Featured Is Everything Predestined?

Mormons affirm the doctrine baptism by immersion, so should we claim that we are all Mormans to a limited degree? This is an attempt on your part to blur the lines of distinction between orthodox Baptist believes regarding God's full and complete knowledge of all things and your Openists views which clearly deny this because you assume that full omniscience equals predetermination.

Yet, you appear to affirm that Peter denied Christ freely and that it was fully foreknown. I'd be interested to know how you affirm this is possible yet declare that God exhaustive knowledge somehow denies human freedom? Please explain.

 

I believe that everything in some form or other ultimately finds its origin in the "decree" of God. If you believe that God freely created the world, and you believe that God "foreknows" all things past, present, and future, you would have to agree that in some sense, God "ordained" all things that come to pass because He "knew what He was getting into" and yet created anyway.
Now, that doesn't mean that God's creatures do things robotically. They do things willfully and without coersion against their will. The mystery of how this is compatible lies with God.

You must distinguish between the direct actions of God and the direct actions of the creature. God did not have to coerce Adam and Eve to sin, but it had to be somewhere in His eternal decree. If Christ is described as "the lamb slain from the foundation of the world," and those "wicked hands" that crucified Jesus also "did what God had predestined to occur," then it would seem necessary to identify sin as part of God's eternal decree, but not something that He had to "intrude" on sentient creatures who would have preferred to do otherwise. As absurd as it sounds, and I try to state things carefully and reverently, I don't see how one could reason otherwise and be Biblical.

If you try to define "open theology" according to any idea that sentient creatures make free moral choices without coercion, then you would dillute the term. Open theism requires by definition that God cannot know with 100% certainty what free creatures will do, because for Him to know would be to make Himself "complicit" in their evil actions and absolve them of moral responsibility. No one who believes that God has exhaustive definite foreknowledge of all future actions can be described as "open theists."

Open theist answers to the challenge of Peter's three denials are always found wanting. How did God know for sure
1. where Peter would be that night? He could have run away with other disciples.
2. that someone would actually confront him?
3. that he would actually deny Christ?
4. that someone would confront him more than once?
5. that he would deny Christ more than once?
6. that it would be three times, and not two or even four?
7. that this would happen "immediately" before the rooster crowed (early in the morning)?

There are innumerable other questions that could be asked because the contingencies surrounding the setup of this are innumerable. A dismissive statement about Jesus knowing the "character" of Peter fails. It still does not guarantee the exact and startling details of Christ's prediction, which are the very emphatic point of it. It was not an educated guess, it was a confirmation of His deity.

Earlier in the same chapter, Jesus makes this startling statement:

Joh 13:18 I speak not of you all: I know whom I have chosen: but that the scripture may be fulfilled, He that eateth bread with me hath lifted up his heel against me.
Joh 13:19 Now I tell you before it come, that, when it is come to pass, ye may believe that I am he.

Jesus predicted that Judas Iscariot would betray Him (i.e. SIN). Jesus based His prophecy on a claim to His own deity and the necessity of fulfilling Scripture. He gave the test of His words such that it would demonstrate that "I am" (ego eimi). Jesus was claiming to be Yahweh Himself. If Jesus could have been wrong about His prediction of Judas' SIN, He would not be God! He would have also failed the test of a false prophet:

Deu 18:18 I will raise them up a Prophet from among their brethren, like unto thee, and will put my words in his mouth; and he shall speak unto them all that I shall command him.
Deu 18:19 And it shall come to pass, that whosoever will not hearken unto my words which he shall speak in my name, I will require it of him. [Can anyone argue that this is not a reference to Messiah?]
Deu 18:20 But the prophet, which shall presume to speak a word in my name, which I have not commanded him to speak, or that shall speak in the name of other gods, even that prophet shall die.
Deu 18:21 And if thou say in thine heart, How shall we know the word which the LORD hath not spoken? [Glad you asked!]
Deu 18:22 When a prophet speaketh in the name of the LORD, if the thing follow not, nor come to pass, that is the thing which the LORD hath not spoken, but the prophet hath spoken it presumptuously: thou shalt not be afraid of him.

