Does 1 Corinthians 12:3 Prove Total Inability?

Dr. Leighton Flowers responds to his Arminian friend, Dr. Brian Abasciano, the Director of the Society of Evangelical Arminianism regarding his belief that 1 Cor. 12:3 establishes the doctrine of total moral inability. JOIN US FOR A LIVE CONVERSATION.

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[PETERJOHN]

I actually prefer the longer format because it brings all the arguments together in a way that a shorter video doesn't. You did a good job of showing how Arminians, like Calvinists, are obsessed with solving a problem that doesn't exist. If the Word was somehow insufficient, the Bible would plainly tell us what is sufficient for faith to believe. The Gospel is simple!

[highwaymissions]

Dr. Leighton, you've gain so much mastery on these matters and in your presentations too.👍👏
May the Lord continue to bless your ministry.🙏

[sharonlouise]

"For since in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom did not come to know God, God was well-pleased through the foolishness of the message preached to save those who believe." (1 Corinthians 1:21)

[Richard_Rz]

I had to read this passage 4 times to see how this could bolster Brian's case.

[VeryBasicBible]

YES! glad you're discussing stuff with Arminians. It's super helpful. The Calvinist thing still needs to be done, but this is a nice change and introduces different topics and points of contention.

[wayneanderson]

Very clear and understandable presentation. Thank you!

[rlee]

I like Brian's analysis of John 3:16.

[jeffreybomba]

The entire passage is about spiritual gifts, which are given as a result of salvation, not a door way to salvation. This is the same mistake Calvinists make with Romans 12:3.

[Kramburger]

The point you make at 39:14 about the gospel and Holy Spirit being inseparable is the piece of clarification I was hoping would be brought up in the discussion on Tim Stratton's broadcast after that hammer and nail analogy was posed, but I didn't watch it live so I wasn't able to comment on it at the time.

[noelenliva]

God is mightily using Leighton to change the hearts of Arminians. I've seen more and more Arminians coming to a more Biblical understanding of Scripture recently

[lewisswann]

I would love to give my calvinism testimony on this program or any of these programs. Idol killer ect.
Because it's so unique in uncovering these ungodly views. I was bullied . I never even knew I was a calvinist I got kicked out for raising questions. Called a stumbling block. One of the last attempts of the pastor to reconcile with me was calling me an armianian and I never even knew what that was either.
But the things I was taught was not making sence. This was over a 2 year span. A recent one.

[brucegolston]

I think I'm going to respond to the calvinist and arminian charge of semi pelagian with semi manechean.

[Salvation-Damnation]

Leighton if you wanna engage with some topics from the live chat, you could take a screenshot and engage with them in a Q&A video at a later date or something like that.

[sharonlouise]

Regarding 1 Corinthians 12:3, the MOST we can gather from this verse is that those within a congregation WHO are SPEAKING BY THE SPIRIT OF GOD, CANNOT say "Jesus is accursed." Why? Because it is impossible. If you say you have a speaking gift and are SPEAKING BY THE SPIRIT OF GOD, you will NEVER PROCLAIM that Jesus is accursed. They are CONTRAY TO ONE ANOTHER. However, if one SPEAKING says "Jesus is Lord, " that person can only do so by the HOLY SPIRIT.

Paul is clearly giving them information that is necessary for them to know because the Holy Spirit gives spiritual gifts that are SPEAKING gifts. Just because one gets up and makes a proclamation or gives a teaching, it doesn't mean that they are SPEAKING BY THE SPIRIT OF GOD. This verse gives them what they need to look for and what to beware of. God IS NOT MUTE like pagan idols. God speaks and He does so through, not just the Scripture, but also through those He has given speaking gifts to. They (the Corinthians) are not to be led astray by those who speak from some other spirit (i.e., the spirit of man, the spirit of Satan) rather than the Holy Spirit.

In Romans 10 Paul states that the WORD that THEY WERE PREACHING was THE WORD OF FAITH...."the word of faith which we are preaching." (Romans 10:8) What is this word of faith, "that if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you SHALL be saved." (vs 9) In the CONTEXT of Romans 10, Paul isn't addressing or saying anything about the Spirit of God's operation within salvation. CLEARLY, Paul speaks of the WORD OF FAITH that is preached. 1 Corinthians 12 the subject is SPIRITUAL GIFTS to those ALREADY SAVED. In Romans 10 the subject is the word of faith that Paul preaches that brings salvation. I find it curious and confounding that Brother Brian would put these two sections of Scripture together.

