Featured Predestination is that of a saved man unto a resurrection body in Christ's image

Okay, so you are a son presently but you have not received the inheritance, which is reserved in heaven and adoption is “to wit, the redemption of the body which is a future event? Doesn’t the two verses you quoted in your earlier post make my case? One of the verses even has the term “ predestination” in it. I guess I do not quite understand your exception to my statement.

One thing I am sure about and that is that I do not have full light on the subject and can be persuaded with an informed and in context biblical argument. I thank you for your input. Following is what I do know and understand. It is too simple to miss it.

Romans 8:15
For ye have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear; but ye have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father.

Romans 8:23
And not only they, but ourselves also, which have the firstfruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body.

In Galatians 4, Romans 8:23, and Eph 1:5, I am not sure Paul has gentile believers in view when he is dealing with the subject of adoption. I haven’t really made up my mind about that entirely but am leaning heavily to thinking not.

 

This is what I see for WH+ Strong's G5206 - "From a presumed compound of G5207 and a derivative of G5087; the placing as a son, that is, adoption (figuratively Christian sonship in respect to God): - adoption (of children, of sons)."

I don't see the "unto" anywhere here that you're referencing above - should i be looking elsewhere? If the "unto" is not to be found, then does it not imply any span of time?

I agree with you that in Rom 8:11 and 1Cor 15 it clearly teaches that our mortal bodies cannot enter the Kingdom and that the Spirit will quicken us into Spiritual bodies. And I agree that in Rom 8:23, it teaches that we are to wait for such redemption of our bodies to happen in the future. There is no debate here.

My only point of disagreement is in equating adoption with this future redemption or receiving of our inheritance - I believe that is a misread of the verse for reasons discussed in other posts here, but sure, I also see how Rom 8:23 could lead to such an interpretation if one wishes to see it that way in isolation.

Wow, this was neat and I nearly would've agreed wholly with you. I agree with the imagery being that of creation giving birth to incorruptible redeemed bodies from that which was in bondage to corruption/mortality.
But shouldn't this imagery be isolated and not be mixed with being born of the Spirit - for we are already born of the Spirit now..it's not something we're waiting for in the future, right?

And secondly, going by the giving-birth imagery, there are the sons in the womb and creation is in labor about to deliver these sons, manifesting/revealing them in redeemed incorruption - but they're sons before and after delivery all the same. What we're awaiting is the manifesting or revealing of these sons after the final delivery. Do you see this paralleled in Rom 8:19?

But yes, your explanation has been quite helpful, thanks!

 

Yes, Sonship is a present reality and yes, inheritance is future. Where we're in disagreement is in you holding adoption to be in the context of inheritance and not sonship while I hold it just the other way round.

The reasons are two-fold as already mentioned earlier in other posts.
1. The biblical definition of adoption itself - the placing as a son, that is, adoption (figuratively Christian sonship in respect to God): - adoption (of children, of sons). (isn't this clearly the context of sonship?)

2. Gal 4:5-6 which necessitates us to have already received adoption or the placement as sons according to the above definition, seen in the logical connection of the "And because..." phrase.

The only reason one might read Adoption to be in the context of future redemption of bodies is because of Rom 8:23 which actually parallels Rom 8:19 and the author took liberties in language to abbreviate sentences within the same context. The expanded structure would've actually read -

Rom 8:19 ....waiteth for the manifestation of the sons of God.
Rom 8:23 ....waiting for the manifestation of the adoption....

where adoption still fits the above Biblical definition of being placed sons and what we're waiting for is the manifestation of the adopted sons, seen at the redemption of our bodies in the future.

 

The Doctrine of Total Depravity is Taught in The Bible, in practically every Chapter.

Once a child of God is Taught Total Depravity, they have every advantage to continue learning God's Word.

Where you asking something?

Calvinism teaches this Doctrine, from what I understand. Those who damn Calvin to Hell may or may not actually have ever read a word of his.

I have done for a dozen sentences or so, in my entire life. There are references that can be linked to his 'Institutes', etc.
I listened to them and how he was fighting Priests for not marrying and cool.

Don't listen long. I don't care for what I've heard him say. Always fleshly psychology.