I am sure the disciples were familiar with the history of Israel and the tests for false prophets. I am sure Jesus was aware of it. It was necessary for the legitimacy and person of Jesus Himself to be correct in His prophecies. If He made a false prophecy, the Jews could rightly try Him before the Roman government and say "in our law, one who claims to speak for God and makes a false prophecy should be put to death." Jesus would not have died a perfect substitutionary atonement for sinners, but would have died justly as a condemned criminal himself. I can assure you that when Jesus predicted the SIN of Judas and the SIN of Peter, He was not making an "educated guess" about it or speaking His prophecies presumptuously. His very claims to be the fulfillment of prophecies themselves, yea, and His very claim to be DEITY require that His predictions had to be 100% accurate (not 99.9% likely).

So, is God the author of Peter's sin, since He "guaranteed" that it would happen?

If you think that anything less than "robotic" determinism is "open theology," I don't think you understand his, nor my view.

I hope I have answered your question.

 

Just answer this...

Has ANYTHING ever happened, or will happen, that God did not know about, and that he did not have direct control over it, as He could chose to either cause it to hapen Himself directly, or else permit it to happen?

IF you say yes, Open Theism does NOT exist for a viable option!

 

In answer to the idea that God predetermined all things, I would like to get some feedback on the issue of God's repenting as mentioned several times in scripture. Why would God be grieved, for example, over the sins on earth and "repent" that he had made man, as told in Gen. 6? I believe I know the answer, but what I believe does not agree with what I understand about the ideas of 'predetermination of all things.'

 

The problem is with trying to derive doctrine about God's attributes from narrative passages and filter the declarative statements about God using these assumptions. Those passages that define God's attributes should guide our understanding of what the narrative and relational passages exhibit.

Let's compare two passages:

Exo 32:9 And the LORD said unto Moses, I have seen this people, and, behold, it is a stiffnecked people:
Exo 32:10 Now therefore let me alone, that my wrath may wax hot against them, and that I may consume them: and I will make of thee a great nation.
Exo 32:11 And Moses besought the LORD his God, and said, LORD, why doth thy wrath wax hot against thy people, which thou hast brought forth out of the land of Egypt with great power, and with a mighty hand?
Exo 32:12 Wherefore should the Egyptians speak, and say, For mischief did he bring them out, to slay them in the mountains, and to consume them from the face of the earth? Turn from thy fierce wrath, and repent of this evil against thy people.
Exo 32:13 Remember Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, thy servants, to whom thou swarest by thine own self, and saidst unto them, I will multiply your seed as the stars of heaven, and all this land that I have spoken of will I give unto your seed, and they shall inherit it for ever.
Exo 32:14 And the LORD repented of the evil which he thought to do unto his people.

Rom 11:33 O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! how unsearchable are his judgments, and his ways past finding out!
Rom 11:34 For who hath known the mind of the Lord? or who hath been his counsellor?
Rom 11:35 Or who hath first given to him, and it shall be recompensed unto him again?
Rom 11:36 For of him, and through him, and to him, are all things: to whom be glory for ever. Amen.

The Exodus 32 passage looks like a vivid account of Moses being God's counselor. Yet, Paul asked rhetorically in Romans 11 "Who hath been his counselor"? He then says that of, through, and to God are "all things."

Can it rightly be said that God forgot His promises that He made to the fathers of the Israelites and that Moses had to help God recollect them? Sure, God was angry at the way the people were acting in their idolatry; however, is it not obvious that God was also testing Moses for Moses' sake? Moses needed to remember the promises.
Moses needed to be aware of why he had been through all the trials of the wilderness and led the people out of Egypt.
Moses was being tested with the temptation to have the chosen race come solely from his own progeny.

If God was fully intentioned to destroy the people, why would He ask Moses' permission to "let me alone"? Nebuchadnezzer declared of God "who can stay his hand?"

Comparing Scripture with Scripture, one can see the revelation of the "depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God" even in the narratives of how He relates to His creatures. It is much more obvious to me in the anthropomorphic and anthropopathic narratives of God and man how that God actually tests people for their own benefit rather than that there is imperfection or deficiencies in God.

