Good point Colonel.
But we need to add to that something about it making sense to whose who are willing to understand what it's supposed to defend. One of the reasons God gave the Church teachers is because most doctrinal ideas are not that simple; they're not covered by some single verse. God's revelation came over time, somewhere in the NT it speaks of things the prophets of old wished to see but didn't. Our full understanding of salvation didn't come till Paul wrote Romans. What the OT temple and sacrifices were a shadow of we get explained in Hebrews.
So back to Mat 23:37, it, like Gen 6:6, Deut 5:29, Ps 81:13 and Isa 48:18 is a lament.
I worked today (see another post on Jer 7 & 44) so I'll explain more tomorrow.
In that case, how does "it's a lament" explain Mat 23:37 in terms of Calvinism ?
I came across this this morning at Today on Non Sequitur - Comics by Wiley Miller - GoComics
I'll try the short way though.
Lament. We see it when a parent dies. The children saying "I wish I'd spent more time with them". But in so many cases they didn't because they didn't actually want to. They chose not to. They chose to do something else. That now saddens them, but they got what they chose.
Same with God.
We've been equated to being a body and a building. A body has to have different parts or else it's not a body (1 Cor 12), and a building has different bits as well. A building can't be all roof tiles or all nails or all electrical wiring, it need lots of things and in the right proportions.
So we have God who "is in heaven; he does whatever pleases him" (Ps 115:3) and He decides to create the body of Christ and He chooses how to do it. As said, it needs many different parts, but as it is Jesus whose building it (Matt 16:18) why are we surprised that God who designed it should actually, personally, chooses the bits that come together to make it a whole? (There's a thread here on Gas-Hogs, and in it people are saying they make choices about cars and engines etc., but then people suggest that God can't have a choice in what He gets????).
But given it is God who decided to create the universe, and does what He wants, and because Jesus is building the church we should not be at all surprised the discover that the result is what God has chosen it to be, that God didn't just hope for the best and take whatever comes out, but just like we insist on doing, God had a plan, decided what He wanted, and then went forward and achieved that (and He's still in the process as we're well aware). This was first articulated by Augustine in the 4th century though Calvin seems to get the blame for it. Augustine was correcting the errors of Pelagius who, amongst other things, denied original sin, an error that has never disappeared, and never will, because man does not wish to acknowledge that he is fully dependant of God for his salvation. There are lots of scriptures affirming election and some can be found at What Does the Bible Say About Election? should you wish to read them.
As we are brought up we are taught that, as adults, we are to be independent. The idea of election contradicts that, hence a source of conflict.
And so to the lament.
God is full of compassion; he desires good, not evil; he doesn't delight in the destruction of the wicked. Jesus would have liked Jerusalem to turn back to Him, but to achieve what He wanted to achieve that would not happen. It was His choice, but at the same time it was at a real cost to him. Hence His expression of sadness.
So Jesus lamented the fact that he himself had made them unwilling to gather to him ?And so to the lament.
God is full of compassion; he desires good, not evil; he doesn't delight in the destruction of the wicked. Jesus would have liked Jerusalem to turn back to Him, but to achieve what He wanted to achieve that would not happen. It was His choice, but at the same time it was at a real cost to him. Hence His expression of sadness.
That works in some contexts, for instance these simple scenarios aren't true :
"God is holy, we have sinned, God destroys us all"
or the more popular one
"We have sinned but God is good so there is no problem"
In other contexts the "complex version" may be closer to the following scripture :
Eccl 10:12b But the lips of a fool shall swallow him up;
13 The words of his mouth begin with foolishness,
And the end of his talk is raving madness.
They were unwilling to come to him. He could have made them willing but he chose not to.
As I said God doesn't delight in the destruction of the wicked. But there were choices He made to achieve His end goal. There was a cost in it to God. Jesus' suffering and death on the cross was a massive cost. But He paid that cost. Jerusalem was unwilling to come to him and he could have made them willing which he didn't. That cost him. On the other hand he made you willing, because he loved you.
You deserve an eternity in hell Colonel. You were lost in your sin and could do nothing about it. But God loved you and saved you by grace, through faith, which was a gift from him. Goes against the grain I know, but that's how it is.
(This came up elsewhere lately)
If a wise man has an argument with a fool,
the fool only rages and laughs, and there is no quiet. Proverbs 29:9
Nowhere does the Bible say what you are saying. The narrative is derived from the Calvinist doctrine concerning the "hidden" will of God that operates behind the scenes and which is often in opposition to his "revealed" will.
Instead of God's will being in conflict with the will of men, you have God being in conflict with himself.