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Bible Study What's Your Position.

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Chopper

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There are two theological positions or convictions on the "Called Out Ones" normally called "True Christians". The following Scripture is case in point....

John 17:6 I have manifested thy name unto the men which thou gavest me out of the world: thine they were, and thou gavest them me; and they have kept thy word.
17:7 Now they have known that all things whatsoever thou hast given me are of thee.
17:8 For I have given unto them the words which thou gavest me; and they have received them, and have known surely that I came out from thee, and they have believed that thou didst send me.
17:9 I pray for them: I pray not for the world, but for them which thou hast given me; for they are thine.

1. My position is that Abba Father, hand picked the Elect Bride for His Son before even man was created with NO foreknowledge of who would believe in His Son.

2. Others have the position that Abba Father saw into the future with His power of foreknowledge and chose the Elect Bride for His Son.

Which position do you folk hold to. No foreknowledge? Or foreknowledge?
 
Which position do you folk hold to. No foreknowledge? Or foreknowledge?
Good morning my sweet brother in Christ. My answer is Foreknowledge, and the following are just my thoughts, and that includes the very bride of Christ being a distinct part out of the full body of the Church.

1Pe 1:2 Elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father . . .
Act 15:18 Known unto God are all his works from the beginning of the world.
Jn 17:6 I have manifested thy name unto the men which thou gavest me out of the world: thine they were, and thou gavest them me; and they have kept thy word.

It has to be evident that in Joh 17:6 that Judas was not belonging to God as a son, but used for His purpose much like He used Satan in the book of Job.

Eph 1:4 According as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world (because God foreknew us?), that we should be holy and without blame before him in love:
:wave2
 
There is also the increasingly influential Open Theology movement, whereby (quoting the Wikipedia article) "God is 'omniscient' about 'settled' reality, but the future that God 'leaves open' can be known only as open 'possibility' without specific foreknowledge." See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_theism, which is a pretty good summary and comparison. In Open Theology, God neither predestines nor foreknows who will turn to Christ.

Your #1 is, I believe, along the lines of what Karl Barth taught: God predestined (or preordained) that all who turned to Christ would be saved but did not predestine who this would be. It seems to me that verses such as Eugene cites can be fitted into this view. Strict Calvinistic predestination of specific individuals, the so-called elect, seems to me to turn Christianity into a cartoon.

Whether God foreknew who would exercise their free will to turn to Christ is a different question from predestination. Open Theology says no. Since God exists outside of our linear time, I don't think we know how He "sees" our world unfold. What we call foreknowledge may not be how God would describe it.

This is another of the multi-view books that I seem to be endlessly promoting, because I have found them all very worthwhile: Divine Foreknowledge: Four Views, https://www.amazon.com/dp/B001RB1S84/ref=dp-kindle-redirect?_encoding=UTF8&btkr=1. The contributors, including William Lane Craig and Greg Boyd (on Open Theology), are all theological heavyweights.
 
the future that God 'leaves open' can be known only as open 'possibility' without specific foreknowledge."
Greetings Brother Runner. I do not know your eschatology as pertaining End Times, but I ascribe to the book of Revelation as being more to fact of things to come given by God, and that to the fact He could actually see the future as it were to reveal to us, and give to Jesus.

Isa 46:10 Declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times the things that are not yet done, saying, My counsel shall stand, and I will do all my pleasure:
:wave2
 
It would be impossible for God to have no foreknowledge of anything.
He's God, so, as He is Omnipotent, then certainly He would know before you are born if you are going to become one of His.
Also, if God chose you for hell, as some believe who are twisted by the "elect" theological mess that some are deceived by, then this would mean that God chose you for hell.
It would literally mean He caused you to be born, having chose you NOT to be saved, which CAUSED YOU to burn in hell.
If God is like that, then we have a problem.
If your theology is like that, then you have a BIG problem.
Real big.
The Good news is, that the bible has used a term....."Elect" that designates those who believed, and of course God knew who would before they were born.
He does not chose this for you, but He certainly knew you would, or wouldn't.
Thats the beauty of Free will..
 
God knows the future as well as the past and present.

BUT

That doesn't mean that He necessarily does anything about it.

Fore-ordination is a lot different than predestination. And where there are a few examples of this in the scriptures (Sampson, Isaac, Samuel, John The Baptist...aka "Born from Above" ) by and large most of us have free will.

And we may be ordained to accomplish Particular tasks but predestined?...I wouldn't go that far.
 
