Do Not Be Deceived

In pondering how far to take this particular verse, I considered verse 16-18, but my heart has set on this one verse. I chose to talk about it alone because it has come up as a popular refutation against the Calvinist view of Justification. James 1:16 says:

Do not be deceived, my beloved brethren.

This is a transition point from the previous verses. Apparently, the people that James were addressing had a problem of blaming God for the sins. He just tells them where the sin is birthed, that is, in their own lusts and passions. Next, he will talk about how God is the author of everything good, but I settled here on the transition: do not be deceived, James echoes. Do not be deceived into thinking that God is responsible for your sins, indeed, God is not the author of evil, but good.

I am a Calvinist. I am sad to say that many people think that a “Calvinist” is actually what a “Hyper-Calvinist” is. I will not take the time here to detail all the points and implications of Calvinism, but in brief, it is the belief that we are all in the same boat (in very general terms:

1. Corrupted to the core (that is, not absolutely in the sense that we can not do ‘good’, but in the sense that all parts of us are fallen). In such a state, there is nothing in us that can follow God.
2. We are selected before hand to come unto election. Again, I will not go into specific verses, but I encourage you to read into Revelations. You will find that the Lambs Book of Life is already written. God is not sitting there with a pen in hand nervously waiting for you to accept His salvation.
3. That the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ was performed to redeem the chosen people (the elect), not the general population
4. Of those that are chosen, all of them will come to belief in Jesus Christ
5. Once a person is saved, it is impossible for that person to fall away from grace or lose their salvation in any way.

The Hyper-Calvinist position is a sick perversion which goes so far as to become fatalism, people never praying, never witnessing, or never doing anything to the glory of God with respect to helping other people come to Christ. That is not the case, because God so decreed that we are the ones who will take the message of Jesus Christ to the world and it is through that message that people are saved. I can not know who is elected and who is reprobate (non-elected), so I have to keep witnessing until the good Lord calls me home. I have to teach people, I have to pray; those are so important.

In all this, there is a view that Calvinists place God as the author of sin. This is not the case. That is what this one little verse is talking about. Do not be deceived, God is not the author of sin.

Now, this is topic of Double Predestination. If people are elected to heaven….that must mean that people are also elected to hell. That is correct, but there are two views of the matter. R.C. Sproul has a book called, “Chosen by God” which covers this in fine detail, but let us examine it briefly here.

The Wrong View – Symmetrical Predestination

This view holds that since God works positively in the elect to regenerate them, he must also work positively in the reprobate to keep them sinning. To borrow from Paul: “May it never be!” God does not NEED to work to make someone a sinner, every single person is already a sinner. Every single person is already hell-bound. All God does is pardons some of those people by the work of Jesus Christ on the cross. God is not the author of sin, He does not work to make people sin.

The Correct View – Asymmetrical Predestination

This view basically holds that God works to regenerate His elect while leaving the reprobate to their own lusts, passions, and desires. Have a brief look at Romans 1:20-24.

God is not the author of sin, He is the author of good. Do not be deceived into believing that God will cause you to sin.