[jaredandrebecca]

Please put more of these on the pod cast apps. My husband listens to your pod cast much more than he can watch YouTube

[jamieammons]

I think it might be helpful to avoid "ontological change" and stick with something like "Are humans created as the type of thing that can potentially respond positively to the gospel?"
It seems to me that this forces them to say no or abandon total inability.
If they say that humans are the type of thing that can potentially respond positively, but they need help, then responding positively to the gospel is like doing math. Your ontology doesn't change when you learn math.
Humans are inherently the type of thing that can do math, but they need help to reach that potential. They could flunk math and ignore their teacher to the point that they never reach their potential in math, but that doesn't mean they are ontologically different from the other humans.

[icilahmb]

Leighton, amazing, welcome to the Word of Faith movement, this video is actually a foundation of what is believed in the movement which I was a part of for many years. Slowly parted ways when ministers misconstrued giving with proving your faith. Didn’t change Gods truth. Leighton.. as always great job…

[SpielbergMichael]

Another wonderful video!

I saw the discussion video they had before this video and Brian tried to say: it wasn’t an ontological change but it was like when someone helps you in the gym lift a weight you can’t lift by yourself.
Brian was trying to show that you can be helped to do something that by yourself you can’t do, and that it isn’t necessary to ontologically change you.
**BUT** - and this is a huge BUT - if it’s like that: then the person being helped hasn’t actually done that action. i.e. it was actually the person who helped them.

Which is saying you don’t have to actually believe the gospel: the Holy Spirit will do that for you.

Is that genuine belief?
Did the person genuinely believe the Gospel?

I think Brian is saying: God will save you if the Holy Spirit believes the Gospel for you. You don’t have to believe because you are still Totally Incapable of believing the Gospel.

I don’t think that’s right, or Biblical.

That’s why Provisionists say that if you believe in Total Inability then unless there’s an ontological change, an Arminian can’t logically say anyone has ever actually believed the Gospel: it was just the Holy Spirit who did it and gave them the benefit of salvation as if they had done it themselves.

The Bible teaches it is impossible for humans to save themselves, and that’s why we need a saviour.
But the Bible doesn’t teach that humans don’t have the ability to believe in that saviour.

I think Arminians are trying to invent a new definition for the word: ‘believe’.
The normal definition for ‘believe’ is something humans are capable of.
But Arminians want ‘believe’ to be a new/different word which humans aren’t capable of. But the Bible didn’t use a new/different word. The Bible just used the everyday normal word: believe.

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Also, I would want to ask the Arminian:

Is believing the Gospel something we are TOTALLY 100% incapable of? Or is it something we are partially capable of, but we need help to fully do it (like in the gym example given by Brian)?

Because if Brian was serious about the gym example (having help to lift a weight we can’t lift by ourselves) - this is saying humans ARE PARTIALLY CAPABLE.

That would be saying Brian doesn’t believe in Total Inability.


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Also:

Brian’s example of the gym: wouldn’t that be cooperating with the Holy Spirit?
But don’t Arminians believe that all humans are ALWAYS hostile to the things of God? So how could a human begin to cooperate with God/the Holy Spirit (in order to lift the weight together) if the human was ALWAYS hostile to cooperating with God to do the things of God????

Wouldn’t they need some pre-prevenient grace to change them and stop them being hostile first???

[sandypidgeon]

Leighton, love your videos. It seems that one of the most poorly exegeted words is "elect". Seems that this is the hinge point. In some passages, "elect" is referring to the Apostles, and in some passages to Israel, and then it seems to be transmuted to this concept of chosen before birth and no capacity to be "chosen" or to choose. If you could do an exegesis on this one word, which, then would explain away total inability (which Romans 1:18-20 and Romans 2:14-15 clearly refute as does John 12:44-50 and others), it might point to the center of gravity of the Calvinist argument in it's faulty definition. GOD Bless

[rlee]

Provisionist Molinism / Molinistic Provisionism (on a Barthian corporate election framework) FTW