What is love?

Blue,

I know what you're sayin', but I just don't get that reading from that verse. To me it just seems to be saying "world". "whosoever" modifies the word "believes", not the word "world". "Loved" refers to the word "world".....at least that's how I see it grammatically speaking.


ps. I do appreciate your ability to disagree kindly.

 

Good point bapmom. these guys do not get the fact that God is sovereign in our salvation not us. Our salvation and HIS LOVE isn't dependant on us in any form, but on God's character and his will.

It is HE that Chooses Us Jn 15:16, Eph 1:4, 2Th 2:13, 1 Pe 1:20, 2:9, and so many others. It is HE that Draws Us Jn 4:66, it is HE that Keeps Us Ph 1:6, Ph 2:12-13, Rom 8 28-39, 2 Cor 20-22, Jude 1:1-2, Jude 1:24-25 and more.

So you see it is God who does everything before druing and after. All we are accountable for is to SUBMIT to his will by accepting his offer of salvation and to be OBEDIENT after.

How can one look at all these verses especially the ones where he chose us and say we had anything to do with it?

 

Ps. 11:5 and Hos. 9:15. These are about God's love, too. May we discuss these for a moment, please?

 

....... is a many splendid thing. Hey, that would make a good song.

 

I disagree. The world means everybody in the world. Why play with definitions of words so the Bible will fit your theology. Jesus was sent so that everybody and anybody will have the oppertunity to be saved. This is not saying everybody will take that oppertunity.

Like:

If I put doughnuts on a table for everybody in the church to eat. But only 60% of church members eat the doughnuts. I did not just put the doughnuts there for those who ate them, I put them there for everybody.

 

I guess your answer fall far short of what I was looking for. But if it is the best you have...

Not an answer to my question. I know it is unconditional.

It just is? Well thats not helpfull

Ok I guess your answer is that God lets those condemed to hell with no chance of redemption have small plesures in life before they burn in hell forever. THAT IS LOVE.

But can you be truly happy without being saved?

I am not questioning God. I am questioning your understanding of God's love.

 

my papa said you can't love without thinking-i guess that implies you can't feel love or love through feelings or something like that

 

Back to the original question

What is love?

Answer:

For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.
John 3:16

Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends.
John 15:13

But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
Romans 5:8

 

LOL! Every time I've read this thread title I think, "Oh baby, don't hurt me, don't hurt me no more"! It's becoming annoying.

 

Good point bapmom. these guys do not get the fact that God is sovereign in our salvation not us. Our salvation and HIS LOVE isn't dependant on us in any form, but on God's character and his will.

It is HE that Chooses Us Jn 15:16, Eph 1:4, 2Th 2:13, 1 Pe 1:20, 2:9, and so many others. It is HE that Draws Us Jn 4:66, it is HE that Keeps Us Ph 1:6, Ph 2:12-13, Rom 8 28-39, 2 Cor 20-22, Jude 1:1-2, Jude 1:24-25 and more.

So you see it is God who does everything before druing and after. All we are accountable for is to SUBMIT to his will by accepting his offer of salvation and to be OBEDIENT after.

How can one look at all these verses especially the ones where he chose us and say we had anything to do with it? </font>[/QUOTE]Frenchy

This post confuses me. It seems we both agree with bapmoms statement. But then you say:

But bapmom saying "the ball is in our court" indicates she believes that we do have a choice in salvation.

Then you really confuse me with:

You indicate we have a choice in our salvation.

I agree with all that in the quote above. So where do we disagre? Maybe we dont and we just do not understand each other.

 

Yes i know that sounds confusing. our part is CONFESSING with our mouth what God has ALREADY PLACED in our hearts.

A person who isn't going to be saved can hear the gospel explained in it's fullness, but because God has NOT chosen to open his heart or mind to truth, he IS NOT able to receive it.

See how that makes sense? God is in control of whose hearts he opens and closes. yes I know there are those who by their lifestyle and choosing can cause God to say ok I gave you enough chances. and there are those God is LONGSUFFERING too. but it is still the work of the Holy Spirit to draw man to God and to give man understanding.

 

So God chooses to not open peoples hearts because He does not want them to be saved?

I believe God calls to everybody. But because it would bring Him no glory to force anybody to worship him He wants us to follow him of our own choice. I believe that even though all are able to accept Gods gift of salvation, few will choose to.

 

If what you are saying is true DeeJay then you would have to THROW OUT all these Verses in the bible!

Look up in the dictionary these words. Chosen, Elect.

DEUTURONOMY 7:6, "For you are a holy people to the Lord your God, the Lord your God has CHOSEN you to be a people for His own possession out of all the peoples who are on the face of the earth." Israel was elect.