 

Yes, I was asking if you would read what I'd posted earlier as total depravity? If not, which parts contained specifically here (and not whatever else you assume is being said) do you disagree with?
I've added all relevant texts again for your reference below -

In the fallen state, the free will of man towards the true good is not only wounded, maimed, infirm, bent, and weakened; but it is also imprisoned, destroyed, and lost. And its powers are not only debilitated and useless unless they be assisted by grace, but it has no powers whatever except such as are excited by Divine grace.

For Christ has said, ‘Without me ye can do nothing.’ St. Augustine, after having diligently meditated upon each word in this passage, speaks thus: ‘Christ does not say, without me ye can do but Little; neither does He say, without me ye can do any Arduous Thing, nor without me ye can do it with difficulty. But he says, without me ye can do Nothing! Nor does he say, without me ye cannot complete any thing; but without me ye can do Nothing.’

In his lapsed and sinful state, man is not capable, of and by himself, either to think, to will, or to do that which is really good; but it is necessary for him to be regenerated and renewed in his intellect, affections or will, and in all his powers, by God in Christ through the Holy Spirit, that he may be qualified rightly to understand, esteem, consider, will, and perform whatever is truly good.

 

Why does someone who is born a son need to be adopted? Did you not say that you are a son now? Will you be more of a son when you are receive your glorified body or when you are adopted? Did you not agree that adoption is future? Thinking out loud, do you think maybe the adoption has something to do with the collective since all those in the body makes up the one body and all are joint heirs with Christ, who is the firstborn son? This means all the sons receive the same inheritance as the firstborn and the inheritance is not reduced.

I am just an old country person and don't know much but I was wondering why this sentence is written in this manner;

"and not only they, but ourselves also, which have the firstfruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves,waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of the body."

This is Rom 8:23. One would think that in the context of all these plurals in the verse, they, we, ourselves, Paul would have said we are waiting for the redemption of our bodies.

17 And if children, then heirs; heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ; if so be that we suffer with [him], that we may be also glorified together

I have never heard of the concept that you are presenting that one who is born into a family must also be adopted. Is this a Jewish custom? I am not trying to be argumentative here. I am trying to know the mind of God and I have not arrived at a final destination on my understanding of this doctrine. I am not trying to convince you of anything. I appreciate your input. When we understand the scriptures they will make perfect and logical sense, don't you think?

 

Where have you seen this - please do tell me. This is precisely the point I'm making here - you go off on a rant assuming things about people you hardly know without ever taking the time/interest to inform yourself on their beliefs and reasons. So let me put you on the spot and call you out here - be gracious in confessing to your faults (I already hold no ill-will either way) or back your statements with undeniable proof.

I presented a simple statement - you said it cannot be true in a billion years - i backed it word for word from Scriptural verses - you simply launched into your own interpretative Bible study on those verses - but the fact still remains that you called a collection of Scriptural verses not being true in a billion years. What's your justification for this erroneous conclusion - that you were reading into my mind as to what I actually meant when these verses were being quoted?

Even so, why the erroneous reading of minds - I am not Arminian myself and I completely hold to total depravity. I was simply responding to your earlier statement that the premise of Arminianism was that nobody was lost in condemnation and that there was no total depravity - I'm fact-checking you on your statement. Should this "Bible believer" then take it as "a wretched insult" that you judged him for what he's not guilty of? What is your explanation for why you jumped the gun?

 

Agreed. And even if you were constructively argumentative, I wouldn't mind in the least - we are after all on a debate forum

These are the things we are agreed upon.
1. I am presently a son/child of God, born of His Spirit, in the here and now.
2. I am an heir to a future inheritance, which will be received in the redemption of our now corruptible bodies into incorruptible glorified bodies by the quickening work of the Holy Spirit.

Isn't it the other way around - it's through adoption that you are born into God's family. In our normal lives, we do not have a concept of a second birth - when we adopt someone who was first born to someone else, we simply make them our sons by relation but not by actual birthing them again to us - not so with God.

We were first born a son of Adam, and did what Adam did and are deserving of condemnation for it, sold a slave in bondage under the law. Christ sacrifices His life to redeem us from such bondage so that we who were not God's people and were rather children of disobedience in bondage may now be adopted = be made sons/children of God. And this process of making us sons is by the birthing of the Spirit and by sealing us with the Spirit of Adoption/Sonship, whereby we cry out as sons, Abba Father. This same Spirit is our earnest pledge of the inheritance to come as heirs, to wit, the redemption of the body to what's glorified and incorruptible.

Nope. Where have you seen me allude to this? Inheritance=redeemed body is future, sonship=adoption is present and already received in believers.

