Christ vs. Crews

“And He said to them, You are those who justify yourselves before men, but God knows your hearts. For that which is highly esteemed among men is abomination in the sight of God” (Luke 16:15 MKJV).

Here are the boasts of Dr. William Crews, as esteemed among men:

“Dr. Crews is a great expository preacher and teacher of the Scriptures. He holds six earned degrees, two of them doctorates, has pastored six churches and also served as a seminary professor.

He has been in radio and television ministries for over 30 years. He is seen on television with his ministry program The Awakening Hour, which airs on 150 U.S. stations and in another 170 countries.

He has written over 50 booklets on religious subjects.

Dr. Crews received a B.A. degree from Lexington Baptist College in 1961 and received his Master of Arts from Ouachita Baptist University in Arkadelphia, Ark. He earned his Bachelor of Divinity in 1965 from Bible Baptist Seminary and holds a Doctor of Theology from Immanuel School of Theology in Atlanta, graduating in 1968, and a Doctor of Ministry from one of the most prestigious seminaries in the country, Trinity Evangelical Divinity School in Deerfield, Ill., graduating in 1982. He also holds a Master of Arts from North American Baptist Seminary in Sioux Falls, S.D.

Dr. Crews has also done post-doctoral study at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary in Wake Forest, N.C.

His honorary degrees include a Doctor of Literature from Florida Research Institute and a Doctor of Sacred Theology from Sacramento Baptist Seminary.

Dr. Crews and his wife, Freda, are both licensed pilots with a twin engine rating and fly to speaking engagements across the country. Dr. Freda Crews also has two earned doctorates and is a professional Christian counselor and psychotherapist.

Dr. Crews was ordained to the ministry in 1957 by Grace Ministry Baptist Church in Newark, Texas. In addition to East Gaffney Baptist Church, he served as pastor of Marlbrook Baptist Church, Belvins, Ark., First Baptist Church, Putney, Albany, Ga., Turner City Baptist Church, Albany, Ga., Hillcrest Baptist Church, Sioux Falls, S.D., and Calvary Baptist Church, Spartanburg.

He was listed in Outstanding Young Men of America in 1970, Outstanding Personalities of the South in 1973, Who's Who in Religion in 1985.” [From http://www.gaffneyledger.com/news/2008/0801/lifestyles/017.html]

Men use their titles to vaunt themselves – “Look at me and see how great a man of God I am!” They boast of their spirituality, intellectually-superior accomplishments, man-made credentials, and honors of men. His works and achievements be damned to Hell, every last one of them. Won’t he be surprised when he finally discovers the Truth, or better still, when the Truth discovers him, weighs him in the balances, finds his works abominable and him utterly wanting!

I found one of his many booklets, The Bible Doctrine of Election. I red it and notified Paul Cohen that “Doctor” Crews believed and taught that God predestined people to eternal torment. Besides many other doctrinal errors, here are two primarily blasphemous ones:

First, that God (Who is Love) would have such a diabolical concept as an eternal torment (as people commonly understand the word “eternal” in modern English) for many created in His image.

Second, that God would predestine one made in His image to such a place of eternal torment.

We decided to contact Mr. Crews. Paul wrote him and received a telling reply. We are dealing with an arrogant and superbly ignorant man that has nothing whatsoever to do with the Lord Jesus Christ, notwithstanding all his educational and intellectual prowess. He is so confident in himself and his knowledge, thinking to have all things quite under his control.

He is so cocksure of himself that, without paying any attention to what we have to say, he defies Paul to a public debate – where, or at whose expense, and before what kind of audience, he does not say. For now, let it suffice that we can have a rather inexpensive written debate on the internet, in public for all who care to see, and if, Lord willing, it should come to a public oral debate, so be it. Either way or both ways, by grace and truth, God will deliver whom He will from the clutches of a diabolical, Pharisaical teacher. He is so sure of his election to Heaven when we see even more surely that he is destined for the fires he presumes he will escape.

But there is a great difference between what we teach and what “Dr.” Crews blasphemously teaches in terms of the fires and timeframe. While he preaches a demonic eternal damnation and torment, we rightly teach that God will correct him by fire - not a literal one, but every bit as hot and hotter (we speak it now – God’s Truth), so that even Crews will eventually be purged of his error, pride, self-righteousness, and wickedness. Yes, though hard to believe, even someone as bitter as Crews - if not in this life, then another, but it will happen. As it is written:

“For since death is through man, the resurrection of the dead also is through a Man. For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ all will be made alive. But each in his own order: Christ the first-fruit, and afterward they who are Christ's at His coming; then is the end, when He delivers the kingdom to God, even the Father; when He makes to cease all rule and all authority and power. For it is right for Him to reign until He has put all the enemies under His feet. The last enemy made to cease is death” (1 Corinthians 15:21-26 MKJV).

