This is something that I have heard many times in one form or another coming from supposed Christians whenever discussing God's Sovereignty. How do you respond whenever someone who claims to be a Christian says they would rather go to hell than to heaven with a sovereign God?

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Bryan Riddle
1689 London Baptist Confession
Bethel Baptist Church Owasso, Oklahoma

Well the first point is that God's choice isn't arbitrary. The second thing is that if God really chose someone, they would not rather go to hell. They really don't understand how regeneration works.

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Vaughn Shideler
St. Andrew's Presbyterian Church
Toronto, ON, Canada

This is a symptom of a greater need. Unfortunately, this attitude is a result of not being taught properly or believing a different gospel. What these people are generally experiencing is worship of a false god. They've created and believed in a god that's not the God of scripture. Therefore, their worshipping an idol, a graven image of the mind, a god who doesn’t require anything. What they need is the gospel preached to them. They need their hearts converted.


Bring them to Ephesians Chapter 2, show them Romans 3, and have them read Romans 9.


Pray and ask God to soften the heart of stone.

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John J.
Member Christ Prebyterian Church (OPC)
Salt Lake City, Utah
www.christpres.net

Does this person believe in God's providence? If they believe this then they are one step away from predestination. Either God is sovereign over everything or there are some things that are not under His dominion (Ephesians 1:11). For you could then assert that God chose where they would be born, giving them opportunities and advantages above others to hear the gospel.

However, if they reject God's providence, you may be dealing with an outright heresy such as Open Theism - a rejection of God's foreknowledge and divine counsel.

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Rev. Daniel Kok
Pastor of Grace Reformed Church (URCNA)
Leduc, Alberta CANADA
Church Blog

"there is no creature, either in heaven or on earth, who loves us more than Jesus Christ"
Belgic Confession, Article 26

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One of my closest friends who is a Christian once said this to me.

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Dan Pemberton
Vacaville, CA

Member, First Baptist Church San Luis Obispo
Formerly ABUSA (We left, so I guess that makes us American Baptists Unleashed!)

This answer has already been given. A child of God would not answer is such a manner. I would tell your friend that it is not imperative that they understand completely the doctrines of grace at this time, but it is imperative that they understand justification and adoption. If your friend balks at these essential doctrines then you may not be dealing with a believer.

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Bill Brown
Elder
Grace Baptist Church
Anne Arundel County, Maryland

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What would be most alarming about this is whether or not such a person actually believes the Gospel.

Deep down, what it points to is the idea that faith was generated from within and was not the gift of God's grace. The Gospel, to this person, began in the flesh and, unless it began in the flesh, the person wants nothing to do with a God that demands worship.

The truly baffling thing for a person that wants God to be an idol of love is that freedom from slavery to sin is slavery to Christ. That's a mind bender to the person that desires autonomous response to God. But we were created for Him and not the other way around.

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Rich
Okinawa, Japan

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DIDDO!!

God's Soverignty and our inablility. . .


Blessings,

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Rev. Toby Holland
Director of Evangelism
Wiltsie Community Church (CCCC)

I assume they didn't actually say, "they would rather go to hell than to heaven with a sovereign God," but that this is your interpretation of what they mean by the quote... I understand the meanings we, being Reformed, place on their words, but don't you think that, at least in many cases, when people say this they actually mean, "I would rather go to hell than be in heaven with a God who forces people to do whatever he wants?" At least sometimes when I've heard people speak like this, that is what they are getting at. If this is the case, then our reformed confessions jump right in and agree that the true God is not like this:

There is no "violence offered to the will of the creature" (3.1) and "God hath endued the will of man with that natural liberty and power of acting upon choice, that it is neither forced, nor by any necessity of nature determined to do good or evil" (9.1).

Thus any tyrant false god should not be served in any way that gets you into that false god's heaven. So if this is the intent of these Christians you have spoken with, their objection is removed since the Reformed will join right in with other Christians who would rather suffer the worst hell any false god can deliver even to the point of maryrdom, than to give up the true God in order to enjoy the greatest heaven any false god of this world could offer. That's what the early church did, and many suffered the worst hell the false god Caesar could deliver.

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C. Gorsuch
Glencullen Baptist
Portland, Oregon

In such a case, we have no reason to believe that a person who says something like that is a Christian.

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Daniel Ritchie
Saintfield, Northern Ireland - Queen's University, Belfast:History/Politics
Member of Dromara Reformed Presbyterian Church of Ireland (Covenanter)

Ditto. Any person who would choose to go to hell instead of being with God, simply because God doesn't measure up to his own humanistic moral standard, cannot have been taught of God, doesn't know God, doesn't love God, and is ignorant of the sufferings of Hell.

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Scott Kessler
Covenant Community OPC
Staunton, VA
Covenant Theology
Christian Skepticism
Christianity In History

This has been said to me too. I usually duck because I think the lightining is coming down soon. It is actually a very sobering and frightful statement.

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Bruce
PCUSA
Ocean City NJ

I don't know that I'd go that far. For those of us (I'm speaking of myself here) who did not grow up knowing and believing the doctrines of grace, the completely sovereignty of God over everything is a very scary concept. I first confessed faith in Christ when I was eight years old, and I have no doubt that God saved me then. But I balked against the doctrines of grace until I was twenty. I didn't know that I was holding God to my humanistic moral standard, even though I said, "God couldn't be that way." "So God is just a programmer and we are His robots?" "God wouldn't do that." "I have to choose to put faith in God!" etc. In my mind, I had the correct view of who God is. And I probably would have said, "Why would I want to go to heaven to be with someone who forced me to be there?" In my mind, GOD was not that way.

