By Michael Bunker
editor@lazarusunbound.com
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Letter to Arminian Pastor Sean Hughes

Date: Monday, July 5, 2010

**This is a recent letter to a post-modern wolf preacher named Sean Hughes, an empty-suit Calvary Chapel mouthpiece from Tampa, Florida. Sean's questions are included in the text of my answer. Also, upon receiving this careful and loving letter which took much time for me to prepare, Sean withdrew from the disputation, announcing that "there is no fruit in debating with Calvinists." Apparently he believes this because they will not change their minds, even when confronted with fraudulent and illogical Arminian arguments, straw-men ploys, and deceptive machinations by unqualified and historically and theologically ignorant heretics. Enjoy***

Dear Sean,

Again, thank you for your letter and your questions. I appreciate the opportunity to answer them and to defend the traditional and historic view of these issues and of these important passages in scripture. I apologize for the length of this response, but I felt it necessary to give you all the materials or information necessary to properly answer your questions, and in many cases those answers require sufficient space for a proper exposition. It is not my intention to filibuster, and I wanted you to have all the information you require. I appreciate your stated desire to seek truth and to defend those with whom you have a relationship, and I also appreciate your desire that I not see hostility or confrontation in your email – I assure you I do not. These things can be difficult because it is so difficult to gauge "heat", anger, or intent when we are dealing in such an impersonal medium. I, too, would like to ask that you not impute any hostility, heat, or anger in what I am writing – because I assure you there is none. It is true that these things are often difficult to traverse because we must tell the truth, and we must do so with all of our might and our energy – and I for one am not interested in mitigating or lessening that truth for the sake of "feelings" or sensitivities. There are several points in your letter (or logical conclusions derived from them) with which I must strenuously and ardently disagree. I must call things as I believe they are, and I know that quite often such zeal is mistaken as anger or hatred when I feel neither. Many years ago I was on a preaching trip in the Pacific Northwest, and I made some very severe, but true, points about the errors and heresies of Mormonism. After the meeting, a very nice woman approached me and asked me point blank: "do you believe that Mormonism is heresy and a false religion, and do you believe that unrepentant Mormons, no matter how sincere, are going to go to hell?". I answered, "Yes, I do". The woman broke down in tears because and began to complain to anyone who would hear her that I was "callous and unfeeling". She said that I was shallow and unloving and that I was hurting people who "love Jesus just as much as you do". Well, the facts were very simple. There were two gospels in view. There were two different "Jesus’" in view. There were two contradictory understandings of God and Salvation in view. There is no concord one with the other. There is no peace between these two positions. Yet, because she was angry and hostile to my right to answer her questions honestly, she imputed that anger and hostility to me – and made sure everyone in earshot knew that she thought that I was angry and hostile to her. Such is the way of things. I say this to say that there is no anger or hostility in my response here to you. It is what I believe (and what I believe I can prove) to be true, and as such it is an unemotional statement of position (or in this case, answer to your fair questions). If, however, the questions are based on presuppositional or logical errors, or belie an ignorance or unfamiliarity with Biblical definitions or the proper explanations of words or concepts, I will do my best to take the time to point those errors out to you.