Dr Michael Brown calls reformed/calvinist God "Schizophrenic"

I just finished listening to a debate that took place back in 2010. A debate between reformed theologian Dr. James R White , and arminian theologian  Dr. Michael Brown.

The two radio debates consisted of the classic protestant debate: "Calvinism vs Arminianism"

In the first debate Dr James R White clearly had the advantage in exegeting John 6, Romans 8, 9 and Ephesians 1 since these passages explicitly teach reformed theology. While Dr Brown had to appeal to passages all over the Bible to "substantiate" his interpretation of each particular passage. What I found lacking in Brown was his focus of the exegesis of the chapter right in front of him, here clearly Dr White had the advantage.

A general good rule to apply exegesis with would be "immediate context", "neighboring context" and then "context of the book", "context of other books in the NT", and "context of the culture and time". Clearly Dr Brown had to skip the first two steps and go straight to context of the book first. What is even more problematic was none of the passages he appealed to before John 6 were actually advocating free will, so the fact that he quoted the passages still seems like a red herring.


In the second debate Dr Michael Brown points out the Schizophrenic nature of a God who has two contrary wills. One will his prescriptive direct will. Also a will where he desires all mankind to be saved. And the second will known as the decreed will of God. A will in which God has decreed the exact opposite of his prescriptive will.

My Conclusion

Both men are right. This entails reformed theology is biblical as argued by Dr White, but as argued by Dr Brown the implications of reformed theology are a schizophrenic God.