Abraham Kuyper The Renown Calvinist Theologian

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Amazing how this is EXACTLY what I have been saying for a few years and is rejected by so many here.

Why is that ?

A Calvinist after my own heart- Praise Jesus !

Before God created heaven and earth with all their inhabitants, the eternal Love of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit shone with unseen splendor in the divine Being. Love exists, not for the sake of the world, but for God's sake; and when the world came into existence, Love remained unchanged; and if every creature were to disappear, it would remain just as rich and glorious as ever. Love exists and works in the Eternal Being apart from the creature; and its radiation upon the, creature is but a feeble reflection of its being.

Love is not God, but God is Love; and He is sufficient to Himself to love absolutely and forever. He has no need of the creature, and the exercise of His Love did not begin with the creature whom He could love, but it flows and springs eternally in the Love-life of the Triune God. God is Love; its perfection, divine beauty, real dimensions, and holiness are not found in men, not even in the best of God's children, but scintillate only around the Throne of God.

The unity of Love with the Confession of the Trinity is the starting-point from which we proceed to base Love independently in God, absolutely independent of the creature or anything creaturely. This is not to make the divine Trinity a philosophic deduction from essential love. That is unlawful; if God had not revealed this mystery in His Word we should be totally ignorant of it. But since the Scripture puts the Triune Being before us as the Object of our adoration, and upon almost every page most highly exalts the mutual Love of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and delineates it as an Eternal Love, we know and plainly see that this holy Love may never be represented but as springing from the mutual love of the divine Persons.

Hence through the mystery of the Trinity, the Love which is in God and is God obtains its independent existence, apart from the creature, independent of the emotions of mind and heart; and it rises as a sun, with its own fire and rays, outside of man, in God, in whom it rests and from whom it radiates.

In this way we eradicate every comparison of the Love of God with our love. In this way the false mingling ceases. In principle we resist the reversing of positions whereby arrogant man had succeeded in copying from himself a so-called God of Love, and into silencing all adoration. In this way the soul returns to the blessed confession that God is Love, and the way of divine mercy and pity is opened whereby the brightness of that Sun can radiate in a human way, i.e., in a finite and imperfect manner to and in the human heart, to the praise of God.

http://christianbookshelf.org/kuyper/the_work_of_the_holy_spirit/xviii_love_in_the_triune.htm
 
There are so many misnomers running around about God and His love and what that looks like in regard to mankind. If anyone wants to know what God is like and what He thinks we need to look no further than Jesus and His teachings since He is the Eternal God who became man.

1- Jesus taught us to love our enemies and pray for them
2- Jesus lived among sinners, ate with them and loved them, had compassion on them.
3- Jesus loves sinners, not hates them
4- Jesus on the cross said please forgive them Father for they know not what they do- His enemies who hated Him at the time.
5- Jesus came to seek and save the lost, the sinner
6- Jesus showed us what love looks like, acts like, talks like, lives like and how it treats people.
7- Jesus told us all the law and commandments are wrapped up/fulfilled in loving God with all our being( heart, mind,soul ) and your neighbor as you do yourself.
8- Jesus said if you really love Him you will do what He has commanded
9- Love is described perfectly in 1 Corinthians 13- If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. 2 If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. 3 If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.4 Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 5 It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. 6 Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 7 It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.8 Love never fails.
10- Love in action in Galatians 5- But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law. 24 Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. 25 Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit. 26 Let us not become conceited, provoking and envying each other.

I could list another 10 points to this list but this should be plenty to get the point across. The wrath, anger, hatred about God towards us misunderstood by many. Gods wrath always falls upon the reprobate, apostate, those hardened against God, those who are wicked and rebellious that reject Gods provision for their sins by Jesus sacrifice.

conclusion: because God is Love and Jesus is God we can see to perfection that 1 Cor 13 and the fruit of the spirit in Gal 5:22-23 describes Jesus to a tee . He is love incarnate since God is love we see Him in action described in the gospels and where the Bible defines love.


hope this helps !!!
 
