Introduction:
Most people think that God loves every individual human that has ever existed. For such a universal dogma, you would expect it to be explicitly said all over the bible, but there’s no explicit statement that actually says that. So, they rely on deduction to derive this doctrine. We will see if they are successful in proving such. That isn’t to say that it is invalid to use good and necessary consequence, but I don’t think that they adequately apply such. We should also keep in mind the doctrine of impassibility. I’ve already shared resources on that before and recommend you read them first. This won’t answer every question that God’s love, but it will try to address to whom receives God’s love.
Divine Impassibility:
This is essential because your view of God dictates how you answer this question. My view is such:
Impassibility is that divine attribute whereby God is said not to experience inner emotional changes of state, whether enacted freely from within or affected by his relationship to and interaction with human beings and the created order.
~Dr. James E. Dolezal
http://www.rbap.net/journal-of-the-institute-of-reformed-baptist-studies-sample-of-impassibility-article/
It simply is the recognition that God is really God and not a man. He doesn’t have human emotions. Both Old and New Testaments are filled with anthropomorphic and anthropopathic language. If God is a being that transcends us, then he reveals himself in human analogous terms. I won’t defend that here. Here is my recommended reading:
http://spirited-tech.com/COG/2017/03/02/impassibility-of-god/
In my perspective, the love of God cannot be isolated from the eschatology that God provided us. God “loved” Jacob and “hated Esau” (Rom. 9). I think these are probably anthropopathisms for God’s election and reprobation. God’s love seems to be isolated to his covenant people.
Matthew 5:43-48
“You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven; for He causes His sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax-collectors do the same? If you greet only your brothers, what more are you doing than others? Do not even the Gentiles do the same? Therefore, you are to be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.”
I think this is a valid text to bring up. I just think Matthew 5 is one of the more abused chapters in these sorts of talks.
I sometimes think this is where some act as if Christ here is giving the Law of Christ here. The issue is that isn’t the context of what Jesus is getting to. These chapters are often read in isolation from the rest of the book as well. We must look at it in its context of Matthew and Jesus’s ministry.
It is slightly poetic as it paints many paintings with its words. This I suspect isn’t God giving us a formal law code. “The reader sees a man offering a sacrifice in Jerusalem (5:23), someone in prison (5:25-26), a body without eye and hand (5:29-30), someone being slapped (5:39), sun rising (5:45), the rain falling (5:45), someone praying inn a closet (6:6), lilies in a field (6:28), a log in an eye (7:4), wolves in sheep’s’ clothing (7:15).”
~Dr. Dale Allison “Sermon on the Mount”
In a comment section Jason Engwer also states about the Sermon on the mount:
Jesus spoke in contexts, as everybody else does, including contexts involving hyperbole, a limited audience, and other qualifiers. For example, the same Jesus who speaks of how the rich young ruler should give all of his possessions away (Luke 18:22) shortly thereafter commends a man who only gave some of his possessions away (Luke 19:8-10) and suggests that investing money, not just giving it away, is acceptable (Luke 19:12-23). Jesus and His disciples owned property, and so did other early Christians (Matthew 8:14, Philemon 2, etc.). Jesus, like other ancient Jewish (and non-Jewish) teachers, often spoke in general terms and used hyperbole to put emphasis on a theme (a plank in an eye, a camel going through the eye of a needle, etc.). Not only do we know that hyperbole was common among ancient Jewish teachers (as it is in many modern contexts), but we also know that the nearby Biblical context refers to Jesus as having a home (Matthew 4:13) and refers to His followers as having possessions (Matthew 8:14), and we know that Christians just after Jesus’ time had possessions (Acts 12:12, Philemon 2, 1 Timothy 6:17-19, etc.).
Jesus’ commands, like principles in any belief system, are interpreted in light of a larger context. One principle is weighed against another, and something that’s appropriate in one circumstance may not be in another. A command to give to others would be interpreted within a belief system that also involved the responsibility of providing for one’s family, for example. As D.A. Carson puts it, “Verse 40 [of Matthew 5] is clearly hyperbolic: no first-century Jew would go home wearing only a loin cloth.” (The Expositor’s Bible Commentary: Matthew, Chapters 1 Through 12 [Grand Rapids, Michigan: Zondervan, 1995], p. 157) Thus, a passage like Proverbs 26:4-5 will deliberately set two contrary-sounding principles together, trusting that the reader will realize that each principle is valid in different circumstances. Some of Jesus’ expressions in Matthew 5 are popular in our world today: “go the extra mile”, “turn the other cheek”, etc. Just as we today interpret and apply such principles in a context that involves examining circumstances and weighing one priority against another, so did people in ancient times.
Jason Engwer
Matthew 5 isn’t giving a universal law to be applicable to every situation. It was actually given for domestic affairs. In language relating to lower-class Jews. As Dr. Dale Allison puts it:
The sermons primary purpose is to instill principles and qualities through vivid inspiration of the moral imagination. What one comes away with is not an incomplete set of statues but an unjaded impression of a challenging moral ideal.
In Matthew 5:43-48, Dr. Andrew Fulford shows how the scope of the passage isn’t referring to everyone to ever to exist. Which would be alien to these first century Jews as the context of the sermon is about their everyday normal experiences. So, any reading would have to have that in mind.
And while it may seem banal, we should take care to note that in none of these examples Jesus gives of obeying the command, does he describe a magistrate specifically. All of the examples are drawn from the normal life of an average, politically powerless, Israelite.
The major focus of Matthew 5 isn’t world leaders or every human being in existence but rather with an individual’s personal enemies.