Both God and Jesus Christ had foreknowledge that one will betray His Son, for that was the plan to bring about salvation.
John 17:6
"I have revealed you to those whom you gave me out of the world. They were yours; you gave them to me and they have obeyed your word.
In bold type, points to acknowledging God's foreknowledge.
John 17:6 "I have revealed you to those whom you gave me out of the world. They were yours; you gave them to me and they have obeyed your word.
In bold type, points to no foreknowledge of Jesus Christ, but absolute faith in His Father.

Jesus knows what is happening as His Father reveals, whatever the Father wills for His Son, to know and do at the right time.
John 7:8 You go to the festival. I am not going up to this festival, because my time has not yet fully come."
John 7:29 At this they tried to seize him, but no one laid a hand on him, because his hour had not yet come.

God reveals, whatever the Father wills for us, to know and do at the right time.
Luke 24:15-16
As they talked and discussed these things with each other, Jesus himself came up and walked along with them; 16. but they were kept from recognizing him.

A woman was healed by her faith, when she touched Jesus Christ's clothes. This points to no foreknowledge of Jesus Christ, but foreknowledge by the woman through her faith.
Mark 5:30
At once Jesus realized that power had gone out from him. He turned around in the crowd and asked, "Who touched my clothes?"

God does not acknowledge/accept what is not by faith or by truth.
Luke 13:26-27
"Then you will say, 'We ate and drank with you, and you taught in our streets.' 27. "But he will reply, 'I don't know you or where you come from. Away from me, all you evildoers!'

Those with faith get healed by God, not by those who claim to be the healer (untruth).
Matthew 7:22-23
Many will say to me on that day, 'Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name and in your name drive out demons and in your name perform many miracles?' 23. Then I will tell them plainly, 'I never knew you. Away from me, you evildoers!'

Jesus Christ, the Faithful Son, is a definite foreknowledge, by God, because He is from God and is True.

We, who are not so faithful and true, so we are not definitely of foreknowledge because we have gaps in our Truth. How much truth depends of who much we surrender our self-will for God's-will.

Foreknowledge and the unconditional nature of Faith and Truth
My contention is that God knows which will have certain amount of truth, but elects to not know which parts because of faith. Faith requires a person to become unconditional (not claiming for the self). Free-will, in the spiritual realm, is about choosing to be unconditional or not. To have true faith, is to become spiritual, in the realm of the invisible God. God sacrificed His only Son, as an act of unconditional love for all concerned, including His Son, so we too, through faith, can be unconditional. In this way foreknowledge becomes unconditional. Meaning, foreknowledge becomes only true, for us, when we are unconditional of self (faithful and true) at the time.

While Jesus Christ was on earth he was also part human though without sin. In other words, it was not until his death on the cross did he complete his task and became absolute Faith and Truth. While on earth he did not have the foreknowledge of the End time, but did so after earthly death.
Mark 13:32 "But about that day or hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father.
Revelations 22:12-13 "Look, I am coming soon! My reward is with me, and I will give to each person according to what they have done. 13. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the First and the Last, the Beginning and the End.

So my answer to Chopper's question...
1. My position is that Abba Father, hand picked the Elect Bride for His Son before even man was created with NO foreknowledge of who would believe in His Son.
2. Others have the position that Abba Father saw into the future with His power of foreknowledge and chose the Elect Bride for His Son.
...is both, because of the unconditional nature of Faith and Truth, and the foreknowledge that ALL unfaithful and untrue will vanish (not known) at the End.
 
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We know the plan of God was to choose to place a believing sinner 'in Christ, Eph. 1:4.
I don't believe He chose who He would place in Christ.
I believe humanity has always had free will, and that does not go away 'in Christ.
I have to go with the Omniscience of the Father.
He may have known who would make a choice but didn't make it for them.
To every man is given a measure of faith, so he may help us to believe or have enough faith to believe, but He depends on an individual to make decisions on their own, right or wrong.
 
I believe it's important to know that there are two meanings to "foreknowledge". Generally, to know before hand. There is to know before Elohim created the earth, He knew who He wanted for His Elect and chose them, OR He looked into the future and saw who would believe in His Son Yahshua, using foreknowledge, and chose them for His Elect.

We serve a mighty Yahweh. To simply look into the future to choose His special believers because they chose to believe in His Son doesn't seem, IMO, God-like. Where as, choosing His Believers before man was created, and having every one of them, without failure, because of His mighty power, is what I believe typifies the great Elohim of the Shamayim (Heaven).

Remember, Abraham was God's choice to begin an Elect people on the face of the earth. That was His choice, not someone else. Israel was His choice, not some other Country....