Synonyms for Love

adore
care for
benevolent
fond affection
treasure
devoted to
attached
hold dear
think the world of
adulate
like
kind
considerate
relish
deeply appreciate
partial to
passion
honor
forgiving

Antonyms for love

hate
dislike
abhor
dislike
scorn
detest
abominate
wrath
retribution
anger
detest
rude
arrogant
envy
unkind
boastful
dishonor
grudgeful

Does anyone get the picture yet ?

1 Cor 13
Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 5 It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. 6 Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 7 It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.8 Love never fails.

Matthew 22:37-40
Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ 38 This is the first and greatest commandment. 39 And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’40 All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.

conclusion : Do you know and understand - God is Love , 1 John 4:8 ?

hope this helps !!!
 
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God can only be who He is and Scripture says more than once God is love.

Love is one of the primary and essential attributes which reflect the nature and character of God. The word Theology refers to the study of God, and God is Triune, a Trinity- Tri-Unity. All doctrine begins with God at its starting point. God’s innate attributes are Aseity (God is self-sufficient), Infinite (without limit), Eternal (God has no beginning or end, he is timeless), Immutable (God is unchanging), Love (God is love), Holy (God is set-apart), Perichoresis (the indwelling of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit). Divine Simplicity states God is Love and because He is Love, not because He possesses that quality. God's love is the center of all the Divine Attributes. They point to His Being. God is not distinct from His nature.

God is Love. In love, the Father sent the Son on our behalf to be the perfect sacrifice for sin. We Love because He first loved us and sent His Son as 1 John 4:8;16 tells us.

We must understand how God's attributes all work in harmony together, not in opposition to each other. God's attributes and character flow from His love—for God is love.

God being love has nothing to do with His creation. That is secondary. God is love, and that love is perfect, lacking nothing within His Triune nature as God. Love, by definition, has to be expressed with another, which is why a unitarian god cannot be love. Love requires another to share and express that love, and it is what we see with the Triune God. God is love before anyone/anything existed.

In the monumental work of Calvin’s Institutes , it is interesting for a man with such an attention to detail when it comes to dogma and Scripture that he left out any mention of Gods primary attribute that God is love ( 1 John 4:8;16 ) and any biblical reference to those two verses in 1 John regarding God is love. His institutes contain thousands of bible references and over 1500 pages in his Institutes.

Another interesting fact is that in the Shorter Westminster Catechism of Faith, question 4 “What is God “? We read the following regarding Gods attributes and notice what is left out.

“God is Spirit, infinite, eternal, and unchangeable in his being, wisdom, power, holiness, justice, goodness and truth. “

Notice like in Calvin’s Institute’s, the WCF leaves out Gods primary attribute that He is love.

Before creation, there was no sin. There was no judgment, wrath, mercy, grace, and justice. There was no Sovereignty for there was no creation to be Sovereign over. Why do you ask about those attributes and that they were not necessary? Because those are God's secondary attributes concerning the creation and the fall. God's love is a primary attribute, like Holy is a primary one. Everything about God flows from His being Love which includes His secondary attributes, which were not in use until the creation and the fall.

The true nature of Gods love is at the heart of the gospel message: God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whosoever believes in His shall not perish but have everlasting life, John 3:16

For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. John 3:17

I understand why people think that and that the god of calvinism is a "monster " with double predestination and the creation of most humankind with no choice due to election/predestination for hell. Its a misunderstanding of Gods nature/character especially when it comes to love.

No parent would say they love all their 10 children yet only rescue 2 of them from the fire in the house when he could of saved them all and let the other 8 burn and die. That is unloving , not loving. But this is what calvinism teaches through their doctrines of grace called tulip.



hope this helps !!!
 
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Just some facts to consider, how many times love is used in scripture not counting all its synonyms which would put it well over 1000. Do you think God wants to get His love across to people ?

