Were these accidents?

[tim-from-pa]

Well Drew, I agree that what I said does not make any sense from man's vantage point. That's my whole point and I already anticipated someone protesting that possibility if you reread what I originally posted. However, that does not mean they cannot both coexist depending on whose time frame one looks at. As Einstein would say, "It's all relative". If you are looking from God's side, it's predestination. If you are looking from man's side, it's free choice. Don't ask me to explain it or rationalize it, though.

 

[Drew]

Let me correct myself....
Tim
I understand where your coming from...I have been trying to explain this, but people are either too Calvinist to see it or to Armenianist to accept it or to Openthiestic to understand it...

Rather than categorizing people, why not attack the issue itself on its own terms. How, specifically, do you counter my recent post about the incompatibility of free will with a God that fully determines the future?

How can Fred have free will in the example if the freedom to choose Pepsi is taken from him?

 

[Drew]

Don't ask me to explain it or rationalize it, though.

Fair enough. I think that you are being honest and forthright in your willingness to state that you cannot explain your position.

 

[jgredline]

Rather than categorizing people, why not attack the issue itself on its own terms. How, specifically, do you counter my recent post about the incompatibility of free will with a God that fully determines the future?

How can Fred have free will in the example if the freedom to choose Pepsi is taken from him?

Because God in his foreknowledge knew what we would choose...
God knew that Fred was an open theist before the foundation of the world...
God also knows if Fred will repent of this false few of God and follow him, instead of his own intellectual mind...

So people are with out ''any'' excuse...There is not a person who has ever walked this earth who could claim that he or she was not one of the elect...
God said, he would turn away no man''.....However, we know this is not the case....Many will think they are Christ followers, but will hear the words..''I never knew you''....Many who do not believe will be bowing there knee one day before the lamb of God....

 

[Drew]

Because God in his foreknowledge knew what we would choose...
God knew that Fred was an open theist before the foundation of the world...
God also knows if Fred will repent of this false few of God and follow him, instead of his own intellectual mind...

I have already agreed that God can fore-know Fred's choice without interfering with Fred's free will. That is not my point.

Now please address my actual argument which asserts that God cannot fore-ordain what Fred will do (I want to make it clear: I use fore-ordain in the "determining the future" sense, not in the "knowing the future" sense - there are important differences) without robbing Fred of free will.

 

[Bubba]

Because God in his foreknowledge knew what we would choose...
quote]

Javier,
According to Ephesians 2:1-7, man is spiritually dead, so if He looks into the future what does God see? If man can make a spiritual choice, why do we have 1Corinthians 2:14? Seems to me, both these Scriptures show that God has to make the individual spiritually alive first. According to Ephesians 1:1-14, God has decided who were His before there ever was a future that humans exist in.
Bubba

 

[jgredline]

Because God in his foreknowledge knew what we would choose...
quote]

Javier,
According to Ephesians 2:1-7, man is spiritually dead, so if He looks into the future what does God see? If man can make a spiritual choice, why do we have 1Corinthians 2:14? Seems to me, both these Scriptures show that God has to make the individual spiritually alive first. According to Ephesians 1:1-14, God has decided who were His before there ever was a future that humans exist in.
Bubba

I agree with what you say...Man indeed is spiritually dead....Man on ''his own'' can't see or want God.....So again...If it is Gods desire ''his will'' for all men to be saved, how does one reconcile this with out contradicting the Gods very word? How does one reconcile this with out making God to be evil? How would God be evil? By creating people for the sole purpose of sending them to hell to be tormented day and night for all eternity....This would make God more evil than Satan.....Gods nature is Love, Grace, mercy and he is righteous and just, so how does one reconcile this problem??????and not go against Gods nature??? Simple...It is the Job of the Holy Spirits job, the third person of the trinity to ''call all'' people to himself...It is the Holy Spirit who gives people ears to hear and eyes to see...It is up to the individual to choose or reject God once the Holy Spirit has revealed himself to the person....and every person will have a meeting with the HS...Some may only have one meeting, some may have many, but all will have the oppertunity to make the choice...Does God know the choice? YES....Is God forcing anybody to love or choose him? NO.....WHo'S choice is it? YOURS...

