IS FREE WILL AN ATTRIBUTE GOD GIFTED TO MAN?

[Iconoclast]

Actually, Adam was wounded or stained.
He was not dead.

Here is where you depart from the biblical narrative....HE WAS DEAD INDEED. Why do you rush past this key point, head long into error.
How do we know He was Dead?
You suggest wounded, or stained?
Simple....What Did God declare?
16 And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat:

17 But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it:
for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.
[in the day thou shalt surely die.]
It does not say wounded it does not say stained

For anyone to say or teach this is direct error.
There Is A Spiritual Death, There is a spiritual death.
The text clearly says death would happen in the day you eat.
Spiritual death was instant, Physical death followed.
How can this be? 1tim5:6 But she that liveth in pleasure is dead while she liveth.
Religious people are spiritually dead.

We can know this because Adam and Eve continued to have a relation ship with God.

NO, WE cannot know this at all......as shown above.

Genesis 3:21
And the LORD God made garments of skin for Adam and his wife, and clothed them.
God cared enough for his creation that He made a covering for them.
The first sacrifice of an animal for God's creation.
He cared enough for them so as to make a plan for their salvation --- Jesus.

Genesis 4:1
....I have gotten a man-child with the help of the LORD.
Eve believed God had helped her conceive.
They were banished from the Garden, but still had a relationship with God, although broken in nature.

They were not spiritually UNABLE to have a rapport with God.

Your false idea starts to grow right here. You and others suggest the opposite of what God says!
1cor2:14 But the natural man receives not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.

The relationship was not as before and future generations would have to follow God's plan for salvation.

No such thing.

Regarding Jesus crying over Jerusalem....
Why would Jesus cry over something He knew man had no control over?
He wouldn't.
He would have understood that there was nothing to cry about.
Instead he wept for those that would not accept Him and be saved.
He knew that it was up to each person, individually, to accept Him or reject Him.

Free will is throughout the bible for those that wish to see it.

No, Jesus said the religious leaders would not.

 

[Iconoclast]

Agreed.
The unsaved certainly do not understand the bible.

No, you do not agree as shown earlier

Again.
Agreed.

No, you do not agree as shown earlier

 

[Iconoclast]

When this is how you begin in addressing a different, opposing perspective, it immediately demonstrates that you aren't seeking Truth but just defending doctrinal turf. I'm well-informed about Molinism, which is why I subscribe to it. Does it have all the answers to every question pertaining to God's sovereignty and Man's free will? No. But no soteriological perspective I know of has all the answers. Molinism, though, is far more fruitful, in my view, in making sense of what is in Scripture than is Reformed doctrine.

One of the things I try my best to avoid is gaining an understanding of a view by the characterizations of it by its enemies. In other words, if I want to be sure to not understand Molinism or Provisionism well, I will let a Calvinist tell me what these perspectives propose. To gain the fullest, clearest conception of any doctrinal perspective, I must go to its chief and best proponents and from them obtain an understanding of the perspective.

This doesn't mean I don't consider the objections and challenges of the detractors of a particular doctrinal point of view, only that I will not let them be the primary source from which I obtain my understanding of that point of view. In my experience, Calvinists are quick to curate information about an opposing view, redacting good rebuttals to Calvinist objections to the view, thus making it seem the view is insupportable, or fatally-flawed.

In any case, I would urge those interested in Molinism or Provisionism to ignore Calvinist sources of information about these doctrinal perspectives and go to Dr. William Lane Craig (www.reasonablefaith.org), or Dr. Kenneth Keathley ("Salvation and Sovereignty: A Molinist Approach"), for careful and lucid explanations of Molinism and to Dr. Roger Olson, or Dr. Leighton Flowers, for explanations of Provisionism.

I interacted with Leighton Flowers for over 4 years straight, and he was corrected often by many of us on Baptistboard, He used the name Skandelon if you look in the archives.
Dr, White answers everyone of these men on the Dividing line over and over. Mostly between 2010- to 2015...Now deal with his error on twitter/X daily.

 

[Tenchi]

I interacted with Leighton Flowers for over 4 years straight, and he was corrected often by many of us on Baptistboard, He used the name Skandelon if you look in the archives.
Dr, White answers everyone of these men on the Dividing line over and over. Mostly between 2010- to 2015...Now deal with his error on twitter/X daily.