ESV: 684
KJV: 442
NASB: 479
NLT: 759
NIV: 686

hope this helps !!!
 
Just some facts to consider, how many times love is used in scripture not counting all its synonyms which would put it well over 1000. Do you think God wants to get His love across to people ?

ESV: 684
KJV: 442
NASB: 479
NLT: 759
NIV: 686

hope this helps !!!
No one deny God does not love. What a colossal waste of bandwidth. ?
 
Synonyms for Love

adore
care for
benevolent
fond affection
treasure
devoted to
attached
hold dear
think the world of
adulate
like
kind
considerate
relish
deeply appreciate
partial to
passion
honor
forgiving

Antonyms for love

hate
dislike
abhor
dislike
scorn
detest
abominate
wrath
retribution
anger
detest
rude
arrogant
envy
unkind
boastful
dishonor
grudgeful

Does anyone get the picture yet ?

1 Cor 13
Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 5 It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. 6 Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 7 It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.8 Love never fails.

Matthew 22:37-40
Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ 38 This is the first and greatest commandment. 39 And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’40 All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.

conclusion : Do you know and understand - God is Love , 1 John 4:8 ?

hope this helps !!!
Sigh...
 
Amazing how this is EXACTLY what I have been saying for a few years and is rejected by so many here.

Why is that ?

A Calvinist after my own heart- Praise Jesus !

Before God created heaven and earth with all their inhabitants, the eternal Love of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit shone with unseen splendor in the divine Being. Love exists, not for the sake of the world, but for God's sake; and when the world came into existence, Love remained unchanged; and if every creature were to disappear, it would remain just as rich and glorious as ever. Love exists and works in the Eternal Being apart from the creature; and its radiation upon the, creature is but a feeble reflection of its being.

Love is not God, but God is Love; and He is sufficient to Himself to love absolutely and forever. He has no need of the creature, and the exercise of His Love did not begin with the creature whom He could love, but it flows and springs eternally in the Love-life of the Triune God. God is Love; its perfection, divine beauty, real dimensions, and holiness are not found in men, not even in the best of God's children, but scintillate only around the Throne of God.

The unity of Love with the Confession of the Trinity is the starting-point from which we proceed to base Love independently in God, absolutely independent of the creature or anything creaturely. This is not to make the divine Trinity a philosophic deduction from essential love. That is unlawful; if God had not revealed this mystery in His Word we should be totally ignorant of it. But since the Scripture puts the Triune Being before us as the Object of our adoration, and upon almost every page most highly exalts the mutual Love of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and delineates it as an Eternal Love, we know and plainly see that this holy Love may never be represented but as springing from the mutual love of the divine Persons.

Hence through the mystery of the Trinity, the Love which is in God and is God obtains its independent existence, apart from the creature, independent of the emotions of mind and heart; and it rises as a sun, with its own fire and rays, outside of man, in God, in whom it rests and from whom it radiates.

In this way we eradicate every comparison of the Love of God with our love. In this way the false mingling ceases. In principle we resist the reversing of positions whereby arrogant man had succeeded in copying from himself a so-called God of Love, and into silencing all adoration. In this way the soul returns to the blessed confession that God is Love, and the way of divine mercy and pity is opened whereby the brightness of that Sun can radiate in a human way, i.e., in a finite and imperfect manner to and in the human heart, to the praise of God.

http://christianbookshelf.org/kuyper/the_work_of_the_holy_spirit/xviii_love_in_the_triune.htm
The Creator/creature distinction is a critical point to note. I appreciate the article. If that was all you were saying, that would be one thing. However, it is precisely what you say with regard to how God expresses His love in the plan of redemption . . . . that is where I jump ship from your views of God's love. I'm totally on board with respect to this article. I wish more people understood the Creator/creature distinction and the ramifications it presents to how we do theology. Thanks for the copy and paste. I'm a fan of Van Til, who also read deeply from Kuyper.
 