Praise God, not one out of a hundred sheep will be lost; in His wisdom, power, and perfect love, He will temporarily leave the ninety-nine if He must, go for the lone lost one, and redeem all! And self-righteous liars, vaunting themselves over their fellow man, telling condemning lies, will not stop Him.

Here now is the correspondence with “Dr.” Crews, and Paul’s response to his booklet, The Bible Doctrine of Election, a document with truth, to be sure, but mixed with enough lethal error to drive people to torment, fear, depression, and even madness and suicide.

Victor Hafichuk

Paul sent this note to William Crews:

Hello Mr. Crews,

We have been reading from your booklet, The Bible Doctrine of Election, and thought of this writing on our site as something you should see:

True Hope for Netherlands Reform Church Members and All Calvin Doctrine Victims

This article contains the true answers from God for those who believe, or were taught, the false doctrine from Calvin that God has predestinated them to burn in hell forever, time without end. There is a time to stop drinking from the poisonous doctrines of men mixed in with Biblical Truth, and to start drinking from Jesus Christ alone, Who gives the water of life freely to whosoever wills. [End of summary]

There is much, much more on our site - the pure sustaining water of life from Him Who has filled us with His Spirit and eternal life.

Paul Cohen

Mr. Crews’ reply:

Mr. Cohen:

Thank you for your email. I'm not interested in your website and I'm not a follower of John Calvin or the Reformed Churches' doctrines. You have my booklet, but have you read it? If you are a preacher and care to debate me in front of an audience, I'll be delighted to pursue the matter further.

Sincerely,

Dr. William Crews

Paul and Victor’s reply:

Mr. Crews,

To answer your question: I plainly told you we were reading your booklet.

How is it that you have red nothing of what we say, yet you insinuate that we don’t know what we are talking about? What is more, you even want to debate us. How do you know you wish to debate us, if you don’t know what it is that we preach? Is that not just a wee bit of presumption and arrogance on your part?

We have heard what you have to say, however, so we would be delighted to debate you. It would give us the opportunity to present Christ versus Crews, the Light shining in darkness and the mouth of pride silenced before many witnesses.

Paul Cohen and Victor Hafichuk

Mr. Crews’ reply:

Paul Cohen:

Your original email stated “we have been reading your booklet.” You did not state that you have read it. I think in the final outcome you will not debate me publically before an audience as I suspect you are as most preachers who approach me – more talk than performance. You will have to prove to me that you will meet me face to face because you cannot disprove my Bible positions.

It’s really not Christ versus Crews, but Cohen verses Christ. Come on fellow and lets set the conditions, time and place for the debate. I think you are a coward and will not go through with it.

Dr. William R. Crews

Paul’s reply:

Mr. Crews,

I have red The Bible Doctrine of Election. More importantly, and what you wanted to know, is that I understood your writing when I sent you an appropriate writing that would have alerted you to the horrible error in your doctrine, had you red it. I also provided the introduction that described your error, which states:

“This article contains the true answers from God for those who believe, or were taught, the false doctrine...that God has predestinated them to burn in hell forever, time without end.”

Do you deny that you teach in your little booklet that God has predestinated some people to burn in Hell with unceasing torment, time without end and no change forever? We welcome your recantation of this diabolical doctrine. Since you boast of wishing to defend all that is in your writing, we do not expect one.

Please note, I have not said that we dispute the doctrine of election. We agree with the many Scriptures in the booklet that declare God is sovereign in every respect, choosing and causing those whom He chooses to do of His good pleasure while orchestrating all the affairs of men. This is a foundational truth of the Gospel of Christ and a reality we know not only by doctrine, but by firsthand experience.

Where your train goes off the rails, at least doctrinally (you are in all wrongness otherwise, despite having some right doctrine), is that you claim God’s election in this life reflects the eternal fate of all souls. In other words, you conclude that those who are not chosen in this world have been predestined to eternal torment (a dualism God never annunciates). You write:

“By reprobates I refer to those who will at last be in hell, suffering the just punishment due them. We say that they are those persons who shall not be saved.” (Page 44)

But the true doctrine of election says nothing of the sort; it only explains how and why there are those who believe and follow the risen Lord Jesus Christ in this wicked world. These chosen of God (not by men or by the will of man) are a special people, known as His firstfruits:

“Of His own will He brought us forth with the Word of truth, for us to be a certain firstfruit of His creatures” (James 1:18 MKJV).

A firstfruit is only the beginning of what promises to be much more to come. In the Book of Revelation the nature of this company of firstfruits is described:

“And I looked, and lo, the Lamb stood on Mount Zion. And with Him were a hundred and forty-four thousands, having His Father's Name written in their foreheads....These are those who were not defiled with women; for they are virgins. These are those who follow the Lamb wherever He goes. These were redeemed from among men, as a firstfruit to God and to the Lamb” (Revelation 14:1,4 MKJV).