“But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you,”
The obvious point is that these are local in their scope. If someone denies that, then you can rhetorically state to him: Has everyone persecuted you? How would this apply to those who existed before you did? How did people 2000 years later into the future persecute you? I think this shows the author didn’t have a universal scope of humanity in mind. It also raises a few issues of asking “What does this love for our enemies entails?”
Steve Hays has written on this issue. Here are some of his statements:
And it’s true that Scripture commands Christians to practice love in general. Love our neighbors. Love our enemies.
4. That, however, also turns on the definition of love. Consider two candidates:
i) An emotion. Affection.
Certainly, that’s a valid definition of love, but is inapplicable in this context? For instance, there are currently about 7 billion humans on the planet, but I don’t have affection for most of them because I don’t know that most of them exist. I don’t know who they are. The figure is just an abstraction. I know that they exist in the sense that there must be that many individuals to comprise that total, but I don’t know them all as individuals. I can’t have the same affection for them that I have for someone I know.
On that definition, not loving someone doesn’t mean hating them. If I don’t know you exist, I don’t love you, hate you, like you, or dislike you. I have no feelings about you whatsoever.
ii) An action. Acting in someone’s best interest.
That’s a common alternate definition. And I think it’s often valid.
That distinction makes it possible to distinguish affection from compassion. I don’t have to have affection for someone to have compassion for someone. Compassion can be more abstract. Imagining myself in their situation.
But in a fallen world, it isn’t possible to love everyone in the sense of (4). I can’t simultaneously act in Hitler’s best interests and Jewish best interests because those are diametrically opposed. Hitler posed an existential threat to Jews. I can love Hitler at the expense of Jews, or I can love Jews and the expense of Hitler, but I can’t do both at the same time. Take the plot to assassinate Hitler. ”
44 But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, 45 so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven. For he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust (Mt 5:44-45). ”
“i) To begin with, how does this prove that God loves everyone? What about unjust farmers whose crops wither in drought conditions? God didn’t send rain on their farm land. Yes, these are agricultural metaphors for God’s common grace blessings. They aren’t literally confined to sunshine and rain. But some of the unjust suffer from blighted lives. What about the unjust who perished in the eruption of Mt. Vesuvius? What about the unjust who perished in the Jialing Great Earthquake? They experienced natural evils. So, the statement is not about every single individual.
To the contrary, it’s talking about the just and unjust as a class. God doesn’t reserve natural goods only for the just, while never doing good for the unjust. Rather, people in general–just and unjust alike–benefit from his providence. The other side is that people in general–righteous and unrighteous alike–may suffer from natural disasters. Ordinary providence is indiscriminate. We share a common biosphere.
ii) In addition, blessing the reprobate can be beneficial to the elect. For the lives of elect and reprobate are intertwined. If God blesses an unbelieving husband, his Christian wife may benefit (to take one example). So that isn’t necessarily an expression of God’s love for that unbeliever. Rather, he may bless that unbeliever for the sake of a believer, who’s related to the unbeliever. They suffer or prosper together, for what affects the one affects the other.
iii) Moreover, this is a temporary state of affairs, rather than the expression of God’s abiding policy. God won’t always make the sun shine and the rain fall on the unjust. There’s a day of judgment when God will tell the unjust: “Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels” (Mt 25:41).
God’s indiscriminate ordinary providence at present will give way to his discriminating judgment in the future: “And these will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life” (Mt 25:46).
Jesus said that, too. So, is David “calling Jesus a liar” when Jesus says God is punitive rather than loving?
iv) In addition, this very same Jesus talks about God’s selective, discriminating grace:
25 At that time Jesus declared, “I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that you have hidden these things from the wise and understanding and revealed them to little children; 26 yes, Father, for such was your gracious will (Mt 11:25-26).
God sovereignly bestows saving illumination on some while withholding it from others.
The issue comes from someone who thinks Christ is giving a new law and has annulled the old Law. They have missed the points of the six antitheses. Which is about Christ getting back to what those laws were originally intended against and the corruption by the Pharisees’ traditions.
Some go on to further argue that common Grace entails universal divine love.
I don’t believe common grace implies divine universal love for all men. Well, common grace is given to not only man but to demons. They are allowed to live in the permitted ranges God has allowed for them. They are allowed to exist in God’s great creation for a time. Does God love Satan and the demons? It just seems to be a non-sequitur with strange implications. The point of the passage is that Christians are to be good to others as a means for a good peaceful life and to further the Gospel. This common grace love seems to take God’s kindness as an emotional attachment. Why should we assume God needs to have such emotional attachments in order to good? Is it impossible for God to do good for some creature and not have an emotional attachment? I don’t think it is impossible to do good for some individuals without love. Sometimes because of common grace, evil men live and seem to live better lives, than the Christian girl that is sold as a sex slave. On this position, God would favor the wicked rich man over the Christian girl. Where is that in the Bible? Does God ever love the wicked more than his chosen? I see no justification for that conclusion and the idea that a lack of more temporal gifts entails that God loves them more than those that lack them. It would seem that would entail God would love us more than that of ancient believers. We have phones, food, and many other luxuries that those in the past could have never imagined. We live in a country with less persecution than throughout all of history. Furthermore, it is a hasty generalization to assume that acting in one’s interest implies that you have an emotion of love for that person. You may be kind enough to help an old lady to her basement door so she can do her laundry. You may have done that nice deed in full intent to kill her in her sleep to gain her house and sell it for a profit. I discuss the notion of “love” when discussing Luke 6:27-33(See Below).
For more on the background of Matthew 5, I think more observations about the context and background here:
http://spirited-tech.com/COG/2018/07/18/the-law-and-the-new-testament/
Galatians 5:13
For all the law is fulfilled in one word, even in this; Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.
