Dave Hunt - Calvinists Aren't Saved, well maybe, but probably not . . .

When I started seminary at Columbia we had a wonderful Church History prof named Bill Davidson (who doesn't appear to be there anymore) who was kind of the token Arminian in a faculty that was loaded with Calvinists and calvinistic sympathizers.  I walked by a class one day and overheard a student ask him if he believed we would see Calvinists in heaven.  He gave a puzzled look and thought for a moment and finally admitted, begrudginly, that he believed there would indeed be calvinists in heaven.  He said this with a chuckle and the class understood that, in that period of deep thought and seeming reticence, he was just funnin with them.

Alas, Dr. Davidson appears to be deceived, and this is no laughing matter young man, thank you very much.  Dave Hunt has recently announced that Calvinists will not be in heaven.  In the September 2005 issue of The Berean Call, his newsletter, someone asks the following:

Question: In the July ’05 Letters section, “TF of Ireland,” a self-proclaimed “Calvinist,” acknowledged that Tom and Dave are saved. Is it possible for someone who believes only in the soteriology of Calvin to be saved? Specifically, that God has to first change a person’s heart. Then…with the gift of grace, faith and salvation in Ephesians 2:8-9, man afterwards, by God’s decree, will come to Him (John 6:37), and fulfill God’s requirement for him to believe and repent. Again, assuming that the fruits and works that follow are genuine, could this soteriology allow for
salvation, apart from attributing any part of it to man’s free will (John 1:12-13)? Can you extend a statement of being a fellow believer to TF (and other Calvinists) as he has to you?

Dave takes oodles of type to answer this simple question and comes to this conclusion:

Could someone who believes this false gospel of Calvinism be truly saved? Fortunately, many Calvinists (you among them) were saved before becoming Calvinists. They now malign God by saying that He is pleased to damn multitudes though He could save all—and that He predestines multitudes to the Lake of Fire before they are even born. But having believed the gospel before becoming Calvinists, they “shall not come into condemnation, but [have] passed from death unto life” (Jn 5:24). Those who only know the false gospel of Calvinism are not saved, while those who are saved and ought to know better but teach these heresies will be judged for doing so.

So, if you are a Calvinist the best case scenario is that if you became a believer becoming a Calvinist you are only a heretic deserving of judgment (hmmm . . . a believer deserving of judgment?? Does that sound a little odd to anyone besides me). The worst case scenario is that you are not even saved.

Dang it! I wish I hadn't read that, now my day is ruined.  How will I explain to my elders that I am a heretic and may not be saved?  How will I explain this to presbytery?  Please don't tell this to Arch Van Devender of Gadfly's Muse - he and I serve on the credentials committee of our presbytery and we have a meeting next week.  When he finds out I'm a heretic I'll be the one on the hot seat.  It's much more fun to be the griller than the grillee in these things.

And how will I explain to my wife that she's been sleeping with a heretic for 18 years?  Oh the shame of it - she'll never be able to look her mother and sister in the eye again!   And what of my children?   And what do I say to those people who say they came to faith in Christ through the ministry of my "calvinistic church?"  Oops sorry we reached out to you and got you in all this trouble.

Like I said - my day is ruined . . . Good thing I've got a plate of chocolate chip cookies waiting for me when I get home, unless those heretical children of mine have eaten them . . .

HT - Calvinist Gadfly, Jared at Thinklings, and everyone's favorite heretical Canuck Tim Challies.