Jesus is the one who saves...
The Holy Spirit is the one who opens the door...

Jack is right, when he says, that people need to get a grasp of the ministry of the Holy Spirit....

Unfortunately most Calvinist that I know and meet, make very little if any reference to the works of the Holy Spirit....This is a real shame, because it is the Spirit who is most active....

 

[Bubba]

I agree with what you say...Man indeed is spiritually dead....Man on ''his own'' can't see or want God.....So again...If it is Gods desire ''his will'' for all men to be saved, how does one reconcile this with out contradicting the Gods very word? How does one reconcile this with out making God to be evil? How would God be evil? By creating people for the sole purpose of sending them to hell to be tormented day and night for all eternity....This would make God more evil than Satan.....Gods nature is Love, Grace, mercy and he is righteous and just, so how does one reconcile this problem??????and not go against Gods nature??? Simple...It is the Job of the Holy Spirits job, the third person of the trinity to ''call all'' people to himself...It is the Holy Spirit who gives people ears to hear and eyes to see...It is up to the individual to choose or reject God once the Holy Spirit has revealed himself to the person....and every person will have a meeting with the HS...Some may only have one meeting, some may have many, but all will have the oppertunity to make the choice...Does God know the choice? YES....Is God forcing anybody to love or choose him? NO.....WHo'S choice is it? YOURS...

Jesus is the one who saves...
The Holy Spirit is the one who opens the door...

Jack is right, when he says, that people need to get a grasp of the ministry of the Holy Spirit....

Unfortunately most Calvinist that I know and meet, make very little if any reference to the works of the Holy Spirit....This is a real shame, because it is the Spirit who is most active....

Javier,
As you know, I lean to the annihilation position, so I will have a different bent on what type of God would allow for eternal torment, if He is the ultimate decider of man's fate. The problem arises with Scripture like Acts 13:48 and Proverbs 16:4. Though I do not understand how man is still responsible for the decisions he makes and God is nonetheless sovereign in who is saved, but this is how I see Scripture. I do believe that it is the Holy Spirit which reveals to man their need of a Savior, but this action is efficacious, in that the heart is changed. Ezekiel 36:20-27 substantiates this truth.
Bubba

 

[jgredline]

Javier,
As you know, I lean to the annihilation position, so I will have a different bent on what type of God would allow for eternal torment, if He is the ultimate decider of man's fate. The problem arises with Scripture like Acts 13:48 and Proverbs 16:4. Though I do not understand how man is still responsible for the decisions he makes and God is nonetheless sovereign in who is saved, but this is how I see Scripture. I do believe that it is the Holy Spirit which reveals to man their need of a Savior, but this action is efficacious, in that the heart is changed. Ezekiel 36:20-27 substantiates this truth.
Bubba

Bubba
Lets look at Acts 13:48...
48 Now when the Gentiles heard this, they were glad and glorified the word of the Lord. And as many as had been appointed to eternal life believed.

Now lets look at the way the Greek has it layed out..
1550 TR..... ακουοντα δε τα εθνη εχαιρον και εδοξαζον τον λογον του κυριου και επιστευσαν οσοι ησαν τεταγμενοι εις ζωην αιωνιον

The Greek word that is used here is tasso...I Hope I spelled it right...In the context in which this is written it means ''to appoint on one’s own responsibility or authority.''..Clearly this election or appointment was and is a result of mans responsibility....How do we know this..Because Appointed follows the Greek Verb ησαν which puts the responsibility on the person......

Now lets look at Proverbs 16:4
4 The Lord has made all for Himself,
Yes, even the wicked for the day of doom.

Bubba...Now, I will admit, that this verse for a while troubled me...but in the end, I see no contradiction....when you look at the context of what Solomon wrote, you need to go further down to verse 6 to 9, you see that indeed God has provided a way (even though this was written on the other side of the cross) and even still this puts the responsibility back on man...The Bible nowhere teaches the doctrine of reprobation

I hope this helps to clarify and better understand my position...

