Why I Reject Reformed Theology, in Love and With Scripture

I want to be clear from the beginning. This is not an attack on people. I know sincere believers who hold Reformed theology and genuinely love Jesus. This is a theological disagreement, not a judgment of hearts. Love demands truth, and truth requires clarity. That is why I believe Reformed theology should be rejected, not out of bitterness, but out of faithfulness to the character of God revealed in Jesus Christ.

How Reformed Theology Reshapes God Before Reading the Bible

One of the most consistent patterns I have observed is this. Every person I have met who holds Reformed theology was taught it. They learned it through a seminary, a pastor, a book, or a theological system. I have never met a single believer who simply read the Scriptures, prayed, and arrived at the conclusions of TULIP on their own. Parts of it, perhaps, but reformed theology as a whole, never.

That matters.

The doctrines of total depravity, unconditional election, limited atonement, irresistible grace, and perseverance of the saints are not obvious conclusions of Scripture. They are conclusions reached only after Scripture is filtered through a tightly constructed philosophical framework. Once that framework is accepted, verses are reread, redefined, and reinterpreted to fit the system.

The Bible is no longer allowed to speak plainly. It must speak correctly according to the system.

That is backwards.

The Fatal Problem. Making God the Author of Evil

The most serious issue with Reformed theology is not academic. It is moral.

Reformed theology teaches that God decrees all things that come to pass. Not merely permits. Not merely works through. Decrees. That includes sin, rebellion, abuse, betrayal, and unbelief. While Reformed teachers may insist God is not morally responsible, the claim collapses under its own weight.

If God eternally decreed every evil act, then evil exists because God wanted it to exist exactly as it does. At that point, language about secondary causes becomes a theological fig leaf.

Scripture is explicit.

God is light, and in Him is no darkness at all.

God cannot be tempted with evil, neither does He tempt any man.

Every good and perfect gift comes from above.

Reformed theology does not merely create tension with these verses. It contradicts them while insisting it honors God’s sovereignty.

A sovereignty that requires God to author evil is not biblical sovereignty. It is philosophical determinism dressed in religious language.

As someone that underwent years of sexual abuse as a child and teenager, I refuse to blame God for the work of the enemy.

How This Destroys Moral Responsibility

If everything is decreed, then nothing is genuinely chosen.

If a man sins because he was eternally decreed to sin, moral accountability becomes theatrical. If a person rejects Christ because they were never given the ability to respond, judgment becomes performative rather than just.

Scripture presents something radically different.

God pleads.

God warns.

God grieves.

God calls people to repent.

These are not illusions. I did not make these things up. They are real invitations that assume real response.

Jesus wept over Jerusalem, not because they fulfilled a decree, but because they would not come. How can Jesus have wept if God decreed it to be?

God Is Not in Control of All, But He Is Lord Over All

The Bible does not teach that God controls every action. It teaches that God reigns. This could probably be a post all on its own.

But we have to in that Lord of all and control over all are not the same thing.

A king can rule without controlling every citizen’s choices. A father can lead without scripting every movement of his children. As a matter of fact as a father, I know that trying to script my kids lives is impossible.

God’s sovereignty is not mechanical. It is relational, authoritative, and redemptive. God is not a program or a system, He’s a living Spirit who loves, not controls.

Scripture consistently shows human rebellion resisting God’s will and not fulfilling it.

People resist the Holy Spirit.

People reject the counsel of God against themselves.

People choose life or death.

Yet through all of this, God remains victorious. He redeems. He restores. He brings good out of evil without ever being its source.

If God is in control what’s the point of taking what the enemy meant for evil and turning it for His good?

What the enemy meant for evil, God meant for good. Genesis 50:20

Joseph says this to his brothers after years of betrayal, slavery, and imprisonment. Notice what the verse does and does not say.

It does not say God meant the evil.

It does not say God planned the betrayal.

It does not say God authored the suffering.

The evil had an author, and it was not God.

God entered the situation after human and demonic intent had already acted, and He redeemed it. He overruled it. He brought life out of death without being the source of the darkness.

This verse perfectly captures biblical sovereignty.

God does not need to control evil to defeat it.

God does not need to plan evil to use it.

God is not the author of sin, yet nothing evil has the final word.

What the enemy means for evil, God turns for good. That is not determinism. That is redemption.

God is not in control of all events, but He is over all events. Nothing escapes His ability to redeem, heal, or judge. That is biblical sovereignty. Anything more turns God into something Scripture never portrays.

How TULIP Twists Scripture

Reformed theology depends on redefining words.

World no longer means world.

All no longer means all.

Desire no longer means desire.

Love no longer means love.

According to Reformed Theology when Scripture says Christ died for all, it must mean all kinds.

When Scripture says God desires all to be saved, it must mean only all the elect.

When Scripture says people resist God, it must mean they resist until the moment they cannot.

This is not proper exegesis. It is system maintenance.

The gospel is simple. God so loved the world. Christ died for sinners. The Spirit convicts the world. Whoever believes will be saved.

Reformed theology complicates what God made plain.

Why This Matters To Me

This theology does damage and I hate people not walking in truth. As someone that was once literally possessed (first time I’m admitting that publicly) and literally hospitalized several times over demonic attacks and oppression, God being blamed for evil is an insult I can’t stand by and ignore after I was set free by His love.

My issue with Reformed Theology is that it brings us doctrinaly to places that I don’t see scripture leading us towards a

It reframes suffering as divinely scripted.

It leaves victims wondering if God authored their trauma.

It turns prayer into submission rather than partnership.

Yes, Reformed theology often uses the right biblical words but places them in the wrong context, both within the full witness of Scripture and the revealed image of Christ. Terms like sovereignty, grace, election, and glory are lifted straight from the Bible, yet they are redefined through a philosophical framework that Scripture itself never demands.

When these words are removed from the narrative of God’s redemptive love and filtered through determinism, they stop pointing to the Father revealed in Jesus and start serving a system. The result is language that sounds biblical while quietly reshaping meaning, producing conclusions that cannot be reached by reading the Gospels plainly and watching how Christ treats sinners, sufferers, and rebels.

Words alone do not guarantee truth. Context does, and the ultimate context of all Scripture is Jesus Christ.

But the worst of all, Reformed Theology reshapes God from the loving Father that Jesus showed us.

Jesus reveals a Father who heals, delivers, forgives, invites, and weeps. Any theology that contradicts the Son’s revelation of the Father must be rejected, no matter how sophisticated it sounds.

A Loving Appeal

This is not about winning arguments. It is about protecting the goodness of God.

You do not need Calvinism to honor God’s sovereignty.

You do not need determinism to trust His power.

You do not need TULIP to preach grace.

My prayer and hope is that we let Scripture speak plainly. Let Jesus define the Father. Let love, not systems, be the highest authority.

If a doctrine requires God to be less good to be more sovereign, that doctrine is not worth defending.

Truth and love are never enemies.