Here is the original (to the left) with an edit by whom I assume are Calvinistic in their leaning (to the right). I say this because they are saying that Satan is driving out solid Biblical teaching via that Calvinist teachers:
Which got me thinking. The person did not realize it, but they undercut their own argument.
How?
This is how [I created a larger cartoon – click to enlarge]:
Satan’s ultimate ambition is to usurp God’s position (Isaiah 14:13-15, 2 Thes. 2:3,4).
Right?
However, John Calvin notes:
- “[W]e infer that God was the author of that trial of which Satan and wicked robbers were merely the instruments.”
- “Therefore, whatever men or Satan himself devise, God holds the helm, and makes all their efforts contribute to the execution of His judgments”
- “That men do nothing save at the secret instigation of God, and do not discuss and deliberate on anything but what He has previously decreed with Himself, and brings to pass by His secret direction, is proved by numberless clear passages of Scripture”
- “That men do nothing save at the secret instigation of God, and do not discuss and deliberate on anything but what He has previously decreed with Himself, and brings to pass by His secret direction, is proved by numberless clear passages of Scripture”
- “not that He intends to teach wicked and obstinate man to obey spontaneously, but because He bends them to execute His judgments, just as if they carried their orders engraven on their minds. And hence it appears that they are impelled by the sure appointment of God.”
Etc, etc. (Institutes 1.18.1. and 1.18.2.).
- … how foolish and frail is the support of divine justice afforded by the suggestion that evils come to be, not by His will but by His permission. . . . It is a quite frivolous refuge to say that God otiosely permits them, when Scripture shows Him not only willing, but the author of them. . . . Who does not tremble at these judgments with which God works in the hearts of even the wicked whatever He will, rewarding them nonetheless according to desert? Again it is quite clear from the evidence of Scripture that God works in the hearts of men to incline their wills just as he will, whether to good for His mercy’s sake, or to evil according to their merits.
— John Calvin, “The Eternal Predestination of God,” 10:11
- …it isn’t just that God manages to turn the evil aspects of our world to good for those who love him; it is rather that he himself brings about these evil aspects for his glory (see Ex. 9:13-16; John 9:3) and his people’s good (see Heb. 12:3-11; James 1:2-4). This includes—as incredible and as unacceptable as it may currently seem—God’s having even brought about the Nazis’ brutality at Birkenau and Auschwitz as well as the terrible killings of Dennis Rader and even the sexual abuse of a young child…
— John Piper and Justin Taylor, eds., Suffering and the Sovereignty of God
- “Therefore, whatever men or Satan himself devise,” argues Calvin, “God holds the helm, and makes all their efforts contribute to the execution of his judgments.” (Calvin, 1.18.1.)
Satan is said to blind the minds of those who believe not (2 Cor. 4:4). So, you note that the “blinding by Satan” is by spitting out the ingested Calvinist acolytes. However, Satan is ultimately irrelevant since the elect still get saved and the non-elect still go to the lake of fire for eternity. The Devil is God’s Devil (to summarize Martin Luther) and never operates outside the Lord’s decree (Sproul). The Devil is God’s servant (Piper, MacArthur).
So, the change in the cartoon is really a defeater. It undercuts any point trying to be made.
In other words, you are saying God put Calvinism into the person. And God took Calvinism out of the person.
To circle back: God would be usurping Himself.
