Most Calvinists have replied to my argument challenging the possibility of assurance if they affirm the exhaustive divine decree by suggesting I look at their confessions, as if they address this argument in specific. They do not! I asked AI to help evaluate the argument and if the 1689 Confession answers it. I know AI had many shortcomings but I’ve vetted this argument and I don’t notice any errors. Do you? —- They do not touch the problem created by combining that distinction with an exhaustive decree. Your three points were: 1. Jesus taught that some would believe themselves saved who were not (Matt 7:21–23 is the proof-text the confession itself uses). 2. If God decrees whatsoever comes to pass, He decreed that false confidence. 3. If that is the kind of thing God does to people, first-person assurance that He is not doing it to you is undercut. What they posted: • Chapter 17 (perseverance): the elect cannot finally fall; perseverance rests on the immutability of the decree of election, not free will. • Chapter 18 (assurance): temporary believers and other unregenerate men “may vainly deceive themselves with false hopes and carnal presumptions”; true believers may have an “infallible assurance” grounded in Christ’s righteousness, inward evidence of grace, and the Spirit’s witness. Chapter 18.1 therefore grants premise 1. Chapter 3.1 grants the decree language in premise 2: God “hath decreed… all things, whatsoever comes to pass.” Chapter 5.4 adds that this is “not mere permission” — His determinate counsel extends to the fall and to “all other sinful actions,” which He “boundeth, and otherwise ordereth and governeth.” So the confession affirms that false assurance happens, and that it falls under the decree. It then asserts that if you are among the elect, your assurance will not finally fail. That “if” is the whole issue. The chapters never explain how, from the inside, a person can know he is not one of the people God ordained to have a hope that will perish. The self-deceived man in 18.1 also thinks he has evidence, sincerity, and (often) a felt witness. Calling the elect’s assurance “infallible” is a claim about the elect’s case after the fact. It is not a first-person test that the non-elect cannot also seem to pass. Chapter 18 actually makes the first-person problem sharper, not weaker. Assurance is not of the essence of faith (18.3). A true believer may wait long for it. It may be shaken, diminished, or intermitted. God may withdraw “the light of his countenance” so that even those who fear Him walk in darkness (18.4). So the confession itself admits that the inner life of a true believer can look, for a time, like uncertainty or darkness — which is the same phenomenological space occupied by the temporary believer. The replies in the thread that do try to meet you (decree ≠ causal influence; they deceived themselves willingly; look at fruit) are not what chapters 17–18 say. They are extra moves. And they sit in tension with 5.4’s “not mere permission.”

Why? Because if God predetermined Jesus’ death and atonement, it follows He also decreed in advance all the evil in the world, including 50 million abortions between 1973 and now?

I suspect the Calvinism debate has been repressed for a long time because of this kind of intellectual thuggery deployed against critics. It doesn’t work on Jenna or me, which probably adds to the frustration of the Calvinist thought police.

This doesn't even make sense on it's own merits, because if god saves some and not everyone, it is by definition not fair. If I give some mercy and not others, then I'm not being fair.

No because God proffered a choice. On a plane if the stewardess (Jesus) offers “coffee or tea”, I make a choice, but I don’t get it myself. She provides it. The airline (God the Father) makes sure there’s plenty on board. It is neither rude or presumptuous to make a selection based on an offer. Jesus offered to save me, He didn’t offer to let me save myself. Coffee please!