The full harvest of God that follows His firstfruits is also described:

“After these things I looked, and lo, a great multitude, which no man could number, out of all nations and kindreds and people and tongues, stood before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed with white robes, with palms in their hands. And they cried with a loud voice, saying, Salvation to our God sitting on the throne, and to the Lamb” (Revelation 7:9-10 MKJV).

And how will that multitude without number come to know the Lord Jesus Christ, bowing their knees to Him and confessing His Name with their tongues? By the work God has done in His firstfruits:

“But God, Who is rich in mercy, for His great love with which He loved us (even when we were dead in sins) has made us alive together with Christ (by grace you are saved), and has raised us up together and made us sit together in the Heavenlies in Christ Jesus, so that in the ages to come He might show the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness toward us through Christ Jesus” (Ephesians 2:4-7 MKJV).

This present evil age is not the only age. There is much more to come, in which God expressly declares He will make known the exceeding riches of His grace. What is the purpose for this demonstration of His grace and kindness? What is the message declared by those graciously pardoned and shown such mercy, but the bringing of this same Word of reconciliation to others?

But you think it is to show all those people burning in hell what they are missing, because God has predestinated them to gnash their teeth in torment forever, while you are licking your lollipop in Heaven. That sure does make Him seem glorious, doesn’t it? You blaspheming fool! Your pride in your so-called spiritual intelligence has made you a blithering idiot.

The Scriptures are full to the brim of the testimony of God’s goodness and His mercy, which endures forever. The apostle Paul wrote of the sequence Christ initiated and will complete in the fulness of time:

1 Corinthians 15:20-28 MKJV
(20) But now Christ has risen from the dead, and has become the firstfruit of those who slept.

The Head comes first and will be followed by the rest of His Body.

(21) For since death is through man, the resurrection of the dead also is through a Man.

It is not the whole, but the sick who need the Physician. It is not the living, but the dead who need Life.

(22) For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ all will be made alive.

Just as none had any say in being born into Adam’s condition, so will none have any say about being born into Christ’s. He has willed them both.

(23) But each in his own order: Christ the first-fruit, and afterward they who are Christ's at His coming;

There is a time for everyone. We are His firstfruits, since He came to us first, turning us away from our sins and giving us a new nature.

(24) then is the end, when He delivers the Kingdom to God, even the Father; when He makes to cease all rule and all authority and power.

His Kingdom will prevail, and It is one in which righteousness reigns. If all are doing right, then where are death and hell?

(25) for it is right for Him to reign until He has put all the enemies under His feet.

Just as we who were once His enemies (Colossians 1:21-22) were brought under His reign, coming to know Him as Lord because we were given obedience by grace, so will all other enemies of God. We share a common fate.

(26) The last enemy made to cease is death.

If death is abolished, there can be no more sin that brings death. And where do those whose sins are abolished reside? Certainly not in eternal fire, for the fire will have already done its work.

(27) For He put all things under His feet. But when He says that all things have been put under His feet, it is plain that it excepts Him who has put all things under Him.

As His firstfruits we (not you) are in Him, bringing all things under Him, just as Israel foreshadowed when sent to subdue the land.

(28) But when all things are subjected to Him, then the Son Himself also will be subject to Him who has subjected all things to Him, so that God may be all things in all.

ALL things in all; who would dare contradict God and say that excludes anything or anyone? Obviously one not yet reconciled, an enemy still not brought under His feet.

Your “theology,” Bill, does not square up with the Scriptures. You write:

“If God is trying to save the all of the Adamic family and does not do so, His power is limited, and He is not omnipotent. On the other hand, if He is not trying to save every member of the Adamic family, then His mercy is limited.” (Page 60)

God does not try; He does. He speaks the Word and It does not return to Him void. He subdues all things and His mercy endures forever. Forever means that everything else will fail, but His mercy will endure. He, and not death and hell, is the Alpha and Omega.

You continue:

“All of us must limit His mercy or His power, or come to the universalist’s position that everyone will be saved. In the face of God’s having all power and exercising it in accordance with His will, I cannot believe that His power is limited in any way. I must also reject the universalist’s idea that every man will be saved. There is no conclusion to which I can come but that God has limited His saving mercy according to His unerring wisdom and sovereign choice. According to the Bible, His mercy is limited.... “I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy...” (Page 60)

The Scripture cited speaks of God’s election in this life, as with Pharaoh and Moses. It says nothing of a final and irrevocable mindset from God that consigns Pharaoh to burning in hell for all eternity. God never said anything remotely close to what you blasphemously attribute to Him.

Rather than meaning no mercy forever for those He has not elected or saved in this world, God’s unlimited power and judgment means the very opposite.

“Descendants of Jacob, I am the LORD All-Powerful, and I never change. That's why you haven't been wiped out” (Malachi 3:6 CEV).

“The Lord has said, If I have not made day and night, and if the limits of Heaven and earth have not been fixed by Me, Then I will give up caring for the seed of Jacob and of David My servant, so that I will not take of his seed to be rulers over the seed of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob: for I will let their fate be changed and will have mercy on them” (Jeremiah 33:25-26 BBE).

