Now for our contingent of humorless Calvinists: Angel’s cartoons come from listening to the Dividing Line and other tapes and materials presented by this ministry. They are meant to make a point. They do so with humor and yes, sarcasm. That’s how they get the message across in a way it will be remembered. Dave Hunt grossly misrepresented Spurgeon (see the documentation in my entry for 1/07, now in the blog archive). Despite being corrected repeatedly, Hunt has remained adamant in his error. So think about it, which is more likely to make the point and get remembered: the blog entry with its nice table, or the wonderfully composed cartoon above?
Further, it is apologetically relevant as well: if we do not call folks on “our” side like Dave Hunt to be accurate in his handling of such materials as the sermons of Spurgeon, how can we complain when our enemies mishandle documentation? If Hunt is willing to stand behind such obviously erroneous statements, despite the corrections of his friends, what does this say? In case you are wondering, Dave has called myself, and numerous other Calvinists, “elitists” many times (lots of documentation on that one), and as to the high praise for the book, well, I personally have always found it outrageously funny that Tim LaHaye, after saying Calvinism comes “perilously close to blasphemy” (would I debate LaHaye on the issue? At a moment’s notice! Think of how many folks would get to hear about the doctrines of grace!), would say of a book copyrighted in 2002 that “This may well be the most important book written in the 21st century.” Comments like that are begging for an “Angel-ic” response. 🙂
Finally, one of our regular participants in channel, Mark Ennis, really summed it up well. He said, “The way he is handling Spurgeon is the ultimate example that proves Dave Hunt has no idea what language Calvinists speak.” Exactly! Spurgeon was talking about the merit of the cross, not the intention of the cross, and as in so many other situations, those who oppose the doctrines of grace do so by not listening to what is being said to them. BTW, if you would like to join the conversation in the chat channel, click on the “A&O Chat” button to the left.
Now to quote folks from the chat channel when I first posted this, “Angel r0x0rz!”