Judas refutes Eternal Security (Calvinism)

One of the most powerful arguments to refute the Protestant doctrine of Eternal Security (also known as Once Saved, Always Saved) is the example of Judas. The typical objection these Protestants make is that if someone 'falls away' then they were never really saved in the first place, but this claim (aside from being unbiblical) doesn't work with Judas' example. Some will point to John 17:2 which says Judas was "lost," but this refers to his losing his salvation, as will be shown.  

The force of my argument rests in the fact that it is impossible to be an Apostle if one is not a true believer in the first place. (This causes problems for Reformed church leadership as well.) If the Protestant position were correct, the Bible could only have said Eleven were Apostles, despite the fact it plainly says Jesus chose Twelve (John 6:70). Further, the Bible is very clear that Judas was sent out by Jesus with the other Eleven to perform the same miracles (e.g. cast out demons) and preach the same Gospel (e.g. Mark 6:7-13; Matthew 10:1-4). If that wasn't enough, Acts 1:17 says Judas "was numbered among us and was allotted his share in this ministry," and Acts 1:24-25 records the replacing of Judas by Matthias, when Peter says they need a person to "take the place in this ministry and apostleship from which Judas turned aside." Clearly, Judas was considered a genuine Apostle and thus was (originally) saved.

Nearly every time Judas is mentioned, his infamy traces to one thing: his future betrayal of Jesus, not some non-converted status he had the whole time (e.g. John 6:71). It is only in John 13 where we see Satan "entered Judas," indicating Judas consented to the betrayal, but up until then Judas was not possessed by Satan. Next, look what the Scriptures say that turns the heat up even more on the Protestant position. In John 13:18, Jesus quotes an OT prophecy in regards to Judas, "But the Scripture will be fulfilled, 'He who ate my bread has lifted his heel against me.'" To share bread with someone in the Hebrew mindset indicates an intimate relationship; something impossible if Judas was never a believer to begin with. But that's not all, most of us forget to look up the prophecy Jesus is quoting (hat tip to Joe for this), which happens to be Psalm 41:9, which says: "Even my close friend in whom I trusted, who ate my bread, has lifted his heel against me." What a new picture emerges after reading this! Indeed, the idea that Judas was so close to Jesus up until then shows just how serious and enormous the betrayal was, since the worst betrayals are those from the people closest to you. Jesus even calls him 'friend' at the moment of betrayal (Matthew 26:49-50)! This is unthinkable if Judas was never saved to begin with.

A convincing proof that Protestants don't really believe in Sola Scriptura (Romans 4:3)

Protestants (particularly Calvinists) believe that "the infallible rule of interpretation of Scripture is the Scripture itself," meaning that whenever there is a 'dispute' on a given text of Scripture there will necessarily be another verse somewhere in Scripture that speaks more clearly on the matter so as to definitively settle the 'dispute'. An irony here is that while this principle is not taught in Scripture, it is employed throughout the history of Catholic exegesis, while on the flip side it's really the Protestants who are the ones that deny it! This post will prove this beyond a doubt by taking a brief look at how Protestants ignore this principle on one of the most important verses in the Bible, Genesis 15:6.

St Paul quotes Genesis 15:6 in Romans 4:3 to show that Abraham was justified by faith. Protestants take this verse and interpret "faith was reckoned as righteousness" as saying that Abraham's faith was akin to that of an 'empty hand' that had nothing of value to it, but instead it 'reaches out' and takes hold of "Christ's Righteousness". They say that any other interpretation turns faith into a work and thus undermines the Gospel. Not only does the plain reading of the verse suggest no such interpretation, using the principle of Scripture-interprets-Scripture refutes this as well. Most people don't know that Genesis 15:6 is actually quoted three other times in the New Testament, but this is important for exposing the Protestant bias:

Romans 4: 18 In hope he believed against hope, that he should become the father of many nations, as he had been told, “So shall your offspring be.” 19 He did not weaken in faith when he considered his own body, which was as good as dead (since he was about a hundred years old), or when he considered the barrenness of Sarah's womb. 20 No unbelief made him waver concerning the promise of God, but he grew strong in his faith as he gave glory to God, 21 fully convinced that God was able to do what he had promised. 22 That is why his faith was “counted to him as righteousness.”