Yes, this is interesting and one I could potentially agree with. I simply don't hold this to be termed as the Adoption - since the adoption is already received.

I've already written my interpretation of Rom 8:23 in the earlier post - you could address that or if you need me to post again, I could do so. In summary, from chiefly Gal 4:5-6 and Eph 1:5-6. I must necessarily conclude we have already received the Adoption and that it's not something yet to be waited for in the future, given that the definition of Adoption is in the context of sonship.

 

2. "God wills that they, who believe and persevere in faith, shall be saved",

This statement is what I spoke of as not being true in a billion years.

As stated, The Arminian Position is said, here, in this statement, as stated,
that "God wills that they, who believe and persevere in faith, shall be saved".

However, Jesus Said, "You Will Not Come unto Me that you may Have Life".

No one could, or has ever, 'believed' because God Sit Back and Waited for them
and then AFTER THEY BELIEVE AND PERSEVERE IN FAITH, be Saved by God.

No gun was jumped other than the ones I brought to town.

There are two sister Major Errors stated by, "2. "God wills that they, who believe and persevere in faith, shall be saved",

No Bible verse opposes or does not state Total Depravity when compared to all other scriptures.

All the 5 to 525 Doctrines of T.U.L.I.P. follow right after a Spiritual Understanding of Total Depravity.

I prefer and Teach the 525 Doctrines of Grace.

 

that which hath been born of the flesh is flesh,

What is your birthday? What day did your mother conceive you of your father?

Acts 13:33,34 YLT God hath in full completed this to us their children, having raised up Jesus, as also in the second Psalm it hath been written, My Son thou art -- I to-day have begotten thee, 'And that He did raise him up out of the dead, no more to return to corruption, he hath said thus -- I will give to you the faithful kindnesses of David;
Col 1:18 And himself is the head of the body -- the assembly -- who is a beginning, a first-born out of the dead, that he might become in all things -- himself -- first,

that which hath been born of the Spirit is spirit.

Romans 8:29 YLT because whom He did foreknow, He also did fore-appoint, (predestinate) conformed to the image of His Son, that he might be first-born among many brethren; ?Out of the dead?
1 Cor 15:46 YLT but that which is spiritual is not first, but that which was natural, afterwards that which is spiritual. ?afterward?
Luke 20:36 YLT for neither are they able to die any more -- for they are like messengers -- and they are sons of God, being sons of the rising again.

Romans 8:15,16 YLT for ye did not receive a spirit of bondage again for fear, but ye did receive a spirit of adoption in which we cry, 'Abba -- Father.' The Spirit himself doth testify with our spirit, that we are children of God;
1 John 3:2 YLT beloved, now, children of God are we, and it was not yet manifested what we shall be, and we have known that if he may be manifested, like him we shall be, because we shall see him as he is;

The Spirit puts us in Christ, in the body of Christ, in the church, Jerusalem above the mother of us all.

Conception and birth?

 

Ephesians 1:4

 

Thank you for that ivdavid.

It seems you are describing a remodel job by God. That is not how God defines salvation. He defines it as a new birth. He does it under the New Testament. He makes the sinner a new creature with the hope of a new body with a destination in the Fathers house in the New Jerusalem in the new heaven where we will even have a new name. God begins this work in a new age, the Old Testament being ended by the cross.

It happens that all the passages you quote for your position also mentions the inheritance along with adoption. However, there are many passages that mention the new birth or sons of God that mentions neither adoption or inheritance. If adoption is not mentioned except in these passages with inheritance then it seems God wants us to see them together and is a strong point for my position.

Rom 7:1 through Rom 11:36 must be understood in primarily a Jewish context. There are several things discussed in these chapters that gentiles simply did not have any experience with, one such thing being the law of Moses being the operative principle of divine dealing, the subject of the entire chapter seven. I have dealt with this extensively on another thread and will not go into it here. Ephesians 1:1-12 is in the same context. God’s intention was to save all Israel as a single entity with all her members and thus conform both members and the collective to the image of Christ. That would be by giving her the Spirit thus making her a trinitarian entity as he is. This was stifled by her unbelief and created an opportunity for the gentiles as described beginning in Rom 11:13. There would still be a collective made up of individual members, both from the Jewish believers called the remnant and gentile believers. Since this entity was not Jewish, then there would need to be an adoption for the inheritance. While I am not 100% sure about the adoption I am about the rest.

