There is a Bible doctrine of God's foreknowledge, predestination, and election. Most great bodies of Christians, not strictly Calvinists, or not Calvinists at all, agree that God has His controlling hand on the affairs of men. They agree that, according to the Bible, He selects individuals like Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, David, and King Cyrus, as instruments to do certain things He has planned. He raised up Pharaoh who was already "a vessel of wrath," with many years of hardened heart and wicked rejection, to make him an example of punishment. Christians agree that God may choose a nation, particularly that He did choose Israel, through which He would give the law, the prophets, and eventually through whom the Saviour would come. It is a Bible doctrine that God foreknows who will trust in Christ, and that He has predestined or purposed to see that they are justified and glorified. He will keep the saved, will glorify those He saves. You see, Calvin did not originate those teachings. They are taught in the Bible, believed by multitudes who are not Calvinists. - John R. Rice [Predestined for Hell? No!, pg. 8]
The doctrine that God predestined some men to Hell, that some cannot be saved, that they are born to be damned by God's own choice, is a doctrine of Calvinism, a philosophy developed by John Calvin. It is a sectarian tenet strictly followed by hyper-Calvinists. It is a radical heresy, not taught in the Bible. - John R. Rice [Predestined for Hell? No!, pg. 8]
The Arminian language about "probation" is unscriptural. The idea that man is not ever really saved while on earth but is simply "on probation," and that any time he may fall in his probation and then be damned, is an unscriptural doctrine. And the terminology itself is not Bible terminology. The Bible never anywhere says that a Christian is on probation. The language is human language because the doctrine is a human philosophy. You see, Arminianism, like hyper-Calvinism, is a human philosophy. - John R. Rice [Predestined for Hell? No!, pg. 27]
Why not just be a Bible Christian instead of being an Arminian or Calvinist? Why should any man follow either Calvin or Arminius? Why should anybody let his doctrine be settled, on the one hand, by the Westminster Catechism, or, on the other hand, by the teachings of John Wesley? - John R. Rice [Predestined for Hell? No!, pg. 27]
Every lost sinner who rejects God's offer of mercy, who turns down the Saviour, who refuses to repent of his sins, will eventually stand before Christ at the great white throne judgment. God will there make a public example of that sinner. There the books will be opened and he will be judged out of the things written in the books according to his works. And there God Himself will be vindicated. Every person who ever lived, every angel, every devil, will see that God has done right in letting the wicked, Christ-rejecting sinner go to Hell for his sins when he would not accept the offer of mercy. - John R. Rice [Predestined for Hell? No!, pg.38]
It seems obvious that Pharaoh had already settled himself and crystalized his will against God. He had chosen: should he continue his murderous enslavement of God's people or release them? Right or wrong, he would continue. He would reject the true God. He would not repent. We believe he had already committed the unpardonable sin. So God made him stubborn in the matter of the release of the children of Israel from bondage, and made him a public example of God's wrath. Really, God did this in lovingkindness to all who would hear, "that he might make known the riches of his glory on the vessels of mercy, which he had afore prepared unto glory, Even us . . ." as Romans 9:23, 24 tell us. - John R. Rice [Predestined for Hell? No!, pg.38]
Christ is the propitiation FOR THE SINS OF THE WHOLE WORLD! Every person ever born had his sins paid for. He could have had them forgiven if he would. He could have been a child of God if he would. The atonement of Jesus Christ on the cross paid for the sins of every poor sinner ever born! No reader can look up to the bleeding Saviour on the cross and then say that God intended that reader to go to Hell! His sins are paid for; he could be saved and ought to be saved. - John R. Rice [Predestined for Hell? No!, pg. 41]
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