Are Freewill and Predestination Compatable?

[SovereignGrace]

Free will does not mean there are no external influences. It means that the choice you make is something you decided and are accountable for and you cannot blame anyone else or claim to be a robot.

At a restaurant, I may be externally influenced seeing a pork chop delivered to a table across from mine, and order that for myself because it looks and smells so good. But I was not forced to order a pork chop.

Free will definition via Merriam-Webster:

voluntary choice or decision
freedom of humans to make choices that are not determined by prior causes or by divine intervention

This definition denies the necessity of being drawn by God, as that would be divine intervention.

 

[Ascetic X]

Free will definition via Merriam-Webster:

voluntary choice or decision
freedom of humans to make choices that are not determined by prior causes or by divine intervention

This definition denies the necessity of being drawn by God, as that would be divine intervention.

Being drawn by God does not mean God forces a person to make a decision. I may be drawn by the smell of steaks cooking, but it will be my decision to enter the restaurant and order one. The steak aroma draws me but does not make my decision for me.

 

[SovereignGrace]

Being drawn by God does not mean God forces a person to make a decision. I may be drawn by the smell of steaks cooking, but it will be my decision to enter the restaurant and order one. The steak aroma draws me but does not make my decision for me.

But it’s still an influence by Him. Being drawn is an influence by the Holy Spirit.

 

[SovereignGrace]

Being drawn by God does not mean God forces a person to make a decision. I may be drawn by the smell of steaks cooking, but it will be my decision to enter the restaurant and order one. The steak aroma draws me but does not make my decision for me.

So being drawn by the Holy Spirit is comparable to smelling a steak. Unreal.

 

[Van]

As I understand the concept, Yahweh created this Time/Space Continuum and that places Him outside our Timeline in order to create the Universe. In Isa 46:10 we learn that He knows the end from the beginning.

In Gal 5:13 we learn thar we, the Created Beings have self determination. Does Yahweh's Predetermination come in conflict with our Free Will? Actually, no!

Metaphores never work perfectly but consider a 4 hour saga on film and the public has never seen, even the clips yet. Even the actors are not certain
of the content because they were not present for the editing and composition.

The editor, creator of the product, knows the beginning from the end, and he directed, not a single frame of his work.

I can not explain the mechanism Yahweh used, some six thousand years ago to create us and all that we see... I might find time to ask Him when I go Home, I'll have time to listen then.

But the short of it all is, God knew that a young Atheist would find his friend blown to pieces in the middle of the night and having no one to curse he would curse the being he did not believe in and hearing that God speak to his spiritual heart and wet upon a 23 year search for the identity of God.

Did God force me to change and seekusand after Him, no. Did He know six thousand years or so ago that I would do so, yes. Can I explain this... nope but, by faith I accept it.

Interesting topic, but several claims above cannot be substantiated.

1) Yes, God created our Universe, including the reality of time. But that does not put God "outside our timeline." He can interact consistent with out timeline.

2) God "declares" the end from the beginning. No verse says He "knows every detail" from the present to the end of time.

But returning to the topic, no, predestination of some aspects of the future does not invalidate our capacity to choose life rather than death, thus altering the outcome of our lives. If God had predestined that outcome, then we would not have had a choice. But scripture says we have that choice. Opponents of the actual opportunity of salvation for the lost, redefine "choice" to mean our choice of only one outcome, which makes scripture to no effect.

 

[SovereignGrace]

From Collins English Dictionary: the freedom of the will to choose a course of action without external coercion but in accordance with the ideals or moral outlook of the individual

Free will starts and ends with the person and the freedom of the choices they make. According to its very definition, it has voided God’s influence via drawing, as that constitutes an external coercion.

 

[Van]

I suppose the doctrine of election is probably the most misunderstood and maligned doctrine in all of Christian theology. Some so emphasize election that they destroy human responsibility. It’s as though man is a robot and God is working out His purposes in spite of us rather than in us and through us. On the other hand, there are some people who so minimize election that they actually deny the sovereign grace of God. It’s as though God is the victim of whatever choices man is going to make.