Romans 13:8-9
Owe nothing to anyone except to love one another; for he who loves his neighbor has fulfilled the law. For this, “You shall not commit adultery, You shall not murder, You shall not steal, You shall not covet,” and if there is any other commandment, it is summed up in this saying, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”
Some read these commands as if they were meant to be abstract commands that entail you must love every person on the planet. But these are to real individuals to love others in their real lives. They simply ignore the historical background of these texts. That we simply need to manufacture emotions. The point is that we are to love people in general and that is the scope of Paul’s letter.
As Dr. Leon Morris puts it:
He has just said that they should pay what they owe to officialdom; now he moves the same obligation into private life. But he goes beyond the payment of debts in the ordinary sense to the thought of a debt that can never be discharged, the debt of love. … This is sometimes taken as justification for self-love, but neither the commandment nor Paul says as much. The fact is that people do love themselves, and “God addresses His command to us as the men that we actually are, the sinners who do, as a matter of fact, love ourselves, and claims us as such for love to our neighbours” (Cranfield).60 Paul is saying in strong terms that believers must love the people they do in fact encounter. It is easy to “love” in an abstract way, but Paul wants his readers to love the people they actually meet day by day (with all their faults). Love is something that takes effect in the home, in the marketplace, in the workshop, on the village green, wherever people are met.
Morris, L. (1988). The Epistle to the Romans (p. 469). Grand Rapids, MI; Leicester, England: W.B. Eerdmans; Inter-Varsity Press.
Matthew 22
36 “Teacher, which is the great commandment in the Law?” 37 And he said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. 38 This is the great and first commandment. 39 And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself.
Mark 12:31
“ The second is this: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.” “
The point of these texts is to show that Christians are commanded to love people regardless of their ethnic. The Jews had no concept that they would have to love other ethnics that didn’t submit to God. The other possibility is that Jesus is affirming the OT command and the Jews are to love those in the covenant community and resident aliens. We won’t discuss which is right because neither affect the subject of this article.
“It seems that the Jews tended to understand by the neighbor one’s fellow Jew and to leave open the possibility of extending a thoroughgoing hatred to “lesser breeds without the law.” “
Morris, L. (1992). The Gospel according to Matthew (p. 564). Grand Rapids, MI; Leicester, England: W.B. Eerdmans; Inter-Varsity Press.
“There is, however, the question of how far τὸν πλησίον σου extends. There is little doubt that in the OT context (note that the first half of the verse forbids vengeance against ‘the sons of your own people’) it denoted a fellow member of the covenant community (though Lv. 19:34 extends it also to the ‘resident alien’); even if the ‘corollary’ καὶ μισήσεις τὸν ἐχθρόν σου which Jesus quotes in Mt. 5:43 is an addition to the text, it is one which draws on the likely meaning of ‘neighbour’ in its original setting. The term πλησίον at least potentially restricts the scope of the love required. That is why when Luke records Jesus’ approval of Lv. 19:18b as an ethical guide the dialogue continues (Lk. 10:29) with the question καὶ τίς ἐστίν μου πλησίον; with the parable of the Good Samaritan as its shockingly inclusivist answer. Here the point is not explored, and it may be that the scribe’s enthusiasm for Jesus’ answer was based on a more limited (and exegetically correct) understanding of the ‘neighbour’ than Jesus intended or than subsequent Christian interpretation has given to this passage.”
France, R. T. (2002). The Gospel of Mark: a commentary on the Greek text (pp. 480–481). Grand Rapids, MI; Carlisle: W.B. Eerdmans; Paternoster Press.
In the OT “neighbor” meant only fellow Jews; it did not include non-Israelites and Gentiles.
Edwards, J. R. (2002). The Gospel according to Mark (p. 372). Grand Rapids, MI; Leicester, England: Eerdmans; Apollos.
Luke 6:27-33
27 “But I say to you who hear, love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, 28 bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you. 29 Whoever hits you on the cheek, offer him the other also; and whoever takes away your coat, do not withhold your shirt from him either. 30 Give to everyone who asks of you, and whoever takes away what is yours, do not demand it back. 31 Treat others the same way you want them to treat you. If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? For even sinners love those who love them. If you do good to those who do good to you, what credit is that to you? For even sinners do the same.
This doesn’t equate to universal love the scope of the passage is local. This is dealing with ordinary human affairs(neighbors). It isn’t universal by its own contents. For example, not everyone hates you. Does everyone curse you? Wouldn’t this make more sense to regular everyday life? Another question that arises is what “love” means in these passages. Is it merely meaning an emotion or acting in one’s best interest?
The introduction is followed by four balanced imperatives in asyndeton (BD 4622). The most general command comes first (par. Mt. 5:44a). ἀγαπάω (6:32, 35; 7:5, 42, 47; 10:27; 11:43; 16:13*; Acts, Ox; Mt., 8x; Mk., 5x) is concerned less with emotional affection than with willing service and the desire to do good to the other person, as is clear from the three following imperatives and the use of ἀγαθοποιέω in 6:35 (on the concept see Spicq, I, 98–155). ἐχθρός (1:71, 74; 6:35; 10:19; 19:27, 43; 20:43*; Acts 2:35; 13:10*; W. Foerster, TDNT II, 811–814) is used to describe a person who has hostile feelings towards me, i.e. in an active sense.
