An Amendment to my Long Letter

I was writing Sam again about the subject of Calvinism, and he wanted me to clarify a point I had made. Sam said the following: "Also, Cam, you have referred to the chosen in Him passage with "I think it can mean God ordained every single specific believer, or just the group of believers, not necessarily a set group." You have said something along this line several times. This is way too vague to even be an argument. Please expound. Yes, I am actually asking you to make your already long letter longer." So, I gave my argument some more thought and realized he was right. This argument I had been using was rather vague. So here is my thought process on the subject.


Makenna, I am sending you this also to clarify some of the stuff in my extremely long letter. I forwarded Sam the letter too, since we've also been debating the subject for a while. Sam's email is below, like he says, he wanted me to make my extremely long letter even longer, and clarify this statement I made:

"I think it can mean God ordained every single specific believer, or just the group of believers, not necessarily a set group."

I think I rather disagree with myself now. It clearly means both at once. It's actually a really complicated sort of thing I've been thinking about. But here is my basic thought process. I first asked myself:

Before the beginning, did God say:

"I choose you... and you... and you... all to inherit eternal life."

Or did He say:

"I choose this group, the believing ones, to inherit eternal life."

Of course, for a while I considered the first view to be Calvinist and the second to be non-Calvinist. However, I don't think so anymore. Now I take the view that neither are necessarily Calvinist. >From 1 Peter 1:1-2 I found that God has ordained believers according to His foreknowledge (that means conditionally). The question I ask is at the beginning of time, did God say:

"I choose you because you will believe, and you because you will believe, and you because you will believe, to inherit eternal life."

Or did He say,

"I choose all the believing ones to inherit eternal life."

But like I alluded to in the letter, these two really arrive at the same destination, because with the first, all the believing ones end up chosen, and with the second, all the individual believers end up chosen. With God's foreknowledge, even if He did choose the group as a whole to inherit eternal life, He would be well aware of the attributes of the group and what members were in that group.

So that's my thought process on the subject.