The Creator/creature distinction is a critical point to note. I appreciate the article. If that was all you were saying, that would be one thing. However, it is precisely what you say with regard to how God expresses His love in the plan of redemption . . . . that is where I jump ship from your views of God's love. I'm totally on board with respect to this article. I wish more people understood the Creator/creature distinction and the ramifications it presents to how we do theology. Thanks for the copy and paste. I'm a fan of Van Til, who also read deeply from Kuyper.
FYI- I always appreciate you posts and insight even though we may not be in agreement brother.
 
@Slyzr what do you think ? :)

can you hear the crickets chirping too. :)

New International Version
The third time he said to him, “Simon son of John, do you love / agape me?” Peter was hurt because Jesus asked him the third time, “Do you love me?” He said, “Lord, you know all things; you know that I love you.” Jesus said, “Feed my sheep.

Pretty sure Jesus did not mean feed his sheep for not being.

I kind of doubt he meant feed my sheep with 'die sinner'.

Good scripture ......the agape , fellato exchange (pardon my spelling)
 
KUYPER on 1 Cor 13

"Love’s superiority of place and quality is principally conspicuous from the fact that, while faith and hope will finally cease, Love abides forever.

Surely, faith and hope do not cease in the sense that other spiritual gifts cease. The word “temporal” has a twofold meaning. Temporal is the worm that dies and from which nothing remains. Temporal is the caterpillar that must die as a worm, but that rises beautiful again as a butterfly. The same is true of faith and hope, as compared with the spiritual gifts of speaking with tongues and healing the sick. The latter will fail altogether. They will completely disappear. They will vanish away, as St. Paul says in 1 Cor. xiii. 8. But the failing of faith and hope may not be taken in that sense. They fail only to rise again in the fuller, richer, and more beautiful form of sight and enjoyment.

But Love does not know this metamorphosis. It not only abides forever, but it ever abides unchanged. In the fact that all other gifts perish or change, and that Love alone is eternal, we see the never-ending work of the Holy Spirit scintillating in the hearts of believers; in our meditation on Love we apprehend His proper work in all its depths, even to the root. " Kuyper- the work of the Holy Spirit, XXIII, the greatest of these is Love.

Is your mind spending its time on the temporal or the eternal ?

hope this helps !!!
 
KUYPER on 1 Cor 13

"Love’s superiority of place and quality is principally conspicuous from the fact that, while faith and hope will finally cease, Love abides forever.

Surely, faith and hope do not cease in the sense that other spiritual gifts cease. The word “temporal” has a twofold meaning. Temporal is the worm that dies and from which nothing remains. Temporal is the caterpillar that must die as a worm, but that rises beautiful again as a butterfly. The same is true of faith and hope, as compared with the spiritual gifts of speaking with tongues and healing the sick. The latter will fail altogether. They will completely disappear. They will vanish away, as St. Paul says in 1 Cor. xiii. 8. But the failing of faith and hope may not be taken in that sense. They fail only to rise again in the fuller, richer, and more beautiful form of sight and enjoyment.

But Love does not know this metamorphosis. It not only abides forever, but it ever abides unchanged. In the fact that all other gifts perish or change, and that Love alone is eternal, we see the never-ending work of the Holy Spirit scintillating in the hearts of believers; in our meditation on Love we apprehend His proper work in all its depths, even to the root. " Kuyper- the work of the Holy Spirit, XXIII, the greatest of these is Love.

Is your mind spending its time on the temporal or the eternal ?

hope this helps !!!
No Reformed believer denies any of this. ?
 
New International Version
The third time he said to him, “Simon son of John, do you love / agape me?” Peter was hurt because Jesus asked him the third time, “Do you love me?” He said, “Lord, you know all things; you know that I love you.” Jesus said, “Feed my sheep.

Pretty sure Jesus did not mean feed his sheep for not being.

I kind of doubt he meant feed my sheep with 'die sinner'.

Good scripture ......the agape , fellato exchange (pardon my spelling)
What?
 
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