2nd Thessalonians 2:10
2nd Thessalonians 2:8-10 (see also 1st Thessalonians 2:16)
Then that lawless one will be revealed whom the Lord will slay with the breath of His mouth and bring to an end by the appearance of His coming; that is, the one whose coming is in accord with the activity of Satan, with all power and signs and false wonders, and with all the deception of wickedness for those who perish, because they did not receive the love of the truth so as to be saved.
John Calvin comments: “To prevent the wicked from complaining that they are perishing innocently, and that they have been appointed to die by God’s cruelty rather than by any fault of their own, Paul shows that there are good reasons why the punishment of God is going to come upon them with such severity. It is because they have not embraced the truth which was offered to them with the proper frame of mind. Indeed, they have rejected salvation of their own accord.” (Calvin’s New Testament Commentaries: Romans and Thessalonians, p.406, emphasis mine)
But if Jesus didn’t die for them, then what exactly was being “offered to them”? As a side note, John Calvin never explicitly affirmed the doctrine of a Limited Atonement.
Question: If 5-Point Calvinism and its associated doctrine of a Limited Atonement are true, then for those who perished, wouldn’t it necessarily follow that they lacked a Savior who died on the cross for them? If that’s the case, then why would you speak of something that they failed to do, “so as to be saved”? How would they have any chance to be saved, without a Savior? What would their hypothetical receiving of the truth, have to do with anything? For if Limited Atonement was true, then what bearing would the love of the truth and the Gospel have on them? Why, in that case, would you speak of what they could have, or should have done, “so as to be saved”?
Answer: That’s why only an Unlimited Atonement can make sense of the verse.