 

[Drew]

jg and others: Please take the time to respond to my post about Fred and his choice of Coke or Pepsi. I think it is eminently clear that we cannot make any sense of the assertion that man has any free will if God fore-ordains everything.

If the argument goes unchallenged, people will likely conclude that it is correct (I would think).

Bubba, I assume that you agree with my argument. Please confirm

 

[jgredline]

jg and others: Please take the time to respond to my post about Fred and his choice of Coke or Pepsi. I think it is eminently clear that we cannot make any sense of the assertion that man has any free will if God fore-ordains everything.

If the argument goes unchallenged, people will likely conclude that it is correct (I would think).

Bubba, I assume that you agree with my argument. Please confirm

Drew
I missed it..I will address it when I get back from lunch

 

[Guest]

jg and others: Please take the time to respond to my post about Fred and his choice of Coke or Pepsi. I think it is eminently clear that we cannot make any sense of the assertion that man has any free will if God fore-ordains everything.

If the argument goes unchallenged, people will likely conclude that it is correct (I would think).

Bubba, I assume that you agree with my argument. Please confirm

Are we to make sense of it?

If His ways are higher that our ways, if His thoughts are higher than our thoughts.... why do we need to make sense of it?

 

[Vic C.]

Now lets look at Proverbs 16:4
4 The Lord has made all for Himself,
Yes, even the wicked for the day of doom.

Javier,

I have no problems with this, even when read literally, without Greek grammatical intervention. It says He made the wicked; it doesn't actually say He made them wicked.

 

[jgredline]

Javier,

I have no problems with this, even when read literally, without Greek grammatical intervention. It says He made the wicked; it doesn't actually say He made them wicked.

vIC
Good point...

 

[Drew]

Are we to make sense of it?

If His ways are higher that our ways, if His thoughts are higher than our thoughts.... why do we need to make sense of it?

Yes we do and I think I can explain why.

When people assert something that is conceptually incoherent they are, by any reasonable standard, saying nothing at all. A belief is conceptually incoherent (in my use of this expression) if it basically involves contradictions of logic that arise in virtue of the concepts involved. Examples:

1. There exist round squares.

2. I have five marbles in my left hand and ten in my right, but I have more marbles in my left hand than in my right.

3. God fully and sufficiently causes every event in the universe, yet humans have a measure of free will.

When we believe in such things, we do violence to the very concepts involved and start down to the road to chaotic and useless thinking.

I suggest that there is an important distinction between what I consider to be patently non-sensical statements (such as the 3 above) and entirely reasonable statements about things we do not understand.

When we make statements that self-destruct because the concepts involved simply cannot work together, we add no useful information to the world. In other words, the belief that man has free will even though God fully and sufficiently pre-determines all events is a statement that simply has no consequences - we cannot use it for any purpose whatsoever.

There is a huge difference between admitting that "X" is a mystery on the one hand and making a conceptually incoherent claim about "X" on the other.

 

[Bubba]

Bubba
Lets look at Acts 13:48...
48 Now when the Gentiles heard this, they were glad and glorified the word of the Lord. And as many as had been appointed to eternal life believed.

Now lets look at the way the Greek has it layed out..
1550 TR..... ακουοντα δε τα εθνη εχαιρον και εδοξαζον τον λογον του κυριου και επιστευσαν οσοι ησαν τεταγμενοι εις ζωην αιωνιον

The Greek word that is used here is tasso...I Hope I spelled it right...In the context in which this is written it means ''to appoint on one’s own responsibility or authority.''..Clearly this election or appointment was and is a result of mans responsibility....How do we know this..Because Appointed follows the Greek Verb ησαν which puts the responsibility on the person......

Now lets look at Proverbs 16:4
4 The Lord has made all for Himself,
Yes, even the wicked for the day of doom.

Bubba...Now, I will admit, that this verse for a while troubled me...but in the end, I see no contradiction....when you look at the context of what Solomon wrote, you need to go further down to verse 6 to 9, you see that indeed God has provided a way (even though this was written on the other side of the cross) and even still this puts the responsibility back on man...The Bible nowhere teaches the doctrine of reprobation

I hope this helps to clarify and better understand my position...

