The 5th and Final Point that Led me Out of Calvinism | Leighton Flowers | Soteriology 101

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11:20 - POINT 1 - The Foresight View (looking through the corridors of time) was not the only scholarly alternative to the Calvinistic understanding of providence. There is also the Corporate View of Election (includes groups and individuals), also called the Election to Service view.

14:33 - POINT 2 - There's a distinction between Total Depravity (Original Sin) and Total Inability. The verses that Calvinist use to support Total Inability are really verses that support the doctrine of Judicial Hardening (not a natural condition from birth). The Jews were being hardened in order to bring the Gospel to all: Jews and Gentiles (The Jews if provoked to envy and the Gentiles who have faith will be 'grafted in'). There's also a distinction between God's choice to bring His message through certain messengers (and the means used to choose such messengers) vs. God's determining those who are responsible to believe that message.

20:46 - POINT 3 - Humbling yourself (repenting in faith) is NOT a meritorious work (the prodigal son didn't deserve the father's grace in taking him back). God has sovereignly chosen to show grace to those who have faith. Those who have faith still deserve Hell. My faith doesn't make me 'better' than those who don't have faith; the word 'make' presupposes non-libertarian freedom and so it begs the question against the libertarian.

25:27 - POINT 4 - Givers get full credit for giving gifts even if rejected by some. The condition of faith does not steal any glory from God's giving of the gift of grace. God gets all glory because God chooses to save us in the middle of the pig stye of our lives if we have faith. This absolutely excludes the legitimacy of boasting.

29:00 - POINT 5 - God's attribute of Sovereignty is not an Eternal Attribute of God that's compromised by creatures with libertarian freedom. Sovereignty is not meticulous control, it is His right to rule (have dominion) over His creation. Thus, prior to the decree, He isn't sovereign over creation until creation is created. Therefore, Sovereignty is not an 'eternal' attribute. All things will be put under Christ's feet in the future through Christ's victory through the cross. For now, God has permitted that the world to man and the dark principalities (Ps. 115, verse 16; Eph. 6, verse 12).

Dr. Leighton Flowers, Director of Apologetics for Texas Baptist and Professor of Theology for Trinity Seminary, recounts the 5 points that helped to lead him away from his Calvinistic beliefs.

Leighton was a Calvinist for over a decade and served as a minister in a Reformed Baptist Church before engaging in a 3 year study on the subject. Years after leaving Calvinism he went back to school at New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary where he wrote his Doctoral dissertation on Soteriology and specifically the rise of Calvinism within the Southern Baptist Convention.

[michaelg.tucker]

The one and only reason that I was led out of the lie of Arminianism- properly exegeting GOD's Word.

[The_D_Langlois]

Lol. You didn’t actually accurately represent what Dr. Flowers presents here.
He goes on to explain that God’s omnipotence is His eternal attribute and sovereignty is a temporal manifestation of this eternal attribute.
Even Scripture tells us this. God isn’t referred to as Lord God until Genesis 2. Lord recognizes dominion over.
The point he makes is that God isn’t sovereign over creation until He created it.. just like Genesis 2 shows us. Genesis 1 He is only referred to as God, the Creator. Then He is recognized as Lord over creation in Genesis 2.

Don’t let your Calvinism get in the way of your Christianity.

And btw, I’m not a Leighton acolyte, nor am I Arminian or Calvinist. I’m also not an Open-Theist or Molinist.

It’s just funny to watch Calvinists strawman other followers of Christ and then toot their own horn as if their interpretation is supremely correct without even properly listening to other points of view.

But your Calvinism is supremely correct, right?

Go read Ecclesiastes.

“When I applied my heart to know wisdom, and to see the business that is done on earth, how neither day nor night do one’s eyes see sleep, then I saw all the work of God, that man cannot find out the work that is done under the sun. However much man may toil in seeking, he will not find it out. Even though a wise man claims to know, he cannot find it out.”
‭‭Ecclesiastes‬ ‭8‬:‭16‬-‭17‬ ‭ESV‬‬

[isaiaslopez]

U sound very confused . Let go of your preconceived ideas and liston to the word . How can people who are lost be more lost for questioning God . God chooses them to be lost if what you say is true . I don't see it in scripture .

[SolaScriptura]

Seems to me, if man is free, truly free, God cannot be active as his activity violates freedom and freedom ia universal to all humans

[donhaddix]

logic. if God predestines everything that include who goes to hell.

[Mike-qtjp]

Think this through. This one verse (there are many others) refutes hyper Calvinism; Matthew 22:14 "For many are called, but few are chosen." If Calvinism were true, the verse would/must simply say, "Few are called and those few are chosen." If God calls many and ONLY few are chosen, that absolutely implies that some who are called, refuse to come. Hence, they made a CHOICE to refuse God's calling.
Also, in Jeremiah 7 God says, "People built places to sacrifice their children (in fire) to foreign gods, and He (God) says, "I did NOT COMMAND this, nor did it enter my mind." So, who do we believe, Jeff Durbin, RC Sproul, James White, John Piper or God Almighty and His Holy Word, the Bible? So, while God does predestine some things, this verse clearly says NOT everything. It's like a university predestining a football team (they WILL have a team next season) but giving free will to players themselves to decide whether or not to come out for that team. God, in His Sovereignty, has the POWER to give mankind a certain degree of free will to choose to follow or reject Him and His Christ.