These individuals take for granted the concept of love from their 21-century contexts. They read the text taking surface level readings as infallible treatises. They state the in-depth statements of “love means “love” and ‘hate’ means ‘hate’!” That those words must refer to emotions and feelings and this is the end of the story. But the issue is that this is surface level and it from it surface level issues arise. Such as:
Lk 14:26
“If anyone comes to me and does not hate his father and mother, his wife and children, his brothers and sisters—yes, even his own life—he cannot be my disciple”
Matthew 10:34-37
“Do not suppose that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I did not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I have come to turn a man against his father, a daughter against her mother, a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law – a man’s enemies will be the members of his own household.’ “Anyone who loves his father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; anyone who loves his son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me.”
John 12:25
“Whoever loves his life will lose it, but whoever hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life.”
Clearly, these texts are not to be interpreted as emotional hate. Would one really be commanded to love your enemies and not our family? If we are to love our neighbor as we love our self and we are to hate our own life, then we are to hate their life? Obviously, surface level reading of these texts is just a terrible way to interpret passages. These texts have a background that will give some light into the background of the Gospels. As Steve Hays notes:
They’re inseparable if you define the love/hate language of scripture in emotive terms. But that’s not generally how the words are used in scripture. These are Semitic idioms. In the process, you’re also subverting the Biblical concept of mercy, which is not about being merciful to those we love (in the psychological sense of the term). You are beginning with some atextual, acontextual concept of love which you then superimpose on the text. You keep psychologizing these Biblical expressions. But as I. H. Marshall explains in his exegesis of Lk 14:26, it’s about “renunciation” rather than “psychological hate.” And as Green explains in his exegesis, “in this context, ‘hate’ is not primarily an affective quality but a disavowal of primary allegiance to one’s kin.”In both the Matthean and Lucan versions, a Jewish family is forcing a Christian convert to choose between filial or familial allegiance and dominical allegiance. So, where you have a conflict of duties, loyalty to Christ enjoys priority over loyalty to one’s own flesh-and-blood. In this situation, it’s one or the other. If you were a Jewish follower of Christ, you would be disowned by your family and ostracized by your community. Banished from your clan and excommunicated from covenant community. Those were the stark alternatives. Was that always the case? No. But that was not uncommon. It’s the cost of discipleship under those social conditions. That’s why Jesus speaks to this scenario. To interpret the usage in emotive terms would make no sense in context. For one thing, it’s not as if our love for our family members is like the volume control on a TV remote which you can raise or lower by pushing a button. The passage is not concerned with how you *feel* about Jesus or how you “feel” about your family. That’s not the choice. Rather, it has reference to the field of action. What will you *do* in that situation?
“Such a person loses his life, i.e. causes his own perdition. By contrast, the one who hates his life (the love/hate contrast reflects a Semitic idiom that articulates fundamental preference, not hatred on some absolute scale: cf. Gn. 29:31, 33; Dt. 21:15 AV, NASB mg.)”
Carson, D. A. (1991). The Gospel according to John (p. 439). Leicester, England; Grand Rapids, MI: Inter-Varsity Press; W.B. Eerdmans.
I look at these as issues of duties, but these aren’t to account for every situation. The important thing is to remember that the Sermon on the mount isn’t a formal all-encompassing law code. We also know that Jesus doesn’t always have to qualify his statements to have a specific statement with qualifications. This would fit with the cultural background of the Jews giving him a background to propel his thoughts from. Jesus in his ministry speaks to the issue of duties. In Matthew 5:43-48 and Luke 6:27-33 is our obligation to our enemies. But in this culture, these laws weren’t absolute. In Matthew 15:1-6 the issue of duty to the religious establishment and duty to parents arise. Here is where the concept of the higher duties come in. It was a duty to in the Jewish culture to support the religious establishment and it was also a duty to your parents. The point of this text is that we have a higher duty to our parents than to the religious authorities. In these cases, the higher duties override the lower duty. We are to love our parents over that of our enemies. So, in the case of conflict-loving, our family comes over that than loving our enemies. Which is because you simply can’t always act in the best interest of everyone. We have examples in life that prove such. A man is trying to kill your parents. He breaks into your home to kill your parents and you have the position to shoot him dead. You must either love him or your parents. Who do you choose? The obvious point is your parents and to act in his best interest. In Matthew 10:34-37, it is told to us that even our obligation to our parents is a lower obligation to that of our obligation to God. In Scripture and Christian ethics, our social obligations are stratified. The only obligation that is unconditional is our obligation to God. All our other duties are conditional duties that have degrees of obligation and depend upon the situation. Which is why God and no person loves every individual. Even if you accept freewill theism God doesn’t love everyone. God actuated this world knowing some would never believe and would suffer the worst fate possible. How is God acting in that person’s best interest? Instead of proving their own case the contrary position has proven mine.
Ezekiel 18:23, 33:11
“Have I any pleasure in the death of the wicked, declares the Lord God, and not rather that he should turn from his way and live?”
“Say to them, ‘As I live!’ declares the Lord God, ‘I take no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but rather that the wicked turn from his way and live. Turn back, turn back from your evil ways! Why then will you die, O house of Israel?’
It is often used to prove that God loves all men. This text doesn’t ever state that God loves all men. We should note it isn’t universal in scope. It was for the exiled Jews. This means this isn’t for the pagans around them and a specific group of individuals. Which shows this text isn’t about God’s love for all men, but rather God’s dealings with his covenant people. That is in contrast to that of their pagan neighbors. This anthropopathic way of speaking of God’s pleasure is to drive the remnant back to God. To have his covenant people look back to God. For of this is a problem for us, then it’s just as much a problem for our opponents. As Mr. Hays states:
The undesirable outcome is both foreseeable and avoidable. Yet by making them, God seals their fate. God had that outcome in mind when he made them. So, he had no intention of saving them.
http://triablogue.blogspot.com/2009/09/why-will-you-die-o-house-of-israel.html?m=1
http://triablogue.blogspot.com/2011/05/taking-pleasure-in-death-of-wicked.html?m=1
http://triablogue.blogspot.com/2011/05/taking-pleasure-in-death-of-wicked.html?m=1
http://triablogue.blogspot.com/2009/08/does-god-desire-whatever-he-commands.html
2 Peter 3:9
“The Lord is not slow about His promise, as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing for any to perish but for all to come to repentance.”