Deuteronomy 7:6 "For thou art an holy people unto Yahweh thy Elohim: Yahweh thy Elohim hath chosen thee to be a special people unto himself, above all people that are upon the face of the earth.
7:7 Yahweh did not set his love upon you, nor choose you, because ye were more in number than any people; for ye were the fewest of all people:
7:8 But because Yahweh loved you, and because he would keep the oath which he had sworn unto your fathers, hath Yahweh brought you out with a mighty hand, and redeemed you out of the house of bondmen, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt.
7:9 Know therefore that Yahweh thy Elohim, he is Elohim, the faithful El, which keepeth covenant and mercy with them that love him."

As I have mentioned before, our mighty El (God) chose His Believers before they were born, knowing they would always be faithful to Him without looking into the future to see it it was true.
 
People forget....every human that has lived deserves hell. That is God's justice.... punishment for a fallen people. The wages of sin is death. Romans 6:23

Romans 9:15 tells us "For he says to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.” .......What then shall we say? Is God unjust? Not at all

I don't think we choose Christ but rather it's the other way around. John 6:65 informs us "And he said, This is why I told you that no one can come to me unless it is granted him by the Father.”

We are chosen Romans 9:11 Yet, before the twins were born or had done anything good or bad—in order that God’s purpose in election might stand: 12 not by works but by him who calls—she was told,
...It's not us who saves us.
 
People forget....every human that has lived deserves hell. That is God's justice.... punishment for a fallen people. The wages of sin is death. Romans 6:23

Romans 9:15 tells us "For he says to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.” .......What then shall we say? Is God unjust? Not at all

I don't think we choose Christ but rather it's the other way around. John 6:65 informs us "And he said, This is why I told you that no one can come to me unless it is granted him by the Father.”

We are chosen Romans 9:11 Yet, before the twins were born or had done anything good or bad—in order that God’s purpose in election might stand: 12 not by works but by him who calls—she was told,
...It's not us who saves us.

This is unquestionably a legitimate biblical position, intuitively unappealing as it might be. Romans 9:20-22 and numerous other verses are difficult to read in any way other than the way you are suggesting. I said in my post above that hyper-Calvinism seems to turn Christianity into a cartoon - meaning that the entire human drama becomes little more than a play with a script written by God, which He then watches unfold for His own amusement or some other purpose not clear to us - but the fact is that it has solid Biblical support. Strict Calvinists are not simply crazy.

To simply look into the future to choose His special believers because they chose to believe in His Son doesn't seem, IMO, God-like.

But, of course, that's the problem: God isn't required to "seem" God-like to you or me. God is sui generis, the great I AM. Whether He seems God-like to you or me is completely irrelevant. If God is the God of the hyper-Calvinists, then that's who He is and we can only assume that what seems silly or repulsive to us makes sense from God's perspective and is worthy of Him.

All this thread really shows is that (1) the Bible is ambiguous in regard to certain doctrines, and (2) we all tend to gravitate toward the interpretation most consistent with the way we would like God to be. I, for one, would have liked God to be less ambiguous - but I have to assume that the ambiguity serves His wise purposes.
 
I believe it's important to know that there are two meanings to "foreknowledge". Generally, to know before hand. There is to know before Elohim created the earth, He knew who He wanted for His Elect and chose them, OR He looked into the future and saw who would believe in His Son Yahshua, using foreknowledge, and chose them for His Elect.

We serve a mighty Yahweh. To simply look into the future to choose His special believers because they chose to believe in His Son doesn't seem, IMO, God-like. Where as, choosing His Believers before man was created, and having every one of them, without failure, because of His mighty power, is what I believe typifies the great Elohim of the Shamayim (Heaven).

Remember, Abraham was God's choice to begin an Elect people on the face of the earth. That was His choice, not someone else. Israel was His choice, not some other Country....

Deuteronomy 7:6 "For thou art an holy people unto Yahweh thy Elohim: Yahweh thy Elohim hath chosen thee to be a special people unto himself, above all people that are upon the face of the earth.
7:7 Yahweh did not set his love upon you, nor choose you, because ye were more in number than any people; for ye were the fewest of all people:
7:8 But because Yahweh loved you, and because he would keep the oath which he had sworn unto your fathers, hath Yahweh brought you out with a mighty hand, and redeemed you out of the house of bondmen, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt.
7:9 Know therefore that Yahweh thy Elohim, he is Elohim, the faithful El, which keepeth covenant and mercy with them that love him."

As I have mentioned before, our mighty El (God) chose His Believers before they were born, knowing they would always be faithful to Him without looking into the future to see it it was true.
And where do you fit into the scheme of things?
Where do I fit in?
 