This quite misses my point. And the partisan character of your remarks about Leighton prevent them from being useful. You might have criticized and opposed Leighton but this by no means equates to correcting him. I'd have to concede right off that your views were correct and that his were in error to accept this description of your interactions with him. I'm sure Leighton would say that he corrected you, not the other way 'round!

Yes, James White "answers" his doctrinal opponents. But mostly with specious reasoning, outright logical fallacies, and an enormous amount of sneering ad hominem - which Leighton has pointed out, over and over.

Anyway, I've heard Dr. Flowers out and evaluated his views in the light of God's word and, while I don't agree entirely with everything he proposes, he is far better aligned with divine Truth than proponents of Reformed doctrine are, in my view. His Provisionist perspective taken in tandem with Molinist ideas has produced for me a far richer, more reasonable and scriptural soteriological view than Calvinist/Reformed doctrine offers.

 

[GodsGrace]

Here is where you depart from the biblical narrative....HE WAS DEAD INDEED. Why do you rush past this key point, head long into error.
How do we know He was Dead?
You suggest wounded, or stained?
Simple....What Did God declare?
16 And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat:

17 But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it:
for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.
[in the day thou shalt surely die.]
It does not say wounded it does not say stained

For anyone to say or teach this is direct error.
There Is A Spiritual Death, There is a spiritual death.
The text clearly says death would happen in the day you eat.
Spiritual death was instant, Physical death followed.
How can this be? 1tim5:6 But she that liveth in pleasure is dead while she liveth.
Religious people are spiritually dead.

We're not discussing religious people.
The sin of Adam left all of humanity stained with the sin nature.
Generations born after Adam were going to be spiritually dead.
But since Adam and Eve were able to continue a relationship with God, albeit broken, they still had the ABILITY to reach out to God at the birth of a son.
You seem to be missing my point.
Adam did die when he ate of the fruit...
He became separated from God...
But he was able to still reach out to God.
Just as today, those who seek God will find Him.
THIS is the point.

Hebrews 11:6
....for whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that He rewards those who seek him.

Matthew 7:7-8
“Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks it will be opened.

Acts 27:17
..they should seek God, and perhaps feel their way toward him and find him..


so many more, even in the OT, how many verses do you need to come to the realization that God WANTS us to SEEK AND FIND.

NO, WE cannot know this at all......as shown above.

If you believe Adam and Eve did NOT continue to have a relationship with God, although broken,
could you please post some scripture?

I showed you that they did.

And God spoke to them AGAIN in
Genesis 4:25
25Adam had relations with his wife again; and she gave birth to a son, and named him Seth, for, she said, “God has appointed me another offspring in place of Abel, for Cain killed him.

Your false idea starts to grow right here. You and others suggest the opposite of what God says!
1cor2:14 But the natural man receives not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.

Any Christian will agree with the above.
I DID explain why the way the reformed understand this is obviously incorrect.
I listed verses....
Please do the same instead of telling me I have a false idea.
Prove it.

No such thing.

This is what you're replying to:
I stated:

The relationship was not as before and future generations would have to follow God's plan for salvation.
You say "no such thing".
You mean that God did not have a plan in place for the salvation of His creation?

Psalm 62:1
For God alone my soul waits in silence; from him comes my salvation.
John 3:16
“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.
The unknown is now known:

Acts 17:30-31
30“Therefore having overlooked the times of ignorance, God is now declaring to men that all people everywhere should repent,
31because He has fixed a day in which He will judge the world in righteousness through a Man whom He has appointed, having furnished proof to all men by raising Him from the dead.”

No, Jesus said the religious leaders would not.

Jesus was crying over Jerusalem.
Not its leaders.

 

[GodsGrace]

No, you do not agree as shown earlier


No, you do not agree as shown earlier

Could you please state what I don't agree with?
IF I agree with a post, it means I agree with it.

You'll have to explain why YOU think I don't know what I agree with.

Thanks.

 

[Whatever]

Your conflating the law of God with The Law.

No, you are doing this. The Law you are speaking about is the Old Testament sacrificial laws. We are not under that.

