 provides part of the reason for this seeming delay of a fulfilled promise: God still wants lost people to be saved. The scoffers and mockers were chiding the believers about God being “slow” (most likely out of a belief that He will never return at all). Peter seeks to correct this grievous error and teach the Christian something more than just about the end times. This verse is about the heart and will of God the Father.
When God created Adam and Eve, He did not decree that they fall away; yet He knew that they would (why else would Christ have been slain from before the foundation of the world (Revelation 13.8). If this would have been God “declaring,” we have a huge, huge problem: God has just declared that sin be, that evil be and therefore would be the author of evil. I think anyone with half a mind can plainly see, God cannot be God if He decree that Adam sin. Clearly there is a difference between foreknowing the event and decreeing that such an event take place.
In 2 Peter 3.9, we see that God does not wish that any should perish. Before I answer the query, “Does ‘any’ literally mean ‘any’ or just the ‘elect’?” I have a query of my own: Is this speaking of God’s declarative will or His “desirative” will? Does Peter mean to teach that God decrees that none shall perish? Or, is he teaching that God does not desire or wish that any should perish at all, yet knows all along that many will perish for eternity? If one answers in the affirmative to the former question, then he is a universalist, believing that all will be saved (I won’t bother delineating the varying degrees of universalism here). That flies in the face of Scripture, makes God out to be no God at all and is rank heresy. So, ‘any’ in this verse means ‘all’ but is then limited by what it is that God is willing and not willing, desiring to do and not do in accordance with His holiness, justice, righteousness and mercy. God clearly would that all wold be saved, but only if they come by faith alone in His Son, Jesus Christ, alone. Otherwise, He will pour out His wrath upon them eternally.
When once you see this clearly, then you know the answer to the second half of the initial question: “Does ‘all’ mean ‘all’ or is it limited only to the elect?” If you answer that God has decreed, in His will, that literally all––every single man, woman, boy and girl––will reach repentance, you are a universalist (to whatever varying degree you may understand that). And again, I would be compelled by the vast evidence of Scripture of pronouncing you a heretic and anathema for preaching another gospel. So, please, don’t go there. It’s all a very unpleasant mess. The “all” here can still mean “all”––God is desirous that all would repent, yet He knows they will not.
Some might want to argue, “Then how do I know when ‘all’ means ‘all’ and when it is limited?” Even a child knows the answer to this: it depends upon the context. You, the reader, were not at our church picnic a couple of weeks ago (well, okay, most of you weren’t), but if I made the statement, “The whole church was there” you would use reasonable judgment of context and realize I had just limited “the church” to our local congregation (and if you are a part of our congregation, then you also know even this statement is limited to “everyone from Cornerstone except those who were absent”).
The same applies to 2 Peter 3.9. Yes, God would save every single human being throughout the history of mankind, He is that loving and that desirous. And He has done everything necessary to make that a reality––should each and every person repent of their sins and turn, by grace through faith, to Christ. Yet, clearly, not “all” do this. Not “all” repent.
I could try to convince you, the reader, that the “you” Peter is addressing here are believers, the church, Christians and therefore, “the elect.” However, first of all that would be unnecessary. All you need to do is look at how Peter describes his readers in the two and a half chapters leading up to this and you know they are Christians (“beloved”––3.1). Yet even this is a bit unnecessary to the original question. “All” means “all” here. Unless you’re a universalist however (in which case you must have been searching high and low and stumbled across this post, nearly by accident), you know that the numbers of those who repent do not add up to “all.”
One final comment: this is one of the verses which most Arminians use to try to trip up Calvinists, either against the doctrine of election and predestination or how “tricksy” we Calvinists get with our words, trying to confuse and change and make up definitions as we go. My response is simply: this verse really says very little about “the elect” and says everything about the heart of our God, who is so merciful, He would save all people everywhere and from every time, if they would only repent of their sins. He didn’t have to; He would have been just as righteous and holy and just to declare us all condemned and have us suffer for all eternity. But He didn’t. His own precious Son condescended to come to earth, humble Himself by taking on the form of a servant, and obediently laying down His life in our place for His Father’s glory.
Next time: “What about the ‘whosoevers’ of Scripture? Do they not literally mean ‘whosoever will’?
The original post is over at: Random Thoughts From a Cluttered Mind
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