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Technically Ephesians 1:4 does not use the termology predestination.

 

It's unfortunate that there'll be a break in the continuity of what we're discussing here given the closure of this thread - but I'd like to thank all who've desired to share your learnings from Scriptures on this topic. It's been new and refreshing to me - and has resolved a lot of open questions I'd earlier had. I see it better now to view being born of God as a whole process of birthing from conception to delivery instead of a singular event - and I still see adoption as the placing of sons the moment you are born (conceived) of God. I don't see how retaining adoption to mean simply this negates anything else of what you believe - but yes, that could be saved for a later discussion.

P.S: The verse that finally persuaded me was Matt 1:20 where begotten=born=conceived.

 

If that's what you got from what I'd said, that's unfortunate. Given the closure of the thread, I'd save clarifying my position for later - I simply believe God creates us anew through adopting us though we were first born in the flesh to Adam. I disagree with your position since it entails adoption only because the Gentiles were grafted in whereas all children of God are adopted regardless of whether jew or gentile (Rom 9:4). For later...

 

If it is God who said - Whosoever believeth in Christ will be saved and have everlasting life (Rom 10:11, 13, Jn 3:16) - then it's a true statement to say "God wills that they who believe shall be saved".

If it is God who said in Jn 15:4 to abide in Him, then it is a true statement to say "God wills His disciples to abide in Him". It does not matter what other truths are brought to bear on this, as valid and relevant as they may be - but this is independently true because it's a direct citation of Scriptures. You may very well say, "but none can abide in Him unless God graciously worked in him and caused him to do so" - and yet it is true that God wills His disciples to abide in Him because that's quoting Scriptures directly. If one were to make the additional claim that disciples are themselves able to self-cause their own abiding apart from the grace of God, you could contest that - but not the preceding simple quotation of Scriptures.

Similarly, you cannot call a direct citation of Scriptures as untrue just because you disagree with what's to follow - contest the statements made on their own merit. Whoever believes in Christ will be saved is a Scriptural citation and must necessarily be true for all time - how one misapplies this elsewhere can be separately contested.

 

There is no doubt whatsoever that adoption is in the context of Israel because there could be no words that says it any plainer and more succinctly than these.

Rom 9:4 4 Who are Israelites; to whom pertaineth the adoption,......

And that it is a future proposition from AD 58 when this letter to the Romans was written as also clearly stated here;

Rom 8:23 And not only they, but ourselves also, which have the firstfruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body.

If that passage does not say that adoption takes place when the body is glorified then I am not smart enough nor do I have enough discernment to even read the scriptures, much less understand them.

The problem as I see it is that people will not allow the context to apply to those to whom it is addressed. One might say that some of these truths apply to gentile believers too. I say, well, but they do not say them here to gentile believers. The truths that apply to gentiles will be stated in places where God addresses gentiles. God really did counsel with himself before the creation of the world to do for his people Israel what he explains in these few chapters but because of unbelief it is not taking place with them at this time. This explains why and when he grafted in the gentiles. Couple this with his kingdom of heaven parables in the gospels and we will get a clear view of the mind of God and what he is doing in this age. Trying to pigeon hole these words into a system is one reason one makes wrong applications and comes to wrong conclusions. These words mean what they say. If one wants them to say something else, then change the words. Many have, many times.

 

Technically, God is God.

He is Allowed, by some, to Use His Terminology all the way in the next verse that He Specifically is EXPRESSING.

He Can even use the same, or different Words, throughout an entire passage, by The Good Pleasure of His Own Will.

Imagine being able to read The Bible, as if He Was God.

4 According as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before him in love:

5 Having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself, according to the good pleasure of his will,

6 To the praise of the glory of his grace, wherein he hath made us accepted in the beloved.

7 In whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of his grace;

8 Wherein he hath abounded toward us in all wisdom and prudence;

9 Having made known unto us the mystery of his will, according to his good pleasure which he hath purposed in himself:

10 That in the dispensation of the fulness of times he might gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven, and which are on earth; even in him: (GOD)

11 In whom also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestinated according to the purpose of him who worketh all things after the counsel of his own will:

12 That we should be to the praise of his glory, who first trusted in Christ.

13 In whom ye also trusted, after that ye heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation: in whom also after that ye believed, ye were sealed with that holy Spirit of promise,

14 Which is the earnest of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession, unto the praise of his glory.