These are the same people upon whom the Lord said, at other times, He would not show them mercy, “for it is a foolish people; for this cause He Who made them will have no mercy on them, and He Whose work they are will not have pity on them” (Isaiah 27:11 BBE). But He will let their fate be changed and will have mercy on them.

You present our God as confused and His mercy limited, but we know there is a time and place for everything:

“In overflowing wrath My face was veiled from you for a minute, but I will have pity on you for ever, says the Lord Who takes up your cause. For this is like the days of Noah to me: for as I took an oath that the waters of Noah would never again go over the earth, so have I taken an oath that I will not again be angry with you, or say bitter words to you. For the mountains may be taken away, and the hills be moved out of their places, but My love will not be taken from you, or My agreement of peace broken, says the Lord, Who has had mercy on you” (Isaiah 54:8-10 BBE).

Is His mercy only limited to His people, Israel? We know otherwise, and God said as much:

Isaiah 19:22-25 BBE
(22) And the Lord will send punishment on Egypt, and will make them well again; and when they come back to the Lord He will give ear to their prayer and take away their disease.
(23) In that day there will be a highway out of Egypt to Assyria, and Assyria will come into Egypt, and Egypt will come into Assyria; and the Egyptians will give worship to the Lord together with the Assyrians.
(24) In that day Israel will be the third together with Egypt and Assyria, a blessing in the earth:
(25) Because of the blessing of the Lord of armies which He has given them, saying, A blessing on Egypt My people, and on Assyria the work of My hands, and on Israel My heritage”

The vanity and fires are purposed by Him to this end:

“Behold, is it not of the LORD of hosts that the people shall labor in the very fire, and the people shall weary themselves for very vanity? For the earth shall be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the LORD, as the waters cover the sea” (Habakkuk 2:13-14 KJV).

So we can say with assurance:

“Oh give thanks to the God of Heaven; for His mercy endures forever” (Psalms 136:26 MKJV).

We can use Israel as an example of God’s mercy. You write:

“Listen to what Paul said concerning the seeking of Israel, '...Israel hath not obtained that which he seeketh for, but the election hath obtained it...' (Romans 11:7)” (Page 32)

Here you cite that Israel did not obtain the blessings of God by their works. I add that being found walking in their own righteousness, they opposed God’s Anointed from Whom all blessings are derived. At the Feast of Pentecost (firstfruits), Peter told them what they did to Him in their darkness and ignorance:

“Him [Christ], being delivered by the determined purpose and foreknowledge of God, you took, and by lawless hands, nailing Him to a cross, you killed Him” (Acts 2:23 EMTV).

Upon hearing these words, many repented (as many as God saw fit to add to His assembly - Acts 2:47), but many others continued in their darkened way, persecuting the Lord in His Body (Acts 4:27-29). Saul of Tarsus was among those who persecuted the Lord (Acts 9:4), but the Lord turned him, as an example of His longsuffering and what, omnipotent power? Yes, but power manifested in mercy:

“Faithful is the Word and worthy of all acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am chief. But for this cause I obtained mercy, that in me first Jesus Christ might show forth all long-suffering, as a pattern to those being about to believe on Him to life everlasting” (1 Timothy 1:15-16 MKJV).

Paul was a firstfruit of the much greater harvest to come, through the long-suffering mercy of God. Isn’t that what Paul showed Israel and all those to whom he preached the gospel? You say God’s mercy is limited to those whom He chooses in this life, but Paul wrote this about God’s mercy to the Gentile believers regarding the Jews’ unbelief:

“For as you also then disbelieved God, but now have been shown mercy through their disbelief, even so these also have not believed now, so that through your mercy they may also obtain mercy. For God has shut up all in unbelief, so that He might show mercy to all” (Romans 11:30-32 MKJV).

Is that a limited mercy or an appropriately timed and effectual mercy? What does mercy mean, anyway, unless there is a container formed to receive it? Even blaspheming, unbelieving Jews will be reconciled to God when their time is fulfilled, according to the gospel that was revealed through Paul:

“For if their casting away means reconciliation for the world, what will their acceptance be, if not life from the dead?...For I do not desire you to be ignorant, brothers, of this mystery, lest you be wise in your own opinion, that blindness in part has happened to Israel until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in. And so all Israel shall be saved, as it is written: ‘The Deliverer shall come out of Zion, and He shall turn away ungodliness from Jacob; For this is My covenant with them, when I take away their sins’” (Romans 11:15-27 EMTV).

Not “if” He will take away their sins, but “when.” God has blinded Israel in order to save the Gentiles, and in turn He will restore Israel, as He will all things.