Galatians 3: 5 He therefore that ministereth to you the Spirit and worketh miracles among you, doeth He it by the works of the law, or by the hearing of faith? 6 Even as Abraham “believed God, and it was accounted to him as righteousness.” 7 Know ye therefore that those who are of faith, the same are the children of Abraham. 8 And the Scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the heathen through faith, preached beforehand the Gospel unto Abraham, saying, “In thee shall all nations be blessed.” 9 So then, those who are of faith are blessed with faithful Abraham.

James 2: 21 Was not Abraham our father justified by works when he offered up his son Isaac on the altar? 22 You see that faith was active along with his works, and faith was completed by his works; 23 and the Scripture was fulfilled that says, “Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness”—and he was called a friend of God. 24 You see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone.

These texts explicitly show the faith Abraham had in Genesis 15:6 was a robust, God-glorifying faith, which God counted as inherently having the quality of righteousness. It was a faith that included hope, grew strong, and was active, rendering Abraham "faithful" in his walk with God. The astonishing thing is, Protestant scholars and apologists routinely ignore these texts when "interpreting" Genesis 15:6. Something's up. Clearly, if Protestants really believed in Sola Scriptura this would not be happening, but in order to salvage Sola Fide they must sacrifice their trust and reliance on the clear teaching of God's Word.

Untapped potentional in Romans 3:4? (Sola Fide)

I need to explore this more, but I think I've come upon another very devastating argument against the Protestant understanding of Justification. Protestants have been very adamant that the term "Justify" (dikaioo in Greek) means "to declare righteous," specifically in a legal context, and have pointed to various passages to support their claim. But it seems as if one passage that I'd expect them to appeal to - Romans 3:4 - has been routinely neglected, and I can only think of one explanation for it. 

In this verse we read: "Let God be true though every man be false, as it is written, 'That thou mayest be justified in thy words, and prevail when thou art judged.'" Here Paul is quoting Psalm 51:4, which happens to use the term dikaioo, and which also seems to be in a forensic context (since the word "judged" appears here). You would think Protestants would be all over this, but I don't recall them appealing to this text (favoring other proof texts instead), and I think I know why. Looking closely, you notice that the term dikaioo here is speaking of God Himself being justified, which means this obviously cannot mean "declare righteous"! The only option then is that dikaioo, in this ever so important junction in the Book of Romans, must mean something akin to "vindicate," just as Protestants claim James 2 must be using dikaioo to mean "vindicate". If this holds up, this is very bad news for Protestant exegesis, because Romans 3:4 would thus dictate how we read dikaioo in the context of Romans 2-4. And if Paul is speaking about "vindication" in these chapters, then there goes the Protestant understanding of justification up in smoke.

Should Protestantism be against The Law?

T. David Gordon is a conservative modern day Reformed scholar and is friends with big name Reformed scholars such as John Fesko and R. Scott Clark. In a 2009 book The Law is Not of Faith, which included essays by various conservative Presbyterian theologians, Dr Gordon wrote an essay that included some important comments on Saint Paul's use of the term "Law" in his Epistles. These comments were so revealing that I was surprised hardly anyone raised an issue about them, and in fact I'm surprised they were even published in the book. 

Since the time of the Reformers, Protestant scholars have interpreted "works of the Law" to be works done under God's eternal law when God made a perpetually binding Covenant of Works with mankind, starting with Adam in the Garden of Eden. Thus, in Paul's frequent use of the term "Law" in his Epistles, nomos in Greek, Protestants have historically said Paul is speaking of the Covenant of Works. But Gordon objects to this thesis, and in doing so undermines the entire foundation from which Protestants derive the doctrine of Justification by Faith Alone. Fortunately, this essay is available on his website, so those interested can read it for themselves. I will limit this post to quoting just the most important parts of Gordon's thesis. 