This is a common text launched at us Calvinist and the simple point is this is God’s dealings with The Covenant community. The simple fact is the “you” refers to someone and not everyone who ever existed. Look at the previous verse:
“But do not let this one fact escape your notice, beloved, that with the Lord one day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years like one day.”
So, the previous verse teaches that he is speaking to the group called the “beloved”. Who is the beloved? We know three things about them.
They await the return of Jesus. We also know they are mentioned before in the chapter. “This is now, beloved, the second letter I am writing to you in which I am stirring up your sincere mind by way of reminder”.They are to be holy. (Verse 11)
Who were the letters sent to?
2 Peter 1:1
“Simon Peter, a bond-servant and apostle of Jesus Christ, to those who have received a faith of the same kind as ours, by the righteousness of our God and Savior, Jesus Christ”
1 Peter 1:1-2
“Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ,
To those who reside as aliens, scattered throughout Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia, who are chosen
according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, by the sanctifying work of the Spirit, to obey Jesus Christ and be sprinkled with His blood: May grace and peace be yours in the fullest measure.”
The last argument presented for this text to refer to the world is that the elect isn’t perishing and don’t need to repent.
The interpretation of the text is that God restrains eschatological judgment for the elect to come to faith. So, it is about the elect throughout time that needs to come to faith and repentance. That requires God to hold back his wrath. It’s not that the elect that has come to faith are perishing.
For those interested, they can look at these resources:
http://www.aomin.org/aoblog/2006/06/11/2-peter-39-and-the-letterhead-argument/
1 Timothy 2:1-6
“First of all, then, I urge that entreaties and prayers, petitions and thanksgivings, be made on behalf of all men, for kings and all who are in authority, so that we may lead a tranquil and quiet life in all godliness and dignity. This is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior, who desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth. For there is one God, and one mediator also between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, who gave Himself as a ransom for all, the testimony given at the proper time.”
This text has been brought up as a text which is used to defend the notion that God desires all men to be saved. They argue further that implies he genuinely loves all men. The worst part is that Calvinist use the same argument. The Calvinist who interprets this as all of the mankind must read this passage in the context of universality as its limit. How would that Calvinist escape the fact that verse 6 would then mean Christ died for all and even mediates for all if the text is about all men? Those Calvinist to escape my position end up affirming the alternative position. Are these Calvinist ready to give up Limited atonement? Of course, it isn’t merely sufficient to just give a negative position. I’ll have to provide a positive understanding of the text. The text sets its purpose out is “for kings and all who are in authority, so that we may lead a tranquil and quiet life in all godliness and dignity”. The context is speaking of praying so we can live a godly life. It’s because the church has received persecution and they should pray for these persecutors so they may live a peaceful life. The “all” of verse 4 is to social classes. The “all” of verse 6 is for Christ has made atonement and intercedes on the behalf, not for every human that has ever existed, but for men from every ethnic. Paul mentions that his ministry was sent to the Gentiles in verse 7 “For this I was appointed a preacher and an apostle (I am telling the truth, I am not lying) as a teacher of the Gentiles in faith and truth.”.
For those interested, they can look at these resources:
http://triablogue.blogspot.com/2018/10/all-of-what.html
http://triablogue.blogspot.com/2008/12/1-timothy-24-exegesis.html
http://triablogue.blogspot.com/2006/08/1-tim-24.html
http://triablogue.blogspot.com/2014/06/arminian-prooftexts.html
John 3:16
“For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life.”
I think one point of the text isn’t about the extent of God’s love but it’s counterintuitive notion that God loves anyone at all because of their sin. The term “world” doesn’t exist in the text. The Greek word “kosmos” is what occurs and it can refer to more than just every individual to ever exist. There is no one agreed upon interpretation of John 3:16 in the reformed side of Christianity. James Gibson mentions this in his article:
There appears to be a variety of views that Reformed people may take. That is, there is no such thing as the Reformed view. A really good resource that catches more quotes than I have found (and in two cases I pulled) is available here (link). Obviously, I have not even attempted an exhaustive list of Reformed writers on the subject. But I have given enough examples to show a variety of views. Authors who want to stress the particularity of the application of the atonement to individuals can come across as having said “world” means “elect”, even if they did not intend this and they did not say this explicitly. Authors who have in mind the universal call of the gospel (e.g., Dabney and Carson) think the “world” is the human race. Some authors think that the human race is in mind, but it is specifically focused upon its ethnic or national aspect (e.g. Shedd, Hendriksen). Some think it is the human race in respect to its sinfulness (Lincoln). Some authors are not clear what they think (e.g., Pink).
So, there is no one interpretation of the verse that is without question. That leaves the Reformed Christian with the task of demarcating the correct interpretation. As one commentator noted:
Some argue that the term ‘world’ here simply has neutral connotations—the created human world. But the characteristic use of ‘the world’ (ho kosmos) elsewhere in the narrative is with negative overtones—the world in its alienation from and hostility to its creator’s purposes. It makes better sense in a soteriological context to see the latter notion as in view. God loves that which has become hostile to God. The force is not, then, that the world is so vast that it takes a great deal of love to embrace it, but rather that the world has become so alienated from God that it takes an exceedingly great kind of love to love it at all.