Your doctrine of election stops way short of God’s intentions, not acknowledging His heart and mind towards His creation, because you do not know Him. Your god is a cold-blooded torturer. Your god is you. Your election is for yourself, and you condemn to hell all those who do not bow to you and your god. You write:

“If God has all power relative to keeping the saved and does not have all power relative to saving all the lost, then His power to save the lost is less than His power to save the saved, consequently you have a finite, powerless, and helpless God. Election overcomes this monstrous and inescapable conclusion, for it guarantees that nothing will limit the application of God’s power in saving all He wants to save.” (Page 50)

You are right; nothing can or does limit God’s power to save everyone. The question you have answered wrongly is what constitutes the “all” God wants to save. God desires that all men come into the knowledge of the truth (1 Timothy 2:4), and they will because He wills it. (Read Religion Sucking Out the Brains of Grown Men.)

The god you have created in your image by your election doctrine ascribes all power to the true God, but an unwillingness in Him to save everyone He created in His image. How unlike Him your depiction is, He Who took the form of a servant in human flesh and laid down His life for the whole world!

Yes, the whole world, and not just the elect. Christ sent forth His apostles: “Go into all the world, proclaim the gospel to all the creation” (Mark 16:15 MKJV). Why? For just a few firstfruits? To gather a few insufferably intolerant more doctrinally correct holier-than-thou preachers like you, and call that Heaven? God forbid. No, because the day would come when the labors and lives of His saints laid down in Him would come to complete fruition:

“And the seventh angel sounded. And there were great voices in Heaven, saying, The kingdoms of this world have become the kingdoms of our Lord, and of His Christ. And He will reign forever and ever” (Revelation 11:15 MKJV).

You have assumed a false foundation of eternal, predestined hell for mankind. Using human logic to build on this error has caused you to come up with all kinds of nonsense and wickedness in your little booklet. Such as:

“Mankind benefits from election and does not lose out because of it.” (Page 53)

Tell that to the people who are allegedly burning in hell forever. Tell that to all those who have figured out, according to your doctrine, that they must be among those who are destined for unrelenting torture. How can you even suggest they will not lose out?

“Friends, if election upsets you, you should seek the Lord fervently, pleading for Him to settle you down.” (Page 47)

What if one is a goat? Shouldn’t he be upset, if your doctrine is correct, knowing he is elected by God to suffer the everlasting flames of hellfire? How could a goat be otherwise minded anyway, seeing he has no heart for God? Why do you urge the reprobate to seek God’s mercy, seeing it does not extend to them?

“It may be, in the light of these things, that some of you find your true identity – an alien from God and a rebel to God, having no hope and without God in this world. I am speaking to some of you who are very dedicated church members and sincere religious people. I earnestly suggest that you give diligence to make your calling and election sure. (II Peter 1:10)” (Page 53)

What if they are not among the elect, but are among those who are categorized as stains in the saint’s love feasts, certain men who have crept in unawares (Jude)? What if you are talking to the tares that the enemy mixed in with God’s wheat? What then? Are you and your advice not confounded? But you are a tare yourself, the blind leading the blind. We are here to deliver those for the truth from your bloodstained, bloodthirsty wolfish jaws.

“I feel like blessing the Lord for His election, for without it I would be lost and without hope for all eternity and so would everyone else.” (Page 50)

Have you conveniently forgotten for the moment that your doctrine states that many of “everyone else” will be lost, without hope for all eternity? Indeed, they are already without hope, if not for themselves, surely for others they know and may love, whom they can kiss goodbye forever according to your definition of election and hell. Being reminded of these loved ones in a perpetual state of agony would be torment enough in itself. One would have to be an extreme sociopath to shut out all such feeling of compassion. In other words, one would have to be in hell to do that.

“The only thing God owes any of us is justice, which if we receive will put us in the lake of fire forever.” (Page 13)

If God owes us justice, and justice dictates eternal torment, then are you not saying He is unjust because He does not put everyone in the lake of fire forever, according to your doctrine? But is God’s justice mere revenge, or is there a good end being worked out by it? Is not fire a purifying agent, a good thing?

“But judgment shall return to righteousness; and all the upright in heart shall follow it” (Psalms 94:15 MKJV),

And what of the Law of God, which says that one will reap what one has sowed? How can anyone have possibly sowed, in one short lifetime, for trillions of years of torture (and then, that is only the beginning of the punishment)? What purpose would that serve? What of the Word of God, which says, “Where sin abounded, grace abounded more”? Does that not apply anymore? To what end has God created all things? Who wins in the end? According to you, Satan. According to God, He has overcome, and we are of good cheer, knowing that not only are our names written in the Book of Life, but our labors in Christ are not in vain:

“The LORD says, A sound is heard in Ramah, the sound of bitter weeping. Rachel is crying for her children; they are gone, and she refuses to be comforted. Stop your crying and wipe away your tears. All that you have done for your children will not go unrewarded; they will return from the enemy's land” (Jeremiah 31:15-16 GNB).

