God is in control but not all events are predetermined.

Is God responsible for everything that happens including evil and sin to be in control or does He allow His creatures the freedom to choose within His will and maintain control? A doctrine that all events are predetermined and are unalterable by man must conclude both “everything is predetermined” and that “God is the author of sin.”

According to Calvinist doctrine for God to be sovereign He must have predestined everything, true?

1) Necessarily God has fore determined everything that will happen
2) God has determined X
3) Therefore it is necessary that X will happen

Is it not theological fatalism in this doctrine to suggest that anything that happens has not been predetermined by God? Let’s see.

In conclusion of the sovereignty doctrine that God must have predetermined everything before it will happen and totally deny man having any free will to alter the future as not a possible sovereign decision of God presumably because of lack of control then one must agree that God is responsible for all happenings regardless of the origin being good or evil.

Also God would have to foreknow all things in advance being responsible for predestinating them. I would suggest God may have a greater knowledge than mans simple understanding of foreknowledge to allow for things to happen freely but yet He can know what the future will bring and still be able to interact with His creatures to conform them to His will as He pleases; can He not be sovereign in this way?

God does allow within His control for man to freely make choices and is able to have knowledge greater than our understanding to both know the future and yet allow it to change in truth being undetermined as He pleases.

The following scripture is a good example that God has allowed man to make a change in his own destiny freely and although within His will and sovereign ability to control He forgoes foreknowledge and predestination to serve His purpose. Man’s ability of free will is seen while God communicates to David the truth as far as what has been determined up the point before Saul comes down, but David changes the circumstances, not God. If God had the circumstances predetermined then one would have to conclude God lied to David, I think not. God instructed David in the truth within the circumstances at hand and David chose of his own free will to change them.

Note: David inquired of the Lord and received clear truthful instructions in he circumstances that existed at the time that he asked. Later David changed the unfavorable circumstances of his own free will because of the knowledge God gave to him as truth and this shows David had a choice and freedom to do so.


(1Sa 23:1) Then they told David, saying, Behold, the Philistines fight against Keilah, and they rob the threshingfloors.

(1Sa 23:2) Therefore David inquired of the LORD, saying, Shall I go and smite these Philistines? And the LORD said unto David, Go, and smite the Philistines, and save Keilah.

(1Sa 23:3) And David's men said unto him, Behold, we be afraid here in Judah: how much more then if we come to Keilah against the armies of the Philistines?

(1Sa 23:4) Then David inquired of the LORD yet again. And the LORD answered him and said, Arise, go down to Keilah; for I will deliver the Philistines into thine hand.

(1Sa 23:5) So David and his men went to Keilah, and fought with the Philistines, and brought away their cattle, and smote them with a great slaughter. So David saved the inhabitants of Keilah.

(1Sa 23:6) And it came to pass, when Abiathar the son of Ahimelech fled to David to Keilah, that he came down with an ephod in his hand.

(1Sa 23:7) And it was told Saul that David was come to Keilah. And Saul said, God hath delivered him into mine hand; for he is shut in, by entering into a town that hath gates and bars.

(1Sa 23:8) And Saul called all the people together to war, to go down to Keilah, to besiege David and his men.

(1Sa 23:9) And David knew that Saul secretly practiced mischief against him; and he said to Abiathar the priest, Bring hither the ephod.

(1Sa 23:10) Then said David, O LORD God of Israel, thy servant hath certainly heard that Saul seeketh to come to Keilah, to destroy the city for my sake.

(1Sa 23:11) Will the men of Keilah deliver me up into his hand? will Saul come down, as thy servant hath heard? O LORD God of Israel, I beseech thee, tell thy servant. And the LORD said, He will come down.

(1Sa 23:12) Then said David, Will the men of Keilah deliver me and my men into the hand of Saul? And the LORD said, They will deliver thee up.

(1Sa 23:13) Then David and his men, which were about six hundred, arose and departed out of Keilah, and went whithersoever they could go. And it was told Saul that David was escaped from Keilah; and he forbore to go forth.

(1Sa 23:14) And David abode in the wilderness in strongholds, and remained in a mountain in the wilderness of Ziph. And Saul sought him every day, but God delivered him not into his hand.

 

You ask me to assume it is unwritten and then make your own assumption to put in the word “if” as if it is OK to add to God’s word to fit man’s doctrine. I would suggest to you this is a poor methodology to interpret scripture by assuming things because preconceived notions of what you think it should have said may work its way in your mind.

God was answering direct questions with direct answers just as He previously was when He told David, and then reassured him, that the Philistines would be delivered into his hand. God told David that Saul would come down and he would be delivered into his hand in the same manner, no ifs, ands or buts in either account as it is written.

As for the little tidbit of advice, 2Tim 3:16 says all scripture is profitable for doctrine, not that some scripture is just stories and fit your doctrine into it the way it suits you to interpret it.

You assume that David did not change the circumstances on his own volition so show me where God told him that he should depart. God told him the truth as per the circumstances that existed, that’s all, lets leave out the preconceived assumptions.

You have not proved to me that David did not change the circumstances from his own volition upon receiving the truth that God gave him.

 

Sorry, but I am not going to debate every proof text or the meaning of “all” throughout scripture, in this case I have already have agreed that God is in control of all things according to His will. Where I take issue is what His purpose and will consist of and the limitation of His sovereignty to not include free will and holding Him responsible for sin by your doctrine. So, do you agree with the following formula or not?

According to Calvinist doctrine for God to be sovereign He must have predestined everything, true?

1) Necessarily God has fore determined everything that will happen
2) God has determined X
3) Therefore it is necessary that X will happen

… then one must agree that God is responsible for all happenings regardless of the origin being good or evil.