A. Lincoln, The Gospel According to St. John, 154.
While Lincoln is correct the interpretation is compatible with a more narrow or a wider interpretation. I think that the most convincing interpretation is held by James Gibson and here is how he explains his view by quoting John Owen:
By the “world,”we understand the elect of God only, though not considered in this place as such, but under such a notion as, being true of them, serves for the farther exaltation of God’s love towards them, which is the end here designed; and this is, as they are poor, miserable, lost creatures in the world, of the world, scattered abroad in all places of the world, not tied to Jews or Greeks, but dispersed in any nation, kindred, and language under heaven.
Owen is not saying that the meaning of “world” is elect, although his statement, “we understand the elect of God only” might mislead one to think he meant that. It is important that he says, “though not considered in this place as such, but under such a notion as … ” which he goes on to say includes being poor, lost creatures in the world scattered abroad. What Owen is saying is that even though the elect are the referent of God’s love in John 3, they are not considered as such – i.e. as elect – in John 3. That is, it is not part of the meaning of “world” that they are the elect.
This interpretation fits perfectly with the passage. One reason this interpretation is preferred is John’s usage of ‘ho kosmos’. Dr. James Anderson mentions in his article:
In John’s writings “the world” (ho kosmos) rarely if ever carries the sense of “all mankind” or “every human who ever lived.” It certainly doesn’t mean that in 3:16 because that would make nonsense of the immediately following verse. (Try replacing “the world” with “all mankind” in verse 17 to see the point.) Rather, “the world” typically means either (i) “the created universe” (as in John 17:24), (ii) something like “the fallen creation in rebellion against God” (e.g., John 3:19; 13:1; 15:19; 17:13-18; 1 John 2:15-17) or (iii) “all nations” as opposed to the Jewish people alone (as in John 4:42). Whatever the exact sense in 3:16, there’s nothing that conflicts with LA.
The other reason Owen’s interpretation is persuasive is the latter half of the verse seems to imply that God has demonstrated his love for the world by dying to save them. The entire world isn’t saved and the atonement was never made for everyone from a Calvinist perspective. The last reason I will provide for the more narrow interpretation is that the universal reading doesn’t make sense. This was noted by Dr. Bignon and James Gibson in their response to Richard Brian Davis:
If Molinism is true, God knew in his middle-knowledge that the non-elect would not freely believe in the circumstances in which God is actually going to place them. Then what is the Molinist to say that John 3:16 is affirming about the non-elect? That God loved them so much that he sent Jesus to die for them, a thing which he knew full-well would not save any of them unless he placed them in different circumstances? If the alleged absurdity of saying of the non-elect “Because God loves the world, he goes ahead and does something that won’t save them anyway” takes down Calvinism, it takes down Molinism too.
I’ve collected the resources on John 3:16 here:
http://spirited-tech.com/COG/2018/10/22/john-316/
1 John 4:8,16
“Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love.”
“So we have come to know and to believe the love that God has for us. God is love, and whoever abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him.”
God simply has the freedom to exercise his love as he chooses. Does God have to love evil? Does God love pedophilia? The text doesn’t limit it only to free agents. Steve Hays comments on the same issue when writing in response to Talbott :
By this “logic,” if a man is naturally loving, then he must make love to every woman he meets. Is Talbott a loving or unloving man? If loving, is he a polygamist? Does he maintain a harem?
After all, it’s not enough, on Talbott’s score, to be merely loving. You must be equally loving. Isn’t marital love an exclusive love? And isn’t marital love an exemplum of divine love (Isa 54; Ezk 16; Hosea; Eph 5; Rev 19-22)?.
If essential love means that God must love everyone, then does essential omnipotence mean that God must do everything? Isn’t there a logical relationship between loving good and hating evil, or loving evil and hating good? If we love one thing, is it not natural to hate its antithesis? In the Johannine epistles, love is a closed circle: The Trinity loves itself, the Trinity loves the elect, the elect love each other, the elect love the Trinity. It is not a love that breaks out of the exclusive circle. It is not love of the world. Love of the world is antithetical to Johannine love.
The ultimate issue is that the entire chapter and the major theme throughout the letter are about how God loves his covenant people (those who are born of God) in contrast to those of the world. Even here it is debated about what it means to say God is love:
The statement that “God is love” is one of the best-known verses even among people who are not Bible readers. In John’s letter, it stands alongside the similar statement, “God is light” (1:5). Neither of these statements is an absolute metaphysical maxim about the essence of God’s being,3 but these statements point to God’s authority to define sin in the first instance, and his authority to define sin’s opposite, love, in the second. God’s defining love is best revealed in his salvation of humanity on the cross, for it was love that sent God’s Son into the world to suffer and die (4:10; cf. John 3:16; see “In Depth: ‘Love’ in John’s Letters” at 4:16).
Acts 17:26-27
26″and He made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth, having determined their appointed times and the boundaries of their habitation, 27 that they would seek God, if perhaps they might grope for Him and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us;”
While this text is about mankind it is absent from any conversation of God’s love or desires. It merely is forced into the text. It doesn’t even pertain to What we are discussing but is used as a prooftext. The “if perhaps” is a Conditional Optative. Which Dr. Daniel Wallace in his work ‘Beyond the Basics’ has said “This is the use of the optative in the protasis of a fourth-class condition (the conditional particle used is εἰ). It is used to indicate a possible condition in the future, usually a remote possibility (such as, if he could do something if perhaps this should occur). There are no complete fourth class conditions in the NT. Sometimes the conditional clause is mixed, with a non-optative in the apodosis (e.g., Acts 24:19). On other occasions, no apodosis is to be supplied, the protasis functioning as a sort of stereotyped parenthesis (e.g., 1 Cor 15:37).93 This usage, like the potential optative, is quite rare.”. Which is what has occurred in this verse. Which is saying that it is very doubtful that they will grope for God? My friend Josh Smith pointed that out to me.