“God will take His scalpel and lance the infectious core of rebellion at the very place it localizes or sends the individual to hell when he dies.” (Page 49)

Is hell a place only experienced after death? David knew differently; he spoke of God’s present deliverance from hell: “For great is Your mercy toward me; and You have delivered my soul from the lowest hell” (Psalms 86:13 MKJV).

David also spoke of Heaven as the opposite of this hell: “If I ascend up into Heaven, You are there: if I make my bed in hell, behold, You are there” (Psalms 139:8 KJV). The Kingdom of God comes from within and is here, but Dr. Crews, with all his degrees, does not know this. He is a child of hell, causing those foolish enough to believe him to be twice the children of hell he is (if that is possible), whose inhabitants “know not anything.”

What is hell if not “the infectious core of rebellion”?

“God sets the solitary in families: He brings out those which are bound with chains: but the rebellious dwell in a dry land” (Psalms 68:6 KJV).

Just as Heaven is within, so is hell. You doctrinally remove these internal realities from the present, creating your own artificial theological construct where you sit as God on your throne. You rebel against God’s dominion, doing your own thing, vaunting yourself as if He is with you in your blasphemous works; He is not and we are here in His Name to dethrone, dehorn, and defang you.

“When God crosses the will of an individual, and that individual fights God knowingly or unknowingly, God will either break him in grace and make him submit to Him unreservedly, or leave him alone and later break him in judgment when he passes away in death.” (Page 49)

No one can resist God’s will, because while a man’s heart devises his way, God is ever directing his steps (Proverbs 16:9). No man seeks after God, but while each is doing his own thing, God is ruling in complete sovereignty over all. He doesn’t need man’s permission to do as He pleases. How can clay dispute with the potter over what he makes of it?

And if one is broken in judgment, submitting to God unreservedly, how can that one be suffering in hell? Jesus said:

“And He who sent Me is with Me. The Father has not left Me alone, for I always do those things which please Him” (John 8:29 MKJV).

But of the wicked He said, as we say to you:

“Well has Isaiah prophesied of you hypocrites, as it is written, ‘This people honors Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me. However, they worship Me in vain, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men’” (Mark 7:6-7 MKJV).

“God accepts and rejects men according to His sovereign purpose and plan. He does make a difference between those who go to heaven and those who go to hell because of His great gracious plan and merciful purpose.” (Page 59)

How can you call hell a “merciful purpose” when you claim that God’s mercy is limited? Isn’t your hell the place where His mercy ran out? What is so gracious about being created to live as a miserable sinner on earth, and then be tormented for the rest of eternity in hell without mercy because of what you were made in the first place? What is so great about this plan, especially if you are one who has drawn a losing hand? Wouldn’t it be far more gracious to never have been created?

(We can say this much with all conviction and assurance: You had better hope you are wrong, because if you are right, you will most certainly be among those predestinated to eternal torment. Fortunately for you, you are wrong.)

“Perhaps someone is saying, ‘Then you believe in what is to be will be?’ Yes, indeed I do, for how ridiculous and absurd it would be for me to say, ‘I believe what is to be will not be.’ Surely I believe in no such jargon.” (Page 60)

My, we should be so impressed with your dazzling intellect, backed by all those degrees to prove it. But despite such a show of confidence, have I not just shown that, indeed, you are saying the very thing you ridicule, which is, “I believe what is to be will not be”? That is because you reject the full testimony of God, which I have only begun to articulate. Read our section on The Restitution of All Things, particularly The Good News and The Reconciliation of All Things.

Your stance instead is, “Whatever I say will be, must be, because I know and understand the doctrine of God perfectly.” You, sir, are an educated, self-righteous spiritual prig. Your doctrine is your god, but God is not your doctrine. He has nothing to do with it. Tainted mixtures are not acceptable to Him; they are an abomination.

“There are no more humbled people upon the face of the earth than those who know they are the elect of God.” (51)

Obviously, then, you are not among the elect. We did not need, however, your wisdom to ascertain the fact. Here is how we knew where you are at:

“If anyone says, I love God, and hates his brother, he is a liar. For if he does not love his brother whom he has seen, how can he love God whom he has not seen?” (1 John 4:20 MKJV).

Your brother John Calvin (whether you follow him or not, you are one in doctrine and spirit) thought he was the elect of God, and he was so humble that he thought nothing of burning a man rather than admitting his own error or confessing that he couldn’t properly answer the man’s legitimate teachings from the Scriptures. Yes, that is the evidence of your wonderful election and humility – which God will destroy as He does all the hypocritical works of the wicked.

On page 36 of your booklet, among other false teachers, you quote Augustine as an authority you consider qualified to validate your doctrine. Selecting such authorities is another proof of your pedigree, which goes back through many false teachers to the Catholic Church, the mother of present day denominational whores and murderers. Apparently you expect these to be your companions in Heaven when you die, but though you join hand in hand to do wickedly, you will hang separately in the judgment of God, which for you has now begun in earnest with our contact.

