Featured God's desire

Yes, Ezekiel is talking to Covenant Israel. God is saying Israel's behavior is wicked. He takes no pleasure in the death of His Covenant people when they rebel against Him. He asks His people why they rebel and go to their own death when He would cover them in love. It is not unlike Jesus crying out over Jerusalem before his crucifixion. "Jerusalem oh Jerusalem..."

 

First all of God's will is perfect. He does not have an imperfect will. So let me ask you this. In 1Thess 4:3 we read the following; 3 For this is the will of God, even your sanctification, that ye should abstain from fornication:

So are you saying that no Christian has ever committed fornication? I would say that God does not always get His will.

 

Martin do you not see mans free will in those words? "everyone who sees the Son and believes in Him" Both are present active participles, the person has to continue looking to Christ and continue believing in Christ if they are to have everlasting life.

 

Just so. "If the Son sets you free, you shall be free indeed." 'But the natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; nor can he receive them, because they are spiritually discerned.'


Your problem, if I may say so, is that you are looking at John 6:40 but not at John 6:39. Both are true and both must be held together.

 

Once again, you cannot make Scripture say the opposite of what it actually says. You cannot make 'Our God is in heaven; He does whatever pleases Him' to mean 'Our God is in heaven; He doesn't do whatever pleases Him.'
Let me try to explain this to you by way of analogy.
I don't know whether you clean your own windows or get someone else to do it. Let us assume the former for the sake of argument. Cleaning windows is not a lot of fun and I don't suppose you enjoy it for its own sake.
But you do it gladly because then you will be able to look out of them more clearly and see your palatial gardens with the lawns sweeping majestically down to the river and the herds of buffalo grazing on the far side..

It is written that '... It pleased the LORD to bruise [Christ]; He has put Him to grief.' You cannot read that to mean, 'It didn't please the LORD to bruise Him; He has got someone else to put Him to grief.' But I'm sure it did not delight the Father to see His beloved Son being scourged, and the nails driven into His hands and feet. Nevertheless, He was pleased. The Scripture says so. He was pleased because by His Son's voluntary suffering, His elect could be saved.

So although Ezekiel 18:23 tells us that God has no pleasure in the death of the wicked (and the judgment that comes thereafter) in itself, nonetheless He is pleased because His righteous judgment is upheld.

 

You correctly assume that Paul is writing to Christians. Multiple verses in the Bible assume that Christians will not lead sinless lives (eg. Hebrews 8:12). Sanctification in 1 Thessalonians 4:3 is progressive; those who are sinning will be brought to repentance.

 

Your problem, if I may say so, is that you are overlooking what we are told in these verses. John 6:39-40 "This is the will of the Father who sent Me" & "this is the will of Him who sent Me" So taking both verses together we see that Christ will raise up all those that are given to the Son because they have seen and believed in Him. Both are true and both must be held together.

And I agree that all those who believe in the Son will be set free from the consequence of their sin. But I have to ask, why would you expect a natural man to understand the things of the Spirit of God. I can understand why you quote 1 Corinthians 2:14 but what the verse does not say, and I think you are implying, is that man can not hear the gospel message and believe. That idea has to be read into the text. Paul tells us in Ephesians 1:13-14 that man can and do hear and believe the gospel message and are sealed by the Holy Spirit. These are the ones that will be able to understand the things of the Holy Spirit and those that continue to reject the gospel message will not.

 

[?QUOTE="JonC, post: 2811264, member: 12639"]Now Scripture states that God desires all come to a knowledge of the truth. You say this means that God does not desire that all come to a knowledge of truth but that some do and others do not.[/QUOTE]
You still don't get it! 1 Timothy 2:4 cannot contradict Psalms 115:3 and other verses. The task of the exegete is to harmonize them. The way that I do it is to look at the words 'all' and 'world' and observe that in many instances they simply cannot mean every single person. Did 'Jerusalem, all Judea and all the region around the Jordan' go out to John the Baptist (Matthew 3:5)? Yes, but surely not every single person? For example, there were only 'many' of the scribes and Pharisees (v.7), not all of them. To be sure, 'all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,' but are all 'justified freely by His grace'? In the first example, as has been shown by others, the context demands that 'all' means 'all sorts and conditions of people.' In the second, it means Jew and Gentile alike , who are both under sin (Romans 3:9). I could give multiple further examples of this sort of thing, but I have a life outside of this forum. But context is your friend, along with the Analogy of faith.