Javier,
If you go to this site, you will find a different conclusion for Acts13:48, then your interpretation.
Bubba

http://www.dtl.org/calvinism/study/acts-13-48/pt-1.htm

 

[jgredline]

Javier,
If you go to this site, you will find a different conclusion for Acts13:48, then your interpretation.
Bubba

http://www.dtl.org/calvinism/study/acts-13-48/pt-1.htm

Bubba...First that is a very Calvinistic website..SEEING ONLY through calvinistic eyes....Secondly, it is ignoring the total grammatical layout of the passage and using what best fits the theology of the writer...I used only the Greek text and context for my interpretation....

ἀκούοντα ptc. ἔ-χαιρον impf χαίρω. ἐ-δόξαζον impf -άζω glorify, praise. ἐ-πίστευσαν . τε-ταγμένοι perh. who had been set, pf ptc pass verb. τάσσω to set responsibility to appoint, assign,... Clearly the responsibility is on the person....

 

[Bubba]

Bubba...First that is a very Calvinistic website..SEEING ONLY through calvinistic eyes....Secondly, it is ignoring the total grammatical layout of the passage and using what best fits the theology of the writer...I used only the Greek text and context for my interpretation....

ἀκούοντα ptc. ἔ-χαιρον impf χαίρω. ἐ-δόξαζον impf -άζω glorify, praise. ἐ-πίστευσαν . τε-ταγμένοι perh. who had been set, pf ptc pass verb. τάσσω to set responsibility to appoint, assign,... Clearly the responsibility is on the person....

Javier,
If you are right, why does every major translation leave the wording in such a way that the English reading shows or at least appears to show God's active involvement?
Bubba

 

[jgredline]

Javier,
If you are right, why does every major translation leave the wording in such a way that the English reading shows or at least appears to show God's active involvement?
Bubba

Bubba
This is one of the reasons I learned how to read Greek..There are many passages through out the bible that are done a great injustice by the many English translations....Now for the sake of argument lets take a look at a few other translations....

From the amplified...
48 And when the Gentiles heard this, they rejoiced and glorified (praised and gave thanks for) the Word of God; and as many as were destined (appointed and ordained) to eternal life believed (adhered to, trusted in, and relied on Jesus as the Christ and their Savior).

The amplified has it right...............

Now from the literal LA Biblia
48 Oyendo esto los gentiles, se regocijaban y glorificaban la palabra del Señor; y creyeron cuantos estaban ordenados a vida eterna.

They too have it right....

Now from the KJV
48 And when the Gentiles heard this, they were glad, and glorified the word of the Lord: and as many as were ordained to eternal life believed.

They were allot closer than the other translations...For one to be ordained, he must be willing to receive it....

So again I say ''The Bible nowhere teaches the doctrine of reprobation''
No place in the bible is it taught that God created folks simply to torment them.....

 

[Guest]

Yes we do and I think I can explain why.

When people assert something that is conceptually incoherent they are, by any reasonable standard, saying nothing at all. A belief is conceptually incoherent (in my use of this expression) if it basically involves contradictions of logic that arise in virtue of the concepts involved. Examples:

1. There exist round squares.

2. I have five marbles in my left hand and ten in my right, but I have more marbles in my left hand than in my right.

3. God fully and sufficiently causes every event in the universe, yet humans have a measure of free will.

When we believe in such things, we do violence to the very concepts involved and start down to the road to chaotic and useless thinking.

I suggest that there is an important distinction between what I consider to be patently non-sensical statements (such as the 3 above) and entirely reasonable statements about things we do not understand.

When we make statements that self-destruct because the concepts involved simply cannot work together, we add no useful information to the world. In other words, the belief that man has free will even though God fully and sufficiently pre-determines all events is a statement that simply has no consequences - we cannot use it for any purpose whatsoever.

There is a huge difference between admitting that "X" is a mystery on the one hand and making a conceptually incoherent claim about "X" on the other.

The idea of ONE MAN dying on a Cross for the sins of the World - doesn't sound all that logical.

Then again - God uses the foolish to shame the wise.

You are attempting to say that God must fit into YOUR form of logic. Christ dying for my sins isn't logical - but I am thankful that He did - logic or no.