On page 48 of your booklet you describe a situation wherein you were offered a job:

“While we were eating lunch with a family in a church I formerly pastored, the lady told me that the church (while they were without a pastor) had prayed that the Lord would sent them a Bible-preaching pastor. When they heard me preach they decided I was the man. She confessed that she concluded after I had been there a few months that they had not prayed for a man that preached as I did. She was referring to my straightforward preaching of the whole counsel of God generally, and the doctrine of election particularly...The lady about whom I have been speaking went on to tell me that she felt sometimes as I preached that she could kill me, as she bitterly opposed the barbedwiry truths I preached. They upset her and made her doubt her salvation, according to her own testimony.” (Page 48)

No doubt there are errors abounding when people look to hire a minister and a man hires himself out as such. That is not the way of Christ or any of His true ministers. What you had there was the blind leading the blind. And it is no wonder that the blind would be agitated by your doctrine of election. Some of the more honest ones might sense or know that they have no such assurance of their salvation as you falsely have, and, not receiving an answer from Heaven according to your teaching (or conjuring one up, as you did for yourself), they could begin to suspect or conclude that they are not of the elect, but of the reprobate you teach will spend eternity in hell.

It was this very kind of situation that inspired the writing I sent you, which you rejected out of hand saying, “Not interested.” You are nothing but a self-important, bitter know-it-all whose ignorance is perpetuated by an overweening arrogance. You have convinced yourself that your conversion experience was from God, but you had and have nothing from Him. No one who knows the Lord could teach what you do and behave himself as you do. You are a usurping fraud, but now exposed for all to whom God gives to see.

You keep calling for a debate. Well, here we are. We have posted this correspondence on our site with an introduction. You may send this to as many as you wish, and if you respond to us, we will gladly post that and answer it as well. If you have something more in mind for a debate, tell us what that is. But how would you answer us in person if you cannot answer what we tell you by letter?

In summary, here is what God has to say to you and your doctrine:

Romans 2:4-9 MKJV
(4) Or do you despise the riches of His kindness, and the forbearance and long-suffering, not knowing that the kindness of God leads you to repentance?
(5) But according to your hardness and your impenitent heart, do you treasure up wrath for yourself in a day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God,
(6) Who will render to each according to his works;
(7) indeed to those who with patience in good work are seeking for glory, and honor, and incorruptibility, everlasting life.
(8) But to those who indeed disobeying the truth out of self-seeking, and obeying unrighteousness, will be anger and wrath,
(9) tribulation and anguish upon every soul of man who has worked out evil; of the Jew first, and also of the Greek.

Paul Cohen

Mr. Crews’ reply:

Mr. Cohen:

You seem to have answers to my views of The Doctrine of Election. You parade yourself as if you do. Let’s cut to the chase. Will you debate me in a public forum? When? Where? What propositions? By what rules? Your caustic spirit permeates your writings. You do not demonstrate the Spirit of Christ. Paul said, “…now if any man have not the spirit of Christ, he is none of His” (Romans 8:9). If you do not have the Spirit of Christ, you cannot understand spiritual things (1 Corinthians 2:14). Hence, your obvious confusion, and furthermore, your mind is darkened (Ephesians 4:18). It’s no wonder that your scriptural errors abound clearly and profusely. All your palaver and rhetoric does not and cannot disprove truth.

According to what I’ve read from you, your email address ought to be changed to “the path of error”. Why don’t you place this response on your website?

Dr. William R. Crews

Paul’s reply:

Mr. Crews,

We don’t just “seem” to have answers to your views of the doctrine of election (you capitalize those last four words because it is your god); we have the answers and have made them public. While you depend on your debating skill, which is not where any man of God's confidence should rest, we trust in the Truth and the Light (getting it out into the open for all).

Therefore, taunting us to “cut to the chase” and have a debate is a little late and a lot lame. The debate has already begun. Our site is open for all to hear your answers, if you have any. We have also sent this correspondence to over 200 of those associated with you by institutional religious affiliation, so the pressure is now on you to come up with something substantive.

The rule for us in this debate is to speak the truth to your error, defining your doctrine by using your own words and drawing out the implications in simple, plain language, applying the appropriate Scriptures that defy your blasphemous characterization of God. The rule for you thus far is to avoid the topic by huffing and puffing at us with empty charges and straw man arguments typical of the accuser of the brethren.

We are “caustic,” you say, and therefore do not have the Spirit of Christ, and therefore do not understand spiritual things, and therefore are wrong.

“Caustic,” how? You don’t say. Like John the Baptist?

“When John saw many Pharisees and Sadducees coming to him to be baptized, he said to them, ‘You snakes---who told you that you could escape from the punishment God is about to send?’” (Matthew 3:7 GNB)

Or like Christ?

“Serpents! Offspring of vipers! How shall you escape the judgment of Hell?” (Matthew 23:33 LITV)

That which you call “spiritual error, palaver and rhetoric” has thoroughly trashed your doctrine. Where is the “truth” you claim yet stands? All we see is smoke and dust where once stood a building that was despicable in the sight of God.

