All good points Smaller,
The post is long enough though, that I’m afraid that many won’t read it thoroughly.
Never the less, I’d like to add to your list this question that the disciples asked of Jesus, followed by the Master’s straightforward reply:
Matthew 13:
10And the disciples came, and said unto him, Why speakest thou unto them in parables?
11He answered and said unto them, Because it is given unto you to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it is not given.
My Arminian friends think (I’ve heard them actually say it...) that Jesus used parables as a masterful teaching technique, because He might reach more people through their imagery. But actually, He used parables to disguise His message so only those whom the Father enables will understand.
If you are a saved person today, you should thank God that He has saved you. He caused you to believe, by putting His Word in your ears and eyes, which He Himself has opened.
Your belief (faith) is not of yourself, it is the gift of God….
Sound familiar?
-HisSheep
Freewillism is a logical fallacy of the theological kind that requires the elimination of both God and devil from interactions with mankinds mind and heart, futilely trying to make the man stand alone.
The scriptures make no such presentations.
God has in fact elected the majority to not hear by placing the spirit of stupor upon them all.
That means there is the person and that spirit as separate entities.
All of us were at one time likewise blinded.
I do not find that any kind of a license to beat the blinded. Unfortunately that is the practice of the blinders of the pseudo religious kind, which same Jesus hated.
You see it was children of the devil who were in/upon the Pharisees of Israel. That was
the spirit of slumber upon them, speaking and acting in those hypocrites, those play actors.
Those men were in fact slaves of lying hypocritical darkness within their hearts. Many of their progeny remain so to this day.
Every unbeliever is also likewise blinded and captured. Just with different types of spirits. There are phony religious spirits, there are blinding spirits, there are vile spirits of the Legion kind. All of these are found 'in MAN.'
Jesus vehemently
resisted the real enemies. Quite plainly pointed them out. Pinpointed them, even in disciples, even in Apostles! In some He cast them out. In others, mostly religious, He left them after correction and rebuke.
Again and unfortunately few see the difference between the person and the spirit of slumber in their various forms.
I strongly dislike slave-ship of the evil kind.
What God does in these matters however
no man can change.
In the end, it remains solely His Choice as to who sees or if He elects to raise a vessel of dishonor OVER the person.
I believe Calvinism falls dramatically short in 'personal understanding' of this particular matter.
Every person who posts here at one time carried a spirit of slumber upon their minds. This much is a fact.
Now, how many have fallen even deeper is also easy to see. How you say? Why by not realizing that we all continue to see only in part, and even more WHY that is so.
See Romans 7:21 for Paul's personal confession of this fact. At least some were honest enough to tell the truth, which I thank God for.
s