Few contributions to Pauline studies in the last several decades are more important than the now widely-recognized lexical reality that for Paul, [ho nomos] means “the Sinai covenant,” far more consistently than it means anything else. As Douglas J. Moo has said: “What is vital for any accurate understanding of Paul’s doctrine of law is to realize that Paul uses nomos most often and most basically of the Mosaic law.”14 That is, Paul uses the term very differently than the term later came to be used in Christian theology, ordinarily to denote something like God’s demand. Again, Moo is right to correct this notion:

As we have seen, the Reformers, as most theologians today, use “law” to mean anything that demands something of us. In this sense, “law” is a basic factor in all human history; and man is in every age, whether in the OT or NT, confronted with “law.” What is crucial to recognize is that this is not the way in which Paul usually uses the term nomos.

In no place is this distinctive use of nomos more obvious than in Galatians 3:17: “This is what I mean: the law, which came 430 years afterward [i.e. after Abraham], does not annul a covenant previously ratified by God, so as to make the promise void.” Note here that what is distinguished is the two covenant administrations spoken of throughout Galatians 3 and 4, covenant-administrations that are historically inaugurated 430 years apart from each other. (Pages 14-15)

In brief, what conservative Reformed scholars Gordon and Moo have admitted is that the Reformers and Protestantism as a whole completely butchered and misunderstood a crucial word/concept of Paul's teaching on justification. The Reformed tradition, with all its great minds and exegetes, has failed to understand a most basic tenet of Romans and Galatians, and in doing so has invented a new theology and new Gospel. Since nomos does not mean "God's demands in general," but rather the "Mosaic Law," this means that the Covenant of Works has no place in Paul's theology and instead projected onto the text! Realizing this, Reformed scholarship is now approaching a cross-roads where any Reformed scholar wanting to save their scholarly reputation must be honest enough to admit Protestantism has been wrong on this point from the beginning, and as a consequence admit Sola Fide is wrong as well.

Did Christ die for everyone or only a select few? (Calvinism & 1 John 2:2)

Since Reformed Protestants (Calvinists) do not believe that Jesus died on the Cross for the sake of all mankind, but rather only a select few (a doctrine called Limited Atonement), one passage often used to refute this error is 1 John 2:1-2,

Jesus is the propitiation for our sins,
and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world.

Taking this plainly, Jesus die for all men, meaning Limited Atonement is refuted and thus so is Calvinism. But since Calvinists can't go down without a fight, they must somehow explain this text. The best they've come up with is saying that the term "world" here does not mean all mankind, but rather "only the select few" or "only the elect Gentiles". But they have no good reason to assume the term "world" here is to be restricted like that. In fact, there's a strong case to be made that John was clearly not speaking of "world" in a restricted sense (hat tip to this Catholic for showing me this), and that can be shown by how Saint John repeatedly uses the Greek word for "world" (Kosmos) in his First Epistle. Consider the 22 other occurrences in the Epistle: 

Chapter 2: 15 Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. 16 For all that is in the world—the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride of life—is not from the Father but is from the world. 17 And the world is passing away along with its desires, but whoever does the will of God abides forever. 

Chapter 3: 1 The reason why the world does not know us is that it did not know him. ... 13 Do not be surprised, brothers, that the world hates you. ... 17 But if anyone has the world's goods and sees his brother in need, yet closes his heart against him, how does God's love abide in him?

Chapter 4: 1 Beloved, test the spirits to see whether they are from God, for many false prophets have gone out into the world. ... 3 This is the spirit of the antichrist, which you heard was coming and now is in the world already. 4 Little children, you are from God and have overcome them, for he who is in you is greater than he who is in the world. 5 They are from the world; therefore they speak from the world, and the world listens to them. ... 9 In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him. ... 14 And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent his Son to be the Savior of the world. ... 17 By this is love perfected with us, so that we may have confidence for the day of judgment, because as he is so also are we in this world.

Chapter 5: 4 Everyone who has been born of God overcomes the world. And this is the victory that has overcome the world—our faith. 5 Who is it that overcomes the world except the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God? ... 19 We know that we are from God, and the whole world lies in the power of the evil one.

It's great that John used the term Kosmos so many times since it gives us a better idea of what he possibly could have meant, including a possible meaning of "select few". But using a simple substitution, try inserting "select few" or "select Gentiles" into these texts. The only text that would remain coherent is 1 John 4:14, but that doesn't prove an alternative definition. Thus, the Calvinist attempt to restrict the term "world" fails. While Kosmos is not used the exact same way in each verse, these acceptable definitions completely permit a universal atonement reading of 1 John 2:2.