This is unquestionably a legitimate biblical position, intuitively unappealing as it might be. Romans 9:20-22 and numerous other verses are difficult to read in any way other than the way you are suggesting. I said in my post above that hyper-Calvinism seems to turn Christianity into a cartoon - meaning that the entire human drama becomes little more than a play with a script written by God, which He then watches unfold for His own amusement or some other purpose not clear to us - but the fact is that it has solid Biblical support. Strict Calvinists are not simply crazy.

Your option seems to be what I call "happenstance salvation". That is, events that happen in your life may or may not cause you to "accept" Christ.
 
This is unquestionably a legitimate biblical position, intuitively unappealing as it might be. Romans 9:20-22 and numerous other verses are difficult to read in any way other than the way you are suggesting. I said in my post above that hyper-Calvinism seems to turn Christianity into a cartoon - meaning that the entire human drama becomes little more than a play with a script written by God, which He then watches unfold for His own amusement or some other purpose not clear to us - but the fact is that it has solid Biblical support. Strict Calvinists are not simply crazy.



But, of course, that's the problem: God isn't required to "seem" God-like to you or me. God is sui generis, the great I AM. Whether He seems God-like to you or me is completely irrelevant. If God is the God of the hyper-Calvinists, then that's who He is and we can only assume that what seems silly or repulsive to us makes sense from God's perspective and is worthy of Him.

All this thread really shows is that (1) the Bible is ambiguous in regard to certain doctrines, and (2) we all tend to gravitate toward the interpretation most consistent with the way we would like God to be. I, for one, would have liked God to be less ambiguous - but I have to assume that the ambiguity serves His wise purposes.

Why should we all believe the same thing at the same time?
God didn't make us that way.
He made us to have a personal relationship with him.
He is the teacher.
He teaches us all things.
A time will come when we will all agree on everything.
But that time has yet to come.

I think we should take it easy trying to figure everything out.
God will reveal everything to us in his own time.
 
I believe it's important to know that there are two meanings to "foreknowledge". Generally, to know before hand. There is to know before Elohim created the earth, He knew who He wanted for His Elect and chose them, OR He looked into the future and saw who would believe in His Son Yahshua, using foreknowledge, and chose them for His Elect.

We serve a mighty Yahweh. To simply look into the future to choose His special believers because they chose to believe in His Son doesn't seem, IMO, God-like. Where as, choosing His Believers before man was created, and having every one of them, without failure, because of His mighty power, is what I believe typifies the great Elohim of the Shamayim (Heaven).

Remember, Abraham was God's choice to begin an Elect people on the face of the earth. That was His choice, not someone else. Israel was His choice, not some other Country....

Deuteronomy 7:6 "For thou art an holy people unto Yahweh thy Elohim: Yahweh thy Elohim hath chosen thee to be a special people unto himself, above all people that are upon the face of the earth.
7:7 Yahweh did not set his love upon you, nor choose you, because ye were more in number than any people; for ye were the fewest of all people:
7:8 But because Yahweh loved you, and because he would keep the oath which he had sworn unto your fathers, hath Yahweh brought you out with a mighty hand, and redeemed you out of the house of bondmen, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt.
7:9 Know therefore that Yahweh thy Elohim, he is Elohim, the faithful El, which keepeth covenant and mercy with them that love him."

As I have mentioned before, our mighty El (God) chose His Believers before they were born, knowing they would always be faithful to Him without looking into the future to see it it was true.

hello Chopper, dirtfarmer here

The problem that I have with your view is that it nullifies John 3:16, "whosoever". John 3:17 states that Christ came not to condemn the world, but to save the world. As I see your position it has no "free will" for man. Did the angels that Lucifer was in charge of have the ability to refuse to follow him in his rebellion?

All of Adam's heirs, mankind, were born after Adam fell and were in the image and likeness of Adam after the fall. Adam had no children that were like him before the fall, we are not born in innocence, but with the nature of Adam after the fall. If a person is born without the ability to choose, would that not make God the God of condemnation. I don't see that God condemns any one, he offers salvation to "whosoever believeth" will receive salvation.

We are told that even the chosen people had to have faith in the coming savior to be saved. The law was not given for salvation but to bring people to a realization that without a savior, someone to die in their place, they were already condemned., why? because God has said those that miss the mark are condemned already. The only human flesh that hasn't sinned is Jesus Christ.
 
People forget....every human that has lived deserves hell. That is God's justice.... punishment for a fallen people. The wages of sin is death. Romans 6:23

Romans 9:15 tells us "For he says to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.” .......What then shall we say? Is God unjust? Not at all

I don't think we choose Christ but rather it's the other way around. John 6:65 informs us "And he said, This is why I told you that no one can come to me unless it is granted him by the Father.”

