One of the major issues dividing protestant Christians is the divide between Calvinism and Arminianism. A summary can be found here. After looking at a (very good) debate between Dr. Michael Brown and Dr. James White on the issue of predestination (that some are predestined by God to be saved and others not), I think it sad that this issue should divide believers, especially since I think that both sides miss parts of the truth.
I should mention that shortly after coming to the Lord the predestination doctrine was a major issue for me (I grew up in the Calvinist Dutch Reformed Church) and I prayed a lot to God that He would show me the truth about it from His Word. He said no. So a lot of what I say here is just my opinion and personal understanding of the Bible, not based on revelation by the Holy Spirit. By contrast, there were many other aspects of my life and faith where the Holy Spirit did convince me of the truth. I mention this, because I think that we as believers do not always depend on the Spirit to open the Word to us to understand it correctly as we should (2 Pet.1:20). Neither do we always distinguish between what the Spirit has revealed to us from the Bible and our own fallible understanding of the Bible. If the Spirit leads us into all truth (Joh. 16:13-14, 1 Joh.2:27), there would be no disunity between Christians as long as we all listen to Him. Unfortunately, we are not always willing to live with "we don't know, since it has not been clearly revealed to us" and instead present our own opinions as the truth.
But as this article shows, it is not as simple to classify everybody. For myself, using TULIP to organise the points:
1. Total depravity vs Free will. Here I have to say that I believe in total depravity in the sense that nobody can come to Jesus if the Father does not draw him (John 6:44), that our hearts are so deceitful, that we always tend to do evil (Jer.17:9-10, Rom.3:23), but at the same time I believe in human freedom in the sense that we chose to do evil and were not forced (although we become slaves to sin when we give in to it). All the calls to repentance in scripture presupposes that we are in some sense free to answer the call (even if it took the conviction by the Holy Spirit to bring us to that point of freedom - Acts 2:37-38).
2. Unconditional election vs Conditional election. Here I am less sure of how to interpret the Word. There are verses that mention the foreknowledge of God in connection with His election (1 Pet.1:2, Rom.8:29-30), but the whole discourse in Rom.9-11 seems to me to be about His election of Israel and would seem to imply that the elect can actually be enemies of God! Rom.11:28 - "As regards the gospel, they are enemies of God for your sake. But as regards election, they are beloved for the sake of their forefathers." I therefore tend to the view that the election is primarily about the group being elected for a certain purpose (to be holy and blameless before Him, to be conformed into the image of His Son - Eph.1:4-6, Rom.8:29) rather than about the specific individuals in the group being elected. For myself, I know that there was nothing in me that could have caused God to choose me, but yet He did.
3. Limited atonement vs General atonement. I think here the Scripture is clear that Jesus died for the whole world (and that it is God's will for everybody to come to repentance - John 3:16, 1 John 2:2, 1 Tim.2:3), even though He knows that not everybody will accept the good news (Matt.7:13-14, 23:37, 24:9-14).
4. Irresistible grace vs Resistance against the Holy Spirit. Once again, it seems to me fairly obvious that the Holy Spirit can be resisted according to the Scriptures (Ps.95:7-11, Acts 7:51).
5. Perseverance of the saints vs Falling from grace. I trust Jesus when He said that nobody can pluck us from His hands (John 10:18-19). Therefore I can have a full assurance. However, I do not think that having a mere "experience" of the Holy Spirit necessarily means that I am saved... we should examine ourselves, whether we are in the faith (2 Cor. 13:5) and if we are indeed bearing the fruits of repentance (Hebr.6:4-8, Matt.3:8). We should make our election sure by the fruit we bear (2 Pet.1:3-10, Phill.2:12-13) , by allowing God to change us (Rom.12:1-2). But this all will be an outflow of our trust in Jesus, not an effort to impress God by our own works (Gal.2:20, 3:3, 5:16,22-24). I believe that those who fall away has never truly been saved, in spite of all external evidence to the opposite (1 John 2:19).
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