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Total depravity or total inability?

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Dave...

Active Member

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This should go without saying. The context is pretty obvious. Likewise goes the rest.

TOTAL DEPRAVITY Proof-Text DISMANTLED In 10 MINUTES | Dr. Leighton Flowers | Soteriology 101

 
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Van

Well-Known Member
Site Supporter
Dave... said:
Van

Arminians believe in prevenient grace. Though, I believe that you're framing it wrong in your mind. It's not that prevenient grace ensures one will be saved, as you believe, rather, it's that it actually allows them to to make the choice. Arminians believe that prevenient grace can be rejected. I believe that's the point of contention and why people are claiming that you'd have to also be a universalist based on your understanding of God's drawing people.

Matthew 13:19. What was sown into this persons heart that the devil can snatch away, if not the intellectual understanding?

The light, as Jesus is, as God is, as believers are called to be, has one of two reactions. A person will be drawn to it or want to put it out, to suppress it and what it represents. The light is the truth. Everyone sees the light, but some want to suppress that truth in unrighteousness. You can't suppress it if you don't understand it and what it represents.

One element that is missing in your equation, is that maybe, at least in many cases, judicial hardening is an act of mercy. It doesn't work out for everyone the same, as some, like the alcoholic, never bottom out and take that disease, as they call it, to their grave. Everyone sees the light and knows what it represents. Some want to suppress it, as they are still holding onto the lies of the world, still suppressing the truth. These will do almost anything to put that light out. It's the basis for our being persecuted. A light doesn't hide under the table, right?

It isn't until one bottoms out in their sin that they stop gnashing their teeth at the light and are drawn to it. They actually want the truth. So in hardening one judicially, I believe that for many, God is actually trying to get them to a point that they let go of the lies of the world and stop suppressing the truth, and actually need and seek it Him and His mercy. It's only then that they are ready to hear and receive the Gospel.

God hardened Israel to provoke them to jealousy. It's tough love, Van.
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You are wasting my time. I say enabling grace, either irresistible grace or prevenient grace, is a fiction and you say I believe prevenient grace "ensures" one will be saved. Goodbye
 
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Martin Marprelate

Well-Known Member
Site Supporter
Total Depravity does not mean that non-Christians are as depraved as they can possibly be. It means that every part of man is depraved to some degree (Isaiah 1:4-6; Matt. 7:11).
Total Inability, if it is the suggestion that non-Christians are physically incapable of repenting and believing, is not a doctrine I believe. Rather, people are morally incapable; it's not that they cannot come, but that they will not (John 3:19; 5:40).
 
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