Featured If God Never decreed/ordained the Fall...

You still have not answered my repeated requests for an answer as well, but for my part it is oversight. Apologies.

To answer your question, hypothetically, the Fall not occurring would mean God had another plan. I do not know what it could have looked like, but I do know that God's purposes will be accomplished.

 

I'll just explain what I mean instead of taking the chance on definitions (I will trust you to place it in your proper category).

God refrained from providing Adam the grace to conquer temptation. Adam was enticed by his own lusts, which gave birth to sin.

In other words, God permitted Adam to sin by allowing him to freely choose when God could have prevented the situation all together.

 

Sorry. I'm doing a couple of things at once and misunderstood.

Sin has not been decreed (it is not necessary that men sin), yet sin occurs.

 

No. What God decrees is what occurs by God's command. What is permitted occurs because God allows it.

Scripture teaches that God has a will, design, plan, purpose for Creation and that God actively causes things in accord with this will. God's purposes will be accomplished because God will accomplish them.

At the same time, men are free agents in Creation. Men make their plans, freely. God does not command man to sin. Instead God permits men to freely choose. If nothing is decreed then everything is happenstance and human invention. If nothing is permitted, then human free agency does not exist.

All things fall into God's purposes, but not all things are necessary even if certain. Sin is never necessary, but all that occurs is certain (God knew them before they came to pass and was willing that they occur).

What is decreed and purposed (what God actively wills and those things that are permitted as a result of God's active will) will certainly occur. Other things are possibilities that never materialize (God was unwilling to permit something to occur, for example).

All men can be saved. This is a possibility Christ secured on the Cross. But not all men will be saved. And this is a certainty because God knew who would and wold not believe before the earth was ever formed. Yet still, God created those who he knew were destined to destruction. Does this mean God decreed their condemnation?

Calvinist will normally say "no". God chose out of fallen man some to save.

I say "yes", because God decreed the Fall (not Adam's sin, but that the fall should occur). And this condemnation applies to all men for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.

I hope this helps explain my position. I eagerly await your answer as well.

 

I believe so. The reason I 'hopped" was to try and cover everything. I did not want to leave you with the impression that what is not decreed is not a certainty.

 

Yes, of course. God actively placed Adam in the Garden where God knew as a certainty that Adam would sin. We both agreed on this part several posts back.

What God did not decree was Adam's sin. God was not obligated to grace Adam with the measure of grace needed to overcome this temptation. The sin was born out of Adam's lusts when tempted. God could have prevented it by fortifying Adam somehow, I suppose. He could have prevented it by banning the Serpent, not commanding Adam to refrain from eating the fruit, not putting man in the Garden, and not creating man to begin with.

I suppose the correct terminology would be that God decreed the Fall, that it should occur. But God ordained Adam's sin, not that it should occur but that in occurring it fulfilled his purposes.

 

I mean that God knew as a fact all that would happen (the future is "written in stone" for God). This includes all of the works of God as well as the fruits of men.

In other words, I don't believe God sits back and analyzed the situation, making plans, ect. God is eternal and knows from start to finish, as a certainly, what will occur.

 

No, God didn't make Adam fall. The Fall was an event essential to God's plan of redemption, so it was in accord with God's plan for the good.

God did not prevent Adam's sin. He allowed Adam to freely choose, and refrained from giving the grace that Adam would prevail over his own lusts and temptation.

 

When I say this, please understand that I am not taking up for Open Theism (I believe it a heresy and a departure from free-will theology that resides within orthodox Christianity), but they do bring up a point. Open Theism believes that God knows all that there is to know, but that the outcome of contingent events (to include the decisions of men) are simply unknowable (they are not a part of what can be known, therefore God's omniscience remains intact).

The reason I bring this up is that I believe God knows the heart of man, and that before God created us he knew all of our thoughts, even the number of hairs on our head. When we look at the Fall, and we consider that God knows all things (to include our hearts, our intentions, our thoughts) then for all practical applications predestination is a given.

All things are predestined to occur as God has known they would occur. In other words, if God knew before you were born that you would be saved then your salvation is predetermined. If God knew before Rudolf Carnap was born that he would reject Christ and die an atheist, then his damnation was predetermined.

Before God created the world, God knew without a doubt everything that would come to pass. God knew the Fall, man's sin, the Cross, those who would be saved, those who would be lost....the beginning and the end. And knowing this it was God's will that Creation as he designed occur. For example, the fact that God created Adam knowing he would fall testifies to the willingness of God that the Fall occur.

 

Decreed or not, all things (if God knows all) will infallibly pass.

You affirmed divine omniscience and agreed that God knew Adam would sin.
If God places Adam in a situation where God knows that he will certainly sin, then yes, the Fall was in accordance with God's purposes. What is interesting is the relationship of redemption. If God created Adam knowing Adam would fall, then the scene turns from man to God. God created man in a sense to fall. Not to sin, but to be redeemed. Redemption then, moves from "plan B" to God's eternal counsel and purpose and Jesus moves from being a reactionary figure to being the One for Whom and in Whom all things exist.