It was only by reading the Word of God that He opened my eyes to understand what grace really is and what comfort there is in believing that God is Sovereign. Maybe I was ignorant before; maybe I was taught that election wasn't scriptural . . . but I was still a believer in God and in Christ. And after kicking against the idea of sovereignty for over a year, God's Spirit used the Scriptures to patiently teach me the truth.

Just my .

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Kim
Baptist
Cornerstone Baptist Church, Greenville, SC

Teach me Your way, O LORD;
I will walk in Your truth;
Unite my heart to fear Your name.
Psalm 86:11

I want to treat this as gently as possible, but ask very directly... you said above "in your mind God wasn't that way".

Is it possible that you didn't at that point know God? God's sovereignty over all things IS a scary concept - and he is a terrible and awesome God, rightly to be feared because of His sovereignty.

What if one does not have that fear concept? What if one takes the position that she cannot serve a God who is like that? Does she truly know Him?

A similar question - suppose someone think that he did 1% and Christ did 99% in order to save him. If that were his position, would he truly be trusting in Christ for all? Would it be fair to question his salvation?

I'm not calling you into question - but I am saying that I am quite sure I was utterly ignorant of who God is until He graciously convinced me of His full and complete sovereignty. What does the Bible say about those who do not know God?

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Todd K. Pedlar
member, First Congregational Church, (CCCC) Cresco, IA
http://semperubi.rtrc.net

"Many men, after a long conversion, see more of the workings of sin in their hearts than ever they did before or at their first conversion. Now, such men have not an increase of sin, but an increase of illumination and light" (Christopher Love)


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I guy can say something dumb and still be a Christian. Denying the Doctrines of Grace isn't the sin against the Holy Spirit. Someone can say something dumb and believe something dumb and that's generally not enough to condemn them to Hell. To say Christ was just a good man and I'm trusting in the Golden Rule for my salvation is one thing, but to (as Rich pointed out) reach a probably temporary wrong conclusion about the nature of God based in really flawed reasoning isn't enough evidence to write him or her off as a non-Christian.

Now as to what you would say to them? I'm going through something similar with a family member, and I was given some good advice. That was "If someone has reached a decision without using logic, you can't change their decision using logic". I'm still digesting that, but perhaps it will give you food for thought.

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Tim Vaughan, 48 years old, member PCA church but currently attending EV Free church. San Luis Obispo County, California.

Perhaps so - but the sin against the Holy Spirit is not the only thing for which one stands condemned of God. My question is as Rich asked... does one who actively denies God's sovereignty (not who frivolously makes a statement about it once) actually believe the Gospel? Does such a person know God and Christ?

I'm not offended, and if that were the time of my true convertion, then so be it. I guess the question would be, HOW MUCH of God do you have to know to be a Christian?

That said, most people in my circles, my family included, were not Arminians. Now that I embrace the doctrines of grace, I wonder what kind of camp we would have put ourselves in. I truly feared God and reverenced Him. I "knew" that He had power over everything and none could thwart His hand in anything He desired to accomplish. But I also believed that God extended a general grace to all men, and those who put faith in the saving grace of God would be saved. In dealing with election, I was brought up learning that God "foreknew" those who would desire to be saved, and He elected those people. Now I know that my theology was skewed. But I still believe that I knew enough of who the true God was to be a Christian.

If I believed God extended grace to all for salvation if they would choose Him (faulty theology), then I couldn't believe that God would elect some people definitely to heaven while sending the rest to hell. Once my faulty theology was fixed (God doesn't extend saving grace to everyone), the second part of the equation was fixed, too.

Am I making any sense?

It's literally none of your business, or mine as to whether he's saved or not. And I'm not saying that in a way to insult you in any way, or to belittle any position that you may have on the subject. His own maker will make him rise or fall.

Many even here on this board denied the Doctrines of Grace for years, including myself. I thank God for a further insight into His character by opening my eyes to that particular truth, but was I unsaved during those years? Of course not. I don't have anything to bring to the table. I'm saved by God's grace alone.

That word "condemned" gets thrown around a lot, even by people who don't like the Bible translation the other guy is using. But you can be really wrong about a subject and not be condemned, the primary meaning of which is pronounced to be wrong, guilty, worthless, or forfeited; adjudged or sentenced to punishment, destruction, or confiscation.

There is something almost magical about having your eyes opened up to Biblical truth, and the Doctrines of Grace are high on the list of things that open your eyes. But to claim that denying them makes you condemned is too strong.

I'm not planning to make a big issue out of this, but merely wanted to point out that I think we say "of course they're saved" far too quickly at times. I still believe that. I was hoping to encourage a little deeper thought on the matter, not to end up trying to quantify how much one has to know.

One question, though, Tim. You say you have nothing to bring to the table, and that you're saved by God's grace alone, which is very true of all of us who are in Christ.

Suppose one steadfastly denies that he brings nothing to the table.

Is this mere "forgivable" ignorance, or is it a denial of the very person and work of Christ?