While you smear us with vague, unsubstantiated characterizations, let’s talk about your fruits. We send you a serious question, offering legitimate Scriptural texts that warrant an answer, and all you can do is scoff at us, insinuate we are unworthy of your attention, and challenge us to verbal fisticuffs. Why the belligerence? You are a bitter and cruel man, a pompous, intellectual bully whose bluff has been called. Not having anything in your hand, you rage as if that will be accounted as substance.

No, Mr. Crews, we are not caustic. That is your own reflection you see, which we have elicited by approaching you and have merely described as you reveal your true nature and manners.

“For there is nothing hidden which will not become manifest, nor anything concealed which will not be known and come to light” (Luke 8:17 EMTV).

Paul Cohen

Mr. Crews’ reply:

Mr. Cohen:

Will you face me in a public debate or not? It is a simple question which elicits a simple answer of yes or no. You are a yellow belly coward who likes to arm chair a discussion without someone who can answer you on the spot. I double dog dare you to meet me face to face. You won’t do it as most of your kith and kin. I would expose your errors and hang you out to dry. Face me and see if you can handle me with the truth in my heart, head, and Bible. You are a scared skunk. Prove to me that you aren’t. You don’t have the guts!
Incidentally, did you post my last email on your website? Will you put this one there?

Dr. William R. Crews

Paul’s reply:

Mr. Crews,

Everything was published on our site including my last letter to you. Now your latest reply along with this one from me is added, too. (Go take a look at Christ vs. Crews.)

And why would we not do this, even gladly so? There is certainly no need to challenge us. Why would we not wish to air your rantings when they so vividly prove the bankruptcy of your spirit, doctrine, and standing? Who needs to shoot you when you keep shooting yourself, not just in the foot, but in the head?

This is a fascinating, voluntary self-exposure. We must ask ourselves, “Is he writing to us while inebriated? Or has some prankster gotten access to his computer, sending us mischievous messages to make him appear the religious madman?”

But alas, it is you, Mr. Crews, is it not? Now will you be coming after us in the “Spirit of Christ,” as you did your wife, with gun in hand? She had to hide herself in the bathroom and call the police to protect herself from “His Coming.”

As I have said twice now: What is the point of debating you in person when your arguments have already been demolished and you prove it with your surly and inane replies? What else can we say to the person who has demonstrated zero credibility for his arguments and a complete lack of ability to rationally and civilly engage another human being in an intelligent conversation?

Now we will ask you, Mr. Crews, why don’t you post all of our correspondence on your website, since, by your own reckoning, you have really shown us up?

Paul

Mr. Crews’ reply:

Paul Cohen:

Your ravings, rantings and hellacious ideations and rhetoric prove nothing. Your suggestive insinuations also prove nothing. I could care less what you say in your correspondence. Either put up or shut up! You are a yellow-bellied coward who will not and cannot face the truth in a public forum debate.

If you will not, please don’t contact me again. I have challenged you to a public forum debate and you have obviously refused. I know why – you can’t face the truth from God’s Word by someone who can expose your scriptural ignorance and spiritual bankruptcy. You are a spiritual nincompoop and a biblical idiot. Again, you don’t have the guts to face me in a public debate. If you don’t, then I conclude that you must perceive a weakness in your theology that you can’t defend and also are a Pharisee fake. I’ll shoot holes through your erroneous doctrine. If you won’t face me publically, then get some one of your stripe to do it. This is an open challenge to anyone in your camp.

Dr. William R. Crews

Victor’s reply:

Hey, doc, judging by your attitude, we think you remain a pool hustler and a drunk, not to mention an abuser of all mankind in your obvious deep-seated anger, testiness, and arrogance. However, if you wish to debate, we will talk to you. Come to Helena, Montana. We will meet you face to face. Not that it is about debate. Jesus never participated in such and neither did His disciples, that we know of. As we have already told you, our trust is not in cleverness or carnal skills of men, but in the Living God, Whom you do not know and have never known.

Victor Hafichuk

Paul’s reply:

Mr. Crews,

Answers are no less answers because they are written. In fact, being written and permanently available for scrutiny, there is all the more opportunity for you to answer and refute them (if that were possible). You declare you “could care less” what I have written as a convenient invention to avoid answering for your teachings and manners.

Nevertheless, as Victor Hafichuk has written you, come to Helena if you wish to meet us face to face. Let me add, you can arrange with the Helena church of your choice for a place and platform to present your doctrine, and we will present what we have from God regarding the Good News He has given us to preach to all peoples, including the wayward religious.

Mr. McCurry (a religious affiliate of Mr. Crews that he has been CC'ing throughout this correspondence),

You have been silent on our Scriptural refutation of Mr. Crews’ doctrine, and regarding his belligerence. Have you nothing to say?

Paul Cohen