Now the doctrine of election is not totally explained in the Bible. There are many mysteries involved in the doctrine of election. God tells us what we need to know, and what we do not know, we simply accept by faith. The secret things belong to the Lord, says Deuteronomy 29:29, and that’s the best place for them. I don’t live by explanations; I live by promises. Mark Twain used to say it’s not what I don’t understand about the Bible that bothers me, it’s what I do understand. There are many things in the Word of God that are mysterious to us. We can’t completely understand or explain them. Why? Well, because God’s thoughts are higher than our thoughts and God’s ways are higher than our ways. But even though we cannot understand or explain all of God’s eternal purposes and plans, we can receive what He says in the Word of God and apply it to our own hearts.

The most dangerous thing we can have in Bible study is speculation. When you start mixing philosophical speculation with a humble obedience to the Word of God, you’re going to have trouble. We don’t speculate about these things. We ponder them, we meditate on them, we rejoice over them, we accept what God has taught us, but we don’t speculate.

— Warren Wiersbe, 1 Thessalonians – God's Elect

1) The doctrine of election for salvation is explained in the Bible.

2) Lost individuals are chosen by (1) the sanctification (being set apart) by the Spirit, and (2) faith in the truth. When does this occur, before creation or after we exist as individuals? Answer: After! For once we were not a people chosen for God's own possession. Once we had not received mercy. Election only becomes a mystery when these explicit scriptures are ignored.

3) Yes, we must try and eliminate viewpoints unsupported from scripture, that arise instead by reading possibilities into vague phrases.

4) Take "God chose us in Him." Ephesians 1:4. Many believe this obscure phrase means God chose us as individuals before creation, but offer endless views of what "in Him" means. Did God choose us as foreseen individuals with or without faith and set us apart in Christ's spiritual body?
No one was set apart in Christ's spiritual body before Christ died on the cross. On the other hand, God did choose Logos to be His Redeemer before creation, for He was know as the Lamb of God before creation. And when you choose a Redeemer, you in effect also choose those to be redeemed. Not individually, as they cannot be chosen before they once we not an existent person, but they can be chosen corporately, as the target group of God's redemption plan, believers whose faith God might credit, provided He determines to credit that faith when formulated.

 

[Van]

From Collins English Dictionary: the freedom of the will to choose a course of action without external coercion but in accordance with the ideals or moral outlook of the individual

Free will starts and ends with the person and the freedom of the choices they make. According to its very definition, it has voided God’s influence via drawing, as that constitutes an external coercion.

The claim "drawing" constitutes "compulsion" is fiction. We are "drawn" by lovingkindness, not irresistible grace. Every one saved was drawn, not everyone drawn is saved.

 

[Ascetic X]

So being drawn by the Holy Spirit is comparable to smelling a steak. Unreal.

What do you compare it to?

Atonement for sins in the OT involves God smelling a steak.

God in the Old Testament said He enjoyed smelling the aroma of bulls being sacrificed on the grill.


Leviticus 3:16

And the priest shall burn them on the altar as food, a fire offering for a pleasing aroma. All the fat belongs to YHWH.


Numbers 28:24

Offer the same food each day for seven days as a food offering, a pleasing aroma to the LORD. It is to be offered with its drink offering and the regular burnt offering.


Genesis 8

20 Then Noah built an altar to the Lord and, taking some of all the clean animals and clean birds, he sacrificed burnt offerings on it.

21 The Lord smelled the pleasing aroma and said in his heart: “Never again will I curse the ground because of humans, even though[a]every inclination of the human heart is evil from childhood. And never again will I destroy all living creatures, as I have done.”

 

[SovereignGrace]

What do you compare it to?

Atonement for sins in the OT involves God smelling a steak.

God in the Old Testament said He enjoyed smelling the aroma of bulls being sacrificed on the grill.


Leviticus 3:16

And the priest shall burn them on the altar as food, a fire offering for a pleasing aroma. All the fat belongs to YHWH.


Numbers 28:24

Offer the same food each day for seven days as a food offering, a pleasing aroma to the LORD. It is to be offered with its drink offering and the regular burnt offering.


Genesis 8

20 Then Noah built an altar to the Lord and, taking some of all the clean animals and clean birds, he sacrificed burnt offerings on it.

21 The Lord smelled the pleasing aroma and said in his heart: “Never again will I curse the ground because of humans, even though[a]every inclination of the human heart is evil from childhood. And never again will I destroy all living creatures, as I have done.”

Getting back to the topic at hand, how exactly do you define free will?