 

1. You need to go back and look at the historical definitions of calvinism & Hyper-calvinism, and the debates between the two. You are correct that Hyper-calvinists believe God predestined everything...However, if you are implying that anyone who believes that God predestined everything is a Hyper-calvinist, then you are historicaly mistaken. Hyper-calvinist does NOT mean "a really serious calvinist." There are actual differing beliefs, most often having to do with the necessity of gospel preaching.

2. As skan said, you need to go look at the (recent) history of what Open theism teaches. Just because once disagrees with the premise that God predestines everything does NOT make them an open theist...if they believe God knew the future and allowed it. Open Theist believe Jesus was born from Mary...so do I; It does not make me an open theist. You are re-writing your own definition of open theism in order to make it apply to more people than it actually does.

3. Despite all you have written, the reason Skan asked the question is because nearly no one who has replied understands your view...(see the bolded section above). To the untrained eye, you statements seem contradictary: Everything is not predestined, but God would have brought about Peter's denials anyway.

4. To answer the OP, There is a sense in which God has either predestined or allowed everything that has ever taken place. If we keep in our mind that God planned and predestined the murder of his own Son, then we will see that What looks like evil in our eyes, God means for Good.

5. Simply saying that someone's view "makes God the AUTHOR of sin" does not show why that is necessarily wrong. That phrase is not in the bible, so it too must be defined to have any meaning. Why is it that everyone assumes that we can say anything as long as we do not say God is the author of sin?

 

Is ANYTHING beyond the means/ability of the Lord to affect it?

 

To answer the OP's question. Yes, and you were predestined to start this thread....:laugh:


I agree that God hasn't decreed everything(meaning that the rapes, murders, molestings, etc). He didn't will them to come to pass.

 

We use words to describe what God allows. 'Permit' is a big one. I think some take comfort in that word, but it seems like it is God coming into the equation via the problem of evil, 'author of sin' and other things are stated as the end of others doctrines, and it is He who is really being called into question.

If God permitted sin, evil, and all things synonymous to this, the end is still effectual, efficacious, authoritative, no matter how you word it. I still see Him in control of all things, no matter what phrases we choose to describe it, permissive or otherwise.

I see many in Scripture who see it this way. None of them sinned in saying it, or believing even evil can come at the hand of the Lord, Job being one who claimed this. The Word says he didn't sin with his lips in declaring this.

I believe God can never be affected by His choosing, permission, using of secondary means, or other like, as He is forever perfectly Holy and Just.

both evil and good, and again the end is still effectual, and that He is all knowing, from eternity past, present, future. I believe it is in this way that He can determine all things, and the outcome is always under His purpose and control. We can see in this way He has predetermined, or predestined all things. He is much bigger than us, and we cannot grasp the how, why &c.

Even His own Son was predestined to suffer and die a grievous death nailed to a tree. Seems we worry about humans and suffering more than what the Innocent Son suffered for us. I can't say anyone else in this world is innocent, and that too is hard to grasp in many situations that we see transpire.

 

The silliness that gets posted in this board is astounding.

 

There is always the mystery of GOD involved here...

We are still finite minded right here and now, and even with the revelation of God to us in the Bible, still seeing' through a dim mirror"

IF the Apsotle paul, one who had staggering revelations, inspired to write portion of NT, still be seeing through the fog, how much more would we be?

We DO know that God rules over ALL things, knows ALL things, and we cannot blame Him for eveil/sin death etc as that is part of the "Grand Design", as what would come to pass in this creation of God, once God created and made the contingincy for "free will"...

 

"Now you are posting absurdity" and "Pure twaddle"

 

Is Everything Predestined?

If it is, so is this answer.
If it ain't, so ain't this answer.

If that is no answer, then it was predestined to not be one, or else not predestined to be one. If it is, then it was predestined to be one, or else not predestined to be one. That's 2-1-1 in favor of 'not predestined to be one.' Preponderance does not prove it, but I'll still go with that here. And if I'm wrong, then I'm predestined to be.

 

If I was "predestined" to Hell, without the ability to repent, then why would I be held accountable for anything I do?

John

 

Because you're predestined to be held accountable for anything you do.

 

That really doesn't make any sense

John

 

That's right. This whole dilemma doesn't.

 

Ok...:tonofbricks:

now I see what you meant.

john