Luke 23:34
But Jesus was saying, “Father, forgive them; for they do not know what they are doing.” And they cast lots, dividing up His garments among themselves.
I won’t try to exegete the text because I don’t think that the relevant part of the verse is original. Lk. 23:34a is probably not in the original text.
John 15:13
“Greater love has no one than this, that one lay down his life for his friends.”
First Argument:
1. The greatest demonstration of love is where one lays down his life for his friends
2. Person A lays down his life for person B
3. Person B is non-elect
4. If limited atonement is true, then Christ did not die for person B.
5. However, Person A laid down their life for Person B.
6. If Person A did die for Person B, then Person A has shown greater love to Person B than someone who has not laid his life for that Person B.
7. If Christ didn’t die for Person B. Therefore, Person A has shown greater for person B.
Second argument:
1. If God is a Maximally Great being, then lesser beings cannot do an attribute that God cannot.
2. God is a Maximally Great being.
3. Therefore, lesser beings cannot do an attribute that God cannot.
We have a few problems with this argument. His first premise is a misunderstanding of the Gospel of John. I just don’t see the problem of loving certain things more than God does is problematic. For example, let’s switch out the players to see where this thinking leads.
1. The greatest demonstration of love is where one lays down his life for his friends
- Satanist lays down his life for a Demon.
- The demon is non-elect.
- If limited atonement is true, then Christ did not die for the Demon.
- However, the Satanist laid down their life for the Demon.
- If the Satanist did die for the Demon, then the Satanist has shown greater love to the Demon than someone who has not laid his life for the Demon.
- If Christ didn’t die for the Demon. Therefore, the Satanist has shown greater for the Demon.
It seems rather strange to say Christ must show to every single individual the highest level of love or maximally great being must love everyone in the strongest way. For that same being, it would be possible for him to love every agent in the highest sense. So, he would have to love all moral agents in the actual world or he is not maximally great. So, according to the objector for God to be maximally great, he must love everyone with the highest form of love. It is strange that would entail that God must love everyone the same. God loved Peter, Paul, and King David the same way he loved Hitler, Stalin, and Dahmer. I find the Calvinist view as a better view of love. It is because God loved us and because of that love, he saved us. That would entail if this is a higher view of love, then the opponent is committed to the proposition that God loves everyone and because such a love must save all. It seems strange to claim God must use all his attribute to be perfect. God must use his omnipotence in everything he does or it is not a perfect action. That God must be perfectly merciful to all agents in the same way, because if he wasn’t, then he hasn’t been as merciful as he could’ve been. He simply can’t escape universalism. Why must God always show greater love? Many spouses love their spouses. This doesn’t entail God needs to love my spouse in the same way that I do and even more. In that type of relationship, a way of showing your love for your spouse is to have sex with them. I don’t see how God must be better at having sex with one’s wife is a great-making property. As it would be better for God to complete the role better than I as well. So, does God have to have sex with everyone to be maximally great? I am a big fan of country music. But I doubt that because I have a love of that music God must love country music more than I do. In the second argument presented has a few problems of the fact we have no reason to accept the first premise. As a Maximally Great Being would only need to have all great-making properties and not all the attributes of creatures. It does not follow since God is maximally great that he must have exercised his attribute in a way that it is equivalent to that of a creature. The claim might be that creatures cannot exercise attributes they share with God in a different manner. That just isn’t the case for Christian theology. Creatures, in fact, love sin and God needn’t also love sin to show he is maximally great. The issue in my mind is that Christ fulfills this as he did lay down his life for his friends. All his friends throughout time known as the elect. That is something no person could do and therefore he showed greater love than any man could’ve. This would entail that premise 1 and 3 ends in fatal contradiction if my view of the passage is correct. Instead of quoting a bible verse let us remember that the verse has a context.
8 My Father is glorified by this, that you bear much fruit, and so prove to be My disciples. 9 Just as the Father has loved Me, I have also loved you; abide in My love. 10 If you keep My commandments, you will abide in My love; just as I have kept My Father’s commandments and abide in His love. 11 These things I have spoken to you so that My joy may be in you, and that your joy may be made full. 12 “This is My commandment, that you love one another, just as I have loved you. 13 Greater love has no one than this, that one lay down his life for his friends. 14 You are My friends if you do what I command you. 15 No longer do I call you slaves, for the slave does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all things that I have heard from My Father I have made known to you. 16 You did not choose Me but I chose you, and appointed you that you would go and bear fruit, and that your fruit would remain, so that whatever you ask of the Father in My name He may give to you. 17 This I command you, that you love one another.”
Does everyone keep Christ commandments? What about those who don’t keep his commandments? Do they abide in his love anyways? This chapter is directed not to all of mankind, but to the disciples. The assumption is that Jesus’s friends are every individual person that has ever existed. But Christ tells us it is the disciples that are his friends. That they are those who believe in him. He is in the very same chapter going to start contrasting the disciples against that of the world in verses 18-24. It seems that we have these distinct groups and it seems as the one receives God’s love and the other in contradistinction receives the opposite.
They usually supply arguments to further the universalist position. The most common argument is that God desires whatever he commands. My Calvinist friends have taken such argumentation as compelling. They have because of such created a tension in their system. On the one hand, they maintain Ezekiel 18:23 teaches that God doesn’t desire the wicked to die and on the other hand, God commands that sodomites, adulterers, and many others be put to death. They have an internal contradiction that God both desires and not desires the death of the wicked at the same time in the same way.