MATTHEW 24: 22, "Unless those days be cut short, no life would have been saved. , But for the sake of the ELECT, THE CHOSEN, those days shall be cut short." Who are the elect? The believers. Verse 24, "False Christs, false prophets will arise, will show great signs and wonders so as to mislead if possible even the ELECT, THE CHOSEN, the believers." It is a term for believers, for Christians verse
31, "When He sends forth His angels with a great trumpet at the Second Coming, they will gather together HIS ELECT from the four winds, from one end of the sky to the other."

LUKE 18:7 says, "Now shall not God bring about justice for HIS ELECT who cry to Him day and night and will He delay long over them?"

ROMANS 8:33 "Who shall bring a charge against GOD'S ELECT?"

COLOSSIANS 3:12, "And so as those who have been ELECT OF GOD, CHOSEN OF GOD, holy and beloved, put on a heart of compassion," and so forth. You've been CHOSEN OF GOD to be holy and beloved. He determined to set His love on you and me for no reason of ours at all, but strictly of His own free choice. The elect of God, that's who we are.

2 TIMOTHY 2:10, "For this reason, Paul says, I endure all things in my ministry for the sake of those who are CHOSEN that they also may obtain the salvation which is in Christ Jesus." I am doing my evangelistic ministry to bring the gospel to the ELECT...the chosen. Titus, when Paul writes that letter he couldn't say it anymore straight-forward. "Paul, a bond servant of God and an Apostle of Jesus Christ, for the faith of those CHOSEN OF GOD."

2 JOHN, describes the church as the chosen lady, the elect lady, 2 John 1; 2 John 13, the children of your CHOSEN sister greet you. Two churches, both elect.

PETER says, "You are a CHOSEN race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for God's own possession." You are a chosen race. You are a Christian because you are chosen to be one by God.

ACTS 15:14, "Simeon, or Peter, has related how...this is the Council of Jerusalem...how God first concerned Himself about taking from among the Gentiles a PEOPLE FOR HIS NAME." God's whole plan is to take out a people, to choose a people.

MATTHEW chapter 20 You have a parable here, the Kingdom of Heaven, like a land owner, went out in the morning to hire labors for his vineyard. He agreed with the laborers for a denarius, he sent them into his vineyard. He went out the third hour, saw others standing idle in the marketplace, went through the process, hired them....hired them...hired them...hired them. Selected them, the whole parable all the way down to the bottom, he picked out who he wanted and he rewarded them with eternal life, that's the essence of the parable. Very simple. He selected them. Called them into his service. Sent them out to serve. Rewarded them fairly, faithfully, generously. That is a picture of election.

JOHN 15, Jesus said it to His disciples, "You did not choose Me but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit and that your fruit should remain that whatever you ask of the Father in My name He may give it you." You didn't choose Me, I chose you.

JOHN 17:9, He says of Christians, praying to the Father does our Lord, "I ask on their behalf," this is the high priestly prayer of Christ, "I do not ask on behalf of the world but of those whom Thou hast given Me." The Father chose us and gave us to Christ as a love gift, for they are Thine.

ACTS chapter 13: 48, "And when the Gentiles heard this, that is the gospel message, they began rejoicing and glorifying the Word of the Lord and as many as had been appointed to eternal life believed." The chosen believed. Those appointed to eternal life believed.

ROMANS 9:14. God is talking about choosing. He says, "Jacob I loved, Esau I hated." God made His choice. Verse 14, "What shall we say then? There is no injustice with God is there? May it never be." Me gennetos, in the Greek, no, no, no. It's...it's not injustice, for He said to Moses, "I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion," which is to say I will do precisely what I want to do. Verse 16, look at this, "So then it, salvation, does not depend on the man who wills or the man who runs but on God who has mercy." Sovereign mercy. And somebody in verse 19 says, "Well then how can He find fault, For who will resist his will?

ROMANS 11: 5, "In the same way then as in the case of the prophet Elijah and seven thousand men who didn't bow the knee to Baal, in the same way then there has also come to be at the present time a remnant according to God's choice." God's choice.

1 CORINTHIANS 1: 9, "God is faithful through whom you were called into fellowship with His Son." Your salvation was a direct work of God. He called you into fellowship with His Son.

EPHESIANS 1:3, "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ, just as He chose us in Him, before the foundation of the world." When did it happen? When were we chosen? Before we were born. Before anybody was born. Before there was a world we were chosen.

1 THESSALONIANS 1:4. "We give thanks to God always for all of you, making mention of you in our prayer, I look at your life and I see...in verse 3...your work of faith, your labor of love, your steadfastness of hope in our Lord Jesus Christ in the presence of our God and Father, knowing, brethren, beloved by God His choice of you."