 

You still don't get it! 1 Timothy 2:4 cannot contradict Psalms 115:3 and other verses. The task of the exegete is to harmonize them. The way that I do it is to look at the words 'all' and 'world' and observe that in many instances they simply cannot mean every single person. Did 'Jerusalem, all Judea and all the region around the Jordan' go out to John the Baptist (Matthew 3:5)? Yes, but surely not every single person? For example, there were only 'many' of the scribes and Pharisees (v.7), not all of them. To be sure, 'all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,' but are all 'justified freely by His grace'? In the first example, as has been shown by others, the context demands that 'all' means 'all sorts and conditions of people.' In the second, it means Jew and Gentile alike , who are both under sin (Romans 3:9). I could give multiple further examples of this sort of thing, but I have a life outside of this forum. But context is your friend, along with the Analogy of faith.[/QUOTE]

Yes context is the friend of those that use it. The problem is that for the average Calvinist context is not their friend.

Yes all and world can and are used to mean different things but context will guide you into the proper understanding of there use. That seems to be something that you are trying to avoid. You are allowing your theology to cloud your vision.

 

Silverhair, the less than average Reformed Christian gives more context in their comments than you have ever provided. You have shown us that context is your enemy.

Context does guide us to understand when "all" and "world" are qualified into a particular sphere and are not universal. @Martin Marprelate has never avoided this. He has addressed it head on, while you try to dance around context at every turn. How you interpret is just awful, awful stuff.

 

If you actually understood context then perhaps you would be listened to but you have show by your denial of scripture that context is indeed not your friend. But I am sure that you will continue to trumpet your philosophy in the hope that some will believe you.

Austin I do trust that you actually do want to know the God of the bible but you have let your pride cloud your acceptance of the truth of scripture and instead run down a rabbit hole of contradictions. But your version of god has determined you to do so.

 

Silverhair, I understand context quite well. You, however, don't.
Silverhair, everyone sees what you are doing. You have a humanist view of God where you set yourself as equal cooperator with God. In fact, you set it up so that God needs your permission for you to be saved. I view your philosophy as incredibly arrogant.

 

If God desires every single person to come to a knowledge of the truth then Psalms 115:3 and various other verses are false. God desires all men to come to a knowledge of the truth - Jews and Gentiles, Pharisees and sinners, rich and poor, young and old and so forth.

1. That is not what the Scripture says.
2. That is not what I believe.
[/QUOTE]
Scripture says that God loved the world. You say this means "the elect".[/QUOTE]
1. Scripture doesn't say that.
2. That's not what I believe.
[/QUOTE]
Scripture says God reconciled man to Himself so that men could be reconciled. You say this means God reconciled the elect so that they are already reconciled.
That's not what I believe.

Is every single person drawn to Christ? No? Was He mistaken then? Not at all. Christ will draw all men - Jews and Gentiles, Pharisees and sinners, rich and poor, young and old and so forth. And when they come, it will be because the Father gave them to the Son to redeem (John 6:37), and because He has loved them with an everlasting love and drawn them with lovingkindness (Jeremiah 31:3).

Since you don't appear to have any idea what my theology is, I don't see how you can stand in judgment on it.

 

You keep saying that you understand context but your comments on here show that is not the case.You have read into scripture your errant theology and or changed the meaning of words to suit your view. That is not trusting scripture that is you trusting in what you think scripture says.

Your Calvinism is your blind spot and you are determined to hold to that view.

 

Scripture says that God loved the world. You say this means "the elect".[/QUOTE]
1. Scripture doesn't say that.
2. That's not what I believe.
[/QUOTE]
Scripture says God reconciled man to Himself so that men could be reconciled. You say this means God reconciled the elect so that they are already reconciled.
That's not what I believe.

Is every single person drawn to Christ? No? Was He mistaken then? Not at all. Christ will draw all men - Jews and Gentiles, Pharisees and sinners, rich and poor, young and old and so forth. And when they come, it will be because the Father gave them to the Son to redeem (John 6:37), and because He has loved them with an everlasting love and drawn them with lovingkindness (Jeremiah 31:3).

Since you don't appear to have any idea what my theology is, I don't see how you can stand in judgment on it.[/QUOTE]

While I can not and would not be the one to stand in judgement of your theology I can tell you that what you are presenting is not biblical but is rather something that you have made up in your own mind.

By your logic one could say the bible proves there is no God as you will find the phrase a number of times but it is not what the bible teaches is it. You pull verses out of context to support your errant view and then wonder why people question you on it. Take of those Calvinist glasses and trust the text of scripture. You will be glad you did.

 

Silverhair, if only one person was graciously saved, that would be one more than was deserved and God's love for the world would still be true.
"But God..."

Let those two words sink in to your cranium.

"But God..."