Does God hold men responsible for sin when they do not have the volition to change the circumstances? If so, is God the author of sin?

 

I think a lot of doctrinal presumptions fall into the finite logic of what kind of knowledge God must have to be able to determine the future of His creatures. Above I’m told, “At best, your interpretation of this story makes God an idiot because He didn't know the future.” But I think God determined that He wanted His creatures to freely come to Him and this is shown all through scripture and has a purpose that’s a lot to get into but has to do with love and truth (the truth of love is it can not be forced and God’s nature abides in truth) Man has developed a doctrine using his understandable logic of how God determines the future and I think one would have to consider God incapable thereby limiting His sovereignty to think that God cannot create His creatures to have free will and still know the future and that doctrine makes God out to be an “idiot”.

I believe God interacts with His creatures within time and is able to do so working all things according to the counsel of His will as He pleases but of coarse He is not limited to time. I also believe God is omnibenevolent in His truth nature and within that self existent nature He does not lie or sin, possibly being limited within His own truth not to have an evil nature by His own choice of what His unchanging truth is.

God certainly does not have to give way to man’s will but at His pleasure He can allow or not allow man to change the circumstances in his life and choose the treasures of his heart and this does not equate to weakening God’s sovereignty for blessing His creatures that He chose to make in His likeness with free will but more so confirms it.

My point is that when God told David that Saul would come He was not lying and can not lie but was telling David the truth as He knows all and within that truth, which I believe includes free will, He allowed David to change the circumstances, knowing all, right on through any given set of circumstances including any circumstances that can arise what will happen. God is in control but not forcing it by having predetermined it but allowing it to happen according to His purposes and will and no doubt that is exactly how it will happen. God abides within the truth of nature as He set forth and He may abide within time to interact with His creatures at His pleasure. Saying He gave free will and determined everything that will happen before it does is like saying He can make a rock so big He can’t lift it.

 

Whatever,

When you say there was “no chance” that Pharaoh would not harden his heart it appears you deny he has freedom? These passages prove that Pharaoh had the free will to be disobedient and sin against God even though it was His will that His people be set free, although He did used it for the good to suit His purpose.

If you use the term “predetermined” as in “arranged in advance” or “fixed” in regards to his own actions being divinely preordained then he is not acting freely and I disagree. If you said He had no chance because God knew his heart and how he would react from the circumstances He was to presently set in motion to accomplish the desire of His will, I would agree.

I think part of everything God knows is possibilities, so is not about whether God is omniscient but about the content of divine omniscience and the truth about what reality actually is concerning foreknowledge within the truth of God’s nature.

Whether or not the future already exist depends on whether God fully determined (fixed) the end, or partially determined the end and controls within time the direction it will go allowing His creatures to freely interact; it also depends on whether or not He created his creatures with undetermined free choices and I guess that depends on ones perception of what God’s plan, purposes, and nature consist of.

 

If you’re not sure why I said “it appears you deny he has freedom” it is because you have not at all “explicitly” defined what you perceive to be his freedom being inclusive with predetermination. As I said, “ If you use the term “predetermined” as in “arranged in advance” or “fixed” in regards to his own actions being divinely preordained then he is not acting freely and I disagree.” This was in regards you’re precious general statements:

You say, “It's not an either/or situation. You don't have to choose "determined" or "free".”

Determinism and free will are mutually exclusive, propositions that cannot logically both be true. Predestination of all things by God cannot be true if He allows man his own volitional decisions.

I have and you want to go forward on what? The premises you’re riding at this point are nothing more than a smokescreen and you are attempting to skip on by with general terms defining free actions and predetermination and now want to take a quick left and jump on to other roads arguing senselessly without out either of us knowing where you’re at?

 

Thank you Tim, you probably would have enjoyed a few of my responses that never made it to the “reply quick”

 

Hello doulous and welcome to the board.

I look at God being omniscient and self derived as knowing that evil would exist in the truth of nature as He made it in order for good to exist.

Some of what we know about His nature from the Word is that He is Love, Truth, and also that He hates evil. So why would He create something that He hates and is against His nature?

When an all-loving and only good God created the world it was for the good; if there was Adam all by himself and nothing to compare against him; a world with a population of one how could it logically be good without a comparison.

I think about God creating the world and saying in was good. He also said it was not good that man should be alone and He created BOTH male and female. He placed the tree of knowledge in the garden and said do not eat of it but I’m sure being omniscient knew with the circumstances He created what the result would be. This is where free will comes in for me; did He create man to be both good and evil or did He create man as good but allowed evil to exist knowing within the circumstances of Truth as He created His creatures that evil would exist in order for man to be made in His likeness being blessed with a free spirit to choose between good and evil.

He knew of coarse that man would fall with the knowledge of good and evil because WHO can compare himself against God who is the Only all Good, again referring back to the logic of good existing without a comparison of evil. To be in God’s kingdom we must be in His Spirit and that is why I think He planned before the foundation of the world with the grace of His love to give His only Son that we could come to be with Him in the spirit of perfection and gave us a choice within our freedom as He created us to be with Him.

So in a nutshell I think He allowed evil to exist as a truth in the nature that He created to provide for a world with a population of more than one creature with a spirit. I do not think God was the author of sin but allowed it for His purposes and pleasure to create a world with creatures in His likeness and I’m glad he did considering the alternative.

 

You've not, you've only made circular arguments, but let's start here - who took Job's camels? </font>[/QUOTE]Sorry, but you have no premise to begin with if you refuse to define between free actions and determinism and it is not me that wants to go into circles disregarding the logic it takes to have this discussion in a rational way.