But we are under God's moral commandments to love God and love our neighbors.
Rom 13:9 For the commandments, "YOU SHALL NOT COMMIT ADULTERY," "YOU SHALL NOT MURDER," "YOU SHALL NOT STEAL," "YOU SHALL NOT BEAR FALSE WITNESS," "YOU SHALL NOT COVET," and if there is any other commandment, are all summed up in this saying, namely, "YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR AS YOURSELF."

BELIEVE in the Lord Jesus to be saved.
This is a command from God. This makes it a "law" (any written or positive rule or collection of rules prescribed under the authority of the state or nation) or by God.

The natural man cannot and will not do this. You must get the idea out of your head of being saved by "doing something." This is salvation by works - doing something.

Eph 2:8 For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God,
Eph 2:9 not of works, lest anyone should boast.

works = Strong's G2041 - ergon
1. business, employment, that which any one is occupied
A. that which one undertakes to do, enterprise, undertaking
2. any product whatever, any thing accomplished by hand, art, industry, or mind
3. an act, deed, thing done: the idea of working is emphasised in opp. to that which is less than work

When Paul says "not of works" he is not saying "not of obeying the OT sacrificial laws. He is saying not of doing anything by your own power that you can boats of. Like: Ha, ha, I was saved because I did something that you didn't do.

You will end up saying I was saved by the sovereign grace of God while I was still dead in my trespasses and sin and unable to call on Him He made me willing.

Eze 36:26 I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; I will take the heart of stone out of your flesh and give you a heart of flesh.
Eze 36:27 I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will keep My judgments and do them.

Statutes = Strong's H2706 - ḥōq = statute, ordinance, something prescribed, specific decree (like call on the name of Jesus)

 

[electedbyHim]

The only free will man has is to sin.

Spurgeon put it this way.

Once there was free will in paradise, and a terrible mess free will made there, for it spoiled all paradise and turned Adam out of the garden. Free will was once in heaven, but it turned the glorious archangel out, and a third part of the stars of heaven fell into the abyss. I want nothing to do with free will, but I will try to see whether I have got a free will within. And I find I have. Very free will to do evil, but very poor will to do that which is good.

 

[Carry_Your_Name]

Do we have Free Will to make that choice?

If God does, then we do, for we are made in God's image.

 

[Carry_Your_Name]

The only free will man has is to sin.

This is of the devil. We have a natural will to sin, we have a free will to OBEY God. Pride, envy, gluttony, greed, lust, sloth, wrath are animalistic instincts in our nature, to which we're naturally slaves, it is free will that gives us power to OVERCOME sin!

 

[GodsGrace]

This is of the devil. We have a natural will to sin, we have a free will to OBEY God. Pride, envy, gluttony, greed, lust, sloth, wrath are animalistic instincts in our nature, to which we're naturally slaves, it is free will that gives us power to OVERCOME sin!

The reformed believe we're incapable of choice because they do Not believe in free will.

Check out Romans 6:16.
TO WHOM WE PRESENT OURSELVES....

Free will?

 

[Carry_Your_Name]

Free will?

Get redpilled and take action. One thing I'm absolutely certain is that free will is not just free thought, you know, ignoring reality by simulating and fantasizing in your brain; it's the ability to take initiative, to act ahead of time, to take control of situations instead of just passively reacting to situations with your fight or flight instinct.

 

[GodsGrace]

Get redpilled and take action. One thing I'm absolutely certain is that free will is not just free thought, you know, ignoring reality by simulating and fantasizing in your brain; it's the ability to take initiative, to act ahead of time, to take control of situations instead of just passively reacting to situations with your fight or flight instinct.

OK
But what you're describing is philosophical free will.
Which also exists IMO.


Biblical free will just means the ability to make a decision between two moral choices without any outside force impeding your will.

 

[electedbyHim]

This is of the devil. We have a natural will to sin, we have a free will to OBEY God. Pride, envy, gluttony, greed, lust, sloth, wrath are animalistic instincts in our nature, to which we're naturally slaves, it is free will that gives us power to OVERCOME sin!

Free will gives you power to overcome sin? That is not what is taught in the Bible.

I could be wrong though because humans have such a high-esteem and self-importance of themselves that they could believe such nonsense.

So in your theology, man is sovereign. Got it.

Free will makes God dependent on humans and their choices. That is a doctrine of demons.

Thanks for sharing your opinion.

 

[Carry_Your_Name]

Free will gives you power to overcome sin? That is not what is taught in the Bible.

I could be wrong though because humans have such a high-esteem and self-importance of themselves that they could believe such nonsense.

So in your theology, man is sovereign. Got it.

Free will makes God dependent on humans and their choices. That is a doctrine of demons.

Thanks for sharing your opinion.

No, free will is a sign of maturity. "Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a Son, and shall call His name Immanuel. Curds and honey He shall eat, that He may know to refuse the evil and choose the good." (Is. 7:15-16) Tell me, was Jesus given a free will to sin? Why did He get to consciously rufuse the evil and choose the good, not automatically choosing good? He was given free will to overcome sin, not to indulge in sin. God doesn't depend on us, we depend on the power of God's Holy Spirit. You're making a strawman argument.

 

[Carry_Your_Name]

OK
But what you're describing is philosophical free will.
Which also exists IMO.


Biblical free will just means the ability to make a decision between two moral choices without any outside force impeding your will.

Just think about what makes our brain different from programmed AI, that difference is free will.

 

[Iconoclast]

Yes, God knows us by name , but have you followed after Christ when you came from your mothers womb?

No I did not. I was born a child of wrath even as others.

Have you lived your whole life as being pleasing unto the Lord? I would have to say no because we have all sinned and fallen short of His glory and that is why God's plan of salvation through Christ Jesus was before the foundation of the world as God is omniscient knowing us before the foundation of the world.

God has a knowledge of all men. However, He only foreknows the elect multitude that He is going to draw savingly to Jesus.

Remember, we were created to be holy and blameless before Him,

Only Those born again are created in Christ to be holy and blameless, not the unsaved world.

but all have fallen short.

We all died In Adam,Rom#:

Do you think that God did not know that Adam and Eve would sin?

Could you please state what I don't agree with?
IF I agree with a post, it means I agree with it.

You'll have to explain why YOU think I don't know what I agree with.

Thanks.

What you do is post that you agree, but one or two posts later say something that directly contradicts what you claim you agree with. You redefine terms to a point that is less than honest.
It is like a person says water is wet, you say you agree, and then two posts later you say I agree water is wet, and dry at the same time.

 

[Iconoclast]

The reformed believe we're incapable of choice because they do Not believe in free will.

EDIT all reformed people believe people make choices all the time.
Why not let reformed people say what they believe, and you stick to your non reformed carnal philosophy.

Check out Romans 6:16.
TO WHOM WE PRESENT OURSELVES....

Free will?

No, not at all.

 

[Tenchi]

Here is a falsehood once again, all reformed people believe people make choices all the time.

Yes, but what they don't often point out is that the person choosing what they want is made to want what they want by God. How, then, are they really choosing in any truly free sense? Obviously, they aren't, on Calvinism.

 

[Iconoclast]

This quite misses my point. And the partisan character of your remarks about Leighton prevent them from being useful. You might have criticized and opposed Leighton but this by no means equates to correcting him. I'd have to concede right off that your views were correct and that his were in error to accept this description of your interactions with him. I'm sure Leighton would say that he corrected you, not the other way 'round!

It is all in the archives there. I stand by what I posted. He has not welcomed correction and still posts error daily.

Yes, James White "answers" his doctrinal opponents. But mostly with specious reasoning, outright logical fallacies, and an enormous amount of sneering ad hominem - which Leighton has pointed out, over and over.

Well maybe you could call up the dividing line program and deal with Dr.White directly, and correct him for us!

Anyway, I've heard Dr. Flowers out and evaluated his views in the light of God's word and, while I don't agree entirely with everything he proposes, he is far better aligned with divine Truth than proponents of Reformed doctrine are, in my view. His Provisionist perspective taken in tandem with Molinist ideas has produced for me a far richer, more reasonable and scriptural soteriological view than Calvinist/Reformed doctrine offers.

Well , you can believe what you want, and all the man centered teaching of these people. If you want to discuss truth, we can do that. If not tune in to Roger Olson, and the failed LF.