The other issue is that God commanded the human sacrifice of Abraham’s son. Are they going to maintain that God desired human sacrifice?
The issue is simply that God has ulterior motives for why he may command a certain action. I can give the example of a government that wishes to take over another nation for national resources. It wishes to do so, but it must not look as if they simply have taken over. It would look like an act of tyranny to invade a nation for its’ resources. There could be a global outcry. They must orchestrate an uprising among the native population. They currently have infiltrated the government with crony politicians. They use the crony government to vote in bills that cause the taxes to skyrocket and the people of this nation grow desperate and revolt. The government uses the revolt as a justification to take over to instill peace. The government gave laws without wanting the population to keep those laws. We seem to understand that ulterior motives exist and that God has decreed events to bring about his purposes in space and time.
I think the last thing I will say is a counterargument that even granting Freewill theism that God doesn’t love everyone. When God acts he always intends what he does. God always acts intentionally. That also means that God intended all the events of this world by knowing all of its content and bringing it into being. God knows that many won’t believe and will refuse to believe. Here is a statement from Paul Helm:
These are absurd statements because it is intuitively obvious (and a properly basic belief) that if one truly loves another, then one desires and hopes the best for the one they love.
http://paulhelmsdeep.blogspot.com/2009/02/language-and-theology-of-free-offer.html
Even if you don’t find that persuasive the thesis of the above argument has astounding evidence against its claim that God must love everyone equally. The above position is a maximal love thesis. God loves everyone the same because he for some reason would be lesser if he didn’t. God seemingly loved Moses over Pharaoh. God seemingly loved David over Goliath. God seemingly loved Jacob over Esau.
http://triablogue.blogspot.com/2016/08/demonstrative-love.html
http://triablogue.blogspot.com/2011/12/is-god-maximally-loving.html
My thoughts:
In my mind, God loves a select and specific group of individuals called the elect. We know this from the way God acts and how he manifests his love towards creatures. I could provide a plethora of verses showing the particularity of God’s love, but I’ll only provide a few passages.
Romans 5:8 “But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.”.
Romans 8:37-39
“But in all these things we overwhelmingly conquer through Him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, will be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
Galatians 2:20
“I have been crucified with Christ, and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me.”
Lastly, we wish to see the evidence for divine hatred.
Psalm 11:5
“The LORD tests the righteous and the wicked, And the one who loves violence His soul hates.”
Psalm 5:5-6
“The boastful shall not stand before your eyes; you hate all evildoers. You destroy those who speak lies; the Lord abhors the bloodthirsty and deceitful man.”
1 John 2:15-17
15 Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him.16 For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world.17 And the world passeth away, and the lust thereof: but he that doeth the will of God abideth for ever.
Psalm 97:10
“O you who love the Lord, hate evil! He preserves the lives of his saints; he delivers them from the hand of the wicked.”
Proverbs 6:16-19
“There are six things that the Lord hates, seven that are an abomination to him: haughty eyes, a lying tongue, and hands that shed innocent blood, a heart that devises wicked plans, feet that make haste to run to evil, a false witness who breathes out lies, and one who sows discord among brothers.”
Psalm 139:19-22
19 “O that You would slay the wicked, O God;
Depart from me, therefore, men of bloodshed.
20 For they speak against You wickedly,
And Your enemies take Your name in vain.
21 Do I not hate those who hate You, O Lord?
And do I not loathe those who rise up against You?
22 I hate them with the utmost hatred;
They have become my enemies.”
Conclusion:
This shouldn’t make us angry or upset, but rather we should rejoice. The intuitive notion that God hates Wickedness and he loved us so much he saved us giving us eternal life is true. He didn’t leave us in sin, but by grace gifted us faith. The fact we don’t see the universality in the atonement, but rather particularity means we should not be against the idea God shows particularity in his love. That faith was in Christ work alone and he was applied to us. Which we became the righteousness of God. That’s the message of this article.
Recommended reading:
Steve Hays and Jason Engwer:
:http://triablogue.blogspot.com/2017/02/if-i-cant-love-hitler-i-cant-love.html?m=0
http://triablogue.blogspot.com/2014/11/taking-wood-to-woodshed.html?m=1
http://triablogue.blogspot.com/2009/09/why-will-you-die-o-house-of-israel.html?m=1
http://triablogue.blogspot.com/2011/05/taking-pleasure-in-death-of-wicked.html?m=1
http://triablogue.blogspot.com/2011/05/taking-pleasure-in-death-of-wicked.html?m=1
http://triablogue.blogspot.com.es/2004/05/somewhere-over-rainbow-3.html?m=1
http://triablogue.blogspot.com/2007/11/moral-equivalence.html
http://triablogue.blogspot.com/2007/11/honor-your-parents-and-love-your.html
http://triablogue.blogspot.com/2009/08/does-god-desire-whatever-he-commands.html
http://triablogue.blogspot.com/2016/08/demonstrative-love.html
Dr. Andrew Fulford:
https://www.amazon.com/Jesus-Pacifism-Exegetical-Historical-Investigation/dp/0692812725
Dr. Dale C. Allison:
The Sermon on the Mount
Dr. Greg Welty:
http://www.proginosko.com/welty/carson.htm
Dr. Craig Keener:
Dr. James White:
Alan E. Kurschner:
http://www.aomin.org/aoblog/2008/12/10/1-timothy-24-an-exegesis/
A.W. Pink:
https://www.studylight.org/commentaries/awp/john-3.html
The Council 