2 THESSALONIANS 2 :13, "We should always give thanks to God for you, we shouldn't thank you, we should thank God, "Brethren, beloved by the Lord." Isn't that good? "Because God has chosen you from the beginning."

2 TIMOTHY 1:9, "God who has saved us and called us with a holy calling, not according to our works but according to His own purpose and gace which was granted us in Christ Jesus from all eternity.”

2 TIMOTHY 2:10 , Paul says, "In my ministry I endure all things," "For the sake of those whose name has been written from the foundation of the world in the Book of Life of the Lamb who has been slain."

REVELATION 17: 8, "And those who dwell on the earth will wonder whose name has not been written in the Book of Life from the foundation of the world." And again we are told in a backhanded way that Christians are those whose names have been written in the Book of Life from beginning, from eternity, from the foundation of the world.

REVELATION 17:14, "These will wage war against the Lamb, that is the host of the Antichrist, and the Lamb will overcome them because He is Lord of Lords and King of Kings and those who are with Him are the called and chosen and faithful." We're the chosen.

REVELATION 20, Final judgment, Great White Throne, "If anyone's name was not found written in the Book of Life he was...what?...thrown in the lake of fire." When were names put in the book? From before the foundation of the earth.

LUKE 4, Jesus in this marvelous synagogue event in Nazareth, opened the book of the prophet Isaiah, stood up in the synagogue, opened the book, read it. This is what He read, verse 18, and here was a prophecy that He was fulfilling right out of Isaiah 61. "The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me because He anointed Me to preach the gospel to the poor, He has sent Me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to set free those who are downtrodden to proclaim the favorable year of the Lord.


ISAIAH 55:8 and 9, the Scripture says of God, "My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, declares the Lord, for as the heavens are higher than the earth so are My ways higher than your ways and My thoughts than your thoughts." We are in no position as fallen creatures to determine whether what God does is just, right or fair.

ROMANS 11:33 the Apostle writes, "O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God, how unsearchable are His judgments and unfathomable His ways for who has known the mind of the Lord, or who has become His counselor?" You've stepped out of bounds when you say that God does anything that isn't fair.

 

Oh Helen, this is really good.
And something I needed to read today, too.

Thanks

Carolyn

 

I thank you too Helen.

It's wonderful, and exactly what I was looking for

 

Helen;
The love between a husband and wife is something special even beyond loving your children for Christ said; husbands love our wifes as Christ loves the Church. Christ and the Church are bonded together as one and so is a husband and wife who truly love one another. They are no longer twain but become as one and when one of them dies, part of the other one also goes in the grave as love, not body. As the years go by that love grows and grows until you even think alike. It is the most precious love there is except between man and The Lord. Hope you understand what I am trying to say.

BBob

 

French

Those verses are compeling for your case, no doubt. But we can not throw out all the whosoever verses in favor of those verses. The Bible does not contradict itself. There must be a way that those verses are true and also the whosoever verses are also true.

THe only thing I can think is that God chooses people who will choose him. I mean God knows our hearts so well, before we ever were, that he can predict with %100 percent acuracy (of course He can He is God) who will choose Him. He chooses the kind of people who will choose him. People with fertle hearts (good soil).

Maybe God is like a good farmer who can look at fields and see what ones will produce. He then knows what fields he will be harvesting in the fall. But just because he knows what field will produce does not mean that he prevented other fields from producing. It means that he can predict what field will produce.

I see no other way to have all the verses in the Bible true with out such things as changing the meaning of words like world.

 

O my imputed goodness ! Get back to the Bible folks . God is not a prognosticator . He doesn't make excellent educated guesses . He determines , sets up, establishes , ordains , fixes His purposes and on and on . As Eph. 1:4 says : He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world ... There are so many more scriptures that say the same . As Luther said of Erasmus : Your thoughts are too man-centered ( or words to that effect ) .

 

Yes DeeJay i understand the delema, and yes even though the bible doesn't contradict itself it often times doesn't EXPLAIN everything either. like lets say the Trinity and other mysteries. that is why it is called a

PARADOX: a statement seemingly absurd or contradictory, yet in fact is true.

But when you put the two together you see both God's sovereignty and mans free will. To say we have anything to DO with "our salvation" either before, during or after is to take AWAY from God's sovereingty and put it on us, which takes away from God's grace and then becomes WORKS. to say we don't have the responsibilty to RESPOND by calling upon the Lord with our mouth to that which God has placed in our hearts and minds and to follow and OBEY him after we are saved is taking away from our free will making us ROBOTS.

Free Will like i have said before comes MORE into play after salvation rather than DURING!

Since i am NOT able to explain away all those verses i quoted, then i have to accept them for what they say.