We are chosen Romans 9:11 Yet, before the twins were born or had done anything good or bad—in order that God’s purpose in election might stand: 12 not by works but by him who calls—she was told,
...It's not us who saves us.

hello Cygnus, dirtfarmer here

Why do you suppose that John 6:65 states that we have "to be granted" by the father? Could it be because God is Holy and cannot look upon sin without judging it? Just as the wedding guest that had not dressed properly was refused entrance into the wedding, so it would be if God had not established parameters for entrance into Christ.
 
Your option seems to be what I call "happenstance salvation". That is, events that happen in your life may or may not cause you to "accept" Christ.

You are hearkening back to a different thread. You surely don't think that any position other than strict Calvinistic predestination equates to "happenstance" salvation? If God preordained that all who turned to Christ would be saved, and then left it to the free will of each individual whether to turn to Christ, this is scarcely "happenstance" salvation regardless of whether God "foreknew" (whatever that may mean in this context) who those individuals would be or did not (as Open Theology suggests). Strict Calvinism is the tidiest package intellectually, albeit at the expense of a picture of God and human existence that many people (including me) find difficult to believe if not downright repulsive.

Why should we all believe the same thing at the same time?
God didn't make us that way.
He made us to have a personal relationship with him.
He is the teacher.
He teaches us all things.
A time will come when we will all agree on everything.
But that time has yet to come.

I think we should take it easy trying to figure everything out.
God will reveal everything to us in his own time.

Sure, I completely agree. God obviously did not intend for us all to have the same understanding. It's hard to believe He intended the level of dissension and disunity that exists within Christianity and that makes it much more difficult to convince non-believers of the truth of the Christian message, but certainly He didn't intend for us to have the same understanding or the Bible would be much clearer than it is on many points.
 
In regards to the thread, and adding to my original post:

Faith in Jesus Christ / God is paramount for salvation.
Faith is not belief without proof (one way or another) but trust without reservation (unconditional).

To be unconditional is to accept everything as it is.
In this way, the truth in all things will be revealed, because one becomes open to it, and the truth will set you free. Meaning, we praise the LORD for our liberation (truth) in all things.

Psalm 46:10 He says, "Be still, and know that I am God; I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth."
 
People forget....every human that has lived deserves hell. That is God's justice.... punishment for a fallen people. The wages of sin is death. Romans 6:23

Romans 9:15 tells us "For he says to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.” .......What then shall we say? Is God unjust? Not at all

I don't think we choose Christ but rather it's the other way around. John 6:65 informs us "And he said, This is why I told you that no one can come to me unless it is granted him by the Father.”

We are chosen Romans 9:11 Yet, before the twins were born or had done anything good or bad—in order that God’s purpose in election might stand: 12 not by works but by him who calls—she was told,
...It's not us who saves us.
Come on Cygnus, your moving the Time Line to this conclusion. For better than 20 centuries, right close to or just after Jesus, just after or around the death of the Savior, Matthew 27:50-54 teaches us where one thought came from when the saints of old ran from the opened graves and through the Holy City.
Hell is, as I am taught, is Gehenna a gave and has taught Jesus teaches us throughout scripture, the Lake of Fire is Satan's final destination and all the nonbelievers. Hell is the stock yard or Cattle Holding Pens.
 
There are two theological positions or convictions on the "Called Out Ones" normally called "True Christians". The following Scripture is case in point....

John 17:6 I have manifested thy name unto the men which thou gavest me out of the world: thine they were, and thou gavest them me; and they have kept thy word.
17:7 Now they have known that all things whatsoever thou hast given me are of thee.
17:8 For I have given unto them the words which thou gavest me; and they have received them, and have known surely that I came out from thee, and they have believed that thou didst send me.
17:9 I pray for them: I pray not for the world, but for them which thou hast given me; for they are thine.

1. My position is that Abba Father, hand picked the Elect Bride for His Son before even man was created with NO foreknowledge of who would believe in His Son.

2. Others have the position that Abba Father saw into the future with His power of foreknowledge and chose the Elect Bride for His Son.

Which position do you folk hold to. No foreknowledge? Or foreknowledge?
I agree with the same position. God never tells us what it was or why He chose certain men. But is not because of merit He saw in them before hand. But notice in Rom. 8:28 it is His purpose that is first that brought about foreknowledge,
predestination and calling. God calls in two ways: Directly or personally as He did the disciples in Matthew and Paul in Acts, and by the preachers in Romans chapter 10 who have heard the Gospel from the Disciples.. They are all called. (John 17:20-21)
 
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