We can see that the Bible tells us that God does not change His mind, yet we see how He seems to do just that. Again, the answer is found in looking at the problem from two perspectives. From the eternal perspective, God does not change His mind since He knew from all eternity what the ultimate decision would be. From the temporal perspective (relative to us), God changes His mind in response to the prayers and pleading of His people.
The fact remains that God says "you will not recover" in verse 1 and then we have Hezekiah's recovery in verse 7.
The quote that Solo has provided
could be true - there is nothing illogical about it and I do not dispute it as a statement of a
possible state of affairs.
Let's start with an extract of the above and see where it leads when considered in light of 2 King 20:
1. Assertion from Solo's post: From the eternal perspective,
God does not change His mind since He knew from all eternity what the ultimate decision would be.
2. Assertion from Solo's post: From the temporal perspective (relative to us),
God changes His mind in response to the prayers and pleading of His people.
3. There can only be one "fact of the matter" concerning the question of whether God changed his mind - either he did or he did not. Even though there are 2
perspectives, there is only one
reality about whether God actually changed his mind.
4. The opponent of open theism has to accept the following: God does not,
in point of fact, change his mind. He can then certainly argue that from our perspective, God
seems to change his mind. This what the Solo's post does.
5. The key point: The material conveniently avoids the issue of God's declaration: "
you will not recover". This statement comes from God. It is a clear statement about Hez's future. Verse 7 tells us Hez did indeed recover. Therefore, the statement "you will not recover" is a falsehood.
This is the problem. If God had not said "you will not recover", then the argument provided by Solo could be